Even among those who are able to see therapy as a potential resource, it seems common to think of therapy as an opportunity to discuss a specific event or experience in life which has led to difficult feelings. And this is a great use of therapy! However, it is not the only (or perhaps not even the primary) way that therapy can be beneficial.

Many of the clients in my practice begin therapy to address feelings of sadness, irritability, or fear which they don’t really understand or see a clear source for. The thing about good therapists is that they are working themselves out of a job, one client at a time, because the task of a course of therapy is to provide someone with a new experience, a new understanding, and a new set of skills for managing life when it becomes difficult (both now and in the future when, inevitably, this will happen again). So, even without a clear understanding of why you’re feeling the way you are, therapy can offer strategies for developing a more productive, meaningful relationship with your emotions which may make difficult feelings more tolerable. You may find new strategies for taking care of your feelings, both on your own and through effective engagement with those who care about you and your well-being. You may find yourself empowered to prioritize efforts that offer improved balance in your life, generating opportunities for peace, power, and joy to offset the difficult feelings which are a natural (and important!) part of our lives.

When I think about therapy, I certainly honor and value aspects of the process which emphasize getting to know areas of concern and understanding both your current strengths and your areas for growth. I deeply appreciate the process of increasing self-awareness and developing good insight, because I believe this work paves the way for meaningful personal and relational growth. But therapy which does not then move toward action – toward learning and implementing new skills and strategies – is missing the mark. To receive support, encouragement, and a place to speak freely is an incredible gift. To find a changed perspective, a new approach, and a set of learnable skills which may make life fundamentally smoother is invaluable to those in the struggle and working to find their way out.

I encourage clients to realize that there is no need to have all the answers before starting the process. It is okay to not know what is leading to difficult feelings. This doesn’t mean you have nothing to talk about – it means you have a lot to discover about yourself and your life!! The goal of the process is to get to know you and your struggle differently. And, perhaps even more importantly, to introduce resources which may make the difficulty more manageable even if you never fully understand what made it so challenging in the first place. If you’re interested in beginning but aren’t sure where to start, start anyway! Your beautiful life is waiting…

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Part 3: Communicating Your Limits

A Beginner’s Guide to Boundaries is a three-part series on this important topic. To start the process, I will focus on identifying some of the myths about boundaries that I hear a lot. Then, when I’ve shared about what boundaries aren’t, I’ll talk about what they are and help reshape your thinking about how they can work for you in your life. Lastly, once you have a good understanding of boundaries and their role in your well-being, we’ll focus on how to effectively communicate them to others. If you’re new to the topic, it can be a lot to sort out! But for those willing to hang in there, most of those I know who have done the work feel so grateful when they get to the other side of the experience and find things changed for the better.

In this third and final part of the series, we will focus on exploring strategies for effectively communicating your boundaries to others. If you missed earlier parts of the series, consider first reviewing Part One: The Myths of Boundary-Setting and Part Two: Identifying Your Limits. In these sections, you will consider first the why and then the how of identifying your interpersonal limits and prepare for this section’s discussion of effectively implementing these newly-identified boundaries.

Once you have identified areas for improvement regarding your decisions about how you spend your time and energy, it is very common (and understandable!) to want to shout them from the rooftops. There are reasons, though, to approach this process a little more slowly and deliberately than may be your first impulse. It is important to realize that making changes in your life will inherently impact those with whom you are in relationship. It benefits everyone for changes to occur gradually, allowing time to make the adjustments and evaluate their outcomes.

Often, when we take stock of our boundaries and the ways they are or are not working for us, we find one or a few areas which stand out as places to make a change. Maybe as you have put your attention on the issue of boundaries, you have realized you having been living far outside your limits at work. Perhaps you have a particular friendship or family relationship that comes to mind as one in which you have not been your best self or gotten your best support. Or maybe you have found a lot of areas which would benefit from a change. When you are ready to make a change, it is probably best to choose one opportunity for getting started. Because the forms boundaries can take vary so widely, there is no one clear strategy for beginning to talk about changes in your limits with others. But there are a few guidelines that can be helpful to be mindful of as your approach the process.

When discussing your personal limits with others, it is generally helpful to

• Be honest. When we are in the position of needing to decline another’s request for our time or energy, we tend to soften the blow of the “no” by expressing our regret. I strongly encourage you to only express your regret to miss the opportunity if you feel true regret and feel hopeful you can participate next time. If you don’t feel that way, please don’t say you do!! If you truly wish you were able to be involved, saying so can ensure others know you are very interested in them, their interests, and their activities but were unable to prioritize them for this moment. However, communicating that we are regretful when we are not makes it more likely we will get additional similar invitations to set boundaries around. An important part of boundary-setting is to establish our limits in ways which accurately reflect our limits for today and for the future, reducing the extent to which we must continue setting the same limits in the same areas with the same people.

• Be brief. Those who struggle to value their own wants and needs tend to provide a host of reasons for their decisions about boundaries, when they exist. If, alternatively, you acknowledge that you are allowed to make good decisions on your own behalf, it is often far easier to simply state the boundary without over-explanation or other efforts to justify your limits or excuse yourself for having them. You are not required to justify your decisions about your boundaries. You are not required to have an “excuse” for declining a request. It is possible and, I would argue, genuinely connecting to simply decline a request without over-apology or over-explanation. “It does not work for me this time” (or a thousand other variations on this theme) is a perfectly valid reason to provide for your decisions about how you spend your time and energy.

• Be prepared for a range of reactions. When we make a change to how we set limits for ourselves, those around us tend to notice and may express reactions ranging from incredible support to all-out rebellion. Generally speaking, groups of people (from as small as two to as large as you can imagine) move toward stability – we like things to stay the same because we tend to value familiarity and predictability. When you begin making changes to your limits and sharing those with others, it is likely that even those who support you will be acutely aware of how these changes impact them and the occasional discomfort of that. Allow those around you to care for themselves in the process of adjusting to your changes. They are allowed to be angry or frustrated, they are allowed to be disappointed, they are allowed to miss you, they are allowed to wish you were back to your “old self.” And you are allowed to pursue your goals and efforts at finding good limits no matter their reactions. The beauty of setting good boundaries and thinking about them effectively is that you will be able to recognize their reactions as understandable reactions to change and grant them permission to their self-care just as you have granted yourself permission to yours. You are allowed to set your rules; they are allowed to set theirs; and together, you will figure out how those work to maintain good relationship between you. It is common for there to initially be a period of tension when boundaries shift; however, that tends to be fairly short-lived and is often best supported by honest, open discussions with the people you care about most. Be patient – with you and with them!

I am in this work ALL THE TIME, both for myself (remember, it’s a continual and continually-changing process!), for the people I love personally, and for the clients with whom I am privileged to work. Because of that, I know the pain, the joy, the tension, and the resolution of the boundaries process. The consequences of not having good boundary-setting skills are real. The consequences of having good boundary-setting skills are real, too. We choose our sets of consequences at each moment, and that carries us to the place of good relationship with ourselves and with others. If you need someone to sit across from while you work through the pain and find the good – to be frustrated with while it’s “not working” and to celebrate with the first time it does – I am SO there!

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Part Two: Identifying Your Limits

A Beginner’s Guide to Boundaries is a three-part series on this important topic. To start the process, I focused on identifying some of the myths about boundaries that I hear a lot. Now that I’ve shared about what boundaries aren’t, I’ll talk about what they are and help reshape your thinking about how they can work for you in your life. Lastly, once you have a good understanding of boundaries and their role in your well-being, we’ll focus on how to effectively communicate them to others. If you’re new to the topic, it can be a lot to sort out! But for those willing to hang in there, most of those I know who have done the work feel so grateful when they get to the other side of the experience and find things changed for the better.

In this second part of the three-part series, we will talk about what boundaries actually are and focus on strategies for beginning to identify and respecting your own personal boundaries as you make decisions about how to live your life. If you missed part one, The Myths of Boundary-Setting, it is a good starting point for understanding the why of setting good interpersonal boundaries and to prepare yourself for this second part, in which we will focus on the how.

At first glance, it may be tempting to think of setting boundaries in overly simplistic terms. Even efforts to define the concept vary widely, though. It’s not a simple thing to think about. For the purposes of being sure we have a shared working understanding as we talk about the issue, I find it helpful to think of boundaries as the limits we set and the agreements we make in relationships. When thinking about boundaries, it is important to remember that healthy, appropriate personal boundaries are neither absolute nor rigid. There are no rules which, when established, work in all circumstances, with all people, at all times.  Boundaries require our ongoing attention and effort. Setting boundaries is both a flexible and continual process, in which you are thoughtfully and intentionally deciding if and when to agree to an experience, knowing your reasons for doing so (or not), and ensuring those reasons are meaningful and important to you.

Most people experience a large number of expectations from others in a given day. Boundaries allow us to be selective about when and how we agree to these expectations, and when and how to voice our disagreement and/or negotiate for an alternative. Examples of boundary-setting may include:

• Giving yourself permission to miss a friend’s event on an evening you already had other plans, rather than attempting to do both and feeling overwhelmed or exhausted by the experience

• Turning your phone to silent when with a loved one so you can focus on appreciating your time with them without interruption

• Respectfully discussing alternative ways you can help when asked to get involved with a service project in a role which you expect will be very difficult for you

• Checking and responding to work email only during business hours, despite regularly receiving communication from others outside of those times

• Making a personal decision, unpopular with some people close to you, about how you will enjoy a holiday

Considering your boundaries offers a flexible way of thinking about your wishes for your life. As discussed when reviewing common myths of boundaries, the goal is not to exclusively show concern for your own needs independent of the impact this has on others. When awareness of personal wishes, wants, and needs emerge as at least as important as the wants and needs of others, though, this often leads to a shift in choices we make about how we spend our time, what we agree to when asked by others, and how readily and/or regularly we sacrifice our own needs to meet the needs of others.

Good boundaries require ongoing awareness, evaluation, and decision-making. The rigid rules simply don’t work – for us or for others. So, instead, it is in our best interest to develop a reliable and trustworthy process for approaching each of these decisions thoughtfully. This process certainly gets easier over time and, eventually, may feel like second nature. Initially, though, using a decision tree or similar organizer may help you take a more systematic approach to honoring your own wants and needs at least as much as you respect and honor the wants and needs of others. When you can be intentional in this way, you are far more likely to engage with your life experiences from a place of enthusiasm and joy – as opposed to from a place of obligation and resentment – because you will know you have thoughtfully agreed to be involved in this situation in this way.

Try out this approach. Use the decision tree below to evaluate a (or a few) recent relational situation(s) which felt difficult for you to navigate.

What was it like for you to think about the situation in this way? Did you manage the situation in the way the decision tree arrived at, or differently? As you reflect on the situation, consider whether what you decided felt like the “right” choice for you in the end. This process of considering the facts, making a thoughtful decision, and reflecting on how it turned out is the “full-circle” process of good boundary-setting. You get to know more about yourself and your limits as you reflect on those times that have gone well and the times you have left a situation feeling less positively. With that information in hand, you make better decisions for yourself moving forward.

Many who identify themselves as “bad at boundaries” are struggling in the form of consistently elevating others’ needs above their own. However, it is important to be aware that boundaries are an issue of flexibility and balance, so it is entirely possible to struggle with boundaries in the form of consistently placing your own needs above those of others. Evaluating your decisions about boundaries will allow you better insight into how your boundary decisions affect you and those around you, in both helpful and unhelpful ways. Before attempting to make any changes in your life, give yourself an opportunity to spend some time evaluating your decisions using some form of strategic approach. Gather information about yourself, noting both your current areas of success and struggle with knowing your boundaries and making life decisions while taking them into account. Through this, you will likely find opportunities to congratulate yourself on ways you are handling this well, and you may find opportunities for small changes which could make a big difference.

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Part One: The Myths of Boundary-Setting

A Beginner’s Guide to Boundaries is a three-part series on this important topic. To start the process, I will focus on identifying some of the myths about boundaries that I hear a lot. Then, when I’ve shared about what boundaries aren’t, I’ll talk about what they are and help reshape your thinking about how they can work for you in your life. Lastly, once you have a good understanding of boundaries and their role in your well-being, we’ll focus on how to effectively communicate them to others. If you’re new to the topic, it can be a lot to sort out! But for those willing to hang in there, most of those I know who have done the work feel so grateful when they get to the other side of the experience and find things changed for the better.

For many people, one of the biggest barriers to setting and maintaining interpersonal boundaries lives in their beliefs about what boundaries are and what role they play in healthy relationships. So before introducing the skills of setting effective boundaries, it is important to begin reshaping some of these thoughts to develop a more realistic understanding of the value of setting interpersonal limits. I’ve chosen a few of the most common misconceptions – I’ll break down the myth and share my thoughts on how to think differently about the issue.

• Boundaries are about being selfish, making myself a priority over others. The true goal of recognizing, establishing, and maintaining appropriate interpersonal boundaries is simply to know and honor your own wants and needs as much as you honor the wants and needs of others. When done well, boundaries do not establish an “I win, you lose” relationship; rather, they allow for genuine connection and promote genuine action. When we meet others’ needs from a sense of obligation, over time we may begin to feel overwhelmed and/or resentful. When we establish balanced relationships which meet the needs (relatively equally) of everyone involved, we tend to engage in those relationships with eagerness and joy. This is the gift of good boundaries.

• Having boundaries is just about learning to say “no.” It’s hard to imagine that so many people struggle in this area if it is as simple as uttering a two-letter word most of us effectively added to our vocabularies as toddlers. It’s true that saying “no” to others’ requests is more difficult for some than for others, and this is certainly relevant to the issue of boundaries. It is also true that as we come to understand our limits, this does mean we may say “no” to others sometimes. But having good boundaries is much more about knowing when to say “yes” than how to say “no.” Keeping the goal of genuine connection in mind, it is the selective use of “yes” that lives at the heart of setting and maintaining good interpersonal boundaries.

• Once I establish my boundaries, others should respect my limits and never challenge them. One of the biggest frustrations with early attempts to establish better boundaries inevitably occurs when someone identifies an opportunity to make a change, establishes a new limit, and sees others acting in ways which challenge their efforts. When this happens, it’s easy to believe boundary-setting will never work because, “people won’t respect my boundaries.” The truth is, boundaries belong to the person who sets them and can only be respected or disrespected, honored or dishonored, by that person. Others cannot be expected to enforce your limits for you, and it will take time for you to learn strategies to enforce them for yourself. But when you are consistently respecting your limits, others will eventually do the same because to do otherwise will be futile for them. This is the power of effectively setting (and maintaining) appropriate boundaries. (If this sounds impossible, hang in there! This is a tough one, but I’ll show you what I mean as we talk about identifying our boundaries and communicating them to others. You CAN do this!)

• I don’t need to set boundaries, because I am happy just to make others happy. Different people have different needs, so boundaries look differently for everyone. If you do well with very few interpersonal limits, that is great! The goal is only to know your personal limits and live within them. It feels good – and is important – to be available to help meet others’ needs. Developing mutually-satisfying relationships is a critical component of well-being, and even those who find joy in providing for others will have emerging needs (even if only relatively minimal). Being able to advocate for the meeting of those needs, by yourself and/or by others, is a skill from which all of us can benefit!

If this is an area where you have struggled, give yourself an opportunity to think about each of these myths. Read and re-read those which are most relevant for you. Consider what other thoughts about setting boundaries show up for you and may represent barriers to the goal of better balancing your needs alongside the needs of others. These exercises in self-reflection represent important preparation for beginning to develop a more thoughtful approach to making decisions about how you spend your time and energy. In part two of the series, Getting to Know Your Limits, we will think together about how to begin this process.

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One of my earliest tasks when meeting with new clients is to talk about the goals they have for their lives. And more often than not, at some point in the discussion, they say some version of, “I just want to be happy.” Most people I meet would give just about anything for more happiness, and I fully understand the desire. Who doesn’t want to be happier?

It is an important part of our overall well-being, but the way we think about happiness tends to be one of the things that keeps us from it.

Most people think of happiness as the “warm and fuzzy” feeling they get when something really great happens. These moments are amazing!! But if you really think about them, they never last long. The situation changes, and the feeling fades. We’re left with waiting until the next good thing happens for us to feel it again. Happiness is a short-term, fleeting emotion (it turns out, this is true of all of our other emotional experiences, too, but we can talk about that another day…). No matter how hard we try to hang on to it forever, things change and the feeling goes. Emotions exist to give us important information about our current situation – they are meant to regularly change as a reflection of our changing circumstances.

When I talk with people about happiness in this way, most are quick to say that is not what they mean when they say they want to be happy. For most people, they are talking about their desire for a longer-lasting sense that their lives are well-lived, with meaning and purpose. They are searching for satisfaction with their lives, rather than hoping to make that short-lived experience of joy last forever. But there is a real danger in confusing life satisfaction and happiness. Being satisfied with life requires going after goals with perseverance, and this is not always a “happy” path.

At some point we must acknowledge that between where we are now and the goals we have for success and satisfaction is a space probably filled with a fair amount of struggle, a lot of hard work, and some times that feel pretty far from happy. If we become exclusively focused on happiness at any cost, we risk missing out on important opportunities. We may no longer be willing to tolerate the discomfort of working through a rough patch in a marriage which has otherwise been a source of joy. We may decide to give up on the dream of career advancement in a workplace we value after being passed over for a promotion. In the short term, these experiences may bring frustration, disappointment, embarrassment, or fear. But the ability to weather the storm and press toward a goal is an important skill. Because it turns out when we seek after purpose and meaning, even when it is difficult, we might accidentally find that happiness lives just on the other side.

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Motivation is that driving energy that moves us toward achieving goals and accomplishing tasks. It tends to go relatively unnoticed when we have it, but we often really notice when we don’t. Many who talk about motivation focus on strategies for increasing motivation when it is lacking, and there are a number of helpful things to try if this is an area where you’re struggling. But I don’t want to talk about any of that. I want to talk about how one of our major assumptions about motivation gets in the way of our success when we’re not feeling particularly motivated. Specifically, it seems to be a widespread assumption that we must feel motivated in order to be productive. The truth?

Motivation is a helpful, but not at all necessary, component of productivity.

It is great when we feel that enthusiastic energy moving us toward our goals and supporting us as we work to check items off the to-do list. Yet on some days (or for some particularly “icky” tasks) it just isn’t there. If we operate from the assumption that we should feel motivated for a task before we do it, we become dependent on that feeling and begin to live our lives at its mercy. When it comes time to get things done and motivation is lacking, we can pour our energy into trying to find feelings of motivation, or we can try a different approach. Consider an alternative:

• Accept that you’re not feeling especially interested or invested in the task at hand. This allows you to focus all of your energy on the task, rather than splitting your energy between tackling the task and trying to change how you feel about it.

• Challenge yourself to just get started with doing what needs to be done. Initial action increases the likelihood of continued action (think about the “object in motion” principle here), so a good start is often all it takes to find the energy you need to make it through the rest of the task.

• Remind yourself of the feelings of relief and accomplishment you will experience when you are finished. So often, avoiding what we don’t want to do leads to feelings of frustration and disappointment which lead to even less motivation. Focusing on the feelings associated with being done can help us approach the task instead of avoiding it, and can move us through the difficulty to a time which will feel much better.

If you consistently struggle to feel motivated, there may be more going on and it may be helpful to consider getting support to directly address factors contributing to that concern. But for those who only occasionally struggle or who only struggle in certain areas of life, remembering that motivation is not a prerequisite for getting things done may help you accept your feelings about the task and get you moving again.

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Know that it is okay to not be ready. So many people who eventually come to therapy feel unsure about starting for a long time. Wherever you are with it is okay. Take the time you need to simply wonder what it would be like to ask for help. It is okay to read about the process, or to ask friends or loved ones about their experiences. Even if you aren’t ready to schedule that first session, it’s okay to call a prospective therapist and ask your questions. It’s perfectly okay to feel however you feel about the time you spend talking with that person. All of it is okay, because it all moves you closer to making important changes – whether or not you decide to use therapy to help you do it.

Therapy will probably be uncomfortable at times. It is, at its heart, a process of change. I’ve never met anyone who comes to therapy to say their lives are perfect. People come to therapy to make something different, and making changes is often at least a little uncomfortable at first. You deserve to be comfortable in your discomfort. The therapist that is right for you will work with you to offer the balance of comfort, support, and challenge you need to become able and willing to pursue the changes you want in your life. If you feel pushed too much, too far, or in the wrong direction it is important to talk about it! The more honestly you can talk about your experiences in the process, the better the process will be able to support you and your goals.

There are many different forms of therapy and, even among therapists who claim to practice the same type of therapy, not all therapists are the same. We are all drawn to some people more than others, and that means a therapist may be a great match for others but feel like a bad match for you. If you find yourself struggling to open up, it’s important to ask yourself what is getting in the way. It may be that the process is early and you often struggle in this way – you may just need more time. It may be that you don’t feel like this therapist is someone you can easily talk to, and you may not even know why. There is nothing wrong with not being able to connect with the first therapist you try. Keep trying!

Whenever you’re ready,

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