Workshop

Tending Boundaries

for Personal Wellbeing and Deep Collaboration

In cultivating our own boundaries, we create the possibility for resource-rich and generative communities. When members of a community have intelligent boundaries, there is clarity and purpose collectively. Boundaries help protect individuals from burnout. They create the opportunity to constructively address inter-personal issues before they become patterned. Individuals’ boundaries also support the group’s boundary--yes, groups and communities have an energy body, just as individuals do. This gives energetic support to social change organizations working to “hold the line” on political issues. Because of all of these factors, healthy individual boundaries are needed to build the collective energy necessary for systemic change.

Many people experience maintaining their boundaries as a risk. We can feel as if it is dangerous to say no in certain contexts. This sense is often the result of childhood experiences. In updating our boundaries to match our adult lives and current capacity for choice, we give ourselves the opportunity to consciously choose what we say yes and no to rather than unconsciously responding out of patterning.

You might appreciate learning a boundary practice if:

• You find yourself often unclear on what you want, or what is okay with you

• You find your own discernment can be dulled by your attunement to others’ desires or emotions

• You sense that your authentic self requires you to say no to something you have been habitually doing

• You feel you have to shield yourself in order to feel safe

• You have found your efforts toward social change, especially in working with others, have been thwarted by your tendency to overextend and burn out.

• You work in an environment in which you receive more requests than you can handle well