Who's in Your Boat

Do you ever feel like you work really hard to keep all the people in your life happy no matter what doing that leaves you feeling like? Are other people's needs, wants, and feelings always taking priority over your own?

You've probably experienced the feeling of being worn out by the people in your life at one time or another, and you surely know not all relationships are created equal. Some will fill your cup while others leave you feeling drained, and sometimes, it can be hard to know which ones are which. Unfortunealty, you only have so much emotional energy to give to people and we often don't realize how much of an energy sucker some relationships can be until they've left us depleted and resentful. So how can you identify which relationships are which?

I created this exercise to help you put the different relationships in your life into perspective and help you to clearly see which one's to regularly nuture and which ones require less. This has become a powerful tool that many people use to make important changes in the amount of time and energy they offer to the people in their lives.

Who's in your boat exercise

There is going to be a huge flood. The only way to safety is by boat, and I have the only boat. It holds 11 people, and I give it to you and tell you to save yourself and 10 people of your choice. Who's in your boat?

Two important things to note:

One, if you have a huge family and the people you dearly love would never fit in your small boat, go ahead and bump up the size of your boat to fit 15-20 additional people, but be careful! It's tempting to want to make our boat so big that we can fit all of the people we know and like. That defeats the purpose of the exercise, which is to limit the number of people, so 20 is the limit.

Two, you only keep people on your boat that you want on your boat. So if you can't stand your sister-in-law, don't add her to your boat because your brother will be pissed if you leave her behind. No one but you even knows about your boat or who's in it. So make sure to only put people YOU like/love/want on your boat.

Did you have to make some tough choices? I'm sure you did. Your boat represents the amount of emotional energy you have to give to the people in your life without draining yourself, so once you've identified who's in your boat, then you've also identified which relationships deserve the bulk of your emotional energy.

What about the poor suckers outside of your boat? Well, since it's a metaphorical flood, they aren't actually drowning (yay!) and can continue to be people you love, care about, and have in your life! But now that you know where they fall concerning the energy you have to give, you can adjust how you interact with those people accordingly (and I'll write another post about what that might look like). It might be worth it to ask yourself why each of these people didn't make it into your boat. We rarely take stock of the relationships in our life in this way, which can be very helpful.

Trying to extend energy to the "non-passengers" too often is like trying to pull people into your boat when there isn't room and risks sinking yourself and sacrificing all the other relationships in your boat. Kind of like in the movie Titanic when the people in the water kept yelling for the lifeboats to come back, but the boats couldn't come back without being swamped and pulled under. Don't let the people outside your boat take you down and leave you feeling drained.

Now, do this exercise once a month or as often as you'd like. The people in your boat will likely change over time, and when you feel your emotional energy wearing thin or that you're dreading a certain person or relationship, check their passenger status on your boat and decide if you're giving away precious resources to a non-passenger and make the changes you need to make to shift the bulk of your attention back to your passengers.

I'd love to know what you think about the "Who's in Your Boat?" exercise and if you've tried it. Please feel free to comment and let me know if you have any questions!