Good Boundaries Make for Good Relationships

Imagine you had a neighbour who was always trying to tell how you to run your life; how to hang your laundry better, when to prune your roses, what colour to paint your walls. I’m guessing you’d find it pretty irritating and intrusive.

Or if the person who lived next door was literally oblivious to your needs – someone who had noisy parties late into the night every weekend. Or started their lawnmower very early on a Sunday morning. Or went about their business, ignoring the smoke and flames engulfing your house?

Whether overly interested or neglectful and selfish, a bad neighbour can make us very unhappy.

The same is true of our neighbours in life: the people we are in relationships with. If we are hooked up with (or are ourselves) someone who is controlling, bossy and interfering, the relationship becomes very lopsided. The bossed person feels though they have no space to be themselves and make their own choices, and the bossy-boots feels that they have to keep everything going.

Likewise, if we are with or are someone who is neglectful and selfish, the relationship feels unfairly tipped in favour of the selfish party. The injured party feels of no value and significance at all.

Good fences really do make good neighbours, both literally and figuratively.

Just as we need to have clear, strong and well-maintained fences separating us from our neighbours, so we need clear, strong and well-maintained boundaries in our relationships; boundaries that are strong enough to maintain our own integrity and independence, while still allowing for co-operation and mutual support and inter-dependence. We need to allow for give and take to keep all parties happy. We need to be able to ask for (and trust that we will receive) help when we need it. We need to respect each other’s choices but also be able to speak up when those choices are compromising our own quality of life.

Most of us struggle to set and maintain clear boundaries in our relationships because relationships are one of the hardest places to get this right. This is even more true if we had a childhood where our relationships had blurry boundaries and where we were expected to play more than one role. Some of us had to parent our parent/s and/or our siblings. Some of us had to be the confidant of our parent/s. Many of us had to be the adult, even when we were tiny children.

Clear boundaries are not something that we are familiar with. And so, our fences are not as strong and stable as they should be. We find ourselves trying to do too much for others, or having others trying to do too much for and to us. And then we don’t understand why we feel so resentful, disappointed and overlooked in our adult relationships. I’m seeing more and more how people are allowing their boundaries to blur and blurred and are suffering the consequences.

The best friend who is also the therapist.

The lover who is also the mother.

The father who is also the sports coach.

The daughter who is also the caregiver.

Sometimes it is unavoidable and inevitable that we need to play more than one role (when parents get older and more dependent, for instance), but even given time and resource constraints, we should always concentrate on playing the primary role of each of our relationships.

Poor boundaries not only lead to exhaustion, overwhelm and a great deal of unnecessary conflict and suffering, they also contribute to both individual and relationship burnout.

Healthy relationships need healthy boundaries. Strong relationships require strong boundaries. Improving your boundaries will not only improve your life, it will also enhance your relationships.

Tags: boundaries | find yourself in love | healthy relationships | relationships