#267| How To STOP People Pleasing & Instantly Create Boundaries That Keep You Calm WITHOUT Using Confrontation

Have you ever felt like people keep crossing your boundaries—even after you've clearly communicated them?

If you're constantly saying yes when you want to say no, working later than you planned, or feeling responsible for everyone else's reactions, this episode will completely change how you think about boundaries. Instead of trying to control other people's behavior, you'll discover how to make decisions that protect your priorities, reduce burnout, and help you respond with confidence—even when it feels uncomfortable.

By listening, you will:

•  Learn why boundaries are really about your decisions, not getting other people to change. 
•  Discover how to overcome the guilt, anxiety, and discomfort that make it so difficult to follow through. 
•  Master Rebecca Olson's Pivot Protocol, a simple process for calming your nervous system so you can make intentional choices that align with your priorities. 

Press play to learn a practical, empowering approach to boundaries that will help you protect your time, reduce overwhelm, and confidently prioritize what matters most.

Featured on the podcast
Check out Rebecca Olson's website and podcast
Schedule a Break Free From Stress Strategy Session

Wondering why you're overwhelmed? Take my "why am I overwhelmed" quiz to find out the source of your overwhelm, and what to do about it. 

Send Me a Message - Have a question, comment, or just want to say hi?  Message me here, I'd love to chat!  

Work With Me - Interested in working with me 1-on-1, taking a class, or joining one of my coaching groups? Message me here to get the scoop.   

Want More? - If you love the content of this podcast, you'll love our Simple Sunday newsletter too. When you sign up, you’ll receive a simple dose of inspiration, practical tips, and a little fun—designed to help you start your week with simplicity and intention. Sign up here 

Life can be overwhelming, but on this podcast, you'll discover practical strategies to overcome overwhelm, imposter syndrome, and negative self-talk, manage time effectively, set boundaries, and stay productive in high-stress jobs—all while learning how to say no and prioritize self-care on the Overwhelmed Worki...

Transcript

Stop People Pleasing Without Confrontation

Michelle Gauthier 0:00

When you listen today, you're gonna learn how to stop people pleasing without using confrontation.

Michelle Gauthier 0:09

You're listening to Overwhelmed Working Woman, the podcast that helps you be more calm and more productive by doing less. I'm your host, Michelle Gauthier, a former Overwhelmed Working Woman and current life coach. On this show, we unpack the stress and pressure that today's working woman experiences. And in each episode, you'll get a strategy to bring more calm, ease, and relaxation to your life.

A Cookie Note And A Boundary

Michelle Gauthier 0:37

Hi, friend. Today we're talking about boundaries, and I had to laugh to myself this morning because I knew I was going to be recording this episode. And I was in my kitchen getting some coffee, and in our kitchen, we have this cake plate with a dome over the top of it, and that's where all the sweets always are. So if we have cookies or whatever, they're always underneath that thing. And I saw there was a note in there. My daughter had a cookie that she bought yesterday at Panera, and it said, You can eat this cookie, but if you do, you have to pay me five dollars, put the cash here. And I was like, solid boundary. Way to go, Josie. When you have a teenage brother and a handsome man friend hanging around who will both eat your sweets without your permission, she knows what's up. Anyway, that's not what we're talking about today, but we are talking about boundaries. My guest today is Rebecca Olson. She is a coach who helps ambitious working moms stop overfunctioning. She and I both talk a lot on our podcasts and to our clients about people pleasing and boundaries. And I just loved hearing her take and the way that she explains it. And I think that you will love it too. When you listen to this episode, you'll learn why a boundary isn't about keeping people out. You'll also learn the real reason why you cave in the moment when someone's asking you to do something and you can know what you want to say, but you don't say it. She's gonna give you a tool that you can use for that situation. And why the guilt that you feel when you say no isn't a sign that you're doing something wrong. It's just the cost of no longer people pleasing. So let's welcome Rebecca. Rebecca, thank you so much for being here with us today on Overwhelmed Working Woman. It's fantastic to have you.

Rebecca Olson 2:08

Thank you for having me here, Michelle. I'm really excited to be chatting with you and your audience.

Boundaries Protect Your Real Priorities

Rebecca Olson 2:13

And we just nerd out about stuff like this, about boundaries and prioritization, which these are like two things that are super intertwined. Your priorities are what your boundaries should be protecting. So your boundary, if we think about it like it's a fence around your home, if we were to use that visual. Your fence is what protects the things that are inside of the fence, in this case, your home and the people within your home and your pets and your stuff and those types of things. And so the fence becomes the protective barrier that keeps some things out that are not important and then keeps the things that are important that you want to protect in. So that gives you the visual on that. But of course, we don't have a fence around our priorities in life, right? That's not how that works. We don't have something physical like that. It wouldn't make it easier if we did. But in this case, what we have, what creates our boundary or our fence around our priorities is our decision. It's our yes and it's our no. And so we want our yes to be prioritizing all of the things within the boundary, right? We want it to be our priorities and we want our no to ultimately be against the things that are outside of our boundaries. If we start to think about our boundaries as actually being our decision making and what we choose to say yes to, what we choose to say no to, we would start to recognize that's solely within our power, right? Nobody else makes our decisions but us. Nobody else tells us what we say yes or no to. We always are in charge of what we say yes and we say no to.

Michelle Gauthier 3:39

Yeah, absolutely. Okay, so I want to go back to something that you said that I think is so good because sometimes people hear boundaries and they feel like they have to put their hand up and give somebody the stiff arm and push them out. Yeah. And I love how you said our fence or imagined fence around our priorities is something that keeps those priorities in. So we're trying to keep in the things that we do want. And I just that twist on the way, uh twist of phrase, turn of phrase, so that it's not like you've got to keep out all these other things. No, you're just keeping inside the things that really matter to you. And I love the way you liken it to a house. Because if you think about your house, like your kids are in there, your pets are in there, your spouse is in there, your chocolate chip cookies are in there, all the things that you want are in your house, and you want to protect those. And it's powerful to think about it. If I make a decision that leaves my fence open, or the example you just gave me when we were talking before this was like kicking down one of the boards in your fence, then you're going to allow for things to come in that you don't want in there.

Stop Waiting For Others To Cooperate

Rebecca Olson 4:43

Yeah.

Michelle Gauthier 4:43

So say more about the decision making piece of it because I think a lot of people don't believe that they always have a choice.

Rebecca Olson 4:51

I think it's more common to say something along the lines of they're not adhering to my boundaries or my wishes or my whatever I've asked them to do, they're not doing it. Right. So I've asked them to not message me after hours anymore, after six, and with my ceiling, I can't get to that message, and they're still doing that. I've asked them to not schedule deadlines Monday morning first thing, and they're still doing that. And so there's this idea that boundaries somehow fall into the hands of other people. And then other people are supposed to be making decisions for your priorities in one of the headers to you. It's not the way, it's not the most helpful way to think about it. I think we're skewed in that way of thinking. So in this case, a boundary is what are you going to do to protect your family time when somebody else calls you, messages you, sends you a Teams message at 6 p.m. after you're done working? What are you going to do? That's your boundary. That's your decision in that moment. They're allowed to message you whenever the heck they want. They can do it at six, they can do it at nine. Maybe they're up at one in the morning. Fine, whatever. That's up to them. It's what are you going to do when that happens? That becomes your decision. And so you can be irritated at them that they're messaging you at six o'clock, but why are you believing that you're supposed to even be messaging them back at that time, right? Yeah. You just get to decide. And so I always want to focus on what you have control over instead of what other people are doing. Being a parent, we know that we never actually get to control our children and we never actually get to control anyone else around us. And so it's always about what have you decided to do? Let me just give you another example of this.

Time Boundaries With A Talkative Boss

Rebecca Olson 6:34

Like I have a client right now, she has a really challenging boss. She'll come into a meeting with her boss. And even if it's supposed to be like a 15-minute, 30-minute meeting, it'll be like an hour or an hour and a half, or even two hours. She's described some of these like ongoing meetings, and she's like, we have work to do. And so she's recognizing that her boss just can talk endlessly about things and has no concept of time for meetings. And rather than coach her on how to get her boss to stop making long meetings, we've just talked about what does it look like to protect your time, which is your priority, right? What does it look like? So when you note it, like how long are you willing to give your boss to go over your meeting? Let's decide that. And then when that time hits, what exactly are you going to tell her? And she has had to start getting, hey, I've got five minutes. Hey, I've got two minutes. Hey, we're at time. I'm sorry. I'm gonna have to leave you right now. And it's almost like mid-sentence. And it's so uncomfortable for her, but that's what's within her boundary. That's her ability to make a decision to protect her time. And it's what she has to do in order to not work late all the time and get all of her work done during the workday.

Michelle Gauthier 7:37

Yes, that's such a good example because the road that you could go down with that is to complain to all of your coworkers and your spouse and everyone who will listen about how bad your boss sucks and how much time she takes that you don't have to give and just become very dissatisfied with your work and maybe even need to go work somewhere else instead of just creating that boundary and holding it for yourself. And you made such an important point that I want to just underscore, which is the boundary belongs to you. You can't write a manifesto and show it to the world and say, here's how I want everyone to treat me or what I want everyone to do. Yeah, it belongs to you. And the consequences of that boundary also belong to you. So if you don't hold it up, it's on you. And even though that sounds maybe harsh, I just think it's such a much more empowering place to be. Like I'm in charge of how I spend my time. Obviously, if you have a boss and you have to have a meeting with that person, I'm not being delusional, but there comes a point where when you're over time, you've got to say something.

Rebecca Olson 8:38

Yep. Absolutely.

Discomfort Versus Working Late Forever

Rebecca Olson 8:39

And the thing that really only ever gets in the way of us holding to our boundaries and keeping to what are our most important things, our priorities, is really how it feels at the end of the day. Right? It just feels bad to interrupt your boss and say, I'm sorry, I gotta go. Like you're probably pissed off at them. You are worried about your performance review coming up, you're worried that they're gonna be upsetting you. And there's all these emotions flying about in the moment that you have to make a decision on whether you're going to raise your hand and say, I gotta step out or not. And that emotional barrier is really what you have to learn how to get through because it's the thing that is driving that decision to either have to stay there and listen to your boss drive on for another hour or not. And so that's enough how important it is to have a toolkit of learning how to process those emotions and recognize them and get through them in the moment because it's the thing that is really preventing you from being able to hold to your boundaries.

Michelle Gauthier 9:36

Yes. And I think that temporary discomfort that you'll feel when you tell your boss I've gotta go. If you compare how uncomfortable it is to work late every night because you don't have time to get your work done, if you weigh those, which is more uncomfortable. I just set this boundary with my kids. I switched the way that we're doing money. I used to give them small allowance and then give them money as time went on, as they were gonna go out with their friends or whatever. And I just figured out how much each one of them should get one of my kids' drives. So he gets gas to go to school and back and work and back, but not just drive all over town, like cover their school lunches, whatever. And so I gave them way more money, like three times more money than I was giving them before. And I said, But here's the deal, you gotta make it last the whole month. You can go out to eat with your friends anytime you want, but when you're out of money, you're out of money. And so last weekend, which was not even the end of the month, it was like 10 days left in the month or something. They were going together and they were driving to their dad's house, which is two hours away, and they didn't have any money left and they wanted to get fast food. And I felt so uncomfortable thinking about my kids being hungry and feeling like I should be providing for them. And I was like, there's plenty of food at our house. You can make yourself a sandwich to take, you can eat before you go. You can call your dad and ask him for money if you want to, but I'm just you are not getting any more. I feel like both for me and for them, they need to know I'm not kidding. Because if I would have said yes, then this next month, when it gets to the end and they're running out, I'm gonna have to do it again and again. So it's once you've held that boundary for the first time and you've sweat and you've felt bad and maybe even guiltier or whatever you feel, just know the next time it's gonna be way easier, easier until it's just comfortable. And then, like in this case, they just won't ask anymore.

Rebecca Olson 11:25

They're they're gonna ask anymore. Yeah, they're gonna learn how to make it last, the whole weapon. Yes, but exactly. Yes. Yeah, I like to teach that there is there's two types of tools we can talk about when we're talking about getting through that emotion to be able to hold your boundaries. This in the moment tool that is gonna help you literally process that emotion in the moment to get through it, to stick to your guns, to say novel, even when it's hard, and even when you're afraid of what they're gonna think, and even when you know that they're cursing you achieved and all of the things. Like, how do you get through that actual moment? Because that moment is everything. I teach a specific process called the pivot protocol to help you process that emotion first so you can stick to your guns. But then the second bank because it's the preventative tools, right? In this case, I'm gonna try to make that moment where my kids are gonna ask for money easier so I don't feel so bad in that moment, or I'm gonna prep my boss before the meeting and let her know what time exactly is my fort out so that when we come to that moment, it doesn't feel so there's preventative ways that we can get ahead of some of those moments to lessen the hard um holding to our boundaries. And both of those kind of tools are really important to be developing simultaneously. But yeah, let me talk to you about the pivot

The Pivot Protocol For Hard Moments

Rebecca Olson 12:40

protocol. So the pivot protocol is six steps and it starts with stopping. That's step one, stop, step out from the moment, label what you're feeling. I call it the noticing and the normalizing. Oh my gosh, I am feeling really nervous. I'm feeling really anxious, I'm feeling really scared, I'm feeling like I'm disappointing someone, I'm feeling really guilty for X, Y, or Z. And then the normalizing is of course I'm feeling that way. My boss, she's the key to my money, right? She's the key to my promotion. She's kind of everything. She employs me. Of course, if I'm gonna push back against her, I'm gonna feel that way. It's really normal that I would feel that way. Or for you, like, of course, you're gonna feel really guilty or anxious in that moment. You love your kids and you want to provide for them, and they it's just food and it's whatever, 15 bucks, and it's really not that big of a deal. Yeah, it feels really bad to deny them something that feels so easy like that. Of course, you're a good mom. Of course, you're gonna feel that way. So stopping, noticing or labeling and then normalizing all of that 10 seconds. If that's when we step back, we just have that moment with ourselves. Then we have to actually process the feelings that are happening in the moment. And we like to skip this. This is really so important. It's the crux of everything, right? You have to be able to calm your nervous system down before you make a decision. Because if you make a decision about what you're gonna do, are you gonna raise your hand and tell your boss, are you gonna say yes or no to your kids or whatever? If you're doing that from a heightened emotional state, you're never gonna make great decisions. Maybe you're gonna stick to your guns, maybe you won't, I don't know. But you're gonna give yourself the greatest possibility of following through with your priority if you have a much calmer nervous system. And so calming your nervous system can be as simple as some deep breathing. Sometimes it's like a walk. If you like really gonna let the steam out, sometimes it's picking up a pen and paper, writing some things down, sometimes it's laying down on the ground and having a meditation. Some of my clients, and this is actually where the word pivot came from, is we were talking about literally pivoting in your chair away from your computer. Spin and pivot away and look at something else for a moment and have a moment with yourself. But that's really what we're doing. And we're but we're not jumping yet to the what should I do about this? Don't feel bad about this, Rebecca. It's their fault, not my fault. It's not convincing yourself to not feel the way you're feeling. You're just letting yourself calm down for a moment before you get into that headspace of thinking about and justifying what you want to do next. And so calming your nervous system down, what we know from science is that actually doesn't take all that long. We think that calming down can take forever. We gotta go on a long walk in order to do that, right? And so we just push those feelings down and we do all the stuff. But in reality, processing our emotions like that can be anywhere from 20, 30 seconds to a couple of minutes at most, if we're really intentional about calming ourselves down and having a tool to do that. So it's okay, I'm calm now. My kids are asking for this. What's really the most important thing here? Is it that they get fed or is it that they learn this lesson? Then you get to make a decision that is much more intentional, much more proactive, much more focused on your priorities. And then of course you just want to execute on that and follow through with whatever you say. So, in a nutshell, what that looks like when you get good at this, 30 seconds to a minute or so at pops, but you might have to do this multiple times a day. All of those moments when your nervous system heightens a little bit and your heart starts to beat a little faster, you get anxious about something. It's always a moment. Get back into a much more intentional space and follow the pivot protocol and be in a headspace that's gonna allow you to prioritize correctly.

Michelle Gauthier 16:11

That's such a good visual to think about it being a literal pivot, like turning your chair around and just turning away from the question, the stress, the everything so that you can process it. I love it. That's so great. Yeah, I think the thought I landed on was hunger is not an emergency, like being hungry for two hours is not an emergency. And also they have the choice, they could get food from the home that we live in. So I think they weren't even thought yet.

Rebecca Olson 16:38

They were like asking for money before they left because they didn't have the money versus yeah.

The Real Fear Behind People Pleasing

Michelle Gauthier 16:44

Yeah, because I have taught them, that's what they can do. I take radical responsibility for why they're asking, it's because I have taught them that. So, of course, when we change, when we make new boundaries, the people who have benefited from us not having boundaries don't like it. They're like, wait a minute.

Rebecca Olson 17:02

Yeah, yeah. A lot of times that's what we blame this on as people pleasers, right? We say you fear their response. I don't want them to be disappointed. I don't want them to think I'm a bad mom. I don't want them to be hungry. I don't want them to think I'm not a team player. I don't want my boss to think that I'm not respectful. We have these thoughts about what other people are gonna think and how they're gonna feel. That's very typical for us as people pleasers, but really it's not about what they're gonna think or feel. It's about what you're going to think and feel if or when they feel that way. We're actually afraid of our own feelings and our own thoughts when other people have big emotions that are triggered by us. And that's ultimately what we're avoiding. We don't want that, feels bad. Feels bad.

Michelle Gauthier 17:44

Yes, yeah, exactly. But not so bad, we're gonna die. That's the thing to remember. It will be uncomfortable.

Rebecca Olson 17:51

We can't avoid it. I and I say that all the time to my clients. We can coach and coach to get you to a place where you are so then that nobody's triggered around you and you're not triggered by anyone, and there's no big emotions flying around. But let's be honest, we are human beings. This is the way of the world. We live in community. The people that we love the most trigger us. I would rather teach you how to keep getting back in control of yourself and your decisions and the way you're thinking and feeling and learn how to do that quickly than to ever try to set your circumstances up where you're never triggered. That's not a good use of time. Yeah. So it always that always makes sense. It makes so much more sense to me to focus our attention on learning how to get back in control than to ever get to a place where we're feeling that sense of being out of control.

Michelle Gauthier 18:36

Yeah. Yes, which I think is like nearly impossible, a nearly impossible state to get to. But if we can shorten the suffering that comes from it, then I think that's what we want. And I also think when you're in control of your own emotions, meaning I can feel guilt, I can feel anger, I can feel all those things, I can feel them, and I can process them and I can come out the other side. When you're worried about what somebody else might think or feel or do, you can just trust them to do that same thing. Like even if they're disappointed, we can let them handle that. They're an adult, or in my case, teenagers, and they can handle that. Being disappointed is also not an emergency. In fact, I would argue that it can be good. Yeah, very they can become resilient and come up with new solutions. I love

A Personal Rule For Parenting Boundaries

Michelle Gauthier 19:20

this. This is such a good, fresh take on boundaries. I have two more questions for you, which I ask everybody, every guest. It's funny though, the first one is really about boundaries. The first question is what's a rule that you've made for yourself that you very rarely, if ever, break?

Rebecca Olson 19:36

That is such a good one. I think that I would say this one is around my kid. This is the first one that's coming to mind. I don't say yes to an activity with my kids that I really don't want to do. I love it. And when it was when they were little, it was things like Candyland. Hated Candyland. Such a stupid I hated playing Candyland. And or I've never been a make-believe parent. Like I don't sit there and engage in make-believe play. That's just not who I am. So I almost never would have said yes to that. No, my kids are a bit out of that stage. But if I didn't want to do it and it didn't feel like with my children it was gonna fill me up, I would never do it for them.

Michelle Gauthier 20:16

Yeah. And I love that. I'm sure everybody's like now picturing something that they've done with their kids that they absolutely hate. My sister and I were talking about when our kids were littler, how our mom stayed home with us and she never played with us. And then there's this expectation now of moms that you like, I don't know, work all day, and then you come home and you get on the floor and you play with your kids, and we're like, mom never played with us, and look, we turned out just fine.

Rebecca Olson 20:42

Never.

Michelle Gauthier 20:43

Yeah, you don't have to do everything with them. Okay, and then the second question is totally unrelated to work. What is something that you like are just into and really love right now?

Rebecca Olson 20:53

One of my favorite things right now that's like really driving our family is we are watching all of the Marvel movies from start to finish. So how funny night or yeah, we always have a Friday night movie night, but we've made it a Saturday night movie night too. But like we're all really into it. There's what is there, like 26 Marvel movies or something like that. So literally starting from the first release on. And we're just like super into it. So it's the kids are loving it, and we're loving it too.

Michelle Gauthier 21:21

So that is so fun. It's so much fun when your kids get to be the age that they watch movies that you also like. I like a lot of the kid cartoon ones, but like once, not absolutely. Oh my gosh. I'd watch things with my son, but it's usually like a stretch for me. It's not something that I would really want to watch. But if he asked me, if he asked me to do anything, he's 18. If he's, hey mom, will you sit on the couch with me and watch whatever? I'm like, I sure will. But my daughter and I have chosen a couple series over time. First Little House on the Prairie. There's 18 seasons of that or something. And then Gilmore Girls. And it's it has been one of my favorite memories because when you're all into it, it's just so much fun to be like, okay, let's hurry up and eat dinner and do our homework so we can watch this show. So that's so fun. I love that. That is great.

Where To Find Rebecca Plus Offer

Michelle Gauthier 22:08

Okay, so let's tell people where they can find you. And I think you have a special offer for us too. So, do you want to just tell the people all the things?

Rebecca Olson 22:16

Ah, you're already a podcast listener, so you can head on over to listen to my podcast, which is ambitious and balanced working moms. You can find that wherever you listen to podcasts. And obviously, you could check me out on LinkedIn or on my website, Rebecca Olsoncoaching.com. But really, what I want to focus on is this breakfree from stress strategy call. I just walked to Michelle through it, actually, before we we hopped on this podcast episode, and this is a 30-minute one-on-one call with me where we are gonna talk about the things that you need to be prioritizing right now. You get to talk that out with me. We're gonna talk about the things that you don't want to be prioritizing right now, and essentially figure out exactly what you need to be doing in order to hold to your priorities. So it's very tailored to you and your life and your challenges. It starts with a custom quiz that you take that helps us understand where your mindset is at, and then I literally walk you through and draw out for you what your priorities are, what your boundaries are, and we're gonna get into the weeds of that. I'd love to offer that to your listeners, and we will have a link to that in the show notes.

Michelle Gauthier 23:20

Okay, wonderful. That's amazing. And yes, it was super helpful to me, who does a lot of mindset work and is a coach. And I was like, oh yeah, that's a great point. I am doing that. I need to stop doing that and start doing this. So it was very helpful. And I think one-on-one time, you can get so much covered when you have a one-on-one session like that.

Rebecca Olson 23:38

Yeah.

Michelle Gauthier 23:38

That is great. We will put all those links in the show notes. And thank you so much for your fresh perspective. It's so great to hear and just hear someone else explain it. I love all the ways that you're describing it and the way that you coach your clients. So thank you so much for sharing with us. You are very welcome. It's a pleasure being here. Thanks for having me.

Closing And Next Steps

Michelle Gauthier 24:01

Thank you for listening to the Overwhelmed Working Woman podcast. If you want to learn more about my work, head over to my website at MichelleGauthier.com. See you next week.