Week 8, Help Yourself Help

Hi All,

Welcome back, we have talked a lot about raising your boundaries, however, it happens to be followed by a set of standards. These are your standards. Your boundaries are what you allow happening to you, but your standards are what you do.

For example, if you enter a room, and it looks messy, you think, my boundaries tell me, I am not supposed to be here with this person. S/He is a messy person, this hits your boundaries, however, if you have a standard of not living in a messy room, you clean your room before it gets messy. If you did not use to do this before, but do it now, you have raised your standards.

So now that we understands the difference between standards and boundaries. Is there any area of your life you need to raise your standards? I know in my life there are lots of places I need to raise mine.

This means that I need to become better at doing things myself. It is easy to raise your boundaries, but your standards should follow, otherwise you are a bit of hypocrite. You cannot demand too much more of your friends than you do of yourself.

In other words. your boundaries and your standards should follow each other closely. Sometimes in my life I have been guilty of demanding more of others than of myself. I thought that if I was sort of keeping up appearances, it was ok, but I did not want anyone to see how I was at home.

Now after reading the book that I am following to write these blog posts, I am finally realizing that it is important to not only be seen to live your standards but to actually do it, whether someone sees you or not. It has to do with your conscience, it also affects your subsconcious mind, if you do not live your standards all the time.

It might be better to loosen your standards if you do not manage to live by them, the standards are how you live. If you do not live by them, they are not your standards, they are what you project to your friends but not really your standards.

I have been guilty of this break with normal traditional standards of what is dinner, I have often not been able to eat dinner every day. In fact, on my income, I probably cannot make dinner 7 days a week. It is just not possible in Norway of kr 500 per week to live normally and have a breakfast. lunch and dinner every day. At least not by the standard of what is a meal. I can eat 2 pieces of bread each day, if I am lucky there will be butter on the bread on Saturday and Sunday.

But I have found that this is because I did not think of something that I could not think of. A good friend of mine told me, that it is not so expensive to eat bread if you bake it yourself. You know in Norway, to go shopping for bread, you are lucky to find anything under kr 30 (or kr 29.90), but now I have discovered a bread that can be made from a spoon of oil, 4 eggs and a pack of doug for kr. 14, so it is at least, a lot cheaper than kr 30, and even better, it last for a week, without being stale or go off. Most bread in the shop, get green growth after a few days out of the freezer.

So, can you see how raising your standards, should be linked to raising your boundaries? It means you live a life, with the same rules as you demand of your friends and people around you.

This is important. You must not demand more of your friends and family than you demand of yourself.

Happy day to all, remember, your boundaries a little looser than your standards, this is today and this weeks slogan.

All the best,
John Eide
Life Coach