Freedom As The Result of Boundaries

When saying NO means saying YES

I am learning to have more boundaries.  I know, kind of late in the game to be acquiring this skill; better late than never.

Part of saying NO (thank you) is being able to weather the sting of turning someone down.  I have a wonderful, replete life filled with people I love, care about, and want to spend time with.  Some of the saying NO means I am choosing to be away from them.  This doesn't feel good, and I learn to live with the discomfort.  I am choosing to say "no" to one thing to say YES to another.  This feels selfish.  It is. I am learning to be SELF-ish.


I urge others to take time for themselves, to hold themselves sacred and dear.  I truly mean these words. In fact I have self care routines that can ground and prepare me for each day.  What I have been neglecting is to play.  To take classes myself, to do something where I don't have a specific defined outcome or productive result. Many things I do have an outcome: a meal, tidiness, a newsletter, an accounting report,  a class taught or a class given, a project completed.  I was craving NOTHING; meaning nothing productive, useful, or goal specific.

I needed clay.  I had to decline some wonderful friendship opportunities this past weekend. I had to say no to some otherwise really fun stuff.   I had to do this so I could sit down at the wheel with a few pounds of mud and make something for no reason.  I made pieces that I crunched up and put back into the clay bag, I made pieces that started out as one thing and became another.  I allowed myself to be a newcomer, a neophyte, a beginner and that took the (self induced) pressure off.  And the next day I needed to follow up; trim and decorate.  First time at the wheel in over a year.  I needed to do this just for myself and not for sale, a gift or to explain or teach.

Well,  I also needed a yoga class, particularly after that first day of throwing; my body was out of whack.  And rather than DO IT MYSELF; I was determined, in the name of self care, to lay down my mat in front of another teacher and to be cared for.  It was perfect.

By creating boundaries in my life I was able to find freedom: freedom to play, freedom to create and freedom to be a human BEing - rather than a human doing.  As the result of saying no AND saying yes I am refreshed.

The courage to change: from being an active addict and codependent to being a woman in recovery.  The courage to change: from a driven woman to one who can let go of the steering wheel: I wish each and everyone one of you the strength to say NO in order to say YES.

Kyczy Hawk E-RYT200, RTY500 is the author of "Yoga and the Twelve Step Path", a leader of Y12SR classes, and the creator of SOAR(tm) (Success Over Addiction and Relapse); a teacher certification training that she holds with her good friend Kent Bond E-RYT500. Find out more about her, her classes and the training at yogarecovery.com

Rejoice in Recovery

No. we are not a glum lot. That is true – together before and after meetings you can hear the chatter and the laughter. But sometimes, on my own, I forget how to have fun. Fun had been a drink …or 5, then it had stopped being pure fun, it became fun with problems and finally, then, as they say, it turned into just problems. I kept at it, hoping for at least the “fun and problems” stage – dreaming really of the illusive FUN with FUN part. When that all stopped working I had to concede that drinking was not only NOT fun, but was an illness that could kill or incapacitate me. (Funny word “incapacitate” as is kind of breaks down to “without a head” and I definitely was moving toward a head-less existence). So , back to the subject: fun, or NON-fun. I stopped drinking, started working the program, found some relaxation and entertainment in the rooms – but still – I didn’t know how to have sober fun outside of my recovery tribe. And it is important to know how to have fun; reading or riding, crocheting or climbing, sewing or singing; I needed to find a way to do something NON productive, un-important and joyful. We were talking about this at a meeting recently: “what do you do for fun?” I really had to think! I had been so busy, had filled my time so fully – I didn’t have time for FUN. That is not completely true, I did have time, I was just frittering it away with in-between things (online foolishness, reading stuff on the way to throw it away, over committing myself, cutting out time to BE). I used my “too busy” excuse to avoid making an effort to find fun things to do. As an adult child of an alcoholic I still have vestiges of that reality in the present time; I am responsible for EVERYTHING (not). If I see a pan I wash it, a smudgy floor I mop it, a dry plant I water it and I do not live alone. Not all things are mine alone to do. Step over the smudge and out the door for a walk! Put down the newspaper ads and pick up a book. Don’t darn and mend – create! Make something for fun and not because it is useful. This is one of the reasons sobriety is joyful – we can learn to play. At the meetings I learn to laugh and find silliness in life. I listen to what others do in their “free time” and I try it out for myself. Walks or waterslides, golf or galleries, movies or museums, I need to find something that pleases me and try it. Don’t make it a rule to do it “X” number of times or until thus and such a goal is reached… just sample it and try something else. Life is for living. We are not a glum lot.



Kyczy Hawk E-RYT200, RTY500 is the author of "Yoga and the Twelve Step Path" ans "Life in Bite Sized Morsels", a leader of Y12SR classes, and the creator of SOAR(tm) (Success Over Addiction and Relapse) a teacher certification training. 

Follow her ONLINE recovery infused yoga classes 
http://yogarecovery.studiolivetv.com/MemberRegistrationYR.aspx