Addressing our boundaries is not enough. Owning the woman we are asks us to take a step further into sacred Sovereignty.
First, let me ask you, have you thought about your personal boundaries? How you manage your resources like time, space (physical, personal, psychic), energy, and money?
Many years ago I had never heard of or thought about the word boundaries. It wasn’t a regular topic on Instagram feeds or conversation amongst my female friends like it is today. Eventually I woke up to the serious boundary issues I had in my life and the consequences they had on me. I struggled to say no when I meant no. My work-life balance both of time and mental space was nonexistent which meant that I was constantly doing work or thinking about it. My value and worth was entirely intertwined with my work and academic achievements and validation from co-workers. I always took 3 am phone calls from friends in crisis regardless of whether I needed to get up early the next morning. I shoved down my feelings and my sharing with others to be with their feelings and their sharing.
The first layer of turning my boat around was recognizing that I had a boundary issue in the first place. If you find yourself in my story above, it’s like you have challenges with boundaries as well. This matters because when we struggle to manage our boundaries, or even consider them we deplete our system physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.
Want to talk about boundaries? I empower women to shift their dynamic with boundaries so they can truly honor themselves. Schedule a free consultation with me HERE.
Boundaries is where most people stop. This is where much of the conversation around self-care hovers. While this addresses some of our “bleeding out resources” problem it doesn’t address the deeper root: Sovereignty.
I'm obsessed with this word these days. It feels like THE ISSUE for women. I’m currently studying the way of the women of Avalon (more on this maybe in the future). The path teaches that The Path to womanhood is seeking sovereignty with a capital S. Jhenah Telyndru, a scholar of Avalon, says that as women, to seek OUR holy grail in this lifetime is to restore our inner Sovereignty “that essence of fully conscious self-determination -- and to acknowledge the Goddess within.”
Ok. Just sit with that for a moment.
What if, your life was entirely about conscious self-determination and realizing that you are the Goddess. The essential creative life force energy fueling all things. The Great Mystery. Intuition. Soul of the World. The Great Mother. Yes You.
She goes on to say “as we embark upon this quest for wholeness we gather the scattered parts of ourselves.” All the places where we left ourselves behind. These are the moments we abandoned our feelings and body because it was easier than staying present with them. The moments we choked down our truth because it felt easier than saying what truly wanted to be said. The people we ignored our inner instinctive feelings about.
A couple of months ago I was teaching about sovereignty in a yoga class and some of the students looked perplexed. Puzzled one of them admitted, "I've only ever heard that word used for God." I smiled to myself. Hello Goddess.
Of course we've only used this for "God." For a masculine, overlord power outside of ourselves, that we are beholden to. Nation states are perhaps not that different given that most of them are led by men. But the real meat to the issue here is that sovereignty is a whole different ball game from boundaries. Because when we start to explore Sovereignty we start to acknowledge our Divinity.
When we talk about boundaries, we talk about drawing lines. Outside of ourselves. When we shift the boundary conversation to fortification versus protection boundaries, we're getting closer. In the practice of boundaries, we learn how to say no. Give ourselves permission to start honoring ourselves. Sovereignty is greater, more expensive, more cellular level state-of-beinghood. It's about being whole, solid, integrated, powerful, majestic, and divine, in and of ourselves.
Sovereignty is to LIVE our Divinity. Every day.
In the mundane moments and in the extra ordinary. We recognize, see, honor, own, our Divinity.
Imagine a woman is a nation state in and of herself. She is able to develop her own set of rules. Seek her own inner council. Gather her own table of experts. Know what is her's and what is not her's and give it back. Stand in her full right and power. Govern her own course, direction, and path. What would this look like? What would have to change? To start she would need to:
Seek answers from within first and only incorporates outside council that aligns with what she already Knows.
Create supportive boundaries inside herself. Not allowing her own negative self-talk to bully her. It's not all about the outside haters and toxic relationships. Most often, we ARE our own biggest toxic relationship. Yikes!
Identify beliefs, stories, and narratives that are not her own and born from social conditioning, family, loved ones, friends, and beyond.
Be impeccable with what information she floods her system with. Music, movies, social media, books, you name it. This isn't about not having fun. It's about deciding what information goes into our system and acknowledging that it shapes us. When we don't do this it's easy to fall into comparison, jealousy, and worthiness questions. Because as women we are conditioned to already have many layers that batter our self-esteem, we don't need to contribute to it. We need to peel off the layers of it. To start, anything that makes us feel off, unaligned, or fuels negative self-talk, is unfollowed, put away, and pushed pause on until further notice. Because we are sovereign, we can always go back and change what information goes in at any time.
Honor her imagination and dreams as a child sharing their most precious gift. This means, as Wayne Dwyer suggests, you build an imaginary fence around your own imagination and dreams so that other people's fears, limiting beliefs, and opinions that could turn you off in a different direction are kept out. Protect that stuff! It's sacred!
Prioritize meditation and tuning in every single day ABOVE EVERYTHING ELSE. Yes. This is up there with water and food. Move this to the first level of your hierarchy of needs pyramid because it's level 1 basic. Even just 5 minutes of regularly tuning in when you first wake up can make a HUGE difference.
For this week’s Joy Tip Wednesday, I’m inviting us to take our practice a step further beyond boundaries to Sacred Sovereignty.
From reaction to proactive. From proactive to a way of being. Sovereignty to me is the way of being. To uncover our Truths, our gifts, our magic, our wisdom, and our potential and then freaking live it.