Boundaries As Medicine

Today I’m making the case that boundaries are not a personality preference, they’re medicine. When we say "yes" while our body feels tight or heavy, we override the very signals designed to keep us well. That pattern doesn’t stay “mental” for long; it shows up in sleep, digestion, hormones, mood, and the way we move through our relationships.

We talk about the hidden link between people pleasing and stress, and why being seen as a “good person” often gets tangled up with self-abandonment. I lean on a powerful idea from Glennon Doyle’s Untamed: your job is to disappoint everybody else before you disappoint yourself, and what that means in real life when you still want to be kind. We also look at the cultural conditioning that rewards overwork, especially in corporate environments, and how that training makes it harder to say no even when you’re running on empty.

You’ll leave with a simple three-step practice: pause before you answer, feel what yes and no do in your body, then deliver the response your nervous system is asking for. I share language you can use in the moment, why parasympathetic “safe state” matters, and a brilliant litmus test: if you can’t say yes with the joy of a small child feeding a duck, it’s a no. If this resonates, subscribe, share with someone you care about, and leave a review so more people can find their way back to their body.

Transcript

Welcome And The Body’s Wisdom

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to You Are the Answer, the podcast that helps you reconnect with the most powerful healer you know, your own body. I'm Naomi Mills, chiropractor, healthcare professional, and believer in the natural intelligence within us all. In this podcast, I explore what it means to trust your body, decode its signals, and take ownership of your well-being without quick fixes or health fads. Whether you're just beginning your journey or deep in transformation, I'm here to guide you back to the truth. You are not broken. You are the answer.

Why Boundaries Are Medicine

SPEAKER_00 0:50

The topic of today is really the idea of us holding boundaries as medicine. We are in the mindset arc of this podcast series where I'm going to spend episodes 20 through 30 focusing on how the mind is influencing our central nervous systems through that mind-body connection. And if you haven't listened back to the previous 10, which is our body arc, I suggest you do because they all interlink beautifully. And the mind is probably our most challenging thing that we need to overcome because it wants to run everything. And so today, when I talk about setting a boundary, the reason I say it's medicine is because so often, even without knowing it, we say yes to things, we overcommit, we agree to do things that we can't genuinely do with joy and freedom of energy because we're already pretty full up of other things to do, already a little bit tight on that time. And we find it hard to say no anyway. And where we are missing this link, and what I would love for you to think about practicing as a result of listening to this episode is tuning into your body and using that as a means to directing you to what you say yes to and what you say no to. And that's how it becomes your medicine. The body will always give you an indicator first, and we are just so used to overriding that and pushing through. And if you want to hear my passionate views on pushing through, just go back one episode to episode 21, all about this idea of keeping calm and carrying on.

Good Person Pressure And People Pleasing

SPEAKER_00 3:00

So I want to acknowledge something very important that of course you want to be a good person. And very often there can be a little bit of discomfort between your perception of you being a good person and what that means, especially if you are a female, I will say, in terms, often it's about what you can give to others, how you can serve. We are all, both men and women, really applauded for times when you put yourself completely aside for somebody else at your own personal cost. And we will often say, like, that was amazing and that was so good, and it makes you a great person. So then at what point do you get to be great to yourself? And with all of this work, there is no clear boundary, there's no right, wrong, no black and white. It's all shades of grey. And it's why I like to defer to some other people's work that I absolutely love and respect.

Disappoint Others Before Yourself

SPEAKER_00 4:08

And today that person is the author, Glenn and Doyle. And one of my favorite quotes of hers is that your job on this planet is to disappoint everybody else before you disappoint yourself. Your job is to disappoint everybody else before you disappoint yourself. And she even shares this with her children and says, even me as your mother, you get to disappoint me before you disappoint yourself. And I think that's probably one of the most empowering things I've ever heard. It's uncomfortable, it's difficult, it's nice in theory and hard in practice. And I don't want to be simplistic about this. That doesn't mean ever you tread over other people or let other people down when you've committed to them because it, you know, you suddenly need to prioritize yourself in a way that's harmful to others. This is not what I'm saying. However, I would suggest that most of the time you harm yourself, consciously or unconsciously, in the service of others. And what we're looking for is more imperfect balance, a better understanding of yourself. So you're not going to let anybody down because you're not going to commit in the first place. You're going to hold boundaries that protect your physical health, your mental health, your emotional health as much as possible. And so all these kind of difficult scenarios we imagine don't come up very often because you're already choosing the better options for yourself right from the beginning. And guess what? People around you might not love it all the time, but they'd respect it. And even more excitingly, you start giving the people around you permission to do that for themselves. And it becomes this much healthier ecosystem in your family and in your friendship groups, and maybe even in your office of people holding boundaries so that they can be not overwhelmed, not stressed, not short-tempered, not sleeping and digesting and having, you know, terrible hormone issues because the body can only regulate all this stuff when it's given enough rest and safe space to do it.

Culture That Rewards Overwork

SPEAKER_00 6:42

I find it difficult every day in my clinical work where I'm working on people's bodies and I'm, you know, we're checking in, we're talking, and I hear all the boundaries that are being overstepped, especially when you work in a corporate environment where you are applauded for doing two people's jobs or working really long hours, you're struggling to fit everything in. So it is a cultural conditioning mind field. And this is where practicing tuning into your body, or you might want to call it your gut instinct, is really fun and it's really, really useful. If you look on my YouTube channel, I demonstrate how to do a little muscle test with your fingers. That's one example of this. I'm talking about actually fully tuning into your body to before you say a yes or a no, to see how it lands in your nervous system.

Pause Before You Answer

SPEAKER_00 7:47

So step one is just us practicing taking that space. And it might be quite a bit of space in the beginning, and then with practice, it might just be a few seconds. Practicing phrases like, can I get back to you about that? Let me think about that. So we're not immediately saying a yes or a no to requests wherever they come from. Just give me a moment to think about that. Let me check in. And the check-in isn't running through your head of can I possibly fit this in? What does it say about me if I do it? What does it say about me if I don't? And you probably won't even know that that's what your mind is doing, but it is because we all want to fit in and we all want to survive in our communities in that way. But I want you to check in with your body and notice does it soften when you think about saying yes, or does it feel tight or restrictive somewhere? Does it feel good in your body or does it not? And then if you're honest and you want to give a no to somebody, you need to be able to differentiate the discomfort of saying no when it's something that you're not used to saying or you know that that will disappoint them. But then if you're really honest, how does it feel saying no in your body? Not the actual physical no, but knowing that when you've said no, you've released yourself from that obligation. And how does that release feel? Because that's what needs to guide you, and then you can go through the discomfort of saying no, but actually what you've done is you've protected your own peace inside your nervous system. Because boundaries don't say anything about your goodness or your rightness as a person. Our brain is always running and it runs both sides, right? There's a practice I do in some of my events with people where I ask you to recall a time when your brain massively argued for something and then massively argued for the opposite. And so this is an important time to realize your brain is just a computer running all the options. It doesn't have the answer, it's just giving you lots and lots of data, and we often fall for that, the more persuasive argument. But the most persuasive argument, the most important signal will come from your body. And when you become attuned to that, it is an absolute game changer. To return to Glenn Doyle for a moment, she has set some really strong boundaries in her life. And if you haven't read her book Untamed that came out in 2020, I highly recommend it. And she says her boundary setting can be very uncomfortable for other people, and they would say, I could never do that. But of course, all of us can set a boundary.

Safety State Makes No Possible

SPEAKER_00 11:19

And to bring it back into the you are the answer chiropractic work, the reason it's so difficult sometimes is because when your nervous system is running in fight, flight, survive, you don't want to say no because it doesn't feel safe. What we need is your nervous system running in this parasympathetic, relaxed, safety state. Because that also comes with the ability and the confidence to know that you're going to be okay regardless of how that person responds. So that when you set that boundary, you feel safe enough to do it. And I had a really great mentor once who helped me figure out not just how it felt in my body, because I was kind of struggling with that as a concept, as perhaps you are now too. And he essentially said to me, if you can't say yes with the same joy as a small child feeding a duck, it's a no. Because you know that feeling, don't you? Like the absolute delight. And how much do you say yes to that you have no, not even no delight for? You already know as the yes is coming out of your mouth, it's a no in your body.

The Three Step Body Check

SPEAKER_00 12:50

So the invitation for today is the next time you feel compelled to offer something, or you're asked to do something or be somewhere, pause. Step one is pause, even creating that space and that awareness, whether or not you make the quote unquote right decision for yourself, the awareness and the space is the first step. Step two, feel into your body, whether it's using the muscle testing that you can go onto my YouTube page to see, but really just tuning in, feeling in your body what a yes feels like, what a no feels like, what feels soft and good and right versus what feels a bit icky or hard or tension. You will get to know what your own signals are. And then step three is delivering the answer that your body wants you to give rather than your brain. That's going to take time, consistency, and practice, especially if you recognize that you're already quite stressed out. So it's going to be easier for you to say yes to something you don't really want to do because you maybe don't have the capacity to hold their discomfort in you saying no. So here's the final part.

You Can Change A Yes

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Even if you make a choice and then regret it, you can go back and change it. The practice of being able to say, you know, I said yes to that, well, actually, it's going to have to be a no. Nothing is set in stone. The only thing that really matters is that you can start to see how what you say yes to and what you say no to doesn't matter nearly as much culturally, socially, as what it's doing to you internally. Because your internal nervous system, which is responsible for every aspect of your life and your health, and therefore your happiness and your quality of life, these decisions also need to be in alignment with that and honour that. Where they aren't, they are costing you much more than you believe.

Share The Show And Closing

SPEAKER_00 15:20

Thank you for joining me on You Are the Answer. If today's episode sparks something in you, share it with someone you care about and leave a review to help others find their way back to their body too. For more tools, inspiration, and resources to support your journey, head to www.uareanswer.co.uk. And until next time, stay connected, stay curious, and remember, you are the answer. And you always have that.