What are Boundaries?
Boundaries are the expectations and limits set within a relationship that help make you feel safe and comfortable. Being able to recognize and express when you want to say no and when you want to say yes within your relationships is essential for healthy relationships. Boundaries are a form of self-care and help protect your well-being. They are important at every stage and age within life, and as you age and transition into new phases of life, so will your boundaries.
Boundaries are learned and taught from a very young age. If you think about your childhood, did you experience any of the following boundary violations?
- Family members did not knock before entering the room
- Told your feelings were “too much”
- Forced to show affection even when uncomfortable e.g. hugging a relative
- Not having private space within the house for yourself
- Rules weren’t consistently enforced
- Your belongings were used or taken without your permission
Levels of Boundaries
Think of a cell membrane when you think of these 3 levels of boundaries:
- Porous Boundaries: Imagine that a cell membrane has weak walls allowing everything to come in and leave without much control. The wall isn’t enforced, which can cause harm to the cell (or within relationships). This can look like difficulty saying “no” to others, often feeling depleted and anxious with others, oversharing, quick to adopt opinions of others, avoiding conflict, people-pleasing, accepting mistreatment and communicating passively.
- Healthy Boundaries: Imagine a healthy cell that is permeable (allowing healthy nutrients in and yucky things out). This level of boundaries takes into account your mental and physical capacities and communicates with clear language. This can look like being selective about whom you share information with, saying “no” as needed, respecting your own values and opinions as well as those of others, knows conflict can be a normal part of life, and builds trust with others over time.
- Rigid Boundaries: Imagine a cell that lets nothing in – that wouldn’t give them the proper nutrients, would it? This level of boundaries often keeps other people at a distance as a way to help yourself feel protected. Although used as self-protection, it can stem from a fear of vulnerability and/or history of being taken advantage of. This can look like being untrusting of others, never sharing, strictly enforcing rules with no flexibility, cutting people out, unrealistic and high expectations of others, and often saying “no” to others.
Most people have variations of levels of boundaries that can depend on the context or the relationship. For example, you might have porous boundaries at work, rigid boundaries when out socially with friends and a mix within family relationships.
Types of Boundaries
- Physical Boundaries: personal space and physical touch. This includes an awareness of what’s appropriate given the setting and relationship. Physical boundaries are violated when someone touches you without your consent or invades your personal space, for example, rummaging through your bag.
- Intellectual Boundaries: thoughts and ideas. Healthy intellectual boundaries are the respect of the ideas of others and awareness of appropriate topics of discussion. These boundaries are violated when someone’s ideas or thoughts are dismissed or belittled.
- Sexual Boundaries: your consents, privacy and preferences around your sexuality and sexual contact. Any form of touching, comments or engagement in sexual acts without expressed consent is a violation of these boundaries.
- Emotional Boundaries: personal feelings. Feelings and information are given over a period of time, shared when appropriate, and confidants are chosen thoughtfully. Emotional boundaries are violated when someone belittles or invalidates your feelings as well as when someone misuses your trust.
- Material Boundaries: money and possessions. You have the right to decide whom you’d like to share your things with and the state you expect them in upon return.
- Time Boundaries: how someone uses their time. This type of boundary is the one that people often have the most difficulty with. People with time boundary issues often struggle with self-care, work-life balance, and prioritizing themselves. As a result, you will notice difficulty in managing your own time, how others use your time, what to do with your free time, and responding to favour requests.
Setting Boundaries
Here are some suggestions on how you might start practicing boundaries:
- Be clear and straight forward. Take a few deep breaths and focus on stating the main point. Keep your language simple without yelling or whispering. E.g. “I don’t like when you talk about my weight, please stop”.
- State your want or need, or say no.g. “I appreciate the invite, but I won’t be able to attend on Tuesday” or “I need you to call first before coming over”.
- Set boundaries as actions you can take:g. “I don’t like that you’re gossiping about my brother, if you continue, I’m going to leave this discussion / or hang up the phone”.
- Manage the discomfort. It’s common to feel awkward, guilty, nervous, or afraid to set boundaries. These feelings are one of the primary reasons people tend to avoid setting them. Learning to manage the emotions and discomfort can help you implement them. You can do this by providing yourself important reminders on why you set boundaries, engage in self-care or use grounding techniques.
Reactions to Boundaries
It’s natural that people may resist change within relationships, especially if they’ve become accustomed to things being a certain way. Having a general idea of how people may respond, either immediately when setting the boundary or after, can help you plan for next steps in how to handle these situations. Reactions might look like:
- Pushback
- Limit testing
- Ignoring
- Rationalizing and questioning
- Defensiveness
- Ghosting
- Silent treatment
If you receive any of these responses, keep in mind people often need time to adjust to these new boundaries. Thus, you can:
- Restate your boundary
- Correct violations in the moment
- Know that people are entitled to feel how the feel about the boundary
- Manage your own discomfort
It’s crucial to uphold your boundaries and not let things slide or else you’ll have to restart the process all over again. E.g. of upholding your boundaries:
- You’re hosting a birthday party for your child but worry about your father showing up intoxicated. “If you show up drunk, I will ask you to leave”. If he decides to show up at the birthday drunk anyways “It looks like you’ve been drinking, please leave” and gently close the door.
Upholding boundaries means you also must be accountable. If you ask people not to show up late to a party, it’s important you also arrive on time. Not respecting your own boundary will give people reason not to honour what you’ve asked of them. It’s also important to acknowledge what consequences will occur if that boundary is violated. If you don’t implement the consequence, you aren’t honouring your boundary.
- E.g. If you’ve expressed the following boundary: “When we disagree, I need you to not yell or call me names”. If the person proceeds to yell during your next disagreement here’s an example of how you can uphold this, “you’re yelling, I’m not going to engage in this conversation with you yelling” and walking away.
“People do not have to like, agree with, or understand your boundaries to respect them” – Nedra Glover Tawwab
Remember: As you begin your journey in setting boundaries with others it’s also important to be aware and receptive to the boundaries others may be trying to communicate with you as well.
