Have you put yourself at a disadvantage when you failed to draw the boundaries because you couldn’t think of a way to do it? Have you ever felt mistreated when someone drew a line to your disadvantage? Setting boundaries is one of the most important parts of a relationship. Everyone must know how to set boundaries. It is the most important thing to have satisfactory relationships with healthy boundaries. Without agreeable boundaries, most relationships cannot function well. The expression, “good fences make good neighbors,” is true.
How to Set Boundaries for a Peaceful Life?
Keep in mind there are different types of boundaries like physical, emotional, sexual, material, time, and workplace boundaries.[1] Not all boundaries are well-defined. There are poor boundaries as well; boundaries that are too loose or too strict, boundaries that are self-serving, and boundaries that feel abusive. So what can we do about this? Well, for that, you must know where to draw the line. Here are the six steps to drawing healthy boundaries and improving your life overall.
Step 1: Know Yourself and Your Needs
This first step in setting boundaries is to make an appointment with yourself. Make yourself comfortable with a notebook so that you can brainstorm your ideas. You need to create a map in your mind that enables you to confidently respond to boundary conflicts. When you have that map in your mind, you will feel more relaxed and will be able to handle conflict in a way that works for you and the other person. This is what you have to come to terms with: Knowing how to draw boundaries is necessary. When thinking about setting boundaries and making compromises, you are considering the totality of your values, your limits in terms of time and energy, and your desire and ability to sacrifice. These are all important issues to understand. Your mind and body work very closely together to keep you functioning, trust what it has to say. If a favor makes you uncomfortable and weighty then say no to the request. If the favor asked doesn’t make you uneasy then consider saying yes. Getting a handle on them keeps you from making commitments in a soft moment when your time will not really allow it, causing you to neglect a more important priority. Since drawing boundaries is often a unique and complex task, it is worth purchasing some books on the subject. Here are two that can help:
Step 2: Planning for Problem Situations
We all have difficult boundary situations. Some will involve a bossy person, a passive person, or someone who has different values. Whatever the difficult boundary problems you face, you can help yourself a lot if you plan for them. These are some planning considerations: Drawing boundaries becomes easier when you have a plan.
Step 3: Develop Your Strategy
As a general rule, most people want good boundaries as much as you do, but they don’t know how to draw boundaries. Most people are not looking for unnecessary problems, and it is where you draw the boundaries. If you respect others and treat their concerns as valid, they will likely do the same since reciprocity is an ancient rule in human relationships.[2] Therefore when you are willing to listen to another person, it is common courtesy that the other person will do the same. It is not unreasonable to want to be listened to as well. It also helps to be in a problem-solving frame of mind. If you ask questions to find out where the other person has some flexibility you can then offer solutions in the form of suggestions, alternatives, or even substitutes for what is being asked of you. Since not everyone understands boundaries, you may have to be a leader in finding an agreeable solution. If I were to create a formula for a boundary setting process, it would be: Successful problem-solving is a combination of respect and creativity. When you combine both, your chances of a positive outcome increase, and you know where to draw the line. You can use the ASSA formula as well. ASSA stands for:
Alert the individual that you need to talk to them. State your issue by revealing to the person what the problem is. Tell them why it’s an issue. Sell the advantages to them for acting better towards you. For example, “you will seem professional”. Agree. Seek agreement for doing things differently in the future.
Step 4: The Tough Cases
The first thing you have to do in tough cases is to give yourself permission to have the problem. If you feel bad about it you will be less effective in solving the problem. You also need to give yourself permission to fail because only then will you come up with solutions. Not everyone is cooperative and if you can accept that with good grace, it will help you to relax about conflict. It also helps to know that walking away from a conflict is sometimes necessary and not a sign of failure. When you have a difficult or stubborn situation, it can help to come up with a way to change the existing dynamic. Here are some ideas:
Step 5: Implementing Your Strategy
Your experience and comfort level should guide how you decide to implement your boundary implementation strategies.[3] You can start with minor situations with people you know and draw the boundaries that are very important to you.
Step 6: The Key
I believe that the key to setting boundaries and good relationships lies in being in a constructive frame of mind. When the people around you know that you see the good in them, they will be in a positive frame of mind when working with you. It also helps to have a sense of humor and to be creative.
Final Thoughts
Good relationships are challenging because we are all both alike and different at the same time. Just making the effort to work on boundaries is something for you to feel proud of. When you learn how to set boundaries, you are creating a better world with each positive step. Every time you find positive interpersonal solutions, you essentially help reduce some of the fear and unhappiness in the world. That is a great gift to yourself and others. Featured photo credit: Dessidre Fleming via unsplash.com
