Boundaries: When to Say Yes, How to Say No to Take Control of Your Life

by Henry Cloud

Any confusion of responsibility and ownership in our lives is a problem of boundaries. Just as homeowners set physical property lines around their land, we need to set mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual boundaries for our lives to help us distinguish what is our responsibility and what isn’t. As

“Has helping him helped?”

Problems arise when people act as if their “boulders” are daily loads and refuse help, or as if their “daily loads” are boulders they shouldn’t have to carry. The results of these two instances are either perpetual pain or irresponsibility.

Boundaries are anything that helps to differentiate you from someone else, or shows where you begin and end.

Your words also define your property for others as you communicate your feelings, intentions, or dislikes. It is difficult for people to know where you stand when you do not use words to define your property. God does this when he says, “I like this and I hate that.” Or “I will do this, and I will not do that.”

Is this a fair comparison between human boundaries and God's moral will?

The Bible supports the idea of limiting togetherness for the sake of “binding evil.”

To continue to open yourself up emotionally to an abusive or addicted person without seeing true change is foolish. Forgive, but guard your heart until you see sustained change.

When they open themselves up to support from others, however, they find that the abusive persons are not the only source of love in the world and that they can find the strength through their support systems to set the limits they need to set. They are no longer alone. The church of Christ is there to give strength to ward off the blows against them.

However, Proverbs repeatedly says that setting limits and accepting responsibility will save lives (Prov. 13:18, 24).

Not at all what passages say.

When we take responsibility for out-of-control behavior caused by loving the wrong things or valuing things that have no lasting value, when we confess that we have a heart that values things that will not satisfy, we can receive help from God and his people to “create a new heart” within us. Boundaries help us not to deny but to own our old hurtful values so God can change them.

In reality, setting limits on others is a misnomer. We can’t do that. What we can do is set limits on our own exposure to people who are behaving poorly; we can’t change them or make them behave right.

To feel safe in such an evil world, children need to have the power to say things like these: • “No.” • “I disagree.” • “I will not.” • “I choose not to.” • “Stop that.” • “It hurts.” • “It’s wrong.” • “That’s bad.” • “I don’t like it when you touch me there.”

Compliant avoidants suffer from what is called “reversed boundaries.” They have no boundaries where they need them, and they have boundaries where they shouldn’t have them.

No matter how much you talk to yourself, read, study, or practice, you can’t develop or set boundaries apart from supportive relationships with God and others. Don’t even try to start setting limits until you have entered into deep, abiding attachments with people who will love you no matter what.

We are built for relationship. Attachment is the foundation of the soul’s existence. When this foundation is cracked or faulty, boundaries become impossible to develop. Why? Because when we lack relationship, we have nowhere to go in a conflict.

Your envy should always be a sign to you that you are lacking something. At that moment, you should ask God to help you understand what you resent, why you do not have whatever you are envying, and whether you truly desire it. Ask him to show you what you need to do to get there or to give up the desire.

The sin God rebukes is not trying and failing, but failing to try. Trying, failing, and trying again is called learning. Failing to try will have no good result; evil will triumph.

Many Christians fear that setting and keeping limits signals rebellion, or disobedience. In religious circles you’ll often hear statements such as, “Your unwillingness to go along with our program shows an unresponsive heart.” Because of this myth, countless individuals remain trapped in endless activities of no genuine spiritual and emotional value.

The Scriptures say that the earth quakes “under . . . a servant who becomes king” (Prov. 30:21–22). The only difference between a servant and a king is that one has no choices and the other has all choices available to him. When you suddenly give those who have been imprisoned all their lives a great deal of power, the result is often an angry tyrant. Years of constant boundary violations generate great anger.

Though we certainly need each other, no one but God is totally indispensable.

The idea is that because we have received something, we owe something. The problem is the nonexistent debt. The love we receive, or money, or time—or anything that causes us to feel obligated—should be accepted as a gift. “Gift” implies no strings attached. All that’s really needed is gratitude. The giver has no expectation that the present will provide a return. It was simply provided because someone loved someone and wanted to do something for him or her.

Never say to a third party something about someone that you do not plan to say to the person himself.

Whenever submission issues are raised, the first question that needs to be asked is, What is the nature of the marital relationship? Is the husband’s relationship with his wife similar to Christ’s relationship with the church? Does she have free choice, or is she a slave “under the law”? Many marital problems arise when a husband tries to keep his wife “under the law,” and she feels all the emotions the Bible promises the law will bring: wrath, guilt, insecurity, and alienation (Rom. 4:15; James 2:10; Gal. 5:4).