Personal Check In: I was born and raised in Los Angeles. My entire family still lives there. Close beloveds are displaced from their homes with their children. It’s been a heavy week with the Southern California fires, and my heart is tender. I appreciate all the prayers and resources I’ve seen flow to my beautiful hometown these last few days.
I’ve also been reflecting on how the close of 2024 guided me into an unexpected recalibration of boundaries. The last six to eight weeks of the year unfolded as a season of discovery, not because I set out with an intention to redefine anything, but because life itself invited me to. The recalibration emerged from being more present with myself, a practice that’s been unfolding with grace and discomfort in equal measure.
In this season of deepening connection with myself, I’ve confronted the pattern of pretending to be okay with things I wasn’t, molding myself into what others want—all to keep certain people close. This avoidance robbed me of true vulnerability, of asking for what I need and want, and allowing others to meet me in that truth.
This is tender work, especially in my closest relationships. Professionally, I’ve cultivated strong boundaries over the past decade. It was time for a deeper octave of truth-bearing in my inner-circle interpersonal relationships. In my twenties, disordered boundaries were my default, leading to the burnout that brought me to my knees in 2014. In my thirties, after recovering from burnout and learning its source, I got it together professionally and built Soil and Shadow. My thirties were also a bootcamp for revealing my personal boundary challenges through stressful times - a 4.5 year fertility journey, two pregnancies, and giving birth/raising a toddler during a pandemic. Humbling times!
I’m looking forward to my forties being a time of implementing what I’ve learned about boundaries in my personal life in new ways, with my family of origin, my husband, my children, and my best friends. I’m excited for the grace and clarity I have in my professional life to overflow into my personal life.
Increased vulnerability has been my companion lately—a new and sometimes uncomfortable one. I’ve had a pattern of automatically tying vulnerability to discomfort, unnecessarily so. Vulnerability feels raw, yes, but it’s also the birthplace of connection and authenticity. The less I resist it, the more I’m discovering ease.
The other night, I asked my husband to put down his phone and rub my shoulders. It was hard to ask. It was vulnerable to 1) acknowledge I wanted touch, 2) acknowledge my fear of potential rejection and hurt feelings if I asked for touch, and 3) ask for touch and breath into what happened. Spoiler alert - he rubbed my shoulders and it was fine! But man, I was shocked by the strength of emotion I felt in such a small ask, from the person I know most deeply. I’m in new territory. I’m so excited by the gems it’s already producing in my capacity for connection and joy.
The end of 2024 was also a time of intellectual nourishment. I immersed myself in books that deepened my understanding of trauma-informed leadership and evidence-based strategies to support women leaders and teams. So much comes up in my coaching sessions - codependent tendencies showing up in supervisory relationships; relationship attachment styles rearing their heads in leadership conflicts; core beliefs, formed in childhood, influencing a leader’s risk tolerance. I’m excited about what I’ve learned the last few weeks, and how it will allow me to better support our coaching clients.
Here’s my reading list from the last few weeks:
ADHD 2.0: New Science and Essential Strategies for Thriving with Distraction--from Childhood through Adulthood by Edward M. Hallowell M.D. and John J. Ratey M.D.
Too Much: A Guide to Breaking the Cycle of High Functioning Codependency by Terri Cole
Codependent No More: How to Stop Controlling Others and Start Caring for Yourself by Melody Beattie
Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson, PsyD
Mother Hunger: How Adult Daughters Can Understand and Heal from Lost Nurturance, Protection, and Guidance by Kelly McDaniel
Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find--and Keep--Love by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller
Set Boundaries, Find Peace: A Guide to Reclaiming Yourself by Nedra Glover Tawwab
The Relationship Cure: A 5 Step Guide to Strengthening Your Marriage, Family, and Friendships by John Gottman, PhD and Joan De Claire
Fight Right: How Successful Couples Turn Conflict Into Connection by Julie Schwartz Gottman, PhD and John Gottman, PhD
Here are a few takeaways:
The connections between attachment styles—secure, avoidant, anxious—and conflict styles—validating, avoidant, volatile—are striking. It’s not a perfect overlap, but it’s enough to make me pause and consider how our formative life experiences shape our capacity for professional collaboration. Conflict is inevitable, but our ability to navigate it is deeply tied to how we’ve learned to relate to others.
ADHD 2.0 explored the concept of VAST (Variable Attention Stimulus Trait), a framework for understanding how many of us experience ADHD-like symptoms in our overstimulated, technology-driven world. It made me think about how attention—that precious, fleeting resource—is the foundation of innovation and collaboration. I’ve noticed how my own attention span affects my ability to vision, be curious about my colleagues ideas, and follow a collaborative effort through to completion.
Finally, I was struck by Lindsay C. Gibson’s definition of emotional maturity. It’s a phrase I use quite a bit, but I’d never attempted to rigorously define it. Gibson’s definition struck me as one I’d like to use as a North Star when training teams on feedback, bias and conflict. It’s an interpersonal concept with profound implications for leaders, especially leaders who value team cohesion and camaraderie with their colleagues. I’ve pasted excerpts of her definition below:
“‘Emotional maturity’ means a person is capable of thinking objectively and conceptually while sustaining deep emotional connections to others. They are direct about pursuing what they want, yet do so without exploiting other people. They have a well-developed sense of self (Kohut 1985) and identity (Erikson 1963).
Emotionally mature people are comfortable and honest about their own feelings and get along well with other people, thanks to their well-developed empathy, impulse control, and emotional intelligence (Goleman 1995). They’re interested in other people’s inner lives and enjoy opening up and sharing with others in an emotionally intimate way. When there’s a problem, they deal with others directly to smooth out differences (Bowen 1978).
Emotionally mature people cope with stress in a realistic, forward-looking way, while consciously processing their thoughts and feelings. They can control their emotions when necessary, anticipate the future, adapt to reality, and use empathy and humor to ease difficult situations and strengthen bonds with others (Vaillant 2000). They enjoy being objective and know themselves well enough to admit their weaknesses (Siebert 1996).”
I LOVE this as a description of emotionally mature leadership! If you’re brave, read the whole book, check out her description of emotional immaturity, and see if she has you clutching your pearls the way I was clutching mine (lol).
As I carry these reflections into the new year, I’m sitting with a few inquiries, and I invite you to do the same:
How does your attachment style influence the way you approach conflict?
What containers and supports can you create to foster emotional maturity in your leadership?
How are you protecting and cultivating your attention in a world that constantly demands it?
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