Sick of chaos and stress? Raise your standards to calm your mind for better mental health… and I’m helping you figure out how in Episode 308, out now. So, Let’s Talk About Mental Health!
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Episode Overview:
Tired of dealing with drama and chaos? Raise your standards and protect your peace!
In this episode of the Let’s Talk About Mental Health podcast I’m tackling a simple fix for better mental health: respect yourself by learning how to be assertive and setting boundaries effectively.
I show you how to be assertive without drama, set healthy boundaries, and treat yourself with respect so you calm your mind and cut the chaos.
If you want less stress and anxiety, and if you know that low standards do you more harm than good, then I’ll help you to know your worth, stop lowering your standards, and build self trust with straightforward and practical mental health tips you can use today (like how to respect yourself, what having high standards looks like in real life, and the small self development steps that boost self worth).
👉 Ready to lift your standards and find greater peace? Then let’s talk!
💡 TL;DR: Sick of chaos and stress? Raise your standards — set healthy boundaries, be assertive, and know your worth — to calm your mind for better mental health. 🙂
New here? Hi! 👋 Let’s Talk About Mental Health is your weekly dose of practical advice for better mental health with Jeremy Godwin. I keep things simple, honest, and doable so you can feel more in control of your life and your mental wellbeing. Sign up below to have new episodes and transcripts land in your inbox every week.
Episode Transcript:
Are low standards draining your peace?
Stop lowering your standards for other people!
Because what you accept teaches people how to treat you.
Low standards will drain your peace of mind and lead to chaos… so today I’ll show you how to be more assertive so you can lift your standards without conflict and protect your peace.
We have a lot to discuss, so let’s talk about…
raising your standards.
Hello and welcome back to Let’s Talk About Mental Health, the weekly show full of practical advice for better mental health! I’m Jeremy Godwin, and this week I’m talking about the role your standards play in protecting your peace and why raising your standards leads to better mental health.
If you often feel worn out by other people, that’s rarely ever just a random thing. It’s usually a standards issue that’s hiding in plain sight, needing your attention.
Most of us were never taught to set a clear minimum for how we treat ourselves or how we allow other people to treat us, and so we end up just tolerating little things that continually chip away at our peace. It might be a so-called ‘harmless dig’ here or there, a late night phone call, a favour you feel obligated to agree to… and suddenly you find yourself on edge, feeling resentful and wondering why you can’t switch off. Being kind is great, and I strongly encourage it for better mental health. But being a doormat? Not so much!
Endlessly accommodating the demands of others is not good for your mental health. You have to respect yourself first by protecting your peace, because that’s what everything else rests on. So this episode is all about raising your standards in a calm and practical way. We’re going to talk about how to make being assertive feel simple and natural, rather than aggressive and uncomfortable. You’re going to hear what healthy minimums look and feel like in real life, why they matter for your mental health, and how to communicate them to others in plain English.
By the end of our chat today, you’ll have a clear sense of what to stop putting up with, how to respond when your limits are tested, and straightforward ways to protect your peace without turning it into a fight.
This isn’t about becoming hard or being mean; it’s about becoming clear, because clarity reduces drama… and consistency builds self-respect, and when you focus on both that’s when you can find greater calm. So if you’re ready to stop putting up with rubbish and start respecting yourself more, then let’s get into it! First, let’s talk about…
What ‘raising your standards’ really means (and how it protects your peace)
When I say ‘raise your standards’, I’m simply talking about setting a clear minimum for how you treat yourself and how you allow others to treat you. You know, this is not the gold standard here. This is just the absolute bare minimum… but it is important that we understand that standards really are the baseline that you set for yourself. It’s effectively, to use the word again, it’s the minimum level that you will accept.
Now, if your baseline is vague or too flexible, then everything ends up feeling like it’s either not clearly defined or that it’s negotiable; you know, your time, your energy, even your self-respect. And so that’s why your peace and calm keeps on getting chipped away at. Clarity about what you will and will not accept, and being clear around that stuff in a healthy way for the sake of your mental health and overall wellbeing, is an absolute must, and clarity is a necessity for better mental health. So is making sure that your standards are not set too low.
You know, look, I’ve had so-called friendships in the past where I haven’t been entirely clear on what I would and would not accept from others, and my standards weren’t as high as they could have been or maybe should have been. And when things aren’t clearly defined, you can very easily find yourself in relationships and situations where you sacrifice your own wants and needs in order to gain someone else’s approval, or so that you’re not rocking the boat. You know, I… I do think that part of this comes from growing older, that you really start to realise and understand that you need to learn to respect yourself enough to set standards that help you instead of harming you. And it’s also that lesson that, you know, we are responsible for what we allow into our own lives. That’s a hard lesson to learn!
Now, this is where boundaries come in, and it’s a topic that I’ve talked about extensively in this show; most recently in Episode 248 and I’ll leave a link to it in the description. Your standards are the minimums that you will accept, your boundaries are how you create and hold your baseline standards, and then assertiveness is part of all of it because that’s about how you communicate it.
Now, I kind of touched on this before: none of this stuff is about becoming demanding or nasty or putting your foot down. It’s the opposite, right? Clear standards reduce drama in your life because it means that there’s much less room for guesswork or mixed messages. You know where you stand, other people know where they stand with you. So the vibe here is ‘kind but clear’ rather than ‘anything goes!’ or ‘my way or the highway!’, OK?!
I mentioned ‘assertiveness’, and that simply means that you state your limits and your needs in a direct and straightforward way… without apology or threat. It’s not aggressive, it’s not passive, it’s not passive-aggressive. It’s just clear. For example, you could say to someone, “I don’t take work calls after 6:00 PM, I’ll reply in the morning,” or if somebody says something that’s supposedly a joke, but you know, we all know those jokes that aren’t really a joke, you could simply say, “That joke doesn’t work for me, please don’t say that to me again,” or even saying to yourself something like, “Scrolling in bed is wrecking my sleep, my phone goes in the other room by 10:00 PM, non-negotiable,” so it’s really clear and direct. It’s not apologetic, but it’s still fair and respectful.
This whole stuff about assertiveness and boundaries… I’ve mentioned that setting standards is part of that, and it comes before your boundaries, and here’s why: if your standards in life are fuzzy or vague, then how are you going to set clear boundaries around them? And whatever boundaries you do have in place will wobble. It’ll be much harder to say no when you want to or need to. But if your standards are clear, then your boundaries become simple and a lot more obvious.
Standards make our decisions faster and lighter. They’re part of who we are, what do we stand for, and they tie back into our values. You spend much less time negotiating with yourself and others, and that in turn frees up your mental space, which then leaves more room for calm. None of this stuff is easy and every situation comes with its own risks and challenges… but for the sake of your peace of mind, and your mental health, I honestly think that it’s much healthier to respect yourself than to put up with rubbish from other people.
Now let’s talk about…
Why low standards drain your peace
And the thing is that when your standards are low or fuzzy, your nervous system never really gets to rest; you’re constantly scanning your environment for what other people want, as well as second guessing yourself and having to deal with the consequences of all those times you say yes, when you really mean to say no. That constant uncertainty creates anxiety and decision fatigue. You burn energy on negotiating and rehearsing conversations in your head, and also from trying to recover from situations that you didn’t want to be in in the first place! Over time, all that builds up and it begins to show up as resentment, low mood, and that heavy tired feeling that you just can’t shake.
But setting clear, fair, and realistic standards reduces any uncertainty. And your brain loves certainty. Loves it! Can’t get enough of it! Wants more of it as soon as possible! So feed it what it wants, because less ambiguity means less stress.
There’s also a self-trust piece here. Every time you override your own limits, you’re actually quietly teaching yourself that you don’t matter, that your needs don’t matter, and that eats away at your self-worth and self-respect making the next override even easier. But the good news is that the opposite is also true. Every single time you keep a small promise to yourself, like the ‘I will finish at six’ thing but actually finishing at six, that’s when you build self-trust… and self-trust calms your mind, because then you know that you’re on your own side, right? You’re not just fighting yourself. The call is not coming from inside the house! And you do what you have to do to protect yourself, to protect your calm and your peace of mind. It’s hard to feel anxious and self-respecting at the same time! Like the great wise one, Alanis Morissette, told us: “you live, you learn”… but that only works if you stop saying yes when you really mean no. This is something I talked about quite recently in Episode 305, about self-worth, and I’ll link it at the end and in the description.
So… why does being assertive feel so difficult and setting high standards for ourselves, or realistically high standards?
First, the thing is that many of us were taught that being nice is the same as being good so we internalise the idea that saying no is selfish, or that harmony means avoiding discomfort.
Second, attachment patterns also play a big role here. If you learned early on in life that approval keeps you safe, then you’re going to reach for it under stress.
Third, fear of conflict doesn’t help. We imagine that assertiveness means an argument, when in reality it’s just about clear information being delivered calmly.
And fourth, there’s the potential pushback factor. When you raise your minimum standards, some people won’t like it and some people will test it and push back on it. Now, those moments feel awkward and so it might feel safer to retreat… but when you do that, the old pattern wins.
Clear standards plus simple language reduces drama, because it removes guesswork. You could say something simple and straightforward like: “That doesn’t work for me, but here’s what does.” People can adapt to clarity. What they struggle with is mixed messages, and if you don’t define your boundaries clearly, then someone else will do it for you… and you’re probably not going to like what they come up with, because it’s going to be focused on their wants and needs and not yours.
There’s also a deeper identity layer here, which is that many of us carry a quiet belief that our value comes from being useful or agreeable or being endlessly available. When you raise your standards, you begin to challenge that identity. You are going to have to say no to things, and that can feel scary at first. But aligning your actions with your values, like peace, respect, and fairness, is what reduces any inner conflict. When your actions match your values, your nervous system relaxes. Alignment is like medicine for the soul, and that sense of being in alignment is also a very powerful protector of your mental health, leading to fewer of those sort of, “I should have done this!” loops, and much calmer follow-through.
The main point here is that low standards invite high chaos, whereas clear standards invite calm. Raising your standards is not about being mean; it’s about freeing up mental space so you can live more intentionally and put up with a lot less crap. And we’re going to talk about how to do that right after this quick ad break.
[AD BREAK]
And welcome back! Now let’s get into the ‘how to’ part of this episode, and let’s talk about…
How to raise your standards
OK, so I’m going to talk through some simple ways to help you raise your standards to keep your mind calm and protect your peace. We’ll talk through some quick actions that you can take this week, then longer changes for you to work on over the coming weeks and months. All of these, as always, can be found in the episode transcript on my website at ltamh.com/episodes. It’s linked in the description, and if you sign up to my free mailing list you’ll get it in your inbox every Sunday.
My first quick action is…
Demand better for yourself.
Stop putting up with rubbish! Tolerating or accepting poor treatment from others is harmful to your mental health, so stop it. Raising your standards protects your peace. What you accept teaches people how to treat you, so set clear boundaries and standards for yourself and communicate them… and then, most importantly, actually stick to them.
Remember: what you will and will not accept is up to you.
OK, the next quick action is…
Define a one-line baseline.
Alright, let’s not try to fix everything all at once; let’s just start by tackling one thing that currently gets on your nerves or drains you the most. Choose just one situation and write a short sentence that sets your new minimum standard. Keep it specific and practical. Like we said earlier, it could be “I don’t reply to work messages after 6:00 PM.” Or maybe it’s, “I don’t accept jokes at my expense,” or “I only take on one extra task per week.”
Whatever it is, write it down. Put it somewhere where you’ll see it, like on your lock screen or on a sticky note on your desk. This sentence is your anchor for the next week. Again, you’re not trying to fix everything all at once here… we’re just going to choose one place where you can and will stand taller and firmer, and we’re going to keep it simple because small, clear decisions are much easier to stick to.
Remember: what you accept is what you get, what you clarify is what you keep.
OK. My next quick action is…
Communicate fairly and assertively.
You don’t need a massive book full of scripts for every possible occasion. Just having one straightforward and assertive line, like we came up with in the last point, can be enough. So what I want you to do is take whatever you created and think about other situations that you may be able to apply it. Again, you’re probably going to want to practice this out loud a few times beforehand, so it feels more natural; the first few times you say these things, it’s going to feel weird, but the more you say it, the more comfortable you feel.
The point here is think about how you can apply it to different things so that you can make your standards very, very clear. You know, we’re not trying to win an argument or dominate a situation. All we want to do is communicate your standards fairly, directly, and assertively. So, think about different ways where you could use that phrase or that kind of very clear, firm-but-fair, assertive language in other situations, either at work or at home.
Just remember: you get to decide what you will and won’t accept.
Now let’s get into the longer-term changes that I suggest you work on bit by bit over the coming months, starting with…
Run a weekly baseline check-in.
Once a week, sit down for five or 10 minutes with a cup of tea or coffee and just reflect on three areas: your self-talk, your time, and your interactions. Ask yourself two simple questions for each of those: where did I dip below my baseline standards? And: what needs a clearer standard next week?
As you do this, adjust and update your one line standard that we talked about before if you need to. Then, choose one small consequence you’ll follow if the line is crossed again; you could end the call, or switch the conversation over to text, reply the next day, leave the room, et cetera. The thing is that you’re not punishing anyone here; you’re protecting your peace, and you’re also keeping yourself consistent. Think of it as ‘tidy up’ time, not ‘telling off’ time!
And while you do all of this, remember to be objective: review to improve, not just ruminate on things.
OK. The next longer-term change is…
Stand your ground.
For me, if my line is crossed, I do three things: I pause, then I restate, and then I step away by either ending the call or replying tomorrow, or whatever the case might be. I don’t argue; I act kindly and consistently, explaining the why behind my actions without justifying it. Look, the thing is that most people don’t need a speech… they just need clarity, context, and consistency. Bear in mind that we all generally put our own needs first, so pushing you and testing your limits is about them… it’s not about you. But you don’t have to give in. It’s OK for you to put your needs first, and it’s OK to say no if and when you need to or want to.
Remember: consistency is a quiet superpower.
So the next longer-term change is…
Tidy your relationships.
Take a look at your inner circle, especially those who are closest to you or who have a lot of access to you; this could be friends, family, really close work colleagues, whatever, and either in your head or on paper, just sort people into three groups: ‘keep’, ‘adjust’, and ‘step back’. ‘Keep’ are the ones who respect your limits, so say a thank you to the universe for them and keep having a great relationship, keep investing in those relationships!
People who you nominate as ‘adjust’ are the ones who you need to raise your standards with by drawing clearer lines. So, take a moment to prepare one short sentence for the most common issue that you tend to have with each of them. Right? So somebody makes jokes at your expense, maybe it’s: “I’m not OK with jokes at my expense, please stop.” And the next time it needs to be said, use it. Again, practice it beforehand… because it makes it feel more comfortable when you actually say it in the real world.
And then the third category is ‘step back’, and that’s where there are people that you see patterns where they’re continuously crossing over your standards and your baseline. These are the ones where you need to change things sooner rather than later, because if nothing changes then nothing changes. So that could mean having fewer one-on-one chats or interactions with them, or when you do only sticking to lighter topics. Or maybe it’s choosing to only meet with them in groups rather than one-on-one.
Your job is not to change other people. Your job is to act in line with your standards and your values. That’s real self-respect, and you are in full control of who has access to you, plus what that access looks and feels like.
Just remember: protect your peace; don’t police theirs.
Alright, so those are the tips for raising your standards. Tell me in the comments which ones you’re going to try and why; I’d love to know!
Here’s the thing to take away from all of this. Raising your standards means choosing a clearer baseline for how you treat yourself and how you allow others to treat you, and then backing it up with calmness and assertiveness. Do that consistently and you cut the drama, build greater self-respect and give yourself the gift of clarity.
Because when you boil it all down, raising your standards isn’t about being harsh… it’s about protecting your peace. And if you don’t do that, nobody will do it for you.
Each week I like to finish up by sharing a quote about the topic, and I encourage you to take a few moments to really reflect on it and consider what it means to you. This week’s quote is by an unknown author, and it is…
High standards protect you from low quality experiences.
Unknown
Let me repeat that.
High standards protect you from low quality experiences.
Alright, that’s it for this week! If you’d like to support the show, my Patreon gets you early ad-free episodes and extras; it’s linked below.
Thank you very much for joining me today. Look after yourself and make a conscious effort to share positivity and kindness out into the world… because you get back what you put out. Take care and talk to you next time!
Join me next week to talk about healthy conflicts without drama, and check out my episode on improving your self-worth next; it’s linked in the description. And follow or subscribe to never miss an episode!
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