Do you have people in your life who ask intrusive questions, perhaps take advantage of you, or make hurtful comments? Their behavior can be malicious or just clueless and insensitive. This can cause much stress in your life. How do you communicate with these folks in a calm and honest manner that lets them know that their behavior is hurtful and wrong?
According to Terri Cole (2021) there are four steps to establish boundaries and fight back. You must practice these steps with small boundary breaches before you move to bigger problems. For example: a neighbor has a spare key to your house which you gave them for emergencies but now they use the key to borrow equipment from your garage. What do you do?
- State the issue and use factual language. “The other day you used your spare key to borrow my lawnmower.”
- State your feelings. Simply discuss how it affects you. “I thought the mower had been lost or stolen. I couldn’t mow my lawn and I was frustrated when you told me a day later that you had borrowed it.”
- Make a simple request in a nonconfrontational way and attach a mutual benefit to it. “In the future when you want to borrow something of mine, please check in with me first so I can continue to let you have the key.”
- Suggest a shared agreement. This engages and enrolls the other person into taking equal responsibility for the success of your new boundary rule. “Can we agree that if you’re interested in borrowing any of my things, you will text me before you let yourself in?
Sometimes when your boundaries are violated, you don’t have the time to calmly reflect on what’s going on and use the four step process. Instead you need the right language and real time strategies to quickly establish limits and prevent tensions from escalating. In the next few blogs I will discuss what to do in these situations.
If you need help with establishing boundaries, life coaching can help. Please reach out to me at 361.442.9590 or holtadams2002@yahoo.com