Why Boundaries are important in relationships and how to set them effectively?

   

Boundaries explain who you are in a relationship. Mainly, what you are and what you are not. The boundaries built in a relationship are meant to reveal where you end and someone else starts.

Boundaries are all around us. Their idea is to help us maintain a well-balanced and functional society. This is necessary because everyone is different and as usual, our needs, wants, and habits don’t line up.

Many people don't like the concept of setting boundaries in relationships, it seems to be a bad one or something unnecessary. The reason why they think boundaries in relationships are bad is that they think they keep people disconnected. However, this theory is very wrong.

On the contrary, it is important to have your boundaries in a relationship to have a loving and healthy relationship. The truth is that a relationship cannot be healthy if clear boundaries are not set and respected.

In a very simple way, boundaries show us where one thing ends and another begins. In a relationship, a boundary can take any form of a limit you set about what you are comfortable with and how you would prefer to be handled by others.

Healthy boundaries in relationships also mean taking responsibility for your feelings and lives. It also means being comfortable to not take responsibility for another person’s feelings and activities.

Also, setting boundaries helps to assure that a relationship is commonly relevant, respectful, and caring. Thus, healthy boundaries encourage partners to take each other’s feelings into account, seek consent from each other, and show gratitude.

Setting healthy boundaries is also a great way to respect your partner’s activities as well as their different ideas and views.

One of the benefits of setting healthy boundaries in relationships is the elimination of blames. The trend for one partner to blame the other is reduced. This is because boundaries leave no place for the deflection of the ownership of a problem.

The set boundaries support each partner to take responsibility for their part in any dispute, conflict, or wrong approach. This way, resolving conflicts becomes a lot easier for the partners.

So, the establishment and respect for personal boundaries in a relationship form good support for the development of strong emotional affection between partners.

How to set healthy boundaries effectively?

Setting boundaries will ultimately help reduce stress and assure that you have a healthy bond with your partner.

Here are 5 tips for setting healthy boundaries in your relationship.

Understand boundaries are healthy for your relationship.

Boundaries are an essential element of healthy relationships because they help to keep a balance between you and your partner. They also help reduce conflict, because they set an example of what you both expect from each other. Having boundaries can bring you closer to your partner because they keep open communication.

Be honest about what you need:

Communication is the key to a healthy relationship. Conversing openly is an important part of every healthy relationship. When discussing boundaries with your partner, being honest about what you are comfortable with or not comfortable with will help in knowing what you expect from them. You could even write down your expectations so it will be easy while sharing them with your partner.

Indicate When You Need Space

This tip is particularly relevant at the moment. If you’re spending a lot of time together mostly, be sure to interact with each other when you need time alone. It’s just as important to set aside time for yourself as it is to have quality time with the person you admire.

Listen to What Your Partner Needs

Since you expect your partner to notice your boundaries, it’s also important to thoroughly listen to their needs as well. Relationships are a two-way road, so you will need to listen to the boundaries they want to set and discuss those as well. Remember, that in a relationship, you should be able to say anything, but the way you say it matters a lot. So, be a good listener when your partner is expressing.

Communicate With Respect

Healthy relationships demand respect from both sides. The best way to communicate your boundaries is with understanding, compassion, and respect for each other’s expectations. Having respect each time you communicate will eventually make your relationship healthier and stronger.

While setting out the boundaries for oneself never forget to explain the limitation of each partner’s boundaries in a clear-cut way.

For example, what exactly does cheating as a boundary breach mean? Is cheating just about the physical connection, or is it about going on a date with the opposite sex? Does it involve sharing personal secrets with others, watching porn, or even fantasizing about someone else?

While communicating your boundaries in a relationship, try to be open to listening to how the boundaries affect your partner. Also try to explain the issue as openly as possible so that both of you feel heard, valued, and cared for.

In review, healthy boundaries need to have an empathetic mind and heart. Setting boundaries is never about being mean to other people and it is not self-centered. Rather, it is about being present and sensible to others while not overlooking our own wants and desires.

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Tips to get Healed from Childhood Toxicity.

   

Someone rightly said, “The childhood of today is the manhood of tomorrow”. We all have certain memories of childhood. Some are sweet and some are scary. But a toxic childhood is a growing period in an environment that negatively influences the child’s self-esteem and sense of belonging. It’s connected with how this child was treated, was neglected, or was getting enough love and care, or considering life is good and secure or complicated and toxic. Toxic childhood is a by-product of toxic parenting or any toxic situation that happened during the period.

Healing from a toxic childhood may be difficult but not impossible, it’s so because those flashbacks and the behavior stay within you for long. Gradually, you start to question yourself for your choices, decisions because the initial stage of your life should have taught you how to live a healthy and well-balanced life but ended up teaching you more about fear, stress, doubts, and insecurities.

Here I’m going to clarify in bullet form to keep my thoughts straight for a better understanding.

Never blame yourself: There is a lot of embarrassment that comes together with childhood trauma, and you have to let that go. Children are taught to be hesitant to tell anyone and are often humiliated into silence. Understand this is something your abuser imposed on you. The fault lies at their feet only. You wouldn’t expect a child to save you from abuse now, so why should you hold the child you were to in several ways.

Seek the help of an expert: this is not something you can deal with on your own. Childhood toxicity often occurs while the brain is still in progress, which means there could be results to it, of which you are unaware. Only by hard work in dealing with core, underlying concerns could you even begin to heal from the harm that could have been done to you.

Realize there will still be people who don’t accept you: Recognize that and respect your boundaries and privacy. It will be painful to hear, so be selective in the people with whom you share your story.
Make something good out of a bad experience: Become a mental health supporter or guide to end childhood abuse. There are children right now going through the same thing, and you can make a real difference in their lives. People are mostly open to listening to someone who has experienced trauma themselves, so use that platform to educate people and help the stigma surrounding it. This will help others with helpful tips of warning signs to look for and may save a child from continuing in a state of constant abuse - and it will help in focusing all that pain, humiliation, and rage into something productive.

Focus on your healing: Ignore the stigma (I know that’s hard) and focus on anything that makes you feel stronger and wiser. One of the big things for me is that I felt weak and helpless to stop what was happening to me, so as an adult, I worked on my Mental Wellness exercises until I felt strong again. Also, distracting yourself to de-stress is part of this. Find a hobby, something you can drive yourself into and get lost in so that you find pleasure and a sense of achievement.

Allow yourself to be self-indulgent: Do whatever it takes to heal. Close out the world for a while if that is what is needed. Cut out the toxic people, completely go no contact with those who know and saw what was happening but did nothing to help.

Remind yourself that you are no longer in pain: For people who deal with childhood trauma, the symptoms are incredibly challenging to deal with. Your body always reacts as if you are still in danger. Keep in mind that you hold the power now. That needs to settle into your mind, and this is where therapy will benefit you most.

Don’t allow anyone to underestimate what you are experiencing as an adult: Childhood trauma stays with us, lives in each of our cells, and influences our thought patterns well into adulthood. Do not listen to people who say, “but that happened ages ago,” “just let it go,” “learn to live in today.” Those people do not know what they are addressing. You have every right to your feelings. What happened to you was shocking and something that people are uncomfortable confronting, so they blame you for not being able to deal with it. Don’t allow that to be a part of your story.

I know it’s a process and not a simple one, but it’s important for your mental health and your well-being. Maybe your toxic childhood didn’t teach you much about love, security, peace, and happiness but it taught you whom you don’t want to be, how not to act, what kind of partner or parent you don’t want to become, and sometimes that’s the best knowledge anyone can give you.

Do comment in what all ways you can see meaning to your life and don’t forget to share it and follow me on Instagram & Facebook - @relivewithsangeeta & ReLive-Because You Matter

How can we support men's mental health?

We all have been listening since our childhood whenever we hear ‘my man’, ‘man of words’, ‘responsible man’ or a ‘family man’, all we get an idea at first sight that man is considered as an epitome of handling responsibilities. No matter a world may change from here & there but a man is expected to never back off from his responsibilities. In cases where a family is led by a woman, she is also deliberately called ‘the man of the house. This overpowers the situation for men. But with more power comes great responsibilities. As the situation turns challenging & progressing, they are expected to be more powerful & stronger than before. Sometimes, they manage to be that powerful while sometimes they fail to make it after all they are also humans & they too have emotions.

Movies & society have set a benchmark for every man like - “Mard ko dard nahi hota (Men don’t feel pain)” or “ Ladke kabhi nahi rote (Boys don’t cry)”. It became so easy to set that benchmark but what about the scar behind those clothes which they receive due to failed careers, bad relationships, abuse, or assault. Somewhere a generation made sure about a thing that there exists nothing like mental health because men don’t have emotions or any emotions to express while women's emotions or mental health were suppressed or ignored subsequently. With changing times, both men & women took their first step forward to speak, share & talk about mental health. Change is coming with time. Women’s mental health has been given due importance with time-based on the changes they go through in their lifestyle personally & socially. While with men, mental health is just related to depression or a failed relationship. There is a lot more beyond what went unnoticed around you only.

Yes, it’s true. We have our younger & elder brothers around us with whom we stay day & night. We never give a thought if they’re going through anything they need to talk about. Sometimes, people just ignore their issues by saying - ‘this is nothing, be strong & ignore’. This is so easy for someone to speak but at the same time so tough to implement. He needs a guide who can save him come out of it successfully. And there is no particular age group that might be facing these mental health struggles. Men of any age can be a victim of mental health struggles. You still doubt - let’s talk about students. Be it school-going or college-going boys, they come across various intercomparisons among each other in terms of height, weight, looks, appearance, physique, strength, or wisdom. It can be either of them or any of them. A boy with superior qualities in any of these tries to make fun of or bully the one who’s less in it. Some try to fight with it while some get embarrassed with their deficiencies which makes them start hating themselves. As they start hating themselves they start losing confidence in everything including the things they can excel in. These are basic struggles almost every boy has experienced in their childhood to teenage.

When they move forward, post completing their education they are expected to get a job or start working as early as possible. If they fail or delay in doing so, they are taunted with harsh words with a view that they start working next time before they get hurt again. Those harsh words are sometimes not just limited to their casual nature towards their lifestyle but often they are put up as a question on their character. Eventually, they end up either settling down with a bad job or being ignorant after being affected mentally. When it comes to work-life or a workspace, the scenario is almost an upgraded version of what it was in schools & colleges. In a workspace, no matter if it’s a job or a business a man goes through different challenges like getting compared with peers/colleagues, getting scolded/insulted by seniors among the entire team/office, or a fear of getting fired from work or business getting shut. Many people just continue a bad job or business just to save their family.

In case a man fails there, often the family members start biting the man with harsh words again without understanding what he was/have been going through. Often a man’s wings of ambition towards pursuing their dream job or role get cut/destroyed due to family needs or responsibilities. As he is expected to take care of the family, sometimes intentionally & sometimes out of situation demands he is made to forget his ambitions. We think it’s not a big deal but the person who suffers knows the pain. It goes up gradually further when a man is rejected outright or doesn’t receive the necessary love from his partner or kids or parents. Every stage has a situation that disturbs mental peace for a long time.

This doesn’t mean that there is no solution to it. A small step at every point can help a man come out of it stronger than before.
When your child/younger brother tries to share about any problems, listen to them very carefully. Sometimes, they might hesitate to share their problems with you on the first go. Give them some time and listen to their problems.
Talk with your child/ younger brother like a friend. Let them speak about their concerns. Sometimes, they might be going through some serious abuses or assaults you might be unaware of.
The same is similar with men. Whenever you talk to any of your male friends if they share anything which is affecting or bothering them by any means. Try to understand and help them in coming up with the solution.
In some cases, a boy comes across different quarrels in childhood. It could be between parents or family members. Speak to your child about the problem, let them know, and understand the situation because we can't expect the wisdom of taking the right decisions from them until we involve them in every aspect of the decision-making process.
Often men don't open up with their emotions so easily. They only come out where they feel trusted, understood, and not judged at all. Once they feel that zone, they will open up their heart like a child.

You might be surprised why there has been so much focus on a boy rather than a man. It's because that's where the first initial shock of mental health is experienced. If that is taken due care of in the beginning, it makes a boy live a stressful free mentally happy life. Else ignorance just keeps increasing troubles. If you are in distress and need immediate help or are feeling like going out of the track, please feel free to contact ReLive-Because You Matter for further assistance.

Do comment in what all ways you can see meaning to your life and don’t forget to share it and follow me on Instagram & Facebook - @relivewithsangeeta & ReLive-Because You Matter