Navigating Through Boundary Confusion

By Elayne Savage, PhD

 

 

Personal boundaries are about space: physical, mental and emotional. 

Having good personal boundaries means knowing where you stop and the other person begins. It means not confusing your own feelings and ideas with those of someone else.



Personal boundaries are about respect: respecting your own space and the space of others. This includes honoring each others differences of style, needs, feelings thoughts, ideas and values . . . and not feeling threatened by them.

The following list of personal boundaries is based on writings of authors John and Linda Friel:



Physical boundaries mean respect for physical space for yourself and others. These boundaries are violated when someone uses your stuff without asking or when someone touches you inappropriately, or pushes or hits you.



Intellectual boundaries mean respect for ideas or thoughts for yourself and others. These boundaries are violated when someone tries to discount your thoughts, saying things like, “You’re imagining it” or “You don’t really think that, do you?”



Emotional boundaries involve respect for feelings. These boundaries are violated when someone tries to invalidate or ignore your feelings, takes you for granted, criticizes, belittles or shames you. 



Money boundaries involve how we earn it, spend it, save it, and how much you need to feel a sense of security. These boundaries are violated when someone makes judgments about how much money you have or don’t have and whether this makes you a good person. Bragging about money and spending is a transgression of these boundaries.



Social boundaries means a respect for our choices of social contact. They’re violated when someone criticizes who you choose to be with or where you choose to go. 



Time boundaries means having respect for your own and others’ ways of getting things done. Some of us operate on time for meetings or completing projects. Others meet our deadlines, but “under the wire,” 



Sexual boundaries are about the right to privacy. No one can touch you without your permission. Staring and leering are also a transgression of sexual boundaries. 



I would add to this list: 


Ethical boundaries are a set of principles for the purpose of guiding decision making, behavior and professional integrity. Many businesses, organizations and professional associations have a Code of Ethics and Conduct.



Boundary Confusion Abounds



Some folks see things as black and white, good and bad, right and wrong. They have a tendency to make other people bad and wrong. This is a common form of boundary confusion.



 

Some view others as extensions of themselves. They assume other people think the same, have the same feelings, or play by the same rules, In other words, they are unable to appreciate others as separate, This can lead to inappropriate, intrusive and controlling behavior. This, too, is a common form of boundary confusion.



Folks who have a high need for appreciation, often push the limits of boundaries in order to get the praise and attention they crave. To call attention to themselves, some may even appear to push another person into over-reacting. You may recognize this as bullying behavior. 




In our early years many developed a facade because we believed we were expected to think or behave in a certain way. So we ended up losing our true self.



A consultation client offers this description of the ‘false front’ he developed as a child. “I couldn’t be myself in my family, and now as an adult I hardly know what’s underneath anymore.”

Yes and No

Learning to say “yes” and “no” defines who you are in the moment — and what you stand for. In fact, these words are great boundary setters.

The trouble is many of us did not have very good modeling of boundaries

in childhood. We had no idea how to define what we stood for or what we needed. In fact, in many families, defining things was discouraged, or even forbidden. Instead, things had to be vague, cloudy, amorphous. Family members played guessing games with each other because being specific was simply not okay. And what could be more specific then learning to say “yes” and “no” loudly and clearly?

Too often we learned to say “yes” when we really meant “no” and we learned to say “no” when we wanted to say “yes.”

When Ginny, a college student, asked her therapist if she could interview him for a class assignment regarding his specialty, he said, “No, I am not able to do that because of my limited time.” Then he added, “My having to say ‘no’ has nothing to do with you, it is only about my time limitations.” Because he was sensitive to Ginny’s issues with rejection, she did not take his “no” personally. She understood that “no” is not a rejection, it’s only a limitation. In fact, it’s one of the best ways to define boundaries.

Some people have a hard time saying “no” because they are afraid they won’t be liked and are afraid of being rejected. In fact, they’re easy to get along with because they say “yes” a lot. Other people have difficulty saying “no” because they have a hard time hearing it from others. If someone says “no” to them, they hear it as a rejection and take it personally.

They’re afraid of hurting the feelings of others the same way they’re afraid their own feelings might be hurt. So instead, they become indecisive, wishy-washy.

Psychoanalyst Alice Miller in Thou Shalt Not Be Aware, states “someone who cannot say no at the decisive moments of life, loses authenticity.” She’s talking about our friend from chapter 4, “Don Juan, the Seducer.”

Remember how “Don’s” mother needed him to be dependent on her and rewarded him for his dependence? It wasn’t okay to be himself because she might be upset with him. He wasn’t able to say to her, “I am your child, but you have no right to my whole being and my whole life.” “Don” still has trouble saying no as an adult, and it gets him into a lot of trouble in his relationships.

In spite of how you grew up, you can learn to say “no” to someone clearly and definitively. You no longer have to pretend to go along with an idea or plan for fear of hurting someone’s feelings, possibly hurting the relationship, or losing the love of that person. A woman I know needs a constant reminder that it’s okay to say “no,” so she hand-lettered a sign for her office: “NO. is a complete sentence."

One of the best ways to set clear boundaries is to learn to clearly say “yes” and “no.” It seems to me that when someone asks you to do something, you can answer in one of four ways:

* “Yes, I can do that.”

* “No, I can’t do that.”

* “I’ll think about it and get back to you.”

* “I can’t do that, but this is what I can do.”

With some practice, you will soon be able to learn to assess a situation without feeling rushed into a “yes” or “no.” You will also, with practice, learn to give the appropriate response.

Claudia Black, in Repeat After Me, has some excellent exercises for practicing saying “yes” and “no.” She suggests asking yourself some of the following questions:

* What do I hear when someone says “no” to me?

* What do I feel when someone says “no” to me?

* How did my mom say “no” to me?

* How did my dad say “no” to me?

* Have any “nos” in my life made me angry?

* When I say “no,” I feel______________.

* Now try asking yourself these same questions about saying “yes.”

 

If you want to practice saying “yes” or “no,” practice with another person. Maintain a comfortable distance from the other person, look the person in the eye, and loudly and clearly say “yes” or “no.” Now try it a little louder.

By the way, “no” can take other forms as well. A young woman I know has found a phrase that works for her: “Stop. This is uncomfortable for me.”

 

Blind Spots and Projection – Spreading the Garbage Around



You may be aware Projection is often one of the most confusing boundary difficulties in both business and personal relationships.

Projection happens when we cannot acknowledge certain unacceptable aspects of ourselves, and we mistakenly imagine that thought or feeling exists in the other person. Because these parts make us uncomfortable they stay hidden from us  ––Carl Jung called these parts the shadow—the dark part, the part we wish wasn’t there. 



When these undesirable thoughts or feelings intrude we often get anxious. Projection is an unconscious way of protecting ourselves from this anxiety. It is a way of dealing with feelings we cannot co me to terms with.

 Projection means disowning, rejecting unacceptable traits in ourselves and perceiving these same traits in another person or group.

In other words, we may find ourselves accusing them of the same types of behaviors that we find incompatible with how we need to see ourselves.



A coaching client sums it up pretty well, “When we can’t own our own stuff, we try to give it away. I guess you could say that projection protects us from ourselves by spreading the garbage around.

 

5 Ideas for Navigating Through Boundary Confusion

- Figure out where you stop and the other person begins.



- Know that you exist separately and distinctly from other people, with different feelings, ideas and needs.



- Learn to say “yes” and “no” loudly and clearly.



- Practice putting yourself in the other person’s shoes and understanding what their worldview is in the moment.



- Remind yourself another person’s words or actions are often about that person and that person’s history, and not about you. Can you choose not to take it personally?



 

© Elayne Savage, PhD

Adapted from Don’t Take It Personally! The Art of Dealing with Rejection and Breathing Room-Creating Space to Be a Couple

You'll find more on blogs on this topic at www.TipsFromTheQueenOfRejection.com under 'Personal Boundaries' in the Archives.