Boundaries

The need for and the importance of them.

Boundaries, the invisible forcefield of sorts we often place around ourselves, but what purpose do they serve? Sure, our therapists talk to us about having them, they tell us the importance of making them, and they even assist in creating a road map on how to manifest them, but what role do they really play in our lives? As it turns out, and any therapist would agree, they play an important part in our mental and physical wellbeing. Setting boundaries is vital to one’s self-care. In setting and establishing one’s boundaries, we create an emotional guideline for ourselves. A guideline that establishes how we want and should be treated by others. Our boundaries are a way of telling ourselves we are important and worthy of being treated with dignity and respect by others as well as what we will and will not tolerate from family and friends. Boundaries help us reinforce our wants, our desires, and most importantly, our emotional needs. We create these forcefields as a means of guarding and protecting ourselves from situations that could be harmful to our emotional, mental and physical well.

Boundaries come in many different forms, and they are often created to accommodate different aspects of one’s life. One can have physical boundaries, time boundaries, financial boundaries, conversational boundaries, and relationship boundaries. Throw them all together and we get what is commonly referred to as one’s personal boundaries.

·         Physical: are boundaries set to ensure one’s need for physical safety are always met. This is one’s way of making sure they are always in places or around people they feel comfortable being around.

·         Time: are boundaries created to help establish a schedule for oneself. Time schedules manifest in the amount of time we allocate to being with friends, family, to be alone in our thoughts, and help to establish a work/life balance.  

·         Financial: this boundary is one that should be easy to establish; spend what you can and don’t overspend. The best way to keep this boundary is to set up a budget and stick with it.

·         Conversational: are setting parameters around topics one is comfortable discussing, and what one is not comfortable discussing. No talking politics with family, no discussing intimate topics on a first date, no talking religion with certain people, etc. . . .

·         Relationships: are boundaries we establish with family, romantic, parental, or between friends and acquaintances and are often the most difficult boundaries to set and keep.  With this boundary we establish how we want to be treated and respected by others, hence the reason why it can sometimes be difficult to keep this. The need to please others oftentimes overrides the importance of adhering to this boundary.

·         Personal: this one can best be described as how we treat ourselves and ensure that our personal needs and wants are being met, not by others, but by ourselves. It can best be described as the total composition of all our other boundaries.

Once our boundaries have been established and relayed to others, we must then enforce them, for ourselves and for our mental and physical wellbeing. What good is it to create them if we are not going to stick with them. In order to keep to one’s boundaries, remember it’s okay to let others know you don’t want to discuss certain topics. It’s okay to let friends know you’d rather stay in and not go out.  It’s okay to tell others you don’t like it when they address you in a particular way. It’s okay to remind friends you don’t want to go to a certain place or be around certain people. And as difficult as it may seem, it’s okay to remove yourself from someone’s life or limit their access to you if the other individual or individuals continually disrespect or treat you in a way that causes emotional or physical harm. This is especially important for those who are LGBTQ. If family or friends continually say or do things that show they do not respect or accept you, then for your mental and emotional wellbeing, one should do what they need to do to protect themselves, even if that means removing themselves from that person’s life. Once you establish your boundaries, it is up to you to enforce them, as no one else can.

One of the most important things to remember about creating and adhering to one’s boundaries is that they were created for one reason, and one reason only: to safeguard oneself from individuals or situations that have potential to cause emotional or physical harm. We always need to remember we are worthy of being treated with respect, kindness, and love. We do not create our boundaries for the comfort of others, we created them for our wellbeing. Yes, our boundaries may put other people off. Yes, people will turn certain situations around and try to make you feel like the situation is your fault. Yes, others will try to make us feel bad because we are enforcing our boundaries, and they will not take responsibility for their actions. Yes, they may cause a ripple in some friendships, or certain circumstances that affect our lives, and those around us, however, isn’t your sanity and your inner peace worth establishing and enforcing said boundaries? Unfortunately, people will test you. They will see how much they can push against you until you give in. They will see how much they can get away with. When these situations arise, remember, their behavior is a result of you requiring that they treat you with dignity and respect, most people do not like it when they are called out for their behavior.  When these situations arise, stick to your inner rules and gently remind others that there is a line that should not be crossed, and to please stop pushing. If they continue, you will need to determine the outcome of that yourself. Always remember that your inner peace and being treated respectfully is more important than anything else in life, and you established those boundaries to ensure you were always in that space. Enforcing your boundaries is for your wellbeing, regardless of what others think, say and feel about them. It’s not their life, it's yours and if they don’t like your boundaries and how you want to be treated, are they really someone you want in your life?