Discomfort does not mean you’re doing something wrong
I’ve gotten a lot better at saying no over the years, but not because it suddenly became comfortable for me.
Honestly, I think people assume that because I teach boundaries, communication, and nervous system awareness that saying no must feel easy or natural for me now. It doesn’t. At least not all the time.
One of the biggest things that changed for me over the years was realizing that discomfort does not automatically mean I’m doing something wrong.
That sounds obvious when you say it out loud, but honestly, I don’t think most women actually believe it deep down.
And I see this constantly with the women I work with, especially high-achieving women and neurodivergent women who are already hyperaware of shifts in tone, tension, mood, expectations, and relational dynamics.
A lot of women are walking around trying to prevent discomfort at all costs.
Not just their own discomfort, but everyone else’s too.
So when you finally start saying no, setting limits, asking for what you need, speaking more directly, or even just taking up a little more space, it can feel physically uncomfortable.
Not metaphorically. Literally physically uncomfortable.
Your chest tightens.
Your thoughts spiral.
You overthink the interaction.
You start questioning whether you were too harsh, too much, too selfish, too direct.
And if someone pushes back? Forget it. Now your brain is fully convinced you must have done something wrong.
But here’s what I’ve learned both personally and professionally:
Pushback does not automatically mean the boundary was wrong.
A lot of the time it simply means the people around you were more comfortable with your lack of limits than they are with your boundaries.
That’s a very different thing.
And honestly, I think this is where most women get stuck.
Not at understanding boundaries intellectually. Most women I work with already know they need better boundaries.
The hard part is tolerating the discomfort that comes after.
Because sometimes you won’t just have to say no once.
You may have to repeat yourself.
You may have to tolerate disappointment.
You may have to let someone misunderstand you temporarily.
You may have to sit through guilt without immediately fixing it by overexplaining or backing down.
That’s the real work.
And no, that does not mean becoming cold or uncaring or rigid. I think some women are afraid that if they stop over-accommodating everyone, they’ll somehow become selfish or difficult.
That’s usually not what happens.
Usually what happens is that you become less resentful, less depleted, and much more intentional.
You stop volunteering yourself automatically.
You stop saying yes before checking whether you even have the capacity.
You stop treating every other person’s emotional reaction like an emergency you’re responsible for managing.
And over time, your nervous system starts learning something really important:
Discomfort is survivable.
Someone being frustrated with you is survivable.
Someone adjusting to a new version of you is survivable.
A relationship experiencing tension or change does not automatically mean you’ve harmed someone.
I think a lot of women have spent years abandoning themselves the second discomfort enters the room because they were taught that keeping other people comfortable was part of being “good.”
But constantly overriding yourself has a cost too.
Burnout.
Resentment.
Shutdown.
Avoidance.
Anxiety.
Feeling completely disconnected from yourself.
I know that cost well, personally and professionally.
And honestly? Learning boundaries was never about becoming fearless for me.
It was learning how to stay connected to myself even when someone else was uncomfortable.
That’s very different.
If this hits home for you, pay attention to where your brain automatically interprets discomfort as danger or wrongdoing this week.
You might notice it more than you think.
And if you’re trying to figure out how to navigate this in your relationships, work, leadership, or everyday life without swinging between people-pleasing and shutting down completely, that’s exactly the work I do.
P.S. You are allowed to disappoint people occasionally without making yourself the villain for it.
