1. Verbalise them. It helps to first define what your boundaries look like, first to yourself then to others. If you understand what your boundaries are, you can then go ahead to explain them to others with ease. You can never explain what you don’t know. Knowing your boundaries requires self-awareness. (We’ll visit that some time to come).
2. Don’t use body language. Voice out how you feel about having a boundary being crossed. People are not mind-readers neither are you. It doesn’t matter how many signals you make with your facial expressions, groans, sighs…they won’t get it until you say it.
Most people who cross boundaries are abusers and narcissistic in nature. Usually, they are too self-absorbed to even notice your discomfort. All they want is their way and their way only.
In most cases, they always assume the victim-role despite them being the oppressors. They may get the clue that you’re uncomfortable but ignore your reactions until you say something and do something about their intrusion which leads us to point 3.
3. Act out your boundary. Talk to the person crossing your boundary. Let them know they are crossing it and what exact boundary they are crossing. Don’t opt for gossip or talking about them behind their backs out of resentment. That never solves anything.
It only gets you more frustrated and vulnerable to have more of your boundaries crossed. Verbalising your boundaries also doesn’t mean complaining about it. Complaining to others or the person overstepping your boundaries only builds resentment and frustration within you, creating a pathetic victim mentality in you—blaming everyone but yourself for failing to stand up for yourself by creating healthy boundaries.
Complaints won’t solve anything. In fact they only lead to more misunderstanding because they don’t attend directly to the root cause of the problem. They make whoever you’re communicating to your boundaries more defensive because they feel attacked. Eventually you go around in circles without results.
“We don’t stop to evaluate what we’re allowing to happen by not setting clear boundaries.”
Glover, ‘Setting Boundaries: Finding Peace.’
Calmly establish your boundaries with the intention to have them known and respected. If eloquently communicated, the other party may choose to act like they’ve not understood them but now they’ll know you have them. Therefore, it will be upon them when they interface with the consequences of their actions if they ever overstep your boundaries again.
4. Set actions and consequences to be implemented when your boundaries are ever crossed. Know while by yourself what you’re to do in case a boundary has been crossed. Let’s say someone talks to you while yelling and you don’t like that. If the action you chose to combat such disrespect is to walk away when someone does it, then if it happens, walk away from that person.
Don’t stay around a person crossing your boundary. Act and be firm about your decision. They’ll threaten. They’ll try to guilttrip you. You must build the resilience to counter their manipulations. For instance, maybe you chose to block a certain abusive toxic family member on all social media platforms. When they say you’re hateful person, ruining your name among other family members, do not by any means unblock them.
Keep firm with your boundary. Protect your peace at all costs. Guess what? They haven’t changed. If you unblock them because of the pressure they’re bringing your way, soon enough you’ll regret why you did. The reason why you blocked them in the first place will resurface in no time.
5. When a boundary is crossed, the culprit must suffer the consequences for their actions. Do not be lenient with it. Be firm. You teach people how to treat you by either letting them disrespect you over and over again or dealing with the disrespect as soon as it surfaces.
Hope this article helps you establish healthy boundaries in your relationships. If you have a question, leave it in the comments and let’s talk about it.
And That’s On Life, Periodt! 