“Don’t let them talk to you any type of way and you don’t talk to you any type of way either. See disrespect don’t start with other people’s mouth.  It starts with how you teach them yours is worth listening to.  Ever notice how someone only talks reckless when they feel safe being reckless with you?  How they only raise their voice when they know you’ll lower your standards to stay?  That’s not just communication, that’s a test of your boundaries disguised as tone. Because the moment you flinch at disrespect, the moment you let ‘They didn’t mean it,’ become your new peace treaty, you train people that you silence is cheaper than your self-worth.  You are not the vent for people who refuse to deal with their storm, you are not the verbal punching bag for people who call it ‘just how I am’.  No, let them be how they are somewhere else, by themselves, not involving you.  Check yourself too, because sometimes the harshest voice you hear is not theirs, it’s yours.  The one that tells you you’re too sensitive for wanting basic respect.  That internal monologue that excuses mistreatment because “at least they’re still here”.  Stop calling mistreatment a misunderstanding.  You’re not hard to talk to, they’re just not used to people who require accountability.  So no don’t let them talk to you any type of way, not out of habit, not out of history, not out of fear, you will be alone if you speak up. You don’t have to choose between peace and people.  Choose the kind of people who bring peace with them,” Jay Douglas. 

We’re going to launch into a series of pieces about how we treat ourselves and the impact of internal talk.  We don’t let the world determine who we are and when we have weak boundaries, the world will fill in the blanks as they see fit.  Those who support our authenticity won’t require your silence or your looking the other way at how they treat you.  Human nature is to test the limits—we are animals, after all.  We need to know where we stand with people and, frankly, who they are to us and what we can get away with.  We’ve perpetuated a hierarchical pattern in our society so we are always trying to find the pecking order and the systems we have in place bank on us knowing exactly where we stand.  The people we surround ourselves with, the appearance of our lives, all of that is a mirror of how we feel about ourselves and our true mental state.  So we need to be strong enough to go against the grain and to stand up for ourselves even in those situations where everyone else tells us not to.  The thing I hate (and I feel strongly enough that I will use hate) about this society is our ability to make an action and turn it around on other people as if we have no part in how people react/feel.  As much as we tell ourselves that we are responsible for our own actions and choices, we have to understand the reciprocal effect in that some of those actions would be elicited without provocation or a different action. 

I’ve said it a million times before and I will say it again: we do not operate in a bubble.  If someone wants to step in and disrupt peace, make us question who we are, make us feel like we are too much for expecting basic respect, that person has no business being in our lives.  I don’t need to make space for those who think my existing is taking up too much space.  Because of that, it is very clear that the way you treat me and what I ultimately decide to allow in my life, is a direct reflection of your choice in how you treat me.  And I will make that decision based on how I treat myself, what I accept for myself.  Do not be surprised if the door that used to be open is now closed and I walk the other way.  Once I learned the way I had to handle myself and what felt right, I knew that lesson needed to be applied to those around me.  The ones who cared and were in it for me, the ones we have a mutual understanding with, they get it.  The ones who make conditions on the expression of my authenticity: they’re out.  As Jay says, we don’t have to choose between peace and people.  If you are determined to take away my peace, or expect me to disrupt my peace for your sake, or if you find the disruption of my peace funny, that tells me all I need to know.  We don’t have time or space for that.  So we set the boundary and wish them well.