Category: Healthy Boundaries

The problem with Reels/Shorts/Tik-Toks is the same problem as bringing the whole bag of cookies/chips with you to the couch… one by one they feel so small… so harmless… a few mere calories in your thousands of calories budget…

…Altogether, however, it turns out to be very much the opposite of that.

The illusion of the mini dose is, “What’s one more gonna hurt?” …It’s only a few seconds / few calories out from your day/ my diet… When in reality, one more turns into another one and another one until it’s way more than just one more.

…A few hours and several hundred calories out from your day/ diet.

This is why we don’t bring the whole bag of cookies with us to the couch; we eat a deliberate and mindful portion.

It’s also why I intentionally avoid opening the “bag” of Reels/Shorts/Tik-Toks when I’m on the couch or unwinding on my phone…

And instead, will watch more medium to long-form content on YouTube… things that are portioned, deliberate, and have actual, identifiable conclusions.

It’s choosing to eat a slice of apple pie versus choosing to eat from a bottomless bag of Doritos or Oreos.

…And it is making all the difference.

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Inner work prompt: How can you switch from bottomless bag to one slice in your life?

Every stimulus begs a response.

• Your phone rings from every call—and “likely spam” is your bff. You must decide if you’ll look, not look, answer, or ignore—every time.
• An app sends a notification. You must decide if you’ll clear it, check it (and likely go down the rabbit hole), or ignore it (and wonder about it on and off until you check it).
• A company emails you about a sale. You must decide if you’ll read it, click it, trash it, or ignore it.
• A friend asks you to do something you don’t want to. You must decide if you’ll say yes, say no, or come up with some kind of excuse or delay.
• The social media accounts you follow show hyper fit and popular people doing incredible and hilarious things that make you feel bad about yourself. You must decide if you’ll leave it and keep opening and scrolling, if you’ll unfollow/mute/block, or if you’ll ignore.

It’s one thing to work really hard to train your responses. To understand that the gap between stimulus and response is your destiny. To learn to control anger, to calm yourself after getting triggered, to manage your impulses to indulge, to have the confidence to stand up for yourself, to teach yourself to love yourself and not compare yourself to others…

…And it’s a whole ‘nother thing to design your lifestyle in a way that those types of stimuli that illicit those types of undesirable responses don’t even exist.

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P.s. If you enjoy getting these types of morning stimuli, you can support my future work by filling up my cup with that hot, brown goodness here.

Boundaries are the walls of your cup that allow you to keep precious energy in.

No boundaries, no walls; no walls, no way to keep energy in.

…And the byproduct is energy overflowing everywhere, up and out from the source of your being, and left up for grabs to whoever is willing to take it—yourself included in that fight.

Fighting for access to your own energy is no way to live.

And if, in fact, you feel like you haven’t had much energy for life, it probably isn’t so much an energy problem as it is a boundary problem. More caffeine, for example, only adds to the overflowing-up-for-grabs-energy that enters the fighting arena.

Construct walls around your energy.

Build up the outer perimeter of your cup.

And stop leaving your life source up for grabs.

Serve yourself a fine cup of that tasty, juicy life energy first and foremost and deliberately choose who you’d like to serve the rest to, second.

This is the way.

The opposite only gives life to the ones who usually deserve it the least—the takers, the manipulators, the narcissists, etc.

Starve them of your life energy and let the source of their power slowly die.

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P.s. I also published: The Ultimate Boundary Builder List – 101 Quotes On Boundaries To Take You From Zero to Boundary Hero

I’m writing an article for MoveMe Quotes on boundaries that I plan on publishing this weekend.

One of my favorite lines that I’ve read so far is: “Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.”

A lot of people feel bad about boundaries… They have a hard time saying “no…” They don’t want to let others down or make them upset or disappointed.

But the truth of the matter is that boundaries are an expression of love—not hate.

And when you draw a boundary that allows you to better prioritize yourself—and your own time/energy/attention—it’s an expression of self-love.

…Because it’s precisely how you fill yourself up so you can better give love.

And anyone who has a problem with that (except maybe children/dependents who require some additional strategizing)… is precisely the type of person who you need to draw a boundary to.

…You’re not letting anyone down.

…There’s nothing to feel bad about.

…You’re not a disappointment.

You’re creating the line that allows you to BETTER LOVE them AND you simultaneously.

Really soak this one in… Because if you keep allowing them to cross your boundaries and suck the life from you… soon there won’t be any life—or love—left for you to give.

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P.s. You can read my complete collection of 150+ quotes on boundaries that I’ll be making the article from here.

Recently, an advisory was issued by the US Surgeon General on the potential dangers of social media for children, highlighting its negative impact on mental health and overall well-being. One key highlight was how:

“Children and adolescents who spend more than 3 hours a day on social media face double the risk of mental health problems including experiencing symptoms of depression and anxiety. This is concerning as a recent survey showed that teenagers spend an average of 3.5 hours a day on social media.”

Couple this with my post yesterday about how advancements in AI led to a 24% increase in time spent on Instagram in quarter 1 of this year… and how that’s only the beginning of what continued advancements will lead to… and you can see how we’re on the cusp of a worsening crisis.

To be clear, I’m not anti-social-media. But, I’m definitely anti-too-much-social-media.

Self-discipline is a hard earned skill, one that most grown adults haven’t fully developed. Assuming kids and teens will be able to discipline themselves is naive. We need to lead the disciplined charge and help initiate forces that push in the opposite direction of screens.

Having strong screen boundaries set—that’s applicable to the whole family—can help (e.g. family dinner time, 1-hour before bed, while outside, etc).

Getting them involved in reality-based activities that make them forget about social media can help (e.g. martial arts, sports, art classes, etc).

And using your unique influence and access can definitely help (plenty of ideas at the bottom of the advisory here).

My intention writing to you today is to call upon that help so we all can better help our next generation. They already need it.

I recently came across an article where Meta bragged that improvements in their AI recommendations led to a 24% increase in time spent on Instagram in the January – March quarter of this year.

…And we’re just at the tip of the AI Iceberg.

Imagine what continued updates, upgrades, and refinements will do to that number in the very near future…

It’s scary to think how that number may very well only go up.

Which is why, it’s more important than ever to build better habits when it comes to social media use.

If it’s true that soon our feeds are going to be so damn good at showing us content that it keeps us on the platforms 24%, 50%, 150%(?!) longer—we need to become damn better at not logging in at all.

It’s rarely ever that I close out a social media app after having unconsciously binged for way too long and don’t immediately regret opening it in the first place.

And on the flip side, it’s rarely ever that I don’t smile with pride when I see my average daily screen time numbers go down at the end of a week.

To be fair, there is certainly some good that may come from getting better content fed into our timelines. And if we’re mindful and deliberate, we may even be able to curate a feed that’s constructive for our lives.

My only fear is that we’ll become so addicted to them that we won’t be able to digest that content, formulate our own thoughts around it, or free ourselves from the impossible grips of its advanced tailored-specifically-for-you, highly stimulating, dopamine-triggering, never-ending, constantly-refreshing feed of content gold.

Proceed with caution.