Gwynn Raimondi, MA

Consent, Boundaries, & Trauma :: Boundaries

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When we talk about consent, we also need to talk about boundaries.  These two things go hand-in-hand.  When we talk about our consent being disregarded we are also talking about our boundaries being crossed (and disregarded).  When we give or deny our consent we are lowering or raising our boundaries with another.

And like consent, our boundaries can feel complex.  However, I would argue that our boundaries are actually something that is very clear.  The issue I believe that comes in is two fold :: 1. that we often assume our boundaries are static when they are in fact fluid and 2. that our disconnection from our body leads to a disconnection from our boundaries and knowing and understanding our boundaries.

When I say our boundaries are fluid, what I mean is that they are movable.  For example one day or moment I may feel extra physical and want to be close to my husband.  Then on another day or in another moment I may not want to close at all and want to be left alone in solitude.  This boundary of physical closeness ebbs and flows based on any number of circumstances or reasons.  This doesn’t mean I love my husband less on the days I don’t want to be close, it simply means I don’t want to be touched.

This fluidity also applies to our emotional boundaries.  Have you ever had, what Brene Brown calls, a “vulnerability hangover”?  That feeling when we have shared too much of ourselves with perhaps the wrong, or at least not the right, people?  That is a crossing of our own emotional boundaries.  Or when a friend or family member gives us advice and one day we can hear it and know it’s coming from a good space and on another day it is simply too much and we want them to STFU?  That is another example of how our boundaries can shift. Or, there are days when I want to sit down and tell my husband All The Things and there are others that I don’t.  Days when I want to talk about past hurts or traumas and days that I don’t.  These are all examples of how our emotional boundaries can ebb and flow.

The other piece of our boundary work, is body connection.  The reality is that we have a very physical response when our boundaries are being encroached, whether physically or emotionally or psychologically.  Our body responds in any number of ways from a sense of agitation to an elevated heart rate to shortness of breath to headaches to our stomach tying itself in knots to many other varied responses. These responses become more intense the more we ignore them, as it seems our body is very clear on wanting to be heard and to keep us safe.

Often our response to these sensations is to ignore them, because they may not make conscious or logical sense in the moment.  And truly, because we are trained to ignore them, to not listen to our body, or our intuition or our knowing.

And.

When we start to connect to our body, to truly feel her, which includes a lot of uncomfortable sensations as well as pleasurable ones, and when we acknowledge the sensations of our boundaries being crossed and honor those sensations by stepping away or demanding that our boundaries be respected, then these sensations become less intense.

Embodiment, I deeply believe, is a key to our own liberation.  It is a key in understanding our own inner workings, which includes knowing our often fluid boundaries and the complexities of our consent.

Embodiment, like knowing and honoring our boundaries, like knowing and honoring our consent, is truly an act of rebellion.  We live in a culture that encourages us to be disconnected from our physical self and teaches us to mute all pain by any and all means possible.

This issue of course being, that when we mute the pain, we mute all the other sensations too, including our “spidey sense” or those sensations we get when our boundaries are slowly (or quickly!) being disregarded.

This does not mean that being present in our body is all sunshine and roses.  Many of us live with chronic pain.  Many of us have auto-immune issues that also cause physical pain.  Many of us get migraines or menstrual cramps or both.

And.

The truth is, even with the pain, I would rather be present in my body, to hear her whispers that are trying to keep me safe, than to continue living disassociated and disconnected.

I would rather be aware of my boundaries and have the opportunity to defend them (and my Self) than allow others to continue to trample them, and me.

I talk even more about boundaries in this 20-minute video below.  I hope you enjoy it.

This essay and video series is in part to share with you the topics we’ll be unearthing, examining, dislodging and embracing in the six month circle Body of Consent.  We begin on March 1 (the video says February, we changed the start date to March).  If you are interested, you can learn more and register right over here. xoxo

Or if you enjoyed this and would like to read more of my essays, you can subscribe for my weekly love letter right over here.

Boundaries of Consent

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We all have days or weeks or months or years or moments where life simply isn’t going as we had planned or wanted or hoped. Days where the actions of others impact us in big and small ways that either we couldn’t anticipate or didn’t expect. Their actions may not be intentionally hurtful or the hurt you feel may not be their fault or issue. And still, here we are, sitting in frustration or confusion or fear or any other number of emotions and needing to re-calibrate and change our own course.

We didn’t “consent” to this other person’s actions that have such a huge impact on us. And, their actions weren’t actually up for us to give permission about.

Often there is a line between my autonomy and right to happiness and yours. And what may bring you happiness may not do the same for me and vice versa. I’m not talking about rape or physical violence or even gaslighting or psychological abuse here – I’m talking about things like canceling dinner plans or not calling when someone says they will or not following through on a promise, either explicitly stated or implied.

So when we talk about boundaries and consent, we also need to talk about resilience and accepting that others may make choices about their own lives that directly impact us and our lives, and how we respond, how we bounce back (or don’t), how we allow space for others to have their boundaries and consent about their own lives even when it may impact, in big or small ways, us.

I don’t have an answer here of when it’s okay and when it’s not or a specific point at which we need to draw our own lines and say “hey this hurts and it’s not okay”. Those answers are as varied as we each are and each of the situations that are in question.

What I do know however, at least for me in my younger years, is that my response to even the slightest “betrayal” would be extreme. That betrayal could have been a friend got sick and had to cancel plans, and I would spin into stories of how she was a selfish bitch (and then often go to the other extreme of how I’m such a shitty person that she just didn’t want to hang out with me in the first place). This reaction is not resilient. This reaction did not gain me more friends (or help me keep the ones I did have). This reaction of everything in the world being about me was not helpful or healthy in any way.

So how do we come to that place of ebb and flow and trust and allowing and knowing and feeling our own boundaries and accepting the same for others?

Work. A lot of fucking work. Coming into our body is part of the work. Developing resilience is part of the work. Maturing emotionally is part of the work. Dealing with our trauma and pain is part of the work. Learning to deeply self reflect and self analyze and being able to pick apart situations to see the Venn diagram of our lives and the lives of others and see how they are separate and how they intersect and coming to terms with the truth that sometimes that intersection isn’t always going to be pleasant or comfortable.

And that that discomfort is OKAY. That we will survive it. That sometimes our discomfort isn’t important in regard to the larger picture. That sometimes our own consent isn’t actually relevant or what we think is a boundary maybe isn’t.

 

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Patriarchal wounds and boundaries (and why I won’t use the term “Mother Wound”)

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patriarchal-wounds-and-boundariesBoundaries and our ancestors and patriarchal wounds.  These things are so intertwined.

At some point in our human history, we, especially us women, lost sight of our boundaries.  We lost sight of the separation between us and others.  We lost sight of our needs and wants.  We lost sight of us.

I believe there was a time in our history when we were deeply connected to our Self.  A time when we lived in an egalitarian culture.  Then something happened or likely many things happened and over time patriarchy arose and with it came all the wounding: shame, misogyny, no longer defending our boundaries, or speaking up or out, or breaking any rules,  for fear of torture or death. (Anthropology seems to back me up in this.)

We, women, did what we needed to survive.  We still do.  We play the game, we follow the rules as best we can, until we just can’t any longer. Some of us never reach that breaking point.  Many of us do.

Our mothers did the same.  And our grandmothers.  And our great-grandmothers.  And so on back through our womanline for a few thousand years.

These women who came before us, they wanted us to survive too.  They loved us, their daughters.  They were terrified for us being in the world they brought us into.

So they trained us.  They taught us to obey. To be deceitful so we can get our own needs met, and in this deceit we learned to not trust our sisters (or mothers or grandmothers).  To play by the rules while still finding ways to hold onto our Self or to let go of our Self completely.  They taught us how to survive in a culture that didn’t consider us fully human, that considered us property, that saw nothing wrong with raping, beating or murdering us.

The ways they taught us to survive equated to playing small, to being silent, to being obedient and docile and doing as we were told.  It equated to not speaking up or out.  It equated to serving others, particularly men, with little to no regard to our own exhaustion or needs.

This training, this wounding, is often called the mother wound.  I’ve used that term, as recently as a couple months ago, and although I’ve used it, it has always bothered me.

It bothers me because it places the blame of our wounding, seemingly, on the surface, on our mothers.  On all mothers.

Because we as mothers don’t already carry enough of the responsibility of the ills of the world.  Hello Eve and Pandora, just to name two.

The truth is, this wounding isn’t from our mothers.  Our mothers, all our ancestral mothers, wanted us to survive. They loved us so deeply and wholly. And they were terrified for us.

How do I know?

Because I am terrified for my own daughter and the world I am sending her off into.  And this world I’m sending her into is much tamer and gentler than the world our ancestors, including our own mothers, sent their daughters, including us, off into.

So I have an issue with the term mother wound. Because these wounds we carry, aren’t really about our mothers.  They are about trying to survive in a culture that hates women.

All women.  Yes, some women more than others, absolutely.  Yes, the color of our skin and our socio-economic status and how high our education goes all play a part.  And whether we’re married or mothers or how many fathers we have for our children and what color skin our partners have and and and…. Intersectionality is vital in the work of unraveling all of this.

And.

All women are hated in our culture.  Matters of degree make little difference when we look at the statistics on rape or interpersonal violence or murder by boyfriends or husbands.  Those numbers cross all skin colors and classes and education levels.

This is not to say that we don’t carry wounds from our actual lived experiences with our mothers.  Of course we do.  We feel betrayed by them for trying to break us so we could live.  Our pain and wounds of our lived experiences with our mothers are valid.  And need to be processed and healed.

And.

While we need to heal our own micro-lived-experience-wounding, we need to remember the macro of the issue at hand.

It is our misogynist, patriarchal culture that is at fault.

Yes, our mothers are responsible for their actions. Yes, many of them did not do their own inner work so that they would not pass on this wounding and instead taught us healthy ways to survive and still feel comfortable in our own skin.  Yes, they screwed up.  Yes, they are human.

And by placing the blame fully on our mothers and our womanline, by putting them at the center of our wounding, we are continuing to be complicit and compliant to the misogynist patriarchal culture that created the environment for this wounding to even occur.

So I’ve decided to stop using the term mother-wound. Because it’s not entirely accurate. It’s misdirecting.  It only feeds our internalized misogyny instead of helping us dislodging it from our bodies and being.

This is actually part of my own boundary work.  Making the distinctions between what is mine and what is someone else’s and what is culture.  Unraveling the stories and training that my ancestors have passed down through word or action or DNA (or all three).  Learning to listen to my own body and knowing and getting to the root of something when it doesn’t feel right or feels off or doesn’t sit well with me.

This is part of connecting to our intuition yes, and it is also part of connecting to our boundaries.  Of acknowledging when something, particularly a commonly used or “known” something, doesn’t feel right to us. Of saying no when that not right feeling comes up. Of doing different so not to pass on something that doesn’t feel right to us in the first place and only causes more wounding and damage.

Boundaries are more than telling someone you aren’t going to let them take advantage of you again. Boundaries are about more than our relationships with other people (though, in truth, a lot of how our boundary work plays out is in our relationships with others).

Boundaries are also about saying No More to a culture that hates us.

Boundaries are about saying No More to passing on the training and wounding of our culture.

Boundaries are about knowing our Self, so wholly and deeply that we don’t question when something doesn’t sit right if that off feeling is valid or not and instead we dig into the why so we can understand ourselves better and then do different in the world.

Boundaries, I believe, are at the base of our ancestral healing of our patriarchal wounds.  As we learn more and more about our own boundaries, we heal the pain of our ancestors who weren’t allowed to have their own boundaries due to risk of torture or death.

As we lay claim to our bodies, to our minds, to our spirits, we are defining the distinctions between our own Self and the Self of others.  We can know intuitively and immediately when someone is projecting their “stuff”on us as opposed to some critique of our behavior having merit.

Boundaries are how we connect to our Whole Self.  Because without boundaries, we cannot define who we actually are.

As we do our own boundary work we learn that boundaries are not rigid nor are they static.  They are flexible and have an ebb and flow depending on the people, places, time and events that are invoking them. We may have a more rigid boundary with one person than with another.  We may need more physical space from some people than others.  And even these boundaries may shift depending on what all is happening in our lives, sometimes needing firmer boundaries with those we generally are pretty easy and loose with.

Even with this being true, that boundaries are more of a fluid thing than not, we must be able to sense these boundaries in the first place.

And, you can probably guess, I deeply believe we learn to sense our boundaries by deeply connecting to and embracing our bodies. By inhabiting them.  Feeling them.  Knowing on a visceral and deep level what exactly embodiment means.

So we can feel our boundaries and know immediately when they have been breached. And honor and defend them, as we deserve to be honored and defended.

It is deep work and messy work and there is much unraveling and untangling and dismantling that must happen.

And it is so deeply and truly and wholly freeing.

Our boundary work is all a part of becoming our own version of the Unleashed Woman. It is another layer in taking off the leash that was put on us at birth by our culture.  It is another layer of coming home to our Self.

And isn’t it time to do that? To come home to our Self? To take off this patriarchal leash? To become our own Unleashed Woman?

xoxo

 

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Fluffy Positive Thinking

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I’ve been feeling annoyed lately. Like really annoyed. Hell, let’s just name it: I’m angry. Pissed off even. And yes frustrated, disgusted and annoyed too.

Mostly I’m angry though.

I’ve been doing my thing, my work, guiding people to connect to their own embodied wisdom; to shedding their shoulds; to connecting deeply to their whole Self, the Light and the Shadow. I talk about the ebb and flow of this work and how sometimes we are deep in it and sometimes we aren’t. I discuss the importance of rest and replenishing and nourishing and allowing our Self to be.

I talk a lot. I do my best to model this way of being by doing my best to live it myself. Which means sometimes I’m deep in the work and sometimes I’m not, and sometimes I’m deep in my practices and sometimes I’m not and regardless of where I am in my journey or what I am or am not doing, I try to be gentle with me and to allow the space for me to be right where I am.

I’m not perfect. I fail all the time. Well, maybe not all the time, and enough to remember why I have my practices and so I pick them up again and they drop off and so it goes.

I’ve become acutely aware lately of pithy quotes and fluffy positive thinking and this idea that our thoughts create our world and if we only think the right thoughts then all the things will perfect and great.

And it’s pissing me off. And it’s time I publicly call bullshit.

First of all let’s break (ha! I first typed “breathe”!) down this idea of thinking the right thoughts. What the hell are the “right” thoughts? If I have the “right” thoughts that does mean I can magically prevent a loved one from dying? Myself from having cancer? A hurricane from devasting the lives and homes of people I know and love (and even the ones I don’t)? If I think the right thoughts does that mean that life stops and nothing bad will ever happen to me? Will I never trip and break a bone or get in a car accident or catch the flu?

Because if thinking the “right thoughts” means all that, then please, will someone tell me what the Right Thoughts are? What are the exact words I need to be thinking? What is the exact mantra I need to have on repeat on my mp3 player and posted on post-its all over my house?

I’m sure there are plenty who will jump in and tell me what some of my “Right Thoughts” could be. And I also bet they won’t own that and allow themselves to be held accountable for what happens when I do every thing that lets me think the “right thoughts” and then still something bad happens.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for gratitude. I’m all for appreciating all that we have. I’m all for seeking and seeing beauty in the world. As long as we don’t shut our eyes to the Shadow, the darkness, to the really shitty parts of being human and living life.

As long as we don’t blame people (and not thinking the right thoughts) for things like cancer and accidents and layoffs and hurricanes, then yes, let’s all do look to the light – BUT let’s not forget for one moment that there is Shadow right behind us and sometimes we need to turn around and have a dance or three with it.

As long as we allow ourselves and others to grieve, to sink into despair, to speak out about how hard life/parenting/partnering/living/being can be.

Also long as we don’t offer “at leasts” and “look on the bright sides” and “silver linings” and the one I hate the most “well if this shitty thing didn’t happen then you wouldn’t have the fabulous life you have today!”

As long as we don’t try to fucking constantly fix it. And by it I mean the dark, the Shadow, the shitty parts of our Self and life.

As long as we can allow ourselves and others to be right where we are, whether that’s in our deepest Shadows or our brightest lights.

Then yes, I’m all for practicing gratitude, seeking beauty, appreciating what we have and who we are.

…

 

Something has shifted in me. Perhaps it’s connecting to the women who came before me and all their (righteous) anger that lives in my bones and muscles and womb. Maybe it’s that I’m going out into the world more, expanding my circles and seeing more and more of this Positive Fluffy Thinking because of it. Perhaps it’s because three different people have mentioned the Law of Attraction to me in the last 48 hours and now my head just wants to explode.

Bad things happen to good people.

Your thoughts do not control reality.

Focusing only on the positive and ignoring and stuffing down the negative only causes imbalance and dis-ease within. It’s makes us ill, physically, emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually.

I invite you to step into your anger. To open your throat to your roars.

I invite you to sink into your grief. To open your self to body-wracking wails.

I invite you to stumble into your sadness. To open your being to your most guttural moans and howls.

I invite you to dance with your Shadow. To wrestle with her. To play with her. To fight with her.

I invite you to acknowledge and accept your darkest self. To allow this part of you to be. She is not all of you. And she is part of you. I invite you to open your arms to her, and to weep together for all that could have been, all that was lost and all that will never be.

I invite you to be fully and imperfectly human. To connect with all your parts and pieces. To love them all: your Light and Shadow. To allow your Self to be exactly where you are, right now.

 

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