Boundaries for Myself

Writing so much lately about boundaries has me reexamining all sorts of boundaries, including the ones I set for myself. With children, we want to be 'the captain' as Susan Stiffelman says, being in charge of the big picture and setting clear limits with love.

Setting limits for myself is hard, whether I'm trying to cut out sugar or stop yelling at my kids. What I can easily forget while getting more and more frustrated with myself, is that I need to handle myself like I would handle one of my kids or a student, with connection, love, listening, and clarity. Self-boundaries, just like boundaries with our children, need to develop out of deep listening (to the parts of ourselves that are having trouble), love and connection, generosity, and clarity.

So if you, like me, are trying to change any deep patterns or established habits, remember to:

• pay attention to why the difficult behavior is happening,
• solve underlying problems that are creating it,
• stay close to yourself as you make the changes rather than being unkind to yourself,
• know that change takes time and mistakes will happen, and
• stay clear about your intention, coming back to it again and again as you make changes to get there.

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