Now that we are in the New Year it might be a good time to reevaluate relationships in your life. While New Year’s resolutions are typically self-improvement-based, one thing that can have major effects on your life is relationships. This goes for family, friends, significant others, or anyone else that you have a notable relationship with. Improvement in this area in your life can start with a conversation about your bourndies with the other person or could start with becoming more self aware of your own thought process. 

Establish the Boundaries and Clearly State Your Expectations

Boundaries are important for any relationship. Whether it be with your partner, your parents, or your coworker. Boundaries are levels of our comfortability with a person in regards to a particular area of our life. It is important to have boundaries and share what they are so that you feel safe and comfortable. Some categories of boundaries include:

• Physical (not wanting someone in your personal space)

• Emotional (letting someone know if a particular action is emotionally triggering)

• Sexual (making sure you feel safe in a sexual relationship. Also feeling safe in nonsexual relationships by confronting sexual innuendo)

• Work environment (feeling secure and able to do your job)

• Items (such as personal belongings)

• Time (understanding and voicing use and misuse of your time)

While not everyone may be accepting of the boundaries that you set, you have a better chance of getting your needs met if you are clear about them. Everyone has different levels of comfortability, such as the hugger in the family verses the person who sticks to fist bumps. No one should be expected to guess what someone else is or is not comfortable with. This is especially true for parents and their children. 

A patient of mine said she came home at 3:00 a.m. expecting everyone to be asleep and even though she was super quiet, her father was waiting up for her and asked her where she’d been. She was astonished that he was up, but even more astonished that he thought he had a right to ask her that question. He, on the other hand, was astonished that she was out so late for “no apparent reason” and for not letting anyone know where she was or what time she’d be home. Turned out, he was mostly angry because his wife could not sleep and would not let him sleep because she was doing what she always did when her daughter was out, waiting for her to be back home safe and sound. This problem could have been avoided with communication focused on managing expectations. 

For the adult child, let your parents know if their advice is welcome or not. When you present a problem or a worry that you have, they may assume that you want their advice and offer it unsolicited. Hint: You may first have to decide what it is you do want. Do you want coaching? A shoulder to cry on or a sounding board to bounce an idea off of but not necessarily input or a reaction? Or are you looking for input? If you are, what kind of input? Advice, feedback, perspective? Figure it out and be clear about it, or you may get a whole lot of nothing, or a whole lot of something you don’t need and don’t want. If you are not clear, you may get unwanted or unneeded advice. Know that it is ok to ask for advice, but it’s also ok to ask that they not jump in with advice every time you stress out about your situation. Sometimes we just want to vent and not to be rescued.

With that said, one very effective way to bring up boundaries with someone is the use of an “I” messages instead of the “You” message (which is always experienced by the receiver as accusatory). For example, if you have a family member that is a hugger and you aren’t comfortable with it, use:

“I am not comfortable with hugging, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love you or that I’m not happy to see you. I’m happy to see you.”

Instead of:

“You really need to stop trying to hug me.”

If someone continues to violate your boundaries after having conversations with them about it take the necessary actions. You are allowed to express your needs and concerns, don’t feel guilty about setting boundaries with anyone. 

Next week I will talk about how errors in thinking can destroy your relationship.