Self-Help

Living your life as an empowered person often requires the placement of boundaries – invisible “lines” across which you will not allow people or events to infringe upon your time or resources.

When you have clear inner boundaries in place, you know where you stand and you’re able to make decisions that support and nurture you. 

These decisions may include refusing extra obligations that you do not have the time or desire to fulfill, keeping a greater distance between you and people who tend to drain your energy, or insisting that others respect your personal time.

A disempowered person will usually find it difficult to set boundaries because they don’t feel that they have the right to do so, or the strength to stand firm in their decisions.  Does that describe you?

If so, read on for some simple and painless ways to set firmer boundaries in your life:

1) First, understand that you have the right to set boundaries.  This can be difficult if you struggle with low self-esteem or self-confidence.  You might hesitate to set boundaries because you’re afraid that people won’t like you, or you’ll hurt someone’s feelings by refusing their requests for help. 

However, more often than not your own feelings will be hurt if you don’t set boundaries!  You’ll find yourself agreeing to do things you really don’t want to do or don’t have time to do, and you’ll run yourself ragged trying to please everyone.  Setting boundaries involves learning to love and respect yourself, and your time and resources.

Get into the habit of affirming your own value and worth, and strengthen your belief that you deserve to live a calmer, more peaceful life.  Be committed to caring for yourself first, and then helping others as time allows.  Remind yourself that you don’t have to feel guilty about not saving the world – do what you can and feel good about it.

2) Build up your courage.  Learning to say “no” can be scary, but it’s important to believe that you have the strength and confidence to stand firm in your decisions.  One good way to become more courageous is to understand that nothing bad will happen if you refuse extra obligations or favors that someone asks of you. 

Will they be disappointed?  Probably.  Will they stop speaking to you or get angry with you?  Probably not.  Except in extreme circumstances, most often the person will simply move on and ask someone else for help.

If you do happen to receive a strong negative reaction when saying no, ask yourself if it really matters to you?  That may sound harsh, but you have to eventually realize that it’s not your job to make life easier for others – especially when doing so makes life more difficult for you! 

A person who gets angry about your unwillingness to help is probably a person who has gotten comfortable using you as a doormat.  In those cases it’s best to nip the problem in the bud before it takes over your life.

3) Be firm, but nice.  One of the reasons you may hesitate to say no is because you think it will make you look “bitchy” or selfish – but that can be avoided by finding a pleasant way to say it.  Rather than saying brusquely, “No, I won’t help you with this,” you could say apologetically, “I’m really sorry, but I just can’t do it at this time.  Maybe another time?” 

The majority of people will understand and not be upset.  However, if you do receive resistance, that is the time to become more firm in your answers. 

One of the hardest parts of setting boundaries is learning to be firm with yourself!  You may be tempted to overextend yourself to help others, even when you know it wouldn’t be in your best interests. 

When that temptation arises, you’ll have to be able to override your desire to please and do what you know is best for yourself.

Welcome back!

One stumbling block that can prevent you from feeling empowered is the inability to forgive – both others and yourself.

Disempowerment often contributes to a self-image of weakness and powerlessness, which makes it difficult to forgive others for hurting or betraying you – or forgiving yourself for allowing it – because you believe that forgiveness means accepting or condoning the poor treatment.

However, forgiveness is necessary if you want to become an empowered person!  Why?  Because a truly empowered person knows that nothing can detract from their strength and value, including hurtful words and actions by others.  In order to release the pain of the past and move into a confident new future, learning how to forgive others and yourself is vital.

Below you’ll find two simple exercises that will help you to forgive:

Forgiving Others

First, try working on forgiving the people who have hurt you in the past.  These people might be your parents or guardians, previous (or current) romantic partners, friends, bosses, co-workers, or anyone else who has treated you with less respect and kindness than you deserve.

Start by writing out the things they did and how they made you feel.  Now, call up a mental image of each of these people in turn.  Tell them mentally how their words and actions made you feel.  Express your hurt, anger, rage, sadness, pain and anything else you feel or felt at the time.

Then, mentally say something like this to each of them, “Even though you hurt me, I choose to forgive you now and release any pain I still carry in my mind, emotions and body.”

Understand that by forgiving them, you are NOT affirming that their actions were acceptable.  Instead, you are choosing to release the negative effects those actions had on you and your life.  There’s a big difference between those two mind-sets!

Know also that forgiveness may take time.  You may have to go through the exercise several times before you truly begin to feel like you can let it go.  That’s okay, just keep doing it and eventually you’ll begin to feel stronger.

Forgiving Yourself

It can often be more difficult to forgive yourself than others because poor self-esteem often goes along with disempowerment.  You may feel that you don’t deserve forgiveness; or believe that you’re a terrible person who deserves to be punished.

However, using the same process as described above can help you to learn to love and forgive yourself and release any feelings of self-hatred.  Begin by writing down any memories of times you belittled or hurt yourself. 

Also, take another look at the things you wrote about others and ask if you played a part in the hurt that resulted from those situations.

Then begin working on forgiving yourself.  Acknowledge that you did the best you could at the time, but now you are choosing to forgive yourself and move on.

Once again, this process will take time and consistent effort before you’ll see lasting changes.

When you truly commit to forgiving others and yourself, you are able to let go of emotional baggage and move confidently into a better future feeling lighter, calmer and in greater control of your life – which equals empowerment!

When it comes to making decisions, a chronic sense of disempowerment often results in feelings of helplessness or hopelessness that can affect the choices you make and determine your quality of life.

When you live your life as a disempowered person, you often feel like the majority of your life experiences are out of your control.  You allow other people or events to determine what you think, say and do; how you spend your time, and even the general direction your life takes. 

Transitioning from disempowerment to empowerment is a simple matter of realizing that few things are truly out of your control when you exercise your right to choose. 

Below you’ll find three tips for building a stronger sense of empowerment through conscious choice:

1) Realize That You Always Have Choices

It’s easy to feel like you’re powerless in certain circumstances, but powerlessness is most often a perception, not a fact.  Even if you’re incapable of physically altering a situation, you at least have the power to choose your outlook, attitude and reaction to the things that happen to you.

More often when you believe you have no choices, you’re really saying that you don’t like the choices you do have.  But that’s very different than not having choices at all!  When you affirm that you have no options, you contribute to a sense of powerlessness that can cause you to act in destructive ways rather than seeking a more balanced solution.

2) You Are Not Responsible For Anyone Else’s Happiness

Have people in your life ever made you feel like you have to go along with their decisions in order to keep peace?  This is common in controlling relationships, but even healthy relationships can experience decision-related conflicts.

True empowerment is having the strength to make the decisions that are right for you, even if others don’t always agree with them.  When other people will be affected by your decisions it’s a good idea to work cooperatively with them, but you may also be tempted to allow others to influence decisions that involve only yourself. 

Most often this is done in an attempt to avoid conflict or disagreement, but it doesn’t serve you in the long run.  When it comes right down to it, you are not responsible for keeping anyone happy other than yourself, and you can empower yourself to make the choices that are right for you – regardless of what others may say or think about them.

3) You Are In Ccharge of Your Own Happiness.

Just as you are not responsible for others’ happiness, neither are they responsible for yours!  Disempowerment can often make you believe that you are reliant on the words or actions of others for your sense of happiness and contentment, but this type of attitude only keeps you stuck in feelings of helplessness.

Instead, use your power of choice to do the things that will make you happy.  These decisions might relate to your work, residence, relationships and more – and they may not be easy decisions to follow through on. 

However, just knowing that you have to make the choices that are right for you or live forever dissatisfied is usually enough to provide the courage to affect positive change.

Personal empowerment often plays a big role in the quality of your relationships because of the beliefs and behaviors you express in your interactions with others. 

If you’ve ever expected a relationship to somehow “complete” you or make you feel strong or whole, you probably experienced disappointment and frustration as it seemed to cause bigger problems in your life.

There are several reasons why personal empowerment is important in relationships:

1) Other people sense the way you feel about yourself and treat you accordingly.

Have you ever noticed that other people seem to pick up on subtle cues and reflect your own beliefs back to you?  For example, if you lack confidence, you’ll often find yourself encountering aggressive or intimidating people who seem to exacerbate those feelings.  If you don’t have a healthy level of respect for yourself, you’ll probably encounter plenty of people who don’t respect you either.

This is no accident!  People tend to sense your inner beliefs based on your demeanor and body language, and gear their behavior to match.

When you’re empowered and strong, you communicate that essence to others, and others will treat you as such, resulting in healthier relationships.

2) You’ll notice in others the things you dislike about yourself.

Have you ever heard of “projecting” your own perceptions and beliefs onto others?  A lack of self-love within yourself will often cause you to believe that others don’t love you either.  A lack of confidence in yourself will attract people that you struggle to place your confidence in also!

When you are empowered and confident, you’ll end up attracting others who both see you that way and embody the same qualities themselves.

3) You’ll constantly look to others for reassurance and validation.

When you don’t feel empowered or confident, you’ll constantly seek reassurance and validation from the people around you.  Rather than feeling self-assured, you’ll appear to be needy and insecure, which will place a drain on your relationship and push others away from you.

Remember that empowerment is an inside job!  You need to give yourself love, respect and confidence first if you want to also receive it from others.

Fulfilling and satisfying relationships require that both partners are empowered and balanced before entering into them.  When you empower yourself from within, you bring a stronger element of genuine love, respect and intimacy to your relationships and stop seeking validation from outside sources. 

Ultimately, this ensures that your connections with others will be deeper, richer and more meaningful…