Boundaries 101
No matter who you are, you cannot have a healthy relationship without boundaries. Since we all engage in so many different roles and relationships (parent, boss, friends, colleagues, in-laws, boyfriends, etc.) we need all kinds of boundaries.
A boundary is a limit imposed for the purpose of protection.
To protect your time, energy, safety, and resources, you decide what is and what is not okay with you – those decisions are your boundaries. For example, to protect your time and energy, you decide that you don’t respond to emails after 6pm.
Boundaries have also been described as the place where your responsibility ends and another person’s responsibility begins. Writer, activist, and founder of The Embodiment Institute, Prentis Hemphill, describes a boundary as “the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously.”
Boundaries serve two main functions:
1. You teach people how to treat you with the boundaries that you set. Your boundaries show people what you need, what you appreciate, what you don't like, and what is full-on unacceptable to you.
2. Boundaries help you create safety and stability in your life. Operating without boundaries invites dysfunction. You can’t just allow yourself to be at the whim of other people’s standards; some people have no standards.
You have the right to protect your time, energy, finances, health, emotional well-being, and anything else you deem worthy of protection. As an adult, protecting your well-being is part of your job.
Each person has different boundaries because each person's needs are different. Setting your personal boundaries begins with figuring out what is and what is not okay for you.
Here are 3 fill-in-the blank exercises to help create a framework for what your personal boundaries might look like, from old-school boundary expert Cheryl Richardson’s book, “Stand Up for Your Life”:
1. It's not okay for people to: ________________
(examples)
Go through my personal belongings
Tell off-color jokes in my company
Make comments about my weight
2. I have a right to ask for: __________________
(examples)
Privacy
More information before making a purchase
Quiet time to myself
3. To protect my time and energy, it's OK to: _____________________
(examples)
Turn my phone on silent
Change my mind
Cancel a commitment when I'm not feeling well
Reserve a place in my home that is off-limits to others
Once you start cultivating awareness about what your boundaries are, you can begin to implement them in your life (the second part of boundary work).This part - the asserting of the boundaries - that’s what activates boundaries.
If you’re not asserting your boundaries, you don’t have boundaries; you have some probably-really-good ideas about what your boundaries could be.
Also important to remember: some boundaries are nonnegotiable and fixed. For example, “I don’t get in the car with anyone who’s been drinking.” Other boundaries require regular calibration because they’re based on shifting needs.
For example, there may be some days or seasons during which you need to incubate, be alone more, do less, say no. You tighten your boundaries in those moments. Other days or seasons you might need to roam free, be with people more, take on more projects, say yes. You widen your boundaries in those moments.
There’s a lot more I want to say about boundaries (like normalizing the guilt that can come after you set them, for example), but I have to put boundaries on my boundary talk lest I get swallowed whole by the topic. For specific scripts on how to set boundaries, read this. For the full course meal, get New York Times bestselling author Nedra Glover Tawwab’s elucidating and practical book, “Set Boundaries, Find Peace: A Guide to Reclaiming Yourself.”
Katherine Morgan Schafler is an NYC-based psychotherapist, author, and speaker. For more of her work: get her book, follow her on Instagram, subscribe to her newsletter, or visit her site.