Boundaries and Stress
In today's world, there seems to be no distinction between our work lives and our home lives. Most of us are contactable at any time and no matter where we are in the world thanks to our ever-present mobile phones. Many of us also have our work-email accounts linked up to our phones, meaning that we run the risk of answering work colleagues and customers at any hour.
Have you ever had the following thought; if I answer this email now [while I'm getting ready for bed], then I will have more time to do other work in the morning.
A handful of years ago, this would not have been an issue. We would have gone to work to do our work, and then come home at the end of the day and be free to do what we want. No mobile phones, no work emails pinging through at all hours, nothing.
Why Do We Need Boundaries?
We need boundaries as a way of letting ourselves, and others in our world, know what we will and will not tolerate.
Boundaries are a way of letting people know how we expect to be treated, what they can expect from us, and how you can work or live together harmoniously.
Let's say you are at work, and you feel constantly bombarded by requests to complete tasks. These requests are coming from your line manager, but also from colleagues, and others who shouldn't be asking things of you. How do you know that you need to set some kind of boundary? If you find yourself hoping that your colleagues won't come over to chat with you, or you feel like you are being taken advantage of - you probably need to start setting some boundaries. But what do you say?
"Thank you for bringing this to my attention, I actually have quite a bit on at the moment from [boss], so I won't actually be able to get to that until next week. If you are happy to wait then leave it with me, but if it's urgent then it might be best to find someone else to help you."
Testing Boundaries
People will almost always try to test your boundaries - this is always more about them than about you. They are not used to the new way of working - they are not used to you standing up for yourself.
Pushing boundaries is also a way of testing our safety. For example, if you set boundaries in your relationship - perhaps setting some time aside to do things on your own - they might feel vulnerable and therefore push your boundaries.
Testing boundaries is especially prevalent among children and teenagers - as many parents will attest to - because they want to know that you are there to contain them. Think of boundaries (rules, restrictions, and so on) as a box. Your children are safe in that box - the rules are there to protect them. Children will try and break through the walls of the box as a way of testing the strength of those walls. Will the walls still be standing, or will they topple over in a light breeze?
How to Set Boundaries
Setting boundaries can be very tricky - especially if you are new to it. It can be a tricky thing to master and requires a level of assertiveness.
Firstly, it is important to discover what you want your boundaries to be. You don't want to set boundaries that don't actually work for you, just because other people have these boundaries. It might work for you to do lots of work in the evening - and if you are happy doing this then there's no reason to stop.
Sometimes it can be easier to figure out where you want to set your boundaries by thinking about times that you felt like your boundaries had been violated - times when you felt taken advantage of or times that you felt uncomfortable.
If you would like to book an initial counselling session with me, please click here to get started!
