Exploring My Boundaries – Hard Work With Intuition Equals Success
Hi Musers, and welcome to my latest post, exploring my boundaries. I hope you all had a great weekend. I had fun watching the Eurovision Song Contest, and while I did not like the winning song at all it was still a good night with some great performances. There was a bit of additional interest due to the Dutch performer being disqualified after an incident with a camera person during the dress rehearsal. The camera person said the performer was being intimidating / threatening and the performer stated that his desire not to be filmed at that moment was not being respected.
Honestly, I’m not sure why the performer would expect to be able to not being filmed as this is a natural part of the event, surely as long as it’s part of the performance schedule then they need to suck it up. However, it works as it leads me to the focus of this post – exploring my boundaries. Let me start by showing you the spread and I’ll talk about the cards I drew later on.
Exploring My Boundaries As A People Pleaser
I have discovered a lot about my psychological make-up lately. Thanks to Dr Kim Sage I have discovered I have an anxious attachment style. For those who don’t know what this it:
Attachment theory—a developmental psychology concept—proposes that each and every one of us has an attachment style that developed when we were very young. The attachment style that was formed during your early relationship with your primary caregivers, and how they responded to your needs, can play a major role in how you relate to the people around you— namely close friends and romantic partners—as an adult, according to the theory.
Forbes Health
So basically, the way our primary caregivers, usually our parents, reacted to us and our needs when we were really little directly impacts how we respond in relationships all through our lives unless we make a conscious effort to understand and change it. If you’re interested in the types I encourage you to watch Dr. Sage’s video above as it’s great.
I’ll explain anxious attachment briefly as that’s my type and it has a big impact on my boundaries. People with anxious attachment have a deep-seated fear of abandonment and will often be very clingy in relationships. In their heart, despite all evidence and reassurance to the contrary, they think the people they live will leave them. They struggle with their self-esteem and they are hyper-vigilant. They will constantly scan the emotional energy of a room and they can only be ok when everyone else is ok.
So, naturally, anxious attachment people are innate people-pleasers as a way of encouraging their loved ones to stay with them. They find it very hard to say no and feel guilty if they are not constantly doing things for others or even worse, needing help! Believe me folks, look up this description in a book and you’ll find a picture of me right next to it!
My Trauma Personality
In another video that I wrote a post about, I learned that most people who experience trauma in childhood find their natural personality replaced with a trauma personality that protects them. Mine is the doer personality. I have all my self-esteem tied up with what I achieve. To-do lists, passing exams, excelling at work, mastering a new hobby, appearing capable and valuable to others.
If I’m not doing something for someone or doing something that will make them admire me then why would anyone ever choose to be with me?? What value do I have to others, to the world?
I’m sure you can realise that an anxious attachment style combined with a doer personality means that I really struggle to maintain boundaries. I worry if I don’t do things for others or achieve anything for me then they’ll see me as worthless and not want to be around me anymore. Now obviously this isn’t the case. I know that this is my trauma speaking but seriously, knowing something and believing it deep, deep down are two very different things.
The Cards
So, for all the reasons above I was very excited when I reached this spread in the book. I want to explore my boundaries and see where I am doing ok because naturally I have some boundaries, just not as many as I should and they’re probably further back than most people without an anxious attachment style would have.
I tried to think about which of my decks would be good for boundaries and after a lot of thought I decided on Tarot of Sacred Kingdoms. I’m going a bit deeper into my kind so that dark palette seemed really appropriate. However, there are elements of light which is what I am looking for. Here are the cards I drew.
My Boundaries – Eight of Pentacles. I am and always will be someone who strives to master things and I do work hard to achieve it. I don’t know who I am if I stop doing things for others and succeeding at tasks to show my worth to the world. I find it almost impossible to a) stop doing things and b) ask for help if I need it.
My boundaries allow me to maintain my own self esteem and feel like I am worthwhile and have accomplished things in my life. I am not averse to taking shortcuts but if I haven’t done the work myself I find it hard to trust the outcome or that the win can be attributed to me.
Does Not Compromise – The High Priestess. I work to achieve my goals and believe i need to do the work myself but that does not compromise my connection to my intuition. There have been various times in my life where I have had a strong flashes of intuition and I always listen to what it says. Normally it works out for me. I am naturally pretty lucky which my sister hates at times, especially when we’re playing board games!
I feel like my intuition guides me where I need to go and keeps me from the areas I don’t. I will work hard and build my success but when my intuition gives me a little short cut I am definitely willing to listen. However, I feel that intuition is a skill or a muscle like anything else and I plan to use my eight of pentacles energy to develop it.
What Are Your Boundaries?
I hope you enjoyed joining me while exploring my boundaries. Do you agree with my reading or do you take something else from it entirely? If so, or if you’ve tried this spread yourself, please let me know. Look after yourselves until next time xx
