09 230824 Toxic Workplaces and Taking Work Home

Meredith Holley38min

Megan Goering Mellin

00:03

Today we're going to talk directly about toxic work environments and taking work home, we will explore the possibility to set boundaries with our inner dialogue and our own inner expectations, especially in those situations where we find more taking work home, literally or figuratively. And we'd ultimately rather not. Meredith, we have talked a bit about more than a bit about boundaries, setting and setting expectations and maintaining them with other people. But today, we are talking about setting boundaries with ourselves. What does that mean? What does it mean to set inner boundaries? And how does this work? When do we need to do this?

Meredith Holley

00:45

So I think about it as our brains think thoughts like our hearts, pump blood, our brains are just thinking thoughts and thinking thoughts all day long. They're offering us this thought that thought, and those thoughts are not us. But most of us have not been taught how to attach to one thought, and then set a boundary with another thought. A lot of times when people tell people, he's always telling me that I'm overthinking things, or I'm thinking things through too much. And I always thought, well, this is how much my brain thinks. So I don't make it not do that. I don't even know what that means. But what they meant was I was attaching to and negotiating with ideas that didn't have an answer. And that just led to back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And like ruminating and perseverating, on issues that I wasn't solving. So later, I learned how to set better boundaries with my inner dialogue and with my thoughts, so that now my brain may still offer me thoughts, like you suck, everyone hates you. And then I say, Oh, we don't talk like that here. In my mind. Like, that's not what we do. So it's like somebody coming into your house, like our thoughts are like somebody coming into your house or houses. And if they are not conforming with the rules of the house, you can ask them to leave, it doesn't mean that they don't show up at the door the next day. But the next day, you also remember, hmm, this person didn't take their shoes off at the entrance, they like left the toilet seat up, whatever they they shouted at my neighbor, they are not following the rules of the house. So we invite them to leave. And with thoughts, it's similar. So if a thought like, everybody hates you comes up. Now in my mind, I'm like, that's not a thought that we choose here. That's not welcome in this space. It's not that it doesn't ever show up again. But we can kind of let it go in in terms of taking work home. But I see a lot of people who are experiencing, what I see a lot of with people who are experiencing toxic work environments, is that either they're literally feeling forced to take work into their private life, or they leave work. But basically the workplace comes with them in their mind. And we're still ruminating about problems that we had, we're still trying to think about what we should have said to the person who criticized us, we're still basically taking the workplace home, in our minds.

Megan Goering Mellin

03:16

I love this so much. So part of what you're saying here in terms of setting boundaries with your thinking, you're not saying we should be like expert meditators and just become free from the cycles of thinking completely, which is not really what meditation is, but it's kind of how it gets twisted a little bit. It's not mind over matter, it's not suppressed the thoughts or rise above them. What you're saying is if your brain is intervening again, and again, with you with unhelpful stuff, this could be your inner critic, it could be self sabotage, it could be stuff that feels like that imposter syndrome type of dialogue that we got into earlier, that you get to also be in intentional dialogue with those thoughts. And you can say things like, actually, we don't do that here and almost redirect the thinking by choice.

Meredith Holley

04:04

Yeah, I think so. And you know, I will say that this kind of concept is a commonly abused concept and colts for example. And so if you're in a space that has like really strict expectations for you only speak positively you only you don't talk unless you have something useful to contribute. You don't ask questions, you just listen. Like if you're in a space like that this concept can feel a little dangerous because that's not a safe way to create a community. People need to be allowed to show up as themselves. And so the rules that I set in the perimeters that I recommend with people are all about who we actually are, who we want to be as people individually as ourselves and setting boundaries around. What who we do not want to be any like what are not welcome thoughts what what are up pressive ways of thinking that we've been encouraged to believe. So for example, when I was in the work environment where I was experiencing sexual harassment, my thought over and over again was, maybe I don't deserve respect. Maybe I don't deserve respect. Maybe I don't belong here. That's a thought that I would never say to a friend. And that's ultimately one of the tests, I think we can go into the tests of like how to kind of navigate setting boundaries with your inner dialogue. But one of the most important tests is what I say this to a child, would I say this to a friend? Not? Does this thought conform with my boss's expectation? Does this thought conform with my pastor's expectation, or a political leader or my husband? The test is what I say this to someone I love.

Megan Goering Mellin

05:55

I love that. You also were sharing about this idea of feeling forced to take work into your private life. And I can resonate with that so much. One of the one of the experiences I had when I was working in tech was with a housemate who was an engineer, and also just a deep delight. And a like a astute observer, an astute observer. And there was a time when I was going through all of this growth, a lot of leadership in some challenging dynamics. And I'll never forget, he sat me down one day, and he was like, I noticed something strange about you. And I was like, Oh, my God, I cannot wait to find out what it is. Yeah, he's when things are, are getting harder at work. You work harder at home. And I was like, of course, because I want to make it through. And he was close. You know, he's an engineering, I was not an engineering, but he was close enough that he he knew the political context, right. He knew like how the milieu was unfolding. And he was like, it's so she's like, I mean, I guess I hear what you're saying. But from my perspective, it would make more sense if things are getting hard if you actually just paused and waited, because sometimes that's the weather, and then you would just be waiting, and then the weather would pass. And then you could just work a normal amount, but make like a bigger impact after that. And like it wouldn't be so hard on you. And it would make it easier, like, what did you just wait it out. And I was like, Oh, what, like I just had never imagined that before. But it was pretty smart. Like, if it's September and you think the Winter's coming on because there's a cold snap, you could either do everything in the cold snap to prepare for the winter, or just check the weather and be like the cold snap will be over in three days, then we'll have a little more time before winter and do it then I think in order to do this, you kind of have to get the idea that it's important to have something after work, that does not belong to work. I don't think I used to have that. So I just wonder from you know, when you see people who are either new in their career, or they're like real go getters. And they may actually not have set a limit before with this is where work is allowed to be this is where work is not allowed to be what can be a first step for people to draw like a line in the sand or experiment with setting a first limit so that when their brain does the thing

Meredith Holley

08:13

they have had. And so you're talking about a first actual limit with WHERE DOES work live. So I will say I have a little bit of a different balance in that than a lot of people like I for a long time I was I didn't like the idea of self care, because I was like, it says that work is not self care. It says that like we, like get tortured at work. And then we care for like the sort of what it said to me. And it sounded like cheesy and stuff. But now actually, I like the concept. And the way that I think about it is what drains our energy and what recharges us. And I think that they're both that exist in like what we call a workspace and what we call a home space. I actually don't think that those two, I think for some people, it's really valuable for those two to be really different. I think for other people, it's valuable for them to have freedom to have those overlap. I don't think that it's an all or nothing question. And so I ultimately think that it's about coming back to ourselves in each moment. And what do we need in that moment. So for me, for example, I tend to work, like start my workday later. And my workday later, in part because I've worked for a long time with employees. And a lot of times they want to talk to me after work hours, but also in part because that's how I work better. So I'm more likely like if a client texts me at 10pm, I'm more likely to respond to that client because I want to and because I think it's fun. If a client texts me at 7am, I probably am not going to respond because I don't think it's fun and my brains not online yet. And so I do think that there's some indirect ways that we can tailor that individually. But ultimately, I think the question is, am I in a space where I'm intentionally using my energy to the best that I can Where am I in a space where I'm intentionally recharging my energy to the best that I can. And do I like my reasons for both.

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