Episode 78: What Is the Window of Tolerance and Why Does It Matter?

Ever feel like you’re at your breaking point, whether it’s your toddler having a full-blown meltdown, a business setback that catches you off guard, or just juggling too many things at once? We’ve all been there, and much of it comes down to what experts call your “window of tolerance.”

This week on the Babies & Business podcast, Avram and Rachel unravel this concept to help you understand how your emotional limits impact your decisions, reactions, and ultimately, your relationships. It’s a framework that can help you better regulate tough moments, avoid rash decisions, and give yourself (and others) the grace to get through challenges.

Whether you’re a parent, a business owner, or a podcast devotee, this is an episode you don’t want to miss. Tune in to gain tools for emotional regulation and learn how to thrive, even when it feels like life is spinning out of control.

Show Notes

Key Highlights from this Episode:

• Avram and Rachel open up about parenting challenges and how stress can push you outside your “window of tolerance.

• They break down the concept of the window of tolerance—what it is, how it works, and how it shows up in everyday parenting life.

• Rachel shares how her therapist helped her recognize triggers and emotional warning signs after having their first child.

• Why it’s important not to make major decisions when you’re outside your window of tolerance.

• Real-life examples of how unresolved stress can lead to unexpected behavior—from yelling to emotional shutdowns.

• How understanding someone else’s window of tolerance can lead to more compassion, especially when conflict arises.

• The importance of self-regulation and simple tools like earplugs that help you stay calm in overstimulating environments.

• Avram talks about how “not taking things personally” (a principle from The Four Agreements) ties in with this framework.

• A great reminder to give others (and ourselves) grace when emotions are high and tolerance is low.

Mentions & Resources

The Four Agreements –  A practical guide to personal freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz, offering four simple yet powerful principles rooted in ancient Toltec wisdom.

Mentioned Episodes

EP 57 – What to do When Your Partner is Spinning Out

Episode Transcription

Below you will find a transcript of this entire podcast episode. Enjoy!

Avram: Hey, you know what? We’ve all been there before. You got a toddler screaming in your face. It’s been a really long day. You’re losing your mind.

Rachel: Yeah.

Avram: Maybe you do actually lose it a little bit. Say something you regret to your kid. Oh my

Rachel: Yep.

Avram: You know, um, we’ve there

Rachel: say something in a way that you wouldn’t like to, you know, with the tone of voice or whatever that might be for you

Avram: Oh my gosh. And so you see parents everywhere struggling with the same thing and it’s just getting to, your wits end. And I think oftentimes you, especially when I think you have a newborn, you get pushed all the way outside of your window of tolerance. Now that’s the topic of today’s episode is the window of tolerance.

We’ve mentioned it in past podcasts, I think episode 57. We mentioned it, what to do when your partner is spinning out. But,this is,a tool, I think like a diagnostic tool, I think

Rachel: Yeah, yeah,

Avram: That’s super useful for you to understand both where you are at emotionally, mentally, but also maybe understanding and having some compassion for other people that are going through a hard time.

Rachel: yeah. So it was introduced to me by, and we have August here.

Avram: He’s a lot to say.

Rachel: It’s gonna be some background music here. It was introduced to me by my therapist just a couple months after Lincoln was born, because I had a lot of stuff coming up frommy growing up years and just a lot of things that I was trying to, wrap my head around having a new child and just having so much love for this child and, you know, so many questions that I had regarding maybe how my parents functioned and how they could do certain things and all sorts of stuff. And what was explained to me was, well, everybody has a window of tolerance.

And just imagine that a window that you look out of, okay, that it’s a space, that it’s a frame that takes up some space, some glass. So anything outside of that, anything that takes you outside of that window of tolerance is something that, you are going to function differently in that situation because you’re outside of your window of tolerance.

You are not gonna make rational decisions. You’re not gonna be, um, the normal coping mechanisms that you might use, aren’t gonna work all these different things. And so I’m not gonna go into all the things that she said about it, but basically what it was for me, the tool that she gave me was. When you’re having those days and you feel like you just can’t do anything and you are outside of your window tolerance, and she helped me understand like what those triggers were for me, what indicated that for me, like the red lights that would come on for me, like check engine light, what those were.

Then she said, don’t make any big decisions when you know you’re outside of your window of tolerance. Don’t make any big decisions. Just do the things that are just required, you know, just the things to survive. That’s it. And then once you get to a better place and you’re back in your window of tolerance, because this wil
l pass, you know, then make those decisions. So it was really, really good for me to not spin out. So if I was spinning out, just let it be, don’t have any judgment around it, and then ride it out.

Nothing needed to be done. That was what was explained to me.

Avram: Yeah, so when you’re inside your window of tolerance, you are a sane, rational person.

Rachel: Yes.

Avram: And when you’re outside of it, you do really weird stuff and you might even be like, maybe mean when you’re not a mean person. You might, like you said, you might make some rash decisions, stuff that you might normally not do.

Rachel: Like the way that we talk about people, you know, that we know, we’re like, oh my gosh, that’s really not Avram, or that’s really not Kim. That’s really not whoever that person is, that’s not them. That’s not how they function, and it’s probably accurate, they’re going through something.

Avram: Yeah. I think that’s totally true. I remember you telling me about your, one of the things that your dad said all the time to you guys when you were growing up, he would say

Rachel: Oh yeah. You go ahead and tell me and then I’ll the story

I’ve heard the quote so much. I don’t care about justice, I care about quiet, or I care about peace. Right? He just couldn’t handle the sound. The volume

Avram: the volume

Rachel: in our house.

Avram: of so many children right under one roof.

Rachel: Yep. Well and for me, that absolutely got me because I was probably the one taking something to my dad and basically saying, I want justice Dad, and he’s like, no. I can’t give you justice because I just can’t, my window of tolerance doesn’t allow me that. He’s not saying this, but this is what I, looking back, I might interpret.

Um, I just need quiet because I am at my limit right now

Avram: And past it.

Rachel: Yeah. My limit and past it, and I just have nothing. I don’t care about justice right now, and I know you’re seeking justice, Rachel. But I can’t give it to you right now. I need quiet. And so my dad, my dad was the person that bought a thousand earplugs, you know, the little squishy earplugs you put in your ears, at a time.

Avram: And he would, he always had earplugs in his pocket and that was a really good thing for him because that was his coping mechanism. You know, you shared this with me and then I started looking at all of these different relationships and things that, that were occurring around me or directly related to people I knew. Um, and, and like you said, you have, you make these comments, like, it just doesn’t really seem like them.

Rachel: yeah.

Avram: And, that I have started to identify as like the trigger phrase that kind of lets you know, oh, maybe this person that I’m interacting with is outside their window of tolerance.

And it’s like, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

Rachel: And that also helps us to have compassion for them because really, honestly, if someone is treating you in a way that’s really just not okay with you, you could also think, you know, maybe I just don’t wanna spend time with them right now, and maybe they need some space and some grace.

Avram: Yeah. And it’s not to say that you know it, quote excuses their

Rachel: No way. No way.

you can have that now have some sympathy and understanding of where they’re coming from and that can help you. Not take it  personally

Avram: Not take it personally. It can help you, man, if there’s like a conflict going on around it, you know, you have a blow up or something.

This can help you manage that with some understanding, like, wow, this person’s got so much other stuff going on in their life. And it’s not about the thing, it’s about all the other stuff.

Rachel: Exactly, exactly. There’s so many hidden things going on. We don’t know what’s going on. You don’t even know, maybe their parents have cancer and it’s come back or, you know, you have no idea. Maybe they had a completely sleepless night for the last whole week. All those nights have been sleepless and that makes people different.

So more compassion. I think that’s all this to say, you know, we can make judgements about people based off of how they show up and, and often we do. But when we get down to it, we can just, give them the same grace that we’d really like to be given.

Avram: Yeah, I love this framework. It just simplified so much. You know, you didn’t have to like, make excuses for people or, you know, come up with, why are they saying that? Why are they being like that? It’s not, you don’t have to deconstruct it just to, you know, to understand that they’re going through it, they’re going through a tough time, and they could use some compassionate and understanding and you don’t have to take it personally.

I just love that too. It’s not about you. It’s really not, and it’s so easy. I’m gonna give a plug for one of my favorite books all time, just ’cause we’re here right now. The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruez. It was literally one of the first personal development books that I ever read. My mom introduced it to me and the first agreement is, don’t take anything personally.

 It is such a powerful thing, and I think this tool really goes alongside that in helping you to navigate that in a new way. So that’s what this episode’s all about. And the question that we have for you. Right. If you go to babiesandbiz.com/78, that’s episode 78 we’re on right now. And you scroll to the bottom of that page, we have the community question for you.

How do you know when your partner is outside their window of tolerance? Sometimes it’s hard to know what your thing is, but it’s easy to know what your partners is. So we started with that question.

Rachel: Because for us, you know, just to give you an example for Avram, um, for me, when I’m observing avm, if it’s really loud in the house, and maybe he’s, it doesn’t even have to have been a long day, but maybe it’s loud in the house and Lincoln’s having a, a bit of a time getting up from his nap.

He’s pretty upset and it’s really loud. If I see that Avram does not have his earplugs in, I will say, go get your earplugs. Just, it’s not a mean thing, it’s just go get your earplugs. Do yourself a favor, please. And really everybody else in the house because when we are well regulated and we are within that window of tolerance, we show up better and we feel better about ourselves and all the things related.

So, you know, we can help our partner out.

Avram: It’s like a self-care kind of deal too. That’s cool. Great spin on it. So that’s our community question for this week. We’d love to hear from you. How do you know when your partner is outside their window of tolerance? I bet you we find some similarities. Pretty neat stuff. So thanks for tuning in this week.

We’ve always got new great stuff coming up for you. If you’ve got questions that you want us to answer on the podcast, you can always reach us by email hello@babiesandbiz.com. Those go straight to our email inbox and we’d love to feature a question from you at an upcoming
episode if there’s some topic you want us to cover.

And with that, uh, we appreciate you for listening. We’ll catch you on the next episode.

Rachel: Bye for now.