Somatic Healing for Wellness-Focused Women

(#64) Understanding Anxiety and Boundaries: The Anxiety Iceberg, People Pleasing, and Perfectionism

• Rae The Somatic Coach • Episode 64

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Are you constantly over-explaining, struggling to say “no,” or feeling drained from trying to keep everyone else happy? This episode dives deep into the connection between anxiety and boundaries and how difficulty setting limits can lead to burnout, resentment, and overstimulation. We explore:

  • The Anxiety Iceberg - what’s really beneath the surface of your anxious thoughts
  • The link between anxiety and people-pleasing (hello, fawn response!)
  • Why setting boundaries can feel so uncomfortable and how to move through the fear, guilt, and what-if spirals
  • Somatic tools to regulate your nervous system so you can trust yourself, respond (not react), and hold your boundaries with confidence

This episode isn’t just theory, it’s packed with practical breathwork, grounding exercises, and somatic practices to help you step into a more embodied, empowered version of yourself.

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Disclaimer: Please remember that the information shared on this podcast is intended to inspire, educate, and support you on your personal journey. It does not substitute for professional mental health advice. I am not a psychologist or medical professional. If you are experiencing distress, mental health challenges, or medical conditions, please seek help from a qualified professional.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Radiant Life Podcast. I'm your host, rae, the Somatic Coach, and I'm here to support you in healing your past, living in the present and creating your future so that you can become the most centered, embodied and happiest version of yourself. Each week, I'll be bringing you episodes to help you navigate life's challenges, ease stress and tension and learn more about holistic healing, spirituality and wellness. If you're interested in becoming the best version of yourself so that you can live the life of your dreams, then you're in the right place. Subscribe to the podcast and the monthly newsletter and follow me on Instagram and TikTok to know when new episodes are released each week. I am so happy that you've landed here. Let's dive in. Welcome back to the podcast. If you are new here, I'm Rae. I'm a somatic coach and breathwork facilitator, and if you aren't new here, welcome back. I'm so glad that you're tuning in for today's episode, so some front desk items before we dive in. One announcement that I also shared on our last episode is about the podcast, and that is that we're moving back to weekly episodes, ideally starting in March. I also might be rebranding the podcast, so that would look like potentially having a new name, new cover art, things of that sort. I don't remember if I mentioned this on the last episode, but I'm also transitioning my website to a new platform and all of these things that I'm updating and things that I'm shifting. I will be sending out an email this month just kind of summarizing all of these exciting new announcements. So if you're not on the monthly email list and you want to be just sending your email, I'll add you. Or you can also sign up for breathe easy, and that is a ebook that teaches you how to create your own breathwork practice and that will automatically add you to receive the monthly newsletter. So lots of fun and exciting things happening and I'm super excited. All good things. I'll also mention that the breathwork class of the month is happening on February 13th it's a Thursday. If you have any questions about that, let me know. It's a Thursday. If you have any questions about that, let me know, and all the information for that will be in the show notes, all right?

Speaker 1:

So for today's topic, I wanted to speak with you about boundaries and anxiety specifically. So my personal journey with anxiety really started my whole journey with everything else. So I don't know if you've ever heard of the anxiety iceberg. It's also something that I've talked about on the podcast, but basically it's like visualizing an iceberg that's above water and then at the top of it it says anxiety and that's the thing that you can see. But underneath anxiety, when all that ice melts, is all of these other challenges that are kind of adding to that anxiety or things that you just you don't see. So, for example, that could look like adhd, uh, poor boundaries, people pleasing perfectionism, self-esteem. It could look like so many different things that are underneath that iceberg. But what we see and what we're experiencing is anxiety. So today I'm going to share with you about how the topic of boundaries and anxiety and navigating both of them kind of can go hand in hand, and how that might be a challenge and what that might look like if those are two things that you're experiencing.

Speaker 1:

So when you struggle with setting boundaries, some of the things that you might be feeling could be burnout from just constantly over giving. You could feel resentful from you know, going against your own words and what is in integrity for you, and you could also feel overstimulated because there's just like so much going on and it's like, ah, there's like a lot happening and oftentimes you might have a fear around even setting boundaries, which can make sense. You know, a lot of times when we struggle in this area it's because there's past conditioning that's contributing to how we show up in this area. So it does make a lot of sense. So you might have a fear around setting some boundaries and having anxiety in general, which is that fear of setting the boundaries can make it really hard to even navigate those fears when they come up and that could look like maybe we feel really guilty when we're setting a boundary, we're really nervous to disappoint other people, or we might have a lot of worry around what's on the other side of making this change, of setting this boundary, of showing up in a new way. And I have another podcast episode coming up that I'm going to dive in a little bit more into people pleasing specifically. But I will say that disappointing other people and setting boundaries often do go hand in hand and that's okay. And I'm going to share with you in another episode how you can kind of move through that challenge if that's the one that's jumping out to you the most over like guilt or worry. If that one's jumping out to you, then I have another episode coming out that will speak to that specifically.

Speaker 1:

So, from a nervous system perspective, when you struggle to set boundaries, you're moving into a FON response, and there are four different trauma responses that happen. It's fight, flight, fon or freeze, and so, specifically with setting boundaries, you could be moving into one of the four, but it's typically fawning. So moving into the fawn response is considered a trauma response and this happens when someone is trying to avoid something that might be considered or perceived as dangerous. So it's a form of survival and, although our defense mechanisms don't always serve us, the reason why this response happens is because over time we've been conditioned to try and keep ourselves safe. So it might not necessarily be serving us, but it is actually quite brilliant. So that's something that you know.

Speaker 1:

Shifting more into like parts work, that's something that when you want to work with this response or this part that finds it safe to constantly be fawning, you use parts work to like move through that and really understand it and kind of like deconstruct it and understand what it really needs, which is typically safety, love, belonging, understanding, a completion of an event, something like that. But a FON response can show up in people-pleasing, it can show up in being overly agreeable and it can show up as constantly putting someone else's needs before your own, which shows up a lot when you're setting boundaries. And what happens when you are starting to understand what anxiety is and you're starting to get to the root cause of it. You might also see that you're struggling to set boundaries or you're struggling with people pleasing, and that goes back to that anxiety iceberg that I mentioned at the beginning of the episode. But ultimately, when you start moving through all of these parts, on the other side you end up feeling like a very strong sense of self-tr side, you end up feeling like a very strong sense of self-trust, you end up feeling safer in your body, you end up being able to like pause and see situations a little bit differently, where you're showing up differently and you're giving a different response, and that FON response eventually begins to shift and change and it doesn't feel as safe as it used to, as like a default response. So oftentimes, when anxiety and setting boundaries and potentially some people pleasing are all at play, this can show up as over explaining yourself. It can feel like you constantly have to ask someone for permission before you take action. It can look like constantly apologizing for things that you know don't require an apology. It can look like going into what-if spirals when you're trying to set a boundary and express yourself and really speak up, and it can also look like completely shutting down, which would be more of like a phrase response. But going into that like avoidance place where you're like this is too overwhelming, this is too much, so I'm just gonna like take a step back and like not even deal with any of this. So, when all of this comes up, there are a few different things that I would love to share with you in terms of, like a Semitic approach that will be supportive for you to move through all of these things when you're looking to set a boundary, and it could also just be helpful anytime that you're even just feeling anxious. These few tools that I'll share with you will definitely support you.

Speaker 1:

So the first is allowing your mind, your body, your energy to feel grounded before you respond to something. So respond versus rather than react. Give yourself the time to gather how you're feeling, to gather what it feels like, what's coming up for you in your body, what's coming up for you in your mind, before you automatically jump to like saying yes to something. So give yourself time to ground your energy before you respond. And then the second tool is allowing yourself, in that pause, to put one hand on your heart, one hand on your belly and breathe in to any tension that you might be feeling in your body. So, again, this is a gentle, somatic practice, but it's going to allow you to start to get curious around where you hold anxiety in your body.

Speaker 1:

So something comes up. You're seeing that your boundaries might have been crossed, or you're looking to just change how things are going and set a new boundary yourself, and it's making you feel anxious and that anxiety is showing up in the body. So the mind is going to do whatever it's going to do, but are you giving yourself the time and space to really pause and sit and be curious about what is this feeling of anxiety Like? Where is it showing up in my body? How am I feeling it? Is it feeling like tension? Is it feeling like a closure? Is it feeling heavy? Is it feeling like really fast paced, like restless, almost? Like how is this anxiety showing up in my body and what does it need from me?

Speaker 1:

And there was a quote that I saw the other day that I wrote down to that I wanted to share with you, and it says knowing what we feel is the first step to knowing why we feel that way. So oftentimes, like with that anxiety iceberg, anxiety is what's showing up. So we're going to set the boundary, and anxiety is what's showing up, but underneath that is usually something else. And so this quote it's by Bessel van der Kolk. I hope I said that right Knowing what we feel is the first step to knowing why we feel that way. So give yourself the time and space to pause, get curious about what's coming up for you in your body, get curious about what's coming up for you in your mind, and that will help you to kind of continue that journey of knowing what exactly is coming up for you, and it will just give you so much more insight too, which is really, really helpful.

Speaker 1:

And then the third again is another like mindful, body-based practice, but it's noticing how you feel in your body before you set a boundary and after you set a boundary. So your intuition and the voice of your body and the wisdom of your body knows things. If you are here listening to this podcast, you are an intuitive person. So are you listening to what your body is telling you? Are you giving yourself the time and space to get curious about? Okay, this is how my body felt before I set this boundary and this is how my body feels after I set this boundary. And so, yeah, like getting curious, giving yourself the time and space to listen to how your body is communicating to you. So maybe you've been doing boundary work for a little while now and you want to even set stronger boundaries, like you're aware that things, something could change around this area, and you're like okay, I'm ready to have have stronger boundaries. So these are a few things that I think are always helpful to incorporate when this is something that you're taking a look at.

Speaker 1:

So the first is for the over explainers. This is a great one. So if you go into the over explaining anxious oh my god, I don't want to make anyone else upset, so I'm just going to explain as much as I can. This one is for you, and that is that no is a complete sentence, so start incorporating that more into what you do. You can say no and that can be that there doesn't need to be an over explanation and notice if that is something that you're changing. Notice how that shows up in your body Like what does it feel like when you don't over explain? If that's something that you're used to, I'm sure it would be a bit uncomfortable at first. And then the second thing I wanted to share with you around this was I'm currently reading the Let them Theory by Mel Robbins and I kind of go in and out of reading self-help books or books that would be considered self-help, because sometimes it's hard for me to finish them because they're like not very interesting or it's just like too much information.

Speaker 1:

Um, but this one was available for me on my kindle and I was like, oh, you know what, I'll just like check it out. Like she's definitely been in my algorithms on Instagram and I've been like loving everything that she's been sharing. So I was like you know what, I'll check it out. And I've actually been really enjoying it. I'm about halfway through, so I think I will finish this one. We'll see. It's really hard for me to finish self-help books, but we'll see if I do.

Speaker 1:

And she refers to this reference in the book no-transcript, disappointing somebody else to know that they are showing up at the emotional capacity of their, the version of their eight-year-old self, and how many people don't actually know about the inner child, or they're not necessarily even really interested in emotional healing or discovering their trauma responses or like anything like that. So oftentimes, when we go into interactions and it's like a struggle or it's hard or could potentially lead to a fight or discomfort or whatever is going on to visualize them as their eight-year-old self, and it allows you to be more compassionate, allows you to slow down, it allows you to see them as potentially an adult that's having a temper tantrum. And she has this great diagram that she shows in the book, where she shows like eight behaviors of children and then how those eight behaviors of adults show up. And again, I don't have it in front of me so I can't can't speak to the diagram specifically, but it's really interesting and I think, if setting boundaries is something that you're struggling with or that you struggled with in the past, uh, having this point of view, this like frame of reference, is really helpful. So, when you're going to set that boundary and it's potentially going to disappoint somebody else, um, visualize them as their eight-year-old self. They have emotions too. They're going to have big feelings potentially, and that's okay.

Speaker 1:

And then the third thing that I would mention here, something that I've been talking about in the podcast forever, and definitely in this episode, is to get to know your body, get to know what it feels like to be in your body, the different sensations, know what it feels like to be in your body, the different sensations, the different reactions. And this can be done through grounding your energy, somatic awareness practices, breath work, mindfulness, somatic shaking, inner child work, and all of this. If you take all of those practices and you start to incorporate them, I cannot stress enough how much it will change how you understand your personal emotional landscape and the subtleties that happen throughout your day to day patterning and behavior. It's really interesting, it's a different perspective and it's really helpful for getting to know yourself in an entirely different way and it will definitely support you if you're looking to navigate anxiety set boundaries. And it's really helpful for getting to know yourself in an entirely different way and it will definitely support you if you're looking to navigate anxiety set boundaries. So for this month of February, the theme of the month is boundaries, and so the YouTube practice of the month is up on my YouTube channel and that is a practice around feeling your personal boundaries, so feeling what it feels like in your body to feel the edge of your own energy and how your personal boundary shows up and how you have, you know, full autonomy and choice around your own energy, which is really empowering.

Speaker 1:

So just a quick recap for today's episode. We talked about setting boundaries. We talked about how, if you struggle with them, that might happen the fawn response. We talked about anxiety and how boundaries and anxiety can go hand in hand. We went over a few different somatic practices that will help you in setting boundaries and moving through anxiety when you're feeling different sensations from setting them, how to have stronger boundaries. And, yeah, I think that's everything.

Speaker 1:

So I hope that you enjoyed today's episode. Thank you so much for tuning in. If you have any questions about what we covered today, or if you just want to chat with me, you can always do that. You can send me an email, you can send me a DM. I respond to everyone that reaches out to me and, yeah, I hope you have an incredible rest of your week, an incredible rest of your day, and I will talk to you soon.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode. If you are moved or inspired, please share with me by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. It means the world to me and I am so appreciative for your support in helping my podcast grow. If we aren't already connected on social media, head over to Instagram and TikTok and follow me at RayTheSemanticCoach. Make sure you check out the show notes of today's episode for links to freebies, opportunities to work with me and ways we can stay connected outside of the podcast. Opportunities to work with me and ways we can stay connected outside of the podcast. I'm so happy that you're here and I can only to talk with you on our next episode of the radiant life podcast.