How Survival Taught Me the Art of Elegant Boundaries
How The Velvet Curtain Method Came To Be (Origin Story?)
Hello, fellow role-jugglers and now boundary architects,
Today I want to share how the Velvet Curtain Method came to be—not through some grand epiphany, but through the messiest, most painful kind of learning: nearly losing myself completely before discovering there was another way.
The Breaking Point
Picture this: Me at 22, working four (+) jobs simultaneously—two full-time, two part-time, plus side gigs—desperately trying to keep our family house from foreclosure after both my parents got sick in the same year. Eventually my mom passed away and my dad couldn't legally go back to work, and as the eldest, everything fell on my shoulders.
I thought I was being heroic. I thought saying yes to everything, sacrificing everything, was what love looked like.
Until the day I drove through a red light, nearly getting hit, because I was so exhausted I couldn't think straight. That's when my girlfriend (now wife) said something that changed everything: "You're going to literally kill yourself trying to save everyone else."
The final blow came when my own family accused me of using inappropriately the money I was sacrificing my life to provide. After giving everything—my time, my money, my relationships, my safety—this is what I got in return.
That's when I realized: Boundaries aren't just about comfort. They can literally be about survival.
The First Boundary
I made the hardest decision of my life: I moved out and left the bills to my sister. Let her experience what it actually meant to manage a household.
But here's the thing about people-pleasers—we don't quit cold turkey. I kept bailing her out. Three times I rescued her before I finally said, "Maybe this is enough."
I failed my past self by continuing to rescue, but I'm proud I went through it. That failure taught me something crucial: Setting a boundary once isn't enough. You have to honour your own decisions, even when it feels uncomfortable.
The Teacher Who Changed Everything
My wife showed me what healthy boundaries actually looked like. She was (and is) the kindest person I know, but she maintained clear limits with everyone around her. I watched her navigate relationships with this beautiful combination of warmth and firmness that seemed impossible.
I thought, "If she can do this in personal relationships, can it work everywhere else? At work? With authority figures? When leading a team?"
That question started everything.
The Identity Crisis
Before boundaries, I believed I was "too much"—too giving, too smart, too serious, too fast. People I loved told me this repeatedly, and I internalized it as flaws to fix.
My wife helped me realize these weren't curses—they were gifts. But the real breakthrough came when I recognized I needed a boundary around feedback itself: knowing when to listen and when not to.
That's when I started making waves instead of just splashes.
The Professional Transformation
At work, I was the self-proclaimed "personality hire"—the yes-man who made everything feel like "all sunshine and rainbows." I thought this was showing