BSB Ep 92
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April: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Bite-Sized Brilliance Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. April Darley, and today I wanna talk about boundaries. What do you do when someone crosses your boundaries? So let's get right into it. Some of the things that I've discovered with a few of my clients is, number one, you may not know that you need to set a boundary, and it may sound ridiculous.
But some people don't realize that other people's behavior toward them is kind of not appropriate just because of what they've normalized or their own past experiences. Even their own self-esteem may play into this, and it may take someone else's perspective to weigh in on that and go,_ "Hey, are you okay with this?"_
Just do a little check-in. That actually happened to one of my clients, and she wasn't aware that she hadn't set any [00:01:00] boundaries at all, but she did talk about certain experiences about how they made her uncomfortable. So she was able to have this bodily awareness. S ometimes she wouldn't feel uncomfortable until hours or even a day later after these experiences would happen. But she would begin to reflect on it and feel some kind of discomfort. But in the moment when these experiences were happening, she didn't think anything of it, that it was normal. Other people were just being friendly. Whatever. But in reality, her personal space, her bodily autonomy was kind of being infringed upon, and she didn't understand that it's because she didn't have a boundary in place and that she didn't correct other people's behavior.
And so they just behaved like they wanted to, noticed that she allowed [00:02:00] it, and in their minds created this permission slip. And so the same thing occurred with repeated interactions, and that is one thing to be aware of is your body. Your body and brain will tell you if they don't like something. You'll experience some kind of sensation.
Most people will experience this in their throat, in their chest, or in their stomach. That can be a tightening. It can be tension in your shoulders. You might clench your jaw or you might feel some sensation of anxiety in your body. It's a good thing to pay attention to your body's reaction to certain people because your subconscious processes at least 12 times faster than your conscious brain does. By the time you stick your hand out to say hello and shake somebody's hand, your brain is already done a preliminary threat assessment [00:03:00] on that person. All right? Our brains are really sharp and we catch a lot of stuff that you may not be consciously aware of.
So if you're feeling these sensations in your body on reflection around certain experiences, that is an indicator that a boundary, an unconscious boundary you didn't even know that you had, has been violated in some way. If you discover that happens, then you want to now bring something to your conscious awareness.
That you can go, _"okay, a boundary needs to be set"_, then you get to dig in. And what would make me feel most comfortable? What's the boundary that would make my body relax? That would make my brain happy, that would make me feel confident and courageous in my best self. So that's number one. Have you not set a boundary when you really need to?
And the next one we're gonna talk about boundary wise [00:04:00] is what happens when you have set a boundary but someone crosses that boundary. So then it comes down to a couple of things. Even if you have conscious awareness of a boundary, you may not have communicated that boundary to someone else. In your mind, you may have thought that you did, but we do this a lot. We have conversations with ourselves, or we think they should just know and we project our social handbook onto someone else, and they don't have the same playbook. They don't have the same experiences. They don't even have awareness of your internal monologue until it comes outta your mouth.
So if a boundary has been crossed, the first question you want to ask yourself is, _"Have I clearly articulated that this is an actual boundary for me and why?" _so that this person understands my reaction to when it was crossed. Ask yourself that. Have [00:05:00] you communicated this boundary well? Has the other person acknowledged receipt of that communication?
Like do they understand why that was a boundary for you? Have they said,_ "okay, alright, now I know" _It takes people time to learn how to do something different. So if you've had this unenforced boundary situation, it's given them time to create a habit to cross it over and over and over.
And we teach people how to treat us through holding these boundaries and correcting when these boundaries have been violated. If a boundary has been violated again, y ou have the option to discuss it again, correct that behavior. Now, this is where it becomes a little tricky. There are people out there who do not care what your boundaries are.
Because they may think it's a dumb boundary, they may think you are overreacting or that those rules don't [00:06:00] apply to them. Tons of reasons. And so they may violate your boundary e ven for fun. I've had some clients tell me, family members violate their boundaries on purpose because they think it's a joke. T hat is not okay.
And when someone knowingly violates your boundaries on purpose, when it has been discussed and you've given them a grace period to correct if it repeats again. This is now at your discretion. If the person habitually violates your boundaries and you have discussed it, they have acknowledged your why.
They have even accepted your why, but they're unwilling to change their behavior. This is where you wanna look critically at that. Because if someone is unwilling to change their behavior, you need to ask yourself, _"Is this a person I still want in my life?"_ Now, if it is a partner or family member, I [00:07:00] recommend trying to get yourselves in therapy or some other way to broach that dialogue where you can communicate with each other if at all possible.
But here's the reality. Sometimes it doesn't get better and the other person doesn't respect you enough or care about you enough to correct their behavior. That has nothing to do with you as a person. That is on them as a person being unwilling to do the work to grow and change. And here's where I want you to be careful, my friend, is that you don't make up any sort of story about why they disrespect you. Why they won't accept your boundary.
And this is where we get into trouble a lot because our brain likes to make up stories. And sometimes you need to put the blame where it rightfully needs to go. It's not you, it's them. And a lot of times that [00:08:00] is true, but I don't want your brain to tell you a story that makes you stay small or stuck or in low self-esteem when you have lovingly tried to explain your position, why this is a boundary.
We hope that people want to respect us, but the truth is some people are afraid to change and so they don't change their behavior, and losing you is not enough of a motivator for them to change. It's harsh and it's heartbreaking. So this is where you want to decide how much contact you have with that person.
And is this a person you want to keep in your life knowing that they do not respect you or your boundary enough to change their behavior? Sometimes you can't cut people out of your life, but you can minimize your contact and you can keep your brain and body as healthy as [00:09:00] possible while you have that contact. And then just treat yourself well and realize that not everyone in your life is like that person and that there are plenty of people out there who will love you, respect you, and your boundaries because you are worthy, deserving, and so amazing. And don't let this one person's behavior, or words or actions ever make you forget that because no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt said that. It's one of my favorite phrases, and we need to realize when somebody else behaves badly, put that back on them. We can't always control what happens to us, but we can control our reaction. And this is critical to keep in mind when you are dealing with a boundary crossing situation. I just wanted to talk about that today because [00:10:00] it's come up.
What do you do when you need to enforce and correct bad behavior that's violated your boundaries. Some people are really hesitant to do that and so they let that violation go on way longer than they should because they think, _"What will this other person do if I maintain my boundary?"_
And so we're afraid of their reaction. And if you are in a situation where the other person's reaction may be violent, then yes, please take caution and please go to the appropriate authorities or appropriate officials that can help you with that situation. But if you're not concerned that the other person might be violent, but you are concerned that they might judge you or disown you or abandon or reject you.
Then that is something from a mind body perspective that you can work on because a lot of times our brain magnifies [00:11:00] what we are afraid will happen that won't ever come true. They've done studies on this that about 85 to 90 percent of the things we're afraid of coming true don't actually come true at all.
We just get our amygdala hypervigilant, we'll whip ourselves into this frenzy and everything we're afraid of it doesn't play out that way. But we do teach people how to treat us by our boundaries and whether we enforce them or not. And a lot of times that is our choice.
It's not one that you're necessarily consciously making, but every time you don't step in to stand up for yourself is a time where you lose an opportunity to feel good. Now, I am not about scarcity with opportunities. I think there are endless opportunities and what is meant for you will never pass you by.
It will come around for you in a new form. So if your boundaries have been crossed [00:12:00] and you were too afraid or too scared to stand up and do something about it, you do have an opportunity to dig into the why of that. Why were you afraid to reinforce that boundary? And sometimes it could be you didn't know that you could. You didn't know that you were maybe supposed to. You didn't know what to do or what to say when it came to boundaries. But the more you learn, the more you educate yourself, and the more you practice standing up for yourself, loving yourself enough to say no to someone else. This is an act of love.
You are reasserting the fact that you are worthy and you are deserving of respect. So food for thought today, my friends, about boundaries and if you have any questions on that or you would like some help with how to lovingly assert your boundaries, then schedule a consultation with me. It's completely complimentary and you can do that at aprildarley.com and we'll [00:13:00] talk about why that may seem hard or scary for you and some things that you can do to improve your life and to treat yourself with a love and respect you absolutely deserve. All right, until next week, my friends. Have a great one. Bye-bye.
