Episode 218: Human Design and Boundaries
Boundaries are a set of rules that we create for how we allow others to interact with us, in the interest of self-preservation so that we feel safe, can manage our energy, and preserve our physical, mental, and emotional health.
In this episode we chat about:
What are boundaries
Why we need them
Personal anecdotes about establishing boundaries
Where our Human Design illuminates what kinds of boundaries we might want to establish
Listen to the Episode:
Mentioned in the Episode:
Episode 211: Addressing Skin Issues with Functional Nutrition and Human Design
Episode 185: Exploring Human Design Motor Centers: Root, Solar Plexus, Sacral, Heart
Episode 186: Exploring Human Design Pressure Centers: Head and Root
Episode 187: Exploring Human Design Awareness Centers: Ajna, Spleen, Solar Plexus
Episode 188: Exploring Human Design Manifestation Centers: Throat & G-Center
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Share the Episode:
“Once you establish a boundary, it feels so good, especially when it’s respected by others. But it’s also so, so, so important to ensure that you uphold it because if you don’t uphold your own boundary, you send conflicting messages, creating confusion that if you don’t uphold your own boundary, why should anyone else?”
Read the Transcript:
Hi there, and welcome back to The Live Fab Life Podcast. I'm your host, Naomi Nakamura.
Today, I want to talk about a topic that, in my observation has become a hot but necessary topic over the past couple of years – boundaries.
I think this is a good thing because more of us need to be empowered on how to handle boundaries, and Human Design and boundaries go hand-in-hand together.
To level-set, let’s talk about what are boundaries. I'm not a mental health professional, but I define boundaries as rules that we create for how we allow others to interact with us and treat us, in the interest of feeling safe, managing our energy, and preserving our physical, mental and emotional health. It’s self-preservation.
Unfortunately, we often feel necessary to establish boundaries when we find ourselves in a situation where, if there had been boundaries, they would have been violated. The need for boundaries arises when we feel unsafe, disrespected, or violated.
But establishing or even respecting boundaries is not a skill that we’re taught. It’s not something we learn in a school classroom, rather we learn it through life experiences - through our own self-development work and personal growth.
And the experience can be painful – the realization that you need to establish a boundary and then figure out how to establish it. It’s stressful – an added layer on a likely already stressful situation, especially when the person or people you need to establish the boundaries with may not have the self-awareness to understand the situation.
But once you establish a boundary, it feels so good, especially when it's respected by others. But it's also so, so, so important to ensure that you uphold it. Because if you don’t uphold your own boundary, you send conflicting messages, creating confusion that if you don’t uphold your own boundary, why should anyone else?
So, today, I want to share stories with you of my experiences with boundaries.
I’m sure that I’ve established personal and professional boundaries, way before this story, and I know I also had dozens of missed opportunities to establish boundaries, but this first particular story is my first recollection of establishing a professional boundary.
It happened about 13 or 14 years ago. I had just started with the company I currently work at but at that time, I worked in a different team with a bunch of people all of whom have since left the company - so I’m not talking about anyone that I currently work.
When I joined the company, I was on a team that was highly micromanaged. If you’ve ever worked for someone that micromanages you, then you understand the frustration, and the tension it causes. I felt on edge all the time. My stomach would literally twist and turn, and I was filled with dread driving to the office every morning. I had high anxiety and stress and would cringe every time I got a new email in my inbox or anytime my cellphone rang. It was the catalyst for me to seek therapy (which by the way, my therapist has been a past guest on the show, way back in Episode 015 on Powerful Strategies to Cope with Stress.
So, the story goes that one afternoon sitting in a conference room for a team meeting about an escalation that had happened over the weekend. And I distinctly remember our director saying that they emailed one of the managers over the weekend and that person emailed them back immediately, and that let them know that it was okay for them to continue to contact the manager after hours.
That was a lightbulb moment for me. To establish a boundary that it's not okay to be contacted after hours and on the weekend, simply, don’t respond. Don’t reply to the texts and emails, don’t listen to the voicemails, and don’t answer the phone.
I took what the director said to mean they respected an established boundary of being left alone after hours, but once they were responded to, it sent a message that that was okay to contact someone anytime they wanted.
So, I gave it a try, and guess what – it worked. I stopped responding after hours and on weekends and the boundary was respected. Because guess what – while of course, I used discernment of what just regular communication was versus what an actual emergency was, the bottom line is – the world wasn’t going to end if I didn’t respond to a message. It simply wasn’t the nature of the work we did.
As someone who was suffering from a lot of anxiety and work-life balance, this was a lightbulb moment for me – it was transformative that I was able to establish this unspoken boundary and for it to be respected.
Another story regarding boundaries I want to share is something that happened recently, probably about a month or so ago. Back in Episode 211, I shared how I’ve been battling, at the time unexplained skin issues, and I shared how I was dealing with it through the lens of Functional Nutrition and Human Design.
At that time, I only knew what I knew, and since then, I’ve learned a lot more and am on a pretty robust treatment plan.
But back then, much of what I know now was unknown and I expressed frustration about the response I’d received from some of my healthcare providers.
As I say every episode, I’m always so appreciative of you listeners – your time, your attention, and your interaction – whether through leaving comments on the Show Notes or finding me on Instagram. I always love hearing from you.
However, after this particular episode aired, I had a listener slide into my Instagram DMs. She let me know she listened to the episode, then sent me paragraphs-long advice on what I should do for my skin issues. Because she also had skin issues, didn’t receive support from her healthcare, and had to figure it out herself.
While I appreciated the outreach, I wasn’t, and still am not, open to receiving unsolicited advice.
Some of you may be thinking, “Well if you’re gonna share the details of what you’re going through, aren’t you asking for advice?”
No. I look at it this way – I’m sharing something with you. It’s your choice to consume it. While I so appreciate that you invite me into your space, it’s a choice that you make - to listen to what I have to share. That being said, my sharing it doesn’t open the door for unsolicited advice.
I thanked this listener for listening and for sharing her time, energy, and attention with me. And I thanked her taking the time to reach out. But I also said that at this time I'm not crowdsourcing medical advice. I have a healthcare team who I trust, who’s put together a treatment plan that I'm working through it.
Now, I don’t have a large audience, but I do have an audience of several thousand people. Can you imagine if I opened the doors to crowdsource advice for something like this? Can you imagine if even a fraction of several thousand people came to me, how overwhelming it would feel? Can you imagine how overwhelming it would feel for you? Because that’s how it feels – overwhelming.
So, it was vital – it was necessary - for me to establish a boundary by saying, “I appreciate your concern, and you taking the time to listen and reach out. But right now, I'm not crowdsourcing medical advice.”
Well, it was not received well.
Listen, I understand, I get it, but at the same time again, this is a boundary that I needed to set, and I don't regret setting it. But this is a good example of what can happen when we set boundaries and why it's so difficult to do - and why we can feel hesitant to set them because of the reaction of the other person now. Because if the person or people you’re setting a boundary with doesn’t have a lot of awareness of themselves or understand why someone sets boundaries, it’s likely not going to be well-received.
The response I got when I set this boundary was that my show sucks and I know nothing about Human Design and they announced that they were unsubscribing.
And that’s okay because although it was unpleasant and uncomfortable, I didn’t take it personally. I am not for everyone and if I’m not for you, I’d rather you spend your time and energy with someone who is for you.
And at the end of the day, I know that this boundary is so necessary for me right now while I’m on this healing journey. It's my way of self-preservation to protect not only my mental health but my physical and emotional health as well.
We can’t control how someone else might respond to our boundaries, but we can feel assured that when we set them, we’re taking a self-leadership role in practicing self-care.
And this is a perspective that I’ve grown into. Many years ago, actually, not even many years ago, just a few years ago, this would not have been my response. But I credit among many things, having the perspective of Human Design.
I have no idea what this person's design is, but what if they have an Emotional Authority and we’re going through an emotional wave when they received my response? Or what if this person was a Projector who didn’t wait for an invitation, and as a result, felt bitterness.
Now, other listeners have reached out on Instagram, sending messages like, “Hey, I listened to the episode. I'm so sorry, that you're going through this. And I don't want to give you unwanted advice, so feel free to just disregard the rest of this message, but I experienced something similar and it turned out my skin issues were happening because of a pretty obscure reason. So if that's something you want to hear about, I'm happy to share it with you.”
I so appreciated that. While I wasn’t crowdsourcing medical information from anyone, I appreciated that they listened, they cared, that they could relate because they experienced a similar situation but also that they assumed that I had a boundary and respected it.
So, you’re probably waiting for me to shed light on how Human Design can help us understand how we can recognize where we may need to establish boundaries.
But before I do, I just want to finish my thought with a third story, related to the one I just shared about my skin issues. This situation has been going on for almost eight months now and there have been so many ups and downs, so many highs and lows. It’s been a rollercoaster and truthfully – it's been overwhelming.
So, not only was I not crowdsourcing advice from strangers on the internet, but I’m also, still, not crowdsourcing information from my own personal community - from my own very close friends and family, some of whom are medical professionals and healthcare professionals, who know a lot more than me.
They would check in to see how things are were going, and then start to ask if I’ve considered this, or if I’ve considered that.
I finally had to say, “I so appreciate you checking in and your concern. And this could very well be those things you’re thinking, but I’m so overwhelmed right now that I just cannot take the stress and the pressure of entertaining more possibilities. I need to see through what I'm focusing on right now. And if it doesn't work out, I will come back to you and maybe pick your brain and see what else your thought might be. But right now, I need to focus on what I'm focusing on.”
I’ve really had to practice self-preservation and that's what boundaries are – a way to protect our mental, emotional, and physical health, as well as our energy.
So, what does Human Design have to do with boundaries?
Well, back in Episodes 185-188, I spent those four episodes exploring the different energy centers on the Human Design body graph chart.
I know I’ve said repeatedly that the foundation of Human Design is our Type, Strategy, and Authority, but if you want to take a layered look and really dive deep into your design, look at your energy centers. Because, your energy centers are what determine your Type, Strategy, and Authority.
For those of you familiar with Functional Nutrition, this is how you can practice root cause resolution in Human Design – look at your nine energy centers.
The energy centers that are shaded in on your Human Design chart are what we call defined centers.
Your defined centers are where your energy is fixed and consistent. You always carry – emanate - the energy of your defined centers. It’s where you’re influential - where you can influence others.
I have a defined Throat Center, which means that I have a fixed way of speaking. I'm very consistent in my voice, and my voice can influence others.
Your energy centers that aren’t shaded in are your undefined or open energy centers. This means that you experience the energy of those undefined or open centers inconsistently. It’s where you are vulnerable to absorbing the energy of your undefined or open centers from those who are around you. You are prone to be influenced in these areas. So perhaps, these areas are where you might need to establish boundaries.
For example, the Solar Plexus Center is the center of emotions. My Solar Plexus center is undefined so I’m vulnerable to being influenced by other people’s emotions because I don’t experience the energy of this center consistently.
If I’m around someone who’s highly emotional, who might be in an emotional wave, I may take on those same emotions and get worked up even though the emotions aren’t necessarily mine.
Another example is the Sacral Center. The Sacral Center is about lifeforce energy. In fact, if this center is defined, it automatically makes someone either a Generator or a Manifesting Generator – people who we tend to think of as little Energizer Bunnies who can get a lot of things done.
As someone with an undefined Sacral Center, I need to be careful around those who have the Sacral Center defined. I can pick up their amplified Sacral energy and try to keep going, going, going.
In fact, I did an episode on this very topic - Episode 189 where I talked about being a Projector who lived my life surrounded by Generators and Manifesting Generators. My immediate family, my extended family, my closest friends in my formative years. So, I spent many years being conditioned to operate as if I had a defined Sacral Center - always the busy bee, always on-the-go, rarely resting or taking breaks. It’s no wonder I’ve struggled with burnout so many times in my life.
People with a defined Sacral Center also can self-regulate because they know when enough is enough. Having an undefined Sacral Center, I happen to struggle with self-regulation because I don’t know when enough is enough. Perhaps that’s why I overtrained – because I couldn’t self-regulate when my body had enough exercise and when I crossed the threshold of doing too much exercise.
So, this is how our Human Design energy centers can help us identify, where might we need to set boundaries in our life.
As I said, boundaries aren’t easy – they can be very hard to establish because usually when we realize we need to establish them, we're already not in a great place or situation. I’ve found it’s even harder to establish boundaries with people who are closest to us.
Last year, I had a situation where I was being taken advantage of by someone who was very, close to me. I love this person dearly and I've always tried my best to be supportive of this person. But I felt that it wasn’t reciprocated.
In dealing with my own personal challenges, it got to the point where I didn't have the capacity to be able to take care of myself and show up for this person too, especially when I knew that the support wasn't being returned, or respected, or appreciated.
So, I went about establishing a boundary - admittedly not in the best way and it was not well received. It didn’t turn out well, and it’s still not well. I’ve agonized about this situation - agonized about the damaged the relationship versus practicing self-preservation and doing what I needed to do to protect myself. I say that because I know that if I had tried to be more direct in establishing the boundary it would not have gone down well because this person wasn’t in the best place to be receptive to it.
But I agonize because part of me knew that my Undefined Emotional (aka Solar Plexus) center was reverting to practicing emotional avoidance in an unhealthy way, in the way I went about establishing this boundary.
But at the same time, I can't say that it would have been better if I had been direct. As I said, I've agonized over this. I've spent sessions talking about this with my therapist. And what we concluded was that based upon what’s happened, it wouldn't have mattered if I tried to establish it in any other way - the outcome would likely have been the same.
I just share this with you because I don't think we get to a place where it’s easy, and no big deal to establish a boundary. Each situation with each person will be unique because we’re all unique.
And we can expect that we’re going to misstep along the way, but at the end of the day, in my opinion, if you feel that you’re moving into an unsafe place that jeopardizes your health and well-being, then the boundary needed to be established.
Next week, we’re going to explore ways to better establish boundaries.
I’m going to be joined by a friend of mine who has more experience and more insight into establishing boundaries and has taught workshops and worked with others in helping them to learn how to do so. I’m really excited to bring that episode to you.
Now, if you’re not yet familiar with your Human Design, or if you have your chart but you're not that familiar with the energy centers, download my free workbook, called “Your Human Design, Discovered.” It'll walk you through how to find your Human Design chart if you don't yet already have it, and then it walks you through every energy center and what it represents, helping you get some insight into what boundaries you may need to establish.
If you want to go a step further and get more insight into those energy centers, I invite you to schedule a reading with me. Readings are offered in three ways – they can simply be a prepared PDF summary of your chart that I email to you. It can be the PDF accompanied by an audio recording of me going through your design. Or, we can get on a Zoom call and have direct one-on-one interaction where we can review your design and have a back-and-forth conversation on it.
You can find all the details website and I’ll also include direct links in the show notes for this episode which is at www.livefablife.com/218 for Episode 218.
I hope this sheds some light on how Human Design can help you establish boundaries and join me next week as we get expert tips on how to best go about establishing them.
As always, thank you so much for listening. I always appreciate your time, your energy, and your attention and always welcome your interaction – if it’s in a way that doesn't violate my boundaries.
See you next time! Bye!
Naomi Nakamura is a Health x Human Design coach who’s creating a healthier society through aligned energy.
She blends a bespoke mix of Functional Nutrition and Human Design to help others shift into alignment to leverage and correctly manage their energy to support their body, mind, and spirit.
She believes that when we embrace our authenticity and lean into our bio-individuality, we naturally live a life of freedom, empowerment, and optimal health.
Naomi resides in the San Francisco Bay Area and can often be found exploring the area with her puppy girl, Coco Pop!
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