Vijay Nagaswami _ Boundaries, Not Walls

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Opinion Columns Vijay Nagaswami

Published: December 8, 2012 17:44 IST | Updated: December 8, 2012 20:15 IST

THE SHRINKING UNIVERSE

Boundaries, not walls

Vijay Nagaswami

In any close relationship it is vital that while accommodating each other, you dont bend over backwards, for that will onlybreak your back.

Every time I talk of relationship boundaries to anyone who cares to listen, I usually get pretty similar responses.Relationship boundaries isnt that an oxymoron? Why have boundaries in relationships? Arent relationships meantto liberate one from boundaries? Dont boundaries confine and restrict? Isnt that a western concept?

Whichever part of the world we live in, it would be a fallacy to believe that we can get by in our relationships withoutboundaries. Whether between parents and children, siblings, spouses, friends, peers, bosses and subordinates, mastersand pets, in short, any situation where two living beings enter into a more-than-casual equation with each other,boundaries creep in, consciously or unconsciously, invited or uninvited. Every transaction you have with anotherindividual is determined by the boundaries both of you have in a relationship. If you agree to go out to lunch with afriend but not to the movies, you have defined a boundary. When you tell your child that you wont play with him butwill help with the homework, you are asserting a boundary. When you tell your boss that you cannot stay back latebecause its your spouses birthday, you have defined a boundary.

Most of us are uncomfortable with the use of the term boundary, for it seems to imply that we set a limit on therelationship. Or that we draw a lakshman rekha around ourselves, which the other is not allowed to cross a thus-far-no-further kind of approach. We generally think of a boundary as erecting a protective wall around ourselves that noone is allowed to breach. In truth, a boundary is none of these. It is actually a recognition of our capabilities andlimitations. It basically tells us how much we are in a position to extend ourselves for a person at a particular point oftime in our lives. How much we can accommodate the others needs, given our own limitations of energy and time. Andhow close we feel to the person, for we generally extend ourselves more for those we care more for than less.

This is why we are usually willing to extend ourselves more for one parent than the other, more for a spouse than a

friend and so on. Usually we are not conscious of how and when we erect these boundaries, and therefore, run the riskof taking them for granted. Its perfectly understandable that our childhood boundaries were unconsciously defined,but since our adult relationships are designed to be more conscious ones which require informed choices to be made, itwould perhaps be prudent to be a little more aware of the boundaries we want to define in them. In the absence ofconscious boundaries, we end up over-extending ourselves in some relationships and not having enough time andenergy for those that truly matter, and we end up telling ourselves that its okay to take the ones we love most forgranted, since they will understand. Actually they won't, beyond a point.

The first thing to appreciate when defining a boundary is that there are no right and wrong boundaries, only congruentand incongruent ones. If both persons are comfortable with a boundary, it becomes congruent and poses no problem,even if this may appear to others to be a wrong way of handling things. The key thing to remember is that inaccommodating each other, neither of you should have to bend over backwards, for this will only break your backs.Boundaries can be tight or lax. People who, for whatever reason, need more privacy than others, generally tend to drawtheir boundaries very close and very tightly around themselves and are considered very private and guarded. Some ofus may be quite the opposite. Most of us fall somewhere in between these two extremes. Its very likely that in time,even tight boundaries may progressively loosen and eventually become lax, for our boundaries are not cast in stone.They keep changing. Its only when we demand a lax boundary as a right, can things become messy.

The other thing to remember about boundaries is that they can be inclusive or exclusive. An exclusive boundaryeffectively excludes any consideration of the other persons needs or requirements, and focusses only on our own levelof comfort. Even if the other person is reasonably comfortable with this boundary, thereby making it a congruent one,it would still be a good idea to define more inclusive boundaries, for these make for greater closeness since they takeinto consideration the others feelings, thoughts or ideas as well.

However consciously we define our boundaries, most of us do tend to violate them every now and again, oftenunintentionally. Sometimes, we violate boundaries wantonly, perhaps out of anger, maybe out of spite, or even out ofsheer contrariness, and fights and fallouts ensue. To ensure that these are minimised, it would be judicious to define as

many congruent, lax and inclusive boundaries as is humanly possible without, of course, compromising ones sense ofpersonal space. What I mean is, do your best to extend yourself for the other person, but dont sell your soul. Then yourboundaries become beneficial boundaries, not walls.

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Keywords: Relationship boundaries, relationship, human relations, The shrinking universe column,Vijay Nagaswami

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Vijay Nagaswami _ Boundaries, Not Walls

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