We hear a lot about setting boundaries. What, really, are boundaries. More importantly, how do you enforce them. Boundaries are what you will tolerate. Some are cultural while others are personal. All are learned from experience and enforced by habits and behaviors. ![]() If you had to earn love, you are more likely to have trouble feeling your own self-worth and confidence. You may have learned to seek approval and validation from others. People-pleasing is likely part of your behavior patterns. That external gratification lasts only a little while and so the pattern repeats. As an adult, you find yourself always doing for others. You have a difficult time saying “No”. People take advantage of you. Worse yet, you feel under-appreciated. Your boundaries are porous, filtering and stopping very little. If you grew up in an environment where you were not listened to, not believed, or simply blamed for everything, you are likely to be shy and uncomfortable in social interactions. You may find making small talk or being in the public view disconcerting. You work hard but get no credit or little credit. When someone wants to showcase you or your work, you dread and fear the recognition. You might wish to shrink and disappear even as you crave to be seen and heard. Your boundaries are tight making you small, unheard, and unseen. If you grew up where everything you did was excessively praised and bragged about; where parents and friends waited for you to shine, you might need to be the center of attention. Maybe you hate that everyone always looks to you. Or it could be that even when someone else has the floor, you inadvertently find yourself front and center. Your boundaries are overpoweringly expansive and encompassing. From these three simplistic examples, you can see how personal boundaries develop differently and uniquely. We still need to sprinkle in overall cultural norms. Every culture, whether communal, regional, or national influences our boundaries and our behaviors. In this era where international communication and cooperation are increasing, we sometimes find ourselves out of step with distant co-workers. Working for an international corporation I witnessed such cultural clashes. Americans and Indian nationals, for example, have different social interaction norms. I watched repeatedly as an American would raise the volume of his voice while the Indian would lower his. The louder the American spoke, the softer the Indian spoke. They completely missed the subtle cultural signals because they operate from different norms. You can change personal boundaries. You cannot change cultural norms and boundaries. They usually adapt and change over one or more generations. We all underwent the significant and rapid cultural changes of the COVID-19 protocols. The resultant protests and polarization bear witness to the challenge – maybe the impossibility – of making such wholesale and rapid changes across an entire population. Yet it isn’t the whole population that needed to change; it was each individual. Regardless of which side you landed on, you made the choice to change or not; you made the effort to change or not; you learned new behaviors regardless of whether you adopted the new norms or not. It was and is difficult for all of us. We had no role models as we would if we relocated to a new country. We had no time to adapt and adjust. Learning to set or adjust personal boundaries requires changing yourself. Do not attempt a radical or wholesale change with your personal boundaries. The results will be hard on you and those you interact with. Make changes steadily but gradually following the guidelines outlined in the four following steps:
You already know this one. You probably are experiencing it on a regular basis which is why you are still reading this blog. The problem stems from how you feel about yourself. The problem is the self-recriminations. The problem is you are not happy with yourself, your situation, or life in general. This is punctuated by a feeling of hopeless or helpless to do anything about it. You may have even tried to do what others told you, but it hasn’t made a permanent improvement. So now what? Don’t give up. ![]() I was once told, “There is nothing you don’t already know about yourself, just things you don’t want to admit.” Digging into the understanding is hard. We have internal resistance to uncovering the truths, especially where we suffer and hurt. If you ask yourself “Why am I so uncomfortable speaking in small groups?”, your first thoughts will likely be along the lines of “I don’t know.” In fact, the most common answer to any self-exploratory why question is “I don’t know.” It’s the wrong question. As soon as we as a why question, our defensive systems are engaged. We are adept at putting up blocks but not so good at taking them down. Being vulnerable to pain, even self-revealing vulnerability, is challenging because pain is the harshest teacher and pain avoidance is the strongest motivator. You need to create a safe place for yourself. A place where the judge cannot come out. You need patience and compassion to allow the open communication between your reactive mind and your conscious choice-oriented mind. Start by mentally observing the situation. Notice the emotions and your body’s reactions. You must be careful not to make excuses for anyone involved. You do not care why the situation arose, only how you felt and reacted. This review is your point of view only. You are not accusing, and you are not excusing. You are simply observing. You may want to jot down the emotions and physical sensations. For example: I feel a tightness in my chest. It’s hard to breathe. I start coughing and my throat just closes. I am nervous; a little scared. What if I say something wrong - a symptom of worry and doubt. That imaginary experience was probably pretty intense because you relived it Depersonalize the experience by giving the emotions and sensations characteristics like shape, size, color, temperature, or any other physical characteristics. Every emotion and physical sensation provide communication from the reactive mind to the conscious mind. Yet we are not always in tune with interpreting the message and often miss or ignore it. You need to understand the message rather than brush it off (It’s just how I am. I’m fine.”) or dismiss it (“I don’t have time right now”). Invite the object to sit with you. Use your imagination. Go someplace relaxing like a campfire or the beach. Ask the object, “What is one important thing can I learn from you?” Write the message down. Sometimes the first thoughts are snippets and more comes when writing. Be patient. This sounds like a long way from setting a boundary. If you do not know why you are reacting the way you are reacting, how do you know what to change? What will you set in its place? How will you know when to enforce it, or even that it is being violated? Make the effort to understand yourself. The reward is worth the trouble. ![]() With the message received and the problem clearly defined, invite your reactive mind and body to sit with you. Treat them as separate, intelligent equals to your conscious mind. They are often not the dominant part, but we cannot be alive without them. Reassure yourself – the reactive mind, your body, and your conscious mind – that you do not need to make any changes. We just want to try out some ideas. What if we could keep the benefits of the reaction without the harmful or hurtful side effects? What would that be like? You might think about what behaviors would change; what you might say. Think about how you have matured since you first developed this response. How can you use your current knowledge and experience to respond differently. Maybe you imagine a whole new situation unfolding. Just be careful to avoid the “it never happened” as the only resolution. Instead, think about how you can empower yourself? Imagine a situation unfolding where you become the hero of your own story rescuing yourself. Pay close attention to how you feel as you become empowered. Play those emotions through you. Act out or say aloud that which you wished you had been able to do and say in the actual event. Feel the power, the freedom of the actions and words. Embody that power and freedom into your current self. Even when the imaginary event is extreme and you would never actually do or say that, embrace the freedom to respond knowing you will be reasonable in real situations. Acting out the physical motions and voicing aloud the words releases somatic triggers in a safe environment. Using your imagination to manage and change reactions to trigger events not only releases the triggers, but it also teaches you reactive mind how to respond. Embracing the new emotions of power and freedom releases the helplessness response giving you authority. You will know you have done all you can handle in any given round. Now you integrate the changes by giving yourself a hug. Allow love to well-up and flow through your arms back into yourself. Take note of how you feel physically, mentally, and emotionally.
At this point, you have reset a boundary by teaching yourself what you need, how to determine if someone is violating that need, and how you desire to respond. Over the next several days, think about the boundary and reinforce what you learned using imaginary practice sessions. That practice trains your reactive mind to respond in the new way enforcing your new boundary. Creating and resetting boundaries requires you to understand yourself, show yourself love and compassion, encourage yourself to become empowered, and making small but deliberate changes. Sometimes you need help. That’s when you seek a therapist, psychologist, or energy healer. Find the right match for you. Comments are closed.
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AuthorI am Ryan. Like you, I am on this journey of life. I never intended to be a healer, but I was the moth and energy the flame. Archives
October 2023
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