026 - Right Distance: Moving from All or Nothing to Empowered Nuanced Choice
Welcome, dear ones. In today’s mini musing, I’m sharing one of my favorite practices from 21 Days of Untapped Support — Right Distance.
Right distance is about transitioning from all-or-nothing thinking to empowered, nuanced choice. We can cultivate right distance in our relationships, our workplaces, our creative projects, and our online presence.
Join me as I share—
How to release all-or-nothing thinking & play with the in-between
The relationship between right distance, right relationship & right timing
Examples of cultivating right distance with work, people & social media
How to find right distance when you end up in a misaligned position
“I wonder” prompts for new possibilities
Connect with Sarah
Links & Resources
Episode Transcript
Sarah Tacey [00:00:05]
Hello, welcome. I'm Sarah Tacey, and this is Threshold Moments, a podcast where guests and I share stories about the process of updating into truer versions of ourselves. The path is unknown, and the pull feels real. Together we share our grief, laughter, love, and life-saving tools. Join us.
Sarah Tacey [00:00:37]
Hello, welcome to Threshold Moment's podcast and to the mini musing that is on right distance. When I first got involved with alchemical alignment, Bridget Vixens would often say to me or maybe to the class, it's not all or nothing. Or maybe she would say all or nothing is a trauma response. which blew my mind. Can you think of the number of times, or maybe you just can begin to notice in a conversation where I might say, also, so I'll put it in my own experience, I might say to someone, you always say this, you never put these things away.
Sarah Tacey [00:01:23]
These are kind of all or nothing. Or it's like, you have to be on a strict diet or you're on no diet at all. You have to be on like a really intensive program or for working out, say, or no program at all. Sometimes it can feel like this in a relationship and it may be truth where it's like we're either in a relationship that's intimate or we can't be near each other at all. And sometimes to me that that seems like it makes good sense. But if I were to play with the possibility that there's an in-between, which has been really interesting over the years, what would the in-between look like? Then I might start to look, there's right timing, which is another one on the 21 days of support, which one could think of it even as divine timing, right relationship. And this doesn't mean right or wrong. It means like,
Sarah Tacey [00:02:19]
If you can think of a spectrum, where on the spectrum would you be in relationship to somebody else? And right distance is day 20 on the 21 days of untapped support, which I'm just going to plug here and say it's a free resource that you can get in the links. And I would say you can do it once. I would say it's even better to do with a friend. And I would also say you can do it on repeat because even when I do it, I'm like, oh, yeah, even though I know this one, I often forget this. Day 20 is right distance. And I'll give some of the examples that I give on day 20. I say right distance is the physical, mental or energetic space or proximity you put between yourself and something or someone else. I love this. This is about relational health. This is about transformation. or transforming or transitioning out of the all or nothing thinking and moving into empowered nuance. Love that. Moving into empowering nuanced choice or into empowered nuanced. Ah, choice. Empowered nuanced choice. I gave examples. already of what all or nothing might be like. I'll never speak to her again. I need this project to go the way I need it to go, or I can't present it at all.
Sarah Tacey [00:03:57]
Perfectionism might fall on this. I have to have social media for my business to keep in touch. I have no choice. It's the all or nothing is often like we have no choice. We're victim in the all or nothing. So some places that we can consider right distance might be between, again, I'll just speak first person. I could consider it between myself and another person, myself and a social event, myself and a family member or a family conflict, between myself and a work project, or how I engage with the work project at work, first, how the distance I give to that work project when I'm with family. So I'm going to give some examples in even more depth. Right? Distance from a work project might be saying, I really want this project to be handled differently. And I don't actually want to invest my energy here. So if I'm asked my opinion, I'll give my opinion. Otherwise, I'll keep my distance from the project and even from me thinking I have the absolute right next way, and I'll let those who are passionate about it handle it. So it's not like I won't touch the project at all, or I have to have total control. It's kind of saying, well, how much energy do I want to invest in it? Not a ton, but I do want a shift to be made. I'm going to give some distance between myself and that. And here are the conditions that I would want in order to be involved. And this is how involved, right?
Sarah Tacey [00:05:49]
So it's like nuanced choice. The next example I give is right distance from a lover. And I love this because this gives an example of how right distance can change even with the same person. So right distance from a lover might be that you want to be held as closely as possible, especially when you're going through something hard, or maybe when you're going through something that you're celebrating and you want them to bring their attention into your heart. So this is now bringing attention. How close is their attention going to come? You want them to bring their attention into your heart. So not just their physical body is right next to you, but now their attention is within you. And then you may want them to read between your words. So now psychically, you want them deep in your thoughts. And you want to be seen deeper than you've ever been seen before. At another time with this exact same lover, you might feel like you want quite a bit of space from this person while you take time for self-care or to make sure that you have time to hang out with friends or family. Because it's possible, so this is also where like right timing comes in. It's possible that if someone were so intimate with you all the time that you'd need some boundary repair, like, where do I end and they begin?
Sarah Tacey [00:07:29]
And where have all of my other relationships gone? And I don't even notice the trees or the stars anymore because I'm only looking into this person and them into me. So right distance is moment to moment, how close or how far until you feel attuned and you feel this is healthy for this individual person at this individual time. Another example, right distance for social media might include how personal you get, with whom you respond to, and when you log in and out might be boundaries that you put on it. When I tell these stories, I often change pronouns and really try to make it like a little bit more discreet. So I'm gonna say, I can think of a time where somebody had an aunt visiting and I could see in their body that there was some tension. And then when their aunt got closer, like started traveling home, and so their aunt was further away in physical distance, And my friend called the aunt to just see how they were doing. How was the travel going? Are you almost home? I saw that my friend's shoulders were down and that their voice was back to normal. And it's like, oh, this is right distance for she and her aunt. Like from this distance, her body is relaxed and she can have a good relationship with this person.
[00:09:06] But when this person is in the home with my friend, it's too much on the system. Like, it's not right distance for them. I know of people who have moved states so that they can have better relationships with their parents so that it wasn't like, I will never talk to my parents again, but it's like, oh, at two hours away or six hours away or an airplane ride away, my parents and I can have a great relationship. And as I'm saying that, I'm thinking about my brother and I, in junior high and high school, there was some serious conflict and tension.
Sarah Tacey [00:09:45]
But then he went to college and I could visit him for a weekend and we could be real cool because there was enough distance and time between us so that those smaller intervals at that time in our life really worked for each other. I'm thinking of this one other example, which was as we were coming out of COVID and beginning to see people, I noticed that I was very overwhelmed when I went to a big gathering with women, something I would be normally very comfortable with. And so right distance was that I wouldn't engage in each conversation that was happening. I wasn't going to ask everybody about their deepest moments because I didn't have the capacity to hold them. So right distance was grabbing a hot cup of water with lemon in it, getting my sweater and wrapping it around me. taking my shoes off so my feet could be on the ground. Further from that, I would say that people I might generally hang out with multiple times a year, I might say like, okay, I'll see them once this year. For some people it'd be like, I'll see them and we'll go on a walk together or we'll do something together where my nearest and dearest might come over for dinner, our kids might hang out. So just this idea that right distance, right timing can kind of overlap, right relations of how we space things out.
Sarah Tacey [00:11:26]
And if we're in a situation that we kind of we ended up in and it's not lining up with our highest desires that even within there, where do we find choice? Because as we move from no choice, which has trauma physiology in it and victimhood, to choice, even if super small little steps and nuances, then we can begin to feel more empowered and we begin to see more possibilities. And then a situation which may have seemed really bad or uncomfortable, we might actually be again to feel little pieces of comfort within it when we start making little changes, little choices in that situation. If you're curious about somatic exploration or nervous system support, you can check out the link below to make a connection call if you're feeling serious about it or truly curious. You can do a one-off session. And because this work, especially in relationship to the nervous system, is small, doable pieces over time, I would consider thinking about a one month, two-month, or three month period of time that you might dedicate towards nervous system support. Again, you can start with a smaller step of a connection call if it's calling you. This is a true mini, mini musing.
Sarah Tacey [00:13:18]
It's like this small, I think it's a small, doable, digestible part that I don't need to make more complicated than it is. In this moment, I think what I do wanna possibly share is what this might look like as a somatic practice. So in a session, we might tune in and actually begin to work out these nuances of getting clear on, say, if it were social media, how you want to engage, how it feels in your body. So we can get nuanced like that. But another exercise that is actually called the right distance exercise is if you are in the room with somebody and you'd find kind of where it feels best orientation-wise, when I'm standing to your side, when I'm standing, I'm combining two exercises here, but when I'm standing directly in front of you, behind you, and you start to notice that you actually have preferences of where certain people are in your periphery. And then you can say like, Can I take another step closer? And in day-to-day life, it's just like, yeah, somebody comes up to you, you're totally fine, it's not a big deal. But when you really slow down, you can start to feel your energetic boundaries and become more aware of how your body is responding to another's. And you might realize, like out of familiarity, like, oh my God, you can come all the way into my heart. Is that true? Is that optimal or is that familiar? Okay, let's slow it down a little bit more. Can I take one step? Does this really feel good to you?
Sarah Tacey [00:15:01]
Can I take one step more? And it might even be at the beginning, no, you can't take a step in. Let's start by stepping away. And then you can start to almost do energetically, okay, how does it feel for me to be outside of the room? What if I move to the outskirts of the city? And the person can imagine, how does it feel to have you further away? And some people could be like, you could go out to the moon, and that would be good for me, or you can come into my heart, and it's good for me, and it's all good. And someone else might say, Yeah, you can go to the Moon and actually don't come any closer. And this is so good for a practitioner to be like, Okay, it isn't personal. They just wanted so much space while still having someone be present for company. I once noticed in it where I was like, I'm so fine with everything. I'm not going to feel anything in this exercise. And I was so shocked that as the person moved further away, I think of myself as someone who loves solo time. As I started moving further away, I was like, oh, oh, that feels like abandonment.
Sarah Tacey [00:16:10]
That feels lonely. Can you come a little closer? And yeah, this exercise is so great at just like beginning to have practice at nuance and nuanced choice. And I feel like it's a practice that I never get bored of doing or even observing from the outside other people doing. We get to see like what is too close, what is just close enough, what is too far, what is just far enough, and where is actually my direct middle preference, what is my right distance. And then to know that we can do it metaphorically and physically with so many different elements of our life. even say religion. Religion would be a great one for me. Like, man, I could look at it and say, man, so many people have been hurt within religion, within dogma, within following certain rules and structures that to me don't seem love-based and seem fear-based and seem to serve a certain power structure outside of ourselves. And from right distance. And then again, choosing my orientation and my perspective in. Maybe it's about learning more about Mother Mary. Maybe it's about learning more about Jesus from different texts that maybe weren't canonized. Maybe it's about learning the history.
Sarah Tacey [00:17:45]
Maybe it's about feeling in my own body, my connection to the divine and to meditating on Jesus. I was raised Protestant so I can start to get what is right distance. Because at some point, even the word God was triggering to me. I imagined a white man with a white beard, an older man in the sky. The Michelangelo with God and Adam touching fingers up in the sky was my image of God, a man who brought down harsh judgment for sin. This is totally my experience that I'm speaking into. I began to study in college Religion 101, world religion. Why? Why did religions form? Why do certain religions have different rules, belief systems, but also just what are they? Where did they come from? What do they feel like? So I had to first get right distance, but then I also wanted to broaden my base of understanding of various religions and then deepen my own experience of energy, wisdom, things coming into me, through me, perceived through life.
Sarah Tacey [00:19:09]
Right distance from religion might then actually allow me to bring spirituality into my heart. And I should say instead of religion from like dogma. So again, if I were to leave you, and maybe I'll start doing this now, if I were to leave you with an I wonder statement again for episode four of reticular formation so that our brain might begin to just open up to see from a new perspective, what would life be like if I had nuanced choice? with how close or far away I was from other things, other people in life. What if things don't have to be all or nothing? I'm so curious about my nuanced choice and my ability to continue to update that choice moment to moment. I wonder what it would be like to trust myself and my nuanced choice and to actually speak out loud my desire. Until next time. Thank you for tuning in. It's been such a pleasure. If you're looking for added support, I'm offering a program that's totally free called 21 Days of Untapped Support. It's pretty awesome. It's very easy. It's very helpful.
Sarah Tacey [00:21:04]
You can find it at sarahtacey.com. And if you love this episode, please subscribe and like. Apparently, it's wildly useful. So we could just explore what happens. when you scroll down to the bottom, subscribe, rate, maybe say a thing or two. If you're not feeling it, don't do it. It's totally fine. I look forward to gathering with you again. Thank you so much.