Setting boundaries sounds easy but it is not. You need to be self-aware to establish healthy boundaries. It’s also important to have confidence in yourself. This will help you have the strength and willpower to establish healthy boundaries in all relationships. The creation of boundaries is an integral part of your identity and a critical component of mental health and well-being. Healthy boundaries can help people to define themselves and identify what they are ready and not accountable for at any given moment. Thus, your interactions with friends and romantic partners will be more fulfilling rather than frustrating.
Here are some tips that can help you create and keep healthy boundaries:
- Talk honestly and clearly about your thoughts and feelings. Share your thoughts and feelings with your partner or friend honestly but respectfully when needed. It is sometimes hard to understand your thoughts and feelings. It is good to ask for a while to resolve it but do not use it as a tactic to avoid an argument in the future.
- Ask your friend or partner how they feel. Each one of you is entitled to your own thoughts and feelings, and it is the responsibility of each one to put them in words to make them understandable. Thus, your partner or friend does not have to guess in any way.
- Be responsible for your choices. Ask yourself how your choices – deliberate or accidental – might have contributed to the situation, instead of blaming your partner or friend for what you feel or what’s going on.
- Voice your emotions without blame. For instance, it would be far better to say something like, “I feel discouraged and saddened by what happened tonight” rather than to say, “You made me feel ugly because of how you’ve spoken about me with our friends tonight.”
Creating boundaries takes time and practice, especially when you come from a family with uncertain or less-than-desirable boundaries It can be challenging to build boundaries, but it is a must to retain your energy, live in your truth and not get lost.
You’ll experience more joy in your relationships because you will have learned not to hold onto uncomfortable emotions and the associated dysfunctional behaviors that bring any relationship down. Speak your truth and stay centered vigorously. You can better identify where the boundaries should be in your relationships. Doing so will make the relationship deeper and healthier over the years.
