By: Regina Hopkins

Psychological Boundaries – These boundaries let you establish what information you share with others, different opinions, thoughts or beliefs you may hold

Emotional Boundaries - These boundaries help you establish whether or not you let others approach you emotionally, including whether or not you let others affect your emotions, like making you feel joyful or guilty.

Physical Boundaries – This refers to any boundary you may have regarding your physical body. These boundaries help you establish whether or not you let a certain person touch you or not, (including any sexual activity).

The next time you have a conversation with someone, try to become mindful of the situation. Observe what they are sharing, what type of information they are sharing, what are you sharing and how are you affecting each other emotionally?

What are your physical boundaries? How much eye contact is there? How far apart are you with the physical space between your bodies? Do you touch each other as you talk?

Being mindful of the boundary, doesn’t mean this is where the boundary should be. You may choose to change the boundaries if you think it would be helpful to you and the relationship.

Once you are aware of the present boundaries in your relationship, you might observe someone trying to change the boundaries, or you might want to make changes in the boundaries. You may want more flexible boundaries, such as sharing more information, let the other person affect you emotionally, or move closer to them. Or, you may want a more rigid boundary such as closing off certain topics, creating more emotional distance, or physically distancing yourself.

These boundary negations often aren’t explicitly discussed. They often happen when one person attempts to move the boundary, and the other person consents, is passive, or resists

For example, you might have a co-worker who you previously only talked to about work matters. Then one day they might share a problem they are having in their personal life. You might negotiate the boundary by continuing the discussion and sharing something from your personal life. You might say nothing or you might redirect the conversation back to work.

You also can explicitly negotiate the boundary. For example, you might tell your co-worker you are glad they shared their personal problem with you, or that you want to keep the conversation focused on work.

It’s also important to note that boundaries aren’t fixed. Just because you set boundaries in one place, doesn’t mean you can’t change the boundaries in the future.

When you aren’t sure if your boundary is too “rigid” or too “flexible” it’s a good idea to practice your “wise-mind” (a concept from Dialectical Behavior Therapy, DBT). In wise-mind you are integrating both your emotional mind (and sensory experiences) and your rational mind. It’s the synthesis of these two minds meeting that we call your “wise-mind”. Wise mind is often described as a centered, gut-feeling felt in the body. To help get into your wise-mind headspace, one technique is to practice breathing in, holding for a count of 10, and breathing out for a count of 10. As you are practicing your breath work, you can imagine the words, “Wise” as you are breathing in, and “Mind” as you are slowly breathing out. This can help recenter you and give you more clarity to help you make those sometimes difficult integrated decisions, and help you determine where you would like your boundaries to be.

Professional credit given to:

Dialectical Behavior Therapy.Katrina. 2022.https://dialecticalbehaviortherapy.com/interpersonal-effectiveness/interpersonal-boundaries/