Good Boundaries and Goodbyes: Loving Others Without Losing the Best of Who You Are

by Lysa TerKeurst

for everything you do flows from it. (Proverbs

Because of the Fall (Gen. 2–3), all of us have some level of distortion or dysfunction. We do not perceive, think, feel, or behave in the healthiest way possible at all times. As a result,

emotional distortions such as latent anxiety, shame, low self-esteem, pessimism, depression, and perfectionism (among others) dynamically interact and affect marriage and family interactions.1

Distortions of reality feed dysfunctions.

Often, our lack of self-awareness collide with the other person’s lack of self-awareness, and we have a choice to make.

Appropriately addressing the issue is healthy. Ignoring the issue increases the likelihood of dysfunction.

I’ve made the mistake of spending countless amounts of emotional energy on trying to please other people—even when I shouldn’t have.

I’ve tried to fix other people. I’ve tried to change myself to accommodate others and avoid conflicts.

She would call it “holding me accountable to being a good Christian” but through counseling I started to see this wasn’t her true intention. She was actually holding me hostage to doing things her way or she would make her disapproval known not just to me but to others as well.

“While it sometimes can be very hard to say ‘no’ to people who want help, an unwise agreement is still an unwise agreement even if it is difficult to decline getting involved.”3

Do I feel the need to cover up or minimize behaviors by someone in my family because that’s just what we do?

I wrongly believe someone’s pushback is an indication that I’m doing something wrong. I don’t like the drama and complications that can happen when I establish a boundary and the other person continues to ask things of me that aren’t in alignment with that boundary. Or they just flat-out ignore the boundary. And when they do, my natural inclination is to take the blame.

sometimes my emotional wiring also plays into my resistance to keeping boundaries. I am wired to want peace. I want everyone to be calm, happy, and stable. Anything that seems to disrupt peace bothers me. So, if someone is aggravated or angry or even acting in a way that makes me doubt my boundary, I can be tempted to give

in. Drop the boundary. Forget the consequence. Reestablish someone’s level of access without remembering the need for them to be responsible. It’s like I have temporary amnesia and start thinking the boundary is hindering peace instead of remembering the boundary is the only fighting chance we have at reclaiming our peace.

Trust me with this. If someone is demanding you drop a boundary or trying to charm and convince you that it’s no longer necessary—beware. People who are genuine and honest don’t go on and on trying to convince you what a good person ...

sometimes I can so desperately want things to be better that I try to reframe reality and convince myself that the person has changed when they haven’t. My confusion or exhaustio...

When we allow a boundary to be violated, bad behavior will be validated.

the absence of boundaries means the presence of chaos.

throughout this journey we need to keep remembering that good boundaries originated with God and are modeled by God. We will have so much more confidence in how to handle a boundary violation when we feel validation from God’s examples.

We are to guard and protect our hearts and our minds to make sure we keep good in and evil out. We are to guard and protect our testimony and make

sure our lives produce the fruit of God’s Spirit in us. And we are to guard and protect our calling to love God and love people. (Note to self: that doesn’t say love God and enable people.)

He loves us unconditionally and He will not tolerate our sin. Both are true with God and both can be true in our relationships as well. God had grace but His grace was there to lead people to better behavior, not to enable bad behavior. And the same should be true of our grace as well.

Don’t continue to excuse negative or destructive patterns of behavior or addictions, as if they are just occasional slip-ups and isolated mistakes. There is something deeper going on in the foundational thinking and processing of someone who has been hurting you with their poor choices over and over. “Things are better” is not the same as “things are healed.”

If someone’s actions toward me are hurting me, they’re hurting me. If it’s

concerning, it’s concerning. If it’s wrong, it’s wrong. And we should be willing to give grace for mistakes. But if the issues are ongoing and continuously harmful, we must acknowledge that and act accordingly. It’s not that we don’t want to be prayerful and hopeful and eager for positive changes in the other person’s life. But we don’t want to become so eager and overcommitted to their health that we stay undercommitted to our own.

I am not honoring Jesus when I give permission for the other person to act in ways that Jesus never would.

Jesus tended to His need to be alone with the Father even when the crowds had needs and demands of Him (Luke 5).

So, if we draw a boundary and someone says we aren’t “acting like Jesus” we can certainly check ourselves—our tone, our words, and our actions. But remember to consider the source of that statement. The problem isn’t the boundary, it’s that the other person won’t respect the boundary.

I so wish I was standing right with you, whispering a boundaries pep talk into your ear the next time someone hurts you and tries to make you feel like the crazy one.

I’d held strong for so long and they seemed to have been so sincere in their promise that they’d changed. They also committed to being kind and to listen without attacking me if I would be willing to have a face-to-face conversation. So, I agreed. And it took only about thirty minutes for me to realize what a mistake I’d made. I was shocked by how things started off okay but then very quickly turned harsh. I felt so foolish. I felt scared. I felt lost in all the confusion swirling in their accusations against me and their grand statements about how much God was with them and that they were praying for my cold heart.

Though I was shaking on the inside, I didn’t sink down to the level of returning hate for hate. Or accusation for accusation. Instead, I told them that what they were

doing was not acceptable

No, they didn’t acknowledge that what they were doing was unhealthy. No, they didn’t apologize or even recognize how their actions were hurting me. But the person did leave. And though I cried buckets afterward, I realized I had never lost control of myself in the midst of the confrontation. And that was a huge win.

Good boundaries = My focus is on what I do

Motivation → Self-control

Mindset → I am responsible for my actions. I manage my behavior. I own...

Approach → I focus on my self-care, safety, sanity, and other things in ...

Outcome → I accept that I am powerless to control other people. Instead, I use my energy to limit my interactions with difficult people, remove myself from destructive relationships, and pursue loving well the peopl...

Outcome → A frustrating cycle of me trying to manage the unmanageable dysfunctions until I’m completely burned out, unhealthy, and bitter. Relationships are no longer a source of satisfaction and fulfillment but instead a constant drain on my always-frazzled emotions.

The problem isn’t the boundary, it’s that the other person won’t respect the boundary.

Boundaries aren’t going to fix the other person. But they are going to help you stay fixed on what is good, what is acceptable, and what you need to stay healthy and safe.

I pray that You would continue to work in me and through me so that I can be the healthiest, most whole, yielded-to-You version of myself.

You have put these kinds of boundaries in place because they’re wise, not because you are mean, rude, uncaring, unchristian, selfish, or insensitive. You are a responsible person. You want to be a good steward of what’s been entrusted to you. Therefore, you walk in reality instead of

wishful thinking. You acknowledge and respect the concept of limitations because you don’t like how you act and react when you get stretched too thin. And you wisely establish boundaries when people keep pushing for you to go past your capacity. When people aren’t respectful of our limits, we can set boundaries, or we can pay consequences.

why is it we understand boundaries with our bank accounts so much better than with our emotional well-being?

Just like our accounts can get overdrawn, so can our emotions. Just like spending that gets out of control can bankrupt a person’s finances, expending too much emotionally can bankrupt a person’s well-being.

We think we can just keep taking it. Overlooking it. Navigating around it. Making excuses for it. Reframing it. Numbing out so we don’t have to deal with it. Praying about it. Fussing about it. Crying about it. Ignoring it. Blaming it. Shaming it. And dropping a million hints about it.

Whatever the “it” is and whoever it involves, please know there is an enormous cost that you and I are probably not factoring in—the trauma1 it’s doing to us. When we allow our emotions to be misused and abused, there will be consequences.

Sometimes we might not even connect the consequences to the stressful situation we are in, like when we experience headaches or unexplainable stomach issues.

But I am encouraging you to pay attention to how devastating emotional situations can hurt more than just your feelings.