Hi Rick …so much good sense in what you have written. I also have flexible boundaries…more like what Glen said …that today’s ‘no I can’t help you/ be with you today’ can become a yes tomorrow…
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My own sense and spiritual experience is that I am, indeed, still connected to those I’ve had a relationship with. Perhaps I don’t feel it or ever think about it if the relationship was fleeting – a moment or a single session.
Yet, for those I’ve come to love – ever – yes, still there.
The right distance right depth has changed, for oh so many of these relationships. While I could feel sad about that, and sometimes do, it also leaves room for those who are currently close and deep with me.
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“…because it is a threat to the control they want over your life…”
Notice how people get dis-regulated when someone they feel they NEED to control is going their own way. Wow.
Right Distance Right Depth invites us to notice the people in our world and how they enhance us or, in this quote, even seek to trash what we’re guided to do and be because it contrasts with their vision of us (or what they NEED from us that they don’t feel confident they can source elsewhere).
Some people walk around NEEDING to control others. There’s a sense of safety if they have someone they can boss around. One reading of this is that in their primitive brain they NEED to feel they at least have status OVER SOMEONE!
Eeek!
It’s core to primal behaviors. It isn’t, most certainly, grounded in thriving or emotional freedom.
Giving yourself more distance and less depth (such as less sharing what matters to you with them) can free up a lot of energy that person or situation requires in order to protect our psyche (and heartistry).
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Omg this is so ridiculously on point. Thank you. What timing. This.
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I can so much relate to this.
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I was raised by someone like this - my mother. Would you believe that in my 20s I was somewhat like this too? My primitive brain was so totally unregulated that I felt like I knew what other people “should” do. I’m glad I found other ways and hope I’m not doing it anymore. Or if I am, please tell me. 
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Control = Safety
If I can control others, then I can feel safer that I can keep my own nervous system from freaking out.
Best gift I’ve given people I love is to be able to self-regulate better without them NEEDING to be different in order to SOOTHE my imbalances.
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i have been ‘puppet’ almost all my life. Indeed enjoying it. So much i ‘worshiped’ the controller in my life. its been an obligation exchange relation rather, as you speak of in the ‘People Pleasing’ workshop.
Lately since a long time i have been craving for Right distance Right depth in all the contexts that are penned throughout here in these discussions. May be my words were different and feelings/thoughts unclear and here i m finding Re-assurance and Re-affirmation and words that ‘its okay’ to want Right distance Right depth in closest of relation(my sister who has raised me since my childhood as my parents separated when i was small). But i need skills to have it flow as nicely as possible. what’s happening is m being blamed for being non-loving n non-caring etc… etc… and i know my fault, which is, i m not able to convey it correctly. i freeze. And i distance. i remain silent. i know my this attitude is unhealthy, unhelpful …but at the moment i know not better. I want to and need to Re-create my individuality…my identity. Until i learn and actually convey it healthily i’ll have to put up with blames. i love her.i care for her. but…i can’t open my mouth in front of her…lots of triggers happen simultaneously and i get in silent mode.
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Control = Safety
Yes, absolutely. Not only is this an incoming experence but out going too : by over protecting.
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“Right Depth” includes for me how much I share. There are people who perhaps I’d LIKE to share a truth with and I… go silent. I don’t speak it. I don’t share my most real and vibrant intentions.
Is that a bad thing?
I’ve decided for me it is a Good Thing. It respects me. It says that I am wise enough to recognize – often with surprising accuracy! – who I can share with where the sharing will enhance my life… and who/when/where I cannot.
It’s why I cultivate relationships with my spirit buddies. It’s why I cultivate practices like tapping out loud my truth when no one except the Divine can hear. I write in my Love Journal truths about what I most crave and perhaps just hint at them with most others. With some they are obscured, because the depth of me is not where everyone can (or wants) to go.
Remembering that during childhood, good parents will feel at times OBLIGATION is what gets them to tend when they don’t want to. I sit here this morning with the headache and want to be outside in the intense cold. Instead, I am tending to Adira so my partner can have some solitude time herself before the boy returns from his Dad today.
Unless I am truly mindful with myself, my survival brain asserts that I am obligated. And on the level of survival, I am. On the level of my heart and deep devotion, it’s “I get to be with her” and deepen our dance of life and laughter.
I can feel how often my Mom, raising two boys almost on her own would radiate “I have to…” energetically. I responded to that with my own Have-To’s of being a Good Boy, Helpful, Supportive, Strong.
Changing those kinds of ingrained dynamics benefits from tenderness and right distance right depthing. SILENCE can be deep! We can hold our tongue while at the same time feeling the depth of care we have. We can even hear someone’s distress and unmet needs come out as blaming… and remind ourselves that blame is a more primal emotion of needs not being met. Doesn’t mean we have to meet those needs… or that we’re obligated to.
Hmm. Thanks for the engagement. I am curious how this resonates with you and how you’ll refine it for your life. ~Rick
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Like Tanvi, I too sometimes freeze, distance and become silent as I’m trying to establish Right Depth and Right Distance with family members. I so appreciate your perspective that going silent can be a Good Thing that respects me! I feel so much better knowing there’s not something wrong with me and the way I’m looking for RD / RD.
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This is where disturbance feels most often- as at times i do feel depth of care and other times helplessness at inability to reply and yet other times angry at her, resentment too and then there’s worry about her wellbeing n her health. And yes, partial of these is real(gratitude) and partial is to pay back (under obligation). m on way way to discern what’s real and mine and what’s the part of layer of obligation stuck on me and needs discarding. Its so difficult to ‘experience’ gratitude when it’s seen(experienced) disguised in obligation. As you so wisely say being in primitive brain n mindful.
Part of being in primitive brain is also not being sure of myself. In the beginning of your post as you are giving assurance of not being wrong by keeping quiet; rather its respect is reassuring. I had thought i m running away by keeping quiet. which may indeed be true at primitive level. but looking at it with this your given perspective is so helping. Thank you! Thank You So Much!
"We can even hear someone’s distress and unmet needs come out as blaming… and remind ourselves that blame is a more primal emotion of needs not being met. Doesn’t mean we have to meet those needs… or that we’re obligated to. "
…YES. This is what i remind myself. it takes about 2 to 3 days to subside the concerns after each such ‘talk session’ with her, draining me.
So first thing first - and that is i have copy pasted this entire reply post of yours - to read it again n again, follow it to get more clarity, more processing and conserving my energy and stabilizing my own mood bringing tenderness as you are saying.
She really cares for me and being controlling is her style. i need to only work on my self, continue in helpful direction and lot of benefits we both sisters will reap.
Right Distance and Right Depth is first master key to it. Thank You! God bless you!
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Yes, wisdom indeed.
My primitive brain is repulsed by obligation energy. Its knee-jerk reaction is to avoid and withdraw and get away.
If I am able (with practice, discernment, and diligence) return to what is MY yes, I might notice that 95% of what someone fantasizes I am obligated to do, that I should do, even that I must do to be a good person is… what I’d do by full and free choice 95% of the time!
Now, yeah, with some people I might only gladly do 10%. Or 0%. Yet for people actually in my life, who I care about, who in their fear or upbringing or strategy to get their needs met might use a bit of guilt and obligation, I don’t actually CHOOSE to run from them or be repulsed!
Starts within, tuning to what my YES is. It starts to come out, “Well, what WOULD be a YES for me is…”.
Then there may, someday, be a point where we’re so clear and loving for us both when we say something like, “Love you sister. And I’ve discovered I am allergic to 'have-to’s and ‘should’s’. Would you be kind enough to restate what you just asked with “Would you be willing to…?” and even leave room enough for me to say no? If not, that’s okay. I do know you love me even if your style doesn’t always convey that to my heart.”
Tee-hee. Gotta wonder what the world would be like if there was more of that kind of asking and allowing…
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Yes…yes…yes…exactly that’s the thing. i want to do BUT from my free will without pressure.
this is needed badly for ‘tenderness’ which you mentioned earlier, is what i think i have been wanting too in Right Distance Right Depth (writing this line i had picture of rubbing soothing ointment on my wound)
So much conflict within me and you can sense it so well.
Diligence. thanks for this word. This is relatable word. In fact its great. You are great. I had been telling self to get disciplined but the word discipline itself throws me off. But diligent i am and that’s enough when add practice n discernment to it. You are simply a great empathetic coach. And this is a great community.
Continuing the workshop ‘No is the freedom word’ is going to help to put me on trail to find my YESes
I m literally waiting for the day when i can have such ‘open’ conversations with my sister as you are describing. great vision you have affirmed for me to keep in mind.
I think the world will be like the ‘heaven’ described in the book ‘Jonathan Livingston Seagull’ 
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(My computer generated this – it’s one of my favorite books for sure!)
Thank you for the reflections. It matters to me to be useful.
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Time for me to re read the book.
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!!! How did you get your computer to generate that painting??? It has a skill with watercolor!!!
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It’s an interface with Stable Diffusion through my note-taking app. There are some amazing potentials for expressing ourselves and inspiring through these tools. Going DEEPER, getting CLOSER. (Right Distance Right Depth).
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What I refer to as “Right Depth” means that the deeper the intimacy, the more access and engagement a person has with what is our deepest nature, that which is innermost and essential.
Is there any wonder that if someone is intimately deep that the repercussions of unsafety, disrespect, and a controlling attitude are Impactful.
We can feel this. And it makes us anxious – even panicked.
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https://twitter.com/icreatelife/status/1766178768354210241
Personal, what to do if someone doesn’t treat you well.
When I was a kid I went to theatre studio because I was very shy and thought it would help me. I was nerdy, a bookworm and not particularly fun person as a kid, so by the end of my first term in the studio I was bullied heavily and I decided to quit. I loved theatre classes so much but I hated breaks and times when kids could pick on me and I honestly didn’t know what to do because, first, I was too young to be emotionally mature enough to be diplomatic and make connections and second, I was too shy.
One day the teacher took me to the side and his advice helped me and keeps helping me. “Look at those people who support you, who’s kind to you and become friends with them”. I remember looking at the room full of kids and in my head every single one disliked me. But then I looked closely. There was a girl named Tanya who was shy and she would always say “hello” and “bye”. So next time I stood next to her and we had a short conversation. Now it was two of us and kids left us alone because Tanya was a bit more vocal than me and when they’d try to bully me she would say something and it was usually smart, she’d turn it into a joke. I’d learn from her. We’re still friends.
So finding kind people, and there’re so many of those in our community and connecting with them. From the day I started here that’s what I did. That’s how this community grew and that’s why there’re so many kind people.
Wishing you a great weekend ahead. ~Kris
(She is one of my favorite humans… @RickThrivingNow )
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