Chapter 1

Creating Order, Safety, and Protection with Boundaries

IN THIS CHAPTER

Defining boundaries

Recognizing that boundaries are inescapable

Appreciating the benefits of boundaries

Understanding the extremes of boundaries

Realizing boundaries vary from culture to culture

Chances are very good that you picked up this book because you’re feeling curious, confused, mystified, or completely clueless about personal boundaries. If you relate to any of these emotions, you’re far from alone. I can’t count the number of times adults in their 30s, 40s, or 50s have told me, “I didn’t even know what boundaries were.”

Not knowing where to start or what to do when you think you need to set a boundary is frustrating. Sometimes it’s even frightening. Boundaries, at their most basic level, are about protection. And when you don’t feel confident about your ability to protect yourself emotionally, physically, or sexually, you’re more likely to feel anxious, suspicious of others, or unnecessarily defensive as you try to create a sense of safety.

You may have tried in the past to set a boundary that didn’t work. Or maybe you set an excellent boundary, but the backlash you got from other people made you think you were wrong or made a mistake. These are exactly the kinds of experiences you can expect when you start implementing or leveling up your boundaries skills.

The good news is you can find simple principles, tools, and skills in this book that will take you from feeling like a boundaries bumbler to a boundaries ninja. I give you six steps for creating boundaries of all kinds (see Chapter 13) and show you what to do when a boundary isn’t successful (see Chapter 18). Having these tools and knowing how to respond to people who are less than thrilled about your new boundaries skills will provide the kind of clarity and confidence that makes boundary setting easy — and maybe even fun!

In this chapter, I define what personal boundaries look like and expand your vocabulary by giving you additional words for describing boundaries. You begin to see that boundaries are simply a fact of life that’s present throughout your day — creating safety, order, and calm. The boundaries running in the background of your everyday experience, along with the boundaries you create for your self-protection and self-care, support and improve your life in ways you may never have imagined.

Despite having a reputation for being harsh, rigid, and selfish, boundaries actually create space and freedom. I show you a simple way to think about your boundaries on a continuum from too little to too much, so you can visualize boundaries when they’re operating at the extremes and when they’re in balance.

Your family’s cultural or ethnic background and the area of the world in which you spent the formative years of your life play an important role in what you know and believe about boundaries. And while different cultures have different ideas and beliefs about boundaries, ultimately you get to decide which boundaries are right for you and how you put your own personal boundaries into practice.

You’re the ultimate decider of every boundary you create.

Knowing What Boundaries Are

Before you can set personal boundaries, you must know what boundaries are — how to describe them, what their functions are, and how they show up in your life.

Some people think boundaries are unnecessary, unkind, or manipulative. Some people believe that setting a boundary means telling another person what to do. Healthy, effective boundaries are none of these.

Personal boundaries serve two primary functions:

• Your boundaries protect you and other people.
• Your boundaries define who you are.

Protecting yourself and others

When you think about protecting yourself or another person, here are a few examples that may come to mind:

• You understandably want to avoid being hurt or injured, or you want to make sure other people aren’t hurt or injured.
• You’ve experienced an emotional, physical, or sexual trauma, and you need to temporarily guard or shield yourself so that you can take care of yourself and heal.
• You care about or love someone (including yourself), and you don’t want them to suffer.

Protecting yourself includes a wide range of mundane, everyday actions. Occasionally, you encounter unexpected (and usually unwanted) events that require you to defend or protect yourself. Everything from putting on your shoes before you go outside, to locking your front door at night, to defending yourself against an armed attacker belongs under the banner of protection.

The four primary categories of boundaries for how you protect yourself and others are:

• Physical
• Sexual
• Speaking
• Listening

Physical, sexual, and speaking boundaries include both self-protection and protecting others, while the listening boundary is primarily one of self-protection. For a detailed discussion of each of these boundaries, see Chapters 8 to 11.

Here’s a brief overview of what it looks like when you’re protecting yourself in the four categories of boundaries. Think of these examples as self-protection north stars or aspirations for your healthy, effective boundaries:

• When you protect yourself with physical boundaries:
  • You’re aware of how close you want to be to others physically. Your preferences are based on your chosen standards rather than on others’ standards or any other external factor that doesn’t align with your preferences or values.
  • You’re able to maintain the physical closeness or distance you want. This means you’re able to stop someone when they get too close to you.
  • You’re aware of how much access to your personal belongings you want to give to others.
  • You’re able to maintain the access to your personal belongings that feels comfortable for you. You stop others when they take or use your personal belongings without your permission.
• When you protect yourself with sexual boundaries:
  • You’re aware of how close you want to be to others sexually. Your preferences around closeness are based on your chosen standards rather than on others’ standards or any other external factor that doesn’t align with your preferences or values.
  • You’re able to maintain the sexual closeness or distance you want. This means you’re able to stop someone when they get too close to you sexually or when they touch you sexually in a way you don’t want to be touched.
• When you protect yourself with speaking boundaries:
  • You understand that in personal (rather than casual or professional) conversations, the primary role of speaking or talking is to be known by the other person.
  • You know how to determine who gets to know what about you. You match your private information with the level of connection or intimacy you have with the other person. (See Chapter 3 for more information about matching your private information with the people you want to share it with.)
  • You understand that speaking clearly, respectfully, and coherently not only protects others but also protects you from unnecessary conflict, disconnection, or future regret.
• When you protect yourself with listening boundaries:
  • You understand that the primary role of listening is to discover or understand who the other person is.
  • You actively assess what you’re hearing to avoid taking on blame or shame, or agreeing with another person’s perceptions that don’t match what you believe to be accurate or true.
  • You understand that what other people say is a description of their reality — their thoughts, beliefs, opinions, judgments, and so on. What they say isn’t a description of you unless you agree that it is. For example, if someone tells you that you’re rude, that’s their opinion about you. It’s not a fact or the truth. You get to decide whether you share their perception that you’re rude.

If you want to maximize the chances of being heard by another person, avoid common patterns of communicating that imply blame. For example, don’t make statements that describe another person, such as “You’re being (mean, rude, ridiculous, and so on),” or ask why questions, like “Why are you talking to me like that?”

The following describes what it looks like when you’re protecting others in the four categories of boundaries. Just like the examples of self-protective boundaries above, these are descriptions of excellent boundaries that develop as your boundaries skills improve:

• When you protect others with your physical boundaries:
  • You respect their nonnegotiable right to decide how close they want to be to you or if they want to be touched.
  • You respect the physical closeness or distance another person wants from you. You stop yourself when someone tells you that you’re getting too close to them.
  • You respect their right to choose how much access they give you to their personal belongings, and you abide by the limits they set.
• When you protect others with your sexual boundaries:
  • You...