Boundaries - Friend Or Foe?

A boundary is simply a property line. It has two jobs. The first, is to define the perimeter of the property and the second is to protect what’s inside there. Imagine that your life is like your physical home . We say yes or no to what we allow inside.

Property lines are easily seen in our physical world by fences and hedges and gates but are much harder to see in our internal world, though they are just as real.

So is a boundary a friend?  Is it a foe?  

Some people don’t like that word ‘boundaries’ because it has a limit, a “no”, attached to it, which can for some, be associated with anger or harshness. To those people it may appear as a foe. In reality, a limit is a friend that brings identity and protection to my life.

A loving limit is possible when we understand our responsibility to steward our own lives. This means we are to keep good things in and destructive or untimely things out, to be able to kindly say no, without guilt or fear of another’s anger.

This is self -control not “other” control.

On the other hand, to have respect for the “no”  of another person, improves my own internal structure. I then will not be saying “no”, to be against someone but to be for the responsible care of my own life.

 When used this way, a boundary is truly a friend.