Following are all true “boundaries stories” from my friends and me (otherwise remarkably powerful, get-shit-done women who are firmly on the personal growth path, who struggle with saying, No, Thank You. We need to part ways. Pay me what you pay him. This just isn’t working for me. No fucking way. This is how I do it. I need to pass, thank you.)

The powerful, deeply nurturing woman who couldn’t tell her adorable but freeloading brother that it’s time to move out of her guest room and get a job — because that wouldn’t be very compassionate.

The bombshell woman who’s A league in her career, who kept quiet about the tantra teacher who crossed the line with her — because she knows this is her karma playing out, she manifested the situation, and she needed to learn the lessons that came with it.

The whip-smart, renegade entrepreneur who wouldn’t put a “stop payment” on the check she wrote to the “socially responsible” business consultant who gave her completely disconnected and incredibly detrimental business advice — because that would have been “too cold” and out of integrity.

The embolden creative who suffers no fools, who couldn’t tell her ex that, after saying it very nicely a dozen times, she really DID mean, “You are not welcome on my property” — because that wouldn’t seem very evolved or forgiving of her.

We fight for causes, for relationships, for our children, for our co-workers, but it can be terrifying to fight for ourselves. This is where sisterhood is particularly powerful. When our girlfriends see us enduring and they look us in the eye and say, “STOP. You’re hurting yourself.” Even then, we may not be able to hear the wisdom of all wisdoms, that: Self respect is a spiritual practice.

In my experience, boundary obliviousness is part of the initiation into wholeness. I don’t think you have to warrior your whole life for it, but it’s a passage to self-agency that most women seem to have to go through.

Boundaries help us expand our consciousness.

It may seem ironic. But sister, it’s truly divine.