Boundaries....

This is from a website about borderline personality disorder. I don't think that automatically makes it advice only for the mentally ill or those who are involved with the mentally ill (though the more people I meet, the more I realize that 'healthy' and 'normal' are generally not so much.)

I think boundaries are something we can all benefit from having and also recognizing in others, whether we recognize that others in our lives have *good* boundaries or poor boundaries...it's all good to know.

And, honestly, frustrating and sad as hell to look back and see times and places in my life when I could have or should have set better boundaries for myself, or challenged other people when they were setting poor or inappropriate boundaries. If we could have just found better ways to communicate, identify what we really wanted or needed in the situation, and convey those in an appropriate way....

The first time I went through the list I felt vindicated and smug. "Oh, yeah,she did this, he did that, they did this, that's totally him/her/them".....and then I had to be honest with myself and say "Oh, right. I did this, that, and this other, and that other,"....nobody did a good job with the boundaries in this, that, or the other situation...everybody fucked it up good and proper.

Oh well. Done and gone. No second chances, no forgiveness. Never ever. Just do better next time if the opportunity comes by.

http://www.bpd411.org/boundariesunhealthy.html

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