Holding Boundaries
I’ve been slow learning how to hold good boundaries. As a younger person I lacked for confidence, which leads to the urge to be a people pleaser in the hopes of being welcome and acceptable. The idea of needing to earn a place can make it hard to say ‘no’. However, as my life has filled up with kind and lovely people willing to accept me as I am, I’ve got better at recognising the more exploitative spaces and simply leaving them.
These days I don’t have a hard time recognising when strangers are out of order, and I don’t give people who try to violate my boundaries much room. Sometimes, however, holding boundaries is much harder than this.
A boundary isn’t just a personal issue. We all need to set them where we need them, and most of the time a boundary should not be open to negotiation. Ideally, we should be trying to respect each other’s boundaries as a collective effort. However, this gets complicated when someone you care about is unable to hold good boundaries for themselves. It’s an issue sometimes in working relationship where those with power may routinely try to violate the boundaries of the people they have power over. It’s certainly something I’ve had to explore as a friend, as a lover and as a parent.
Boundaries are better held collectively. As with most things, when we stop treating it as an entirely personal issue and square up to it collectively, a lot can change. In the workplace, unions are the obvious answer to boundary violation and collective action can stop those kinds of abuses. A bit of worker solidarity can go a long way even without anything formal in place.
It can be tempting to ignore boundary violations when they don’t affect you. Scapegoating, blaming and picking on people can provide a kind of social bonding for groups, where resisting that can line you up to be the next victim. Resisting can be difficult. I think in Pagan spaces we need to be alert to the people who use power to compromise others. There are too many stories already about people who have abused their power. Push back at the first signs of boundary violation and we are less likely to get people in positions of power who feel entitled to ignore other people’s boundaries.
We can and should hold each other to high standards. Not just around our behaviour, but also around our expectations. If we normalise boundary violation, we enable it. One of the things I learned the hard way some years ago, is that if I let people treat me unethically, I’m enabling unethical behaviour and if I can resist that, I prefer to. I think it’s important not to make people who are in difficulty responsible for solving problems, but at the same time what I choose for myself is to push back where I can.
We can lift and support each other by recognising where their boundaries are threatened or violated. Even if it doesn’t seem safe to push back, saying to the person being affected that what’s happening to them isn’t ok can be a great help. The kinds of people who like to violate boundaries tend also to blame their victims or come up with justifications, and that can really wear people down. Acknowledging that the problem is real is a meaningful act of support.
It’s important to resist having a culture where some people are let off the hook for acting inappropriately. No one is so important, or clever, or essential that we have to put up with them causing harm. Most people can be replaced, and anyone abusing a position of power really should be replaced. Don’t by into the stories that give anyone a free pass on mistreating others.
