3 Common Untruths About Boundaries

Why are boundaries a big deal?

Boundaries as defined by Wikipedia, “are guidelines, rules or limits that a person creates to identify reasonable, safe and permissible ways for other people to behave towards them and how they will respond when someone passes those limits.”

Whether it be in romantic, platonic, familial or work relationships, boundaries are vital to long-term success, fulfillment and happiness. Speaking from personal experience, without healthy boundaries you run the risk of being depleted, used or abused. We hear the term “boundaries” often but there are a good many who don’t understand what they are and/or have struggled to implement them. Highly sensitive people (HSP) and empaths (clairsentients) especially struggle with boundaries due to their strong compassionate spirit and inherent understanding that hurting people hurt other people. Nevertheless, I encourage all people to take responsibility for their own inner workings and hold others accountable for their own — boundaries are how we do this.

Here are a few common misunderstandings about boundaries and the truths behind each to help empower you in your journey:

UNTRUTH #1: “Boundaries are mean and extreme.” Healthy boundaries are not punishment to others, they are your guidelines for how you care for yourself and how others are to treat you if they wish to have a relationship with you. There’s no “right” or “wrong” when it comes to your boundaries — it’s all about what works for you and what doesn’t. And only you get to decide what they are and how you enforce them.

Boundaries help you protect your most valuable resource: your life energy. Failure to protect your energy means that the things most important to you won’t get the best version of you. We only have so many minutes in a day and so much energy, so it’s important to be selective about what you give your time and energy to. If you spread yourself too thin, self-care goes out the window, you become stressed, you become depressed, you become a shadow of your authentic self.

Boundaries also help others know where your responsibility ends and where theirs begins, much like property lines. But instead of saying “this is your lawn which you are responsible for cutting” you say “these are your emotions/moods which you are responsible for maintaining/regulating.” Co-dependent relationships are a perfect example of weak or undefined property lines, where you don’t know how to separate your feelings from your partner’s and allow his or her moods to dictate your happiness. This is also a huge challenge for ungrounded or unhealed empaths due to our supernatural openness to the inner workings of others and innate desire to help.

Now if you grew up in a home where boundaries were non-existent or consistently trampled upon, defining and maintaining healthy boundaries will be hard work to you. That’s okay. Much of life is about purging old programming. The more you integrate with your authentic self and understand your own needs, wants, capabilities and limitations, the easier it’ll be to define your property lines and enforce them. Conversely, the more unclear your sense of self is, the easier it is for others to manipulate you.

Narcissists, for example, are most drawn to people without boundaries. This is because these energy vampires have one goal only: to get the most supply for their ego with the least amount of effort. It’s not uncommon for narcissists to undermine, guilt or shame you for having boundaries in an effort to get you to back down in order to take from you more easily. If anyone responds to your energetic fence lines in this way PAY CLOSE ATTENTION. You are not dealing with someone who is concerned with you feeling mutually fulfilled in the relationship; you’re dealing with a taker.

Healthy people, on the other hand, will not test or protest your boundaries. They’ll value (read: respect) you and their relationship with you too much to jeopardize it. In fact, they’ll be all for boundaries because they, too, are giving to the relationship and want to protect their investment. They understand that interactions are an energetic exchange and that healthy relationships are based on reciprocity.

Drawing clear boundaries is a win-win for all parties involved and the fastest way to tell if someone is in a relationship to use and control you, or to see you shine and thrive.

UNTRUTH #2: “Boundaries do not apply to families (or close relationships).” This is a common toxic belief for people who come from enmeshed family dynamics. In an enmeshed family it’s hard to tell where one person ends and another begins. Healthy separateness (having your own identity, wants, and needs) is seen as a threat at worst and a nuisance at best. At the root of these families is a pervasive feeling of shame (not being good enough). To mask this shame, members of the family are expected to project an image of perfection to the outside world. The children in this dynamic are expected to make the parents proud and avoid any appearances of failing, struggling or having anything less than the “perfect life.” Meanwhile, issues go unaddressed, swept under the rug to protect the parents’ fragile egos. This is where boundary issues are born (among other things like anxiety, depression and addiction from undigested emotions). Conformity is valued at the expense of each individual’s authentic self. It’s a truly narcissistic dynamic where the children are seen as an extension of the parents, discouraged from having needs separate from that of the broken family unit.

These families usually go on to create two types of people in the world: people who give all of themselves without limits and people who take, dominate and control without limits. If you belong to one of these families, developing boundaries will go a long way in helping you recover as you work to provide yourself with the proper nurturing you didn’t receive growing up.

It’s important to know that sharing the same bloodline or storied history with another person isn’t what makes you “family” or “close”, it’s having a sincere connection and genuine care for one another. You shouldn’t have to hide aspects of who you are in order to belong. Ultimately, it’s this rejection —this lack of being seen and known for who you truly are— that’s one of the most painful existences humans can go through and one of the biggest determining factors of mental health issues.

If you’re on the journey of separating from an enmeshed family, good on you. It can feel scary initially, but as you move forward into your authentic self you’ll feel a big weight lifted off of you (the weight of other people’s expectations and judgments). You’ll realize you thrive just fine on your own…that your survival and happiness isn’t contingent upon the acceptance of others.

At times you may experience push back in the form of undermining, minimizing, testing or disrespecting, or receive responses like “you’re too sensitive” or “you took it the wrong way, I was just joking”. Don’t fall for it! Don’t take it personal. Stand firm in your truth. You are growing in self-sufficiency, something that greatly unsettles the enmeshed dynamic. Have compassion but maintain healthy boundaries. Send them love and light while you continue to honor and nurture your sacred self. Once they realize that they can’t pull you off your path, they will have no choice but step up or step out.

UNTRUTH #3: “Boundaries are rigid and permanent.” Healthy boundaries are strong but flexible, like a tree anchored with hearty roots and branches atop that sway with the changing winds. There may be times when you need to open up a bit more or pull back to create the right amount of mutually fulfilling intimacy. For example, spending extra time with a friend who’s going through a devastating breakup. Or maybe you need to establish healthy distance from a toxic family member who dominates or undermines you on a never-ending basis. Remember, your power is always in your hands.

The main idea with healthy boundaries is being protected in a permeable bubble where love is able to flow in and out. Be cautious not to wall yourself up in a castle keep making it hard to connect with safe, healthy people. At the same time it’s completely acceptable to disconnect from people who are consistently dismissive or disrespectful of the time and energy you give.

Here’s where the aforementioned flexibility of boundaries comes into play: if that same person who crossed your boundaries decides to take ownership of his or her actions and reconnect on terms that work for you as well, then you can allow them back into your life one trustworthy step at a time. What I caution you against is spending energy getting another person to want to know and respect your boundaries. If they’re interested, they’ll do it on their own accord.

At the end of the day it’s important to be clear and consistent with your boundaries and emotionally-centered in defining and enforcing them.

Again, boundaries are not to keep other people away. They’re not to punish other people either. They’re for you, to protect you. You have every right to be treated how you want to be treated, just as others have a right to exit the relationship if for any reason they don’t like your boundaries.

Stand strong in your self-worth and kindly show anyone the door who can’t/won’t honor your boundaries. In doing so you’ll protect your priceless time and energy for what is most important – your journey towards your Highest Self.