How to Set Healthy Boundaries Every Day
There may come a time in life when everything seems to hit at once. You’re overwhelmed, stressed out, and feeling as if you’re at or near your breaking point. When this happens, you go into self preservation mode.
You don’t have to get to this point to enact this strategy. You can practice self care and self preservation long before things get out of control. You do it by setting healthy boundaries with everyone you interact with — no matter how close the relationship.
Author Anne Katherine wrote a book for people who need to know how to set healthy boundaries on a daily basis. It’s called Where to Draw the Line and it covers a variety of situations you may need help with.
The premise she conveys is that you’re constantly confronted with choices as to whether or not you’re going to protect your values and your well being. She emphasizes that every time you don’t set boundaries, you’re not being true to yourself and you’re allowing others to harm you, even unintentionally.
What this book does is gives you the tools you need to have those conversations about boundaries in every area of your life — work, home, friendships and more. You’ll free up time for things that energize and fulfill you, rather than feeling drained because you’re catering to everyone else’s needs.
It helps that the author presents a variety of case studies to showcase how boundaries help in everyday situations. This allows you to see how certain boundaries might benefit you (and your loved ones) if you set and adhere to them.
You can still meet the needs of those you love and cherish, but you won’t be doing anything at the expense of your own physical and emotional health. Everyone has demands made on them by others.
The difference is, many people refuse to be taken advantage of or have their space and time infringed on. They have boundaries in place — while you may be just learning such a thing exists.
It’s never too late to begin implementing boundaries in your life. Even if you were raised in a family where no one had ever heard of boundaries, you can adopt the idea from this point forward and even share it with your loved ones so that they, too have ways to deal with toxic encounters.
This is especially helpful for people who have to deal with narcissists or co-dependent individuals on a regular basis at work or in the home. It will provide layers of protection against their destructive behavior.
