Setting Healthy Boundaries
Setting boundaries is useful and valuable for maintaining healthy relationships and self-respect. Especially among military families with increased stress from frequent moves, changing and growing demands on the service member, and likely with the civilian spouse’s employment needs, setting and maintaining boundaries preserves overall well-being and supports personal and professional relationships.
How and why should you set boundaries?
- Preserve Emotional and Mental Health: Creating boundaries preserves crucial mental and emotional health. Especially after stressful periods, when using up your emotional and mental well-being, it is essential to regain or outline boundaries to replenish your emotional and mental well-being.
- Fosters Healthy Relationships: Balance is essential in all things. While the phrase “everything in moderation” is used when speaking about food, the same is true for some relationships. You cannot be everywhere for or be everything for one person, so setting boundaries maintains the relationship healthily.
- Increases Communication: Part of setting boundaries is communicating them to the people in your life. Communication is vital — being open and transparent about goals reduces misunderstandings and prevents conflict.
- Encourage Healthy Habits: Maintain your personal space and emotional and mental well-being by maintaining healthy boundaries. You meal plan and schedule time for exercising to maintain physical fitness, and your emotional and mental well-being are just as important. Setting and maintaining healthy boundaries allows for continued growth and maintenance of the emotional and mental space and will likely improve your physical health.
- Improves Decision Making: Setting boundaries also makes it straightforward to yourself what your limits are and makes it easier to decide what fills your time and space. It provides a framework for building your schedule and goals — a perfect time to reflect on that is the new year.
- Preserves Personal Energy: When you are clear with your limitations and follow them, your energy is used for your priorities and not distracted by other things or people that will not help you achieve those goals.
- Limits Resentment: Again, clear goals and limitations mean you won’t overcommit, leading to resentment by others or yourself when you cannot do what they ask.
- Promotes Self-Respect: Setting boundaries establishes your personal needs, desires, and values with those in your life — personally and professionally.
Whether you have considered establishing boundaries within your personal or professional life, it is always a good time to evaluate if you should. Dive further by reading or listening to these books on establishing healthy boundaries: Set Boundaries, Find Peace by Nedra Glover Tawwab; Boundaries by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend; and Unraveling the Ties by Elizabeth Morquecho.
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