5 Distinctives between toxic barriers and healthy boundaries
If you look around in our culture today, more people than ever before are ghosting, canceling and cutting friends and family off over conflict. Many people believe they are putting healthy boundaries in place by estranging their family or blocking people with opposite political views on social media. But in reality they've put up toxic barriers that are polarizing themselves from those around them.
In the article, I'm going to address the difference between healthy boundaries and toxic barriers. My goal is to help others understand the difference so that they can work on healing their relationships with parents, children and long time friends and neighbors, instead of killing years - sometimes decades - of love and trust for each other.
As a Christian, I believe the church should work to inspire and influence our culture on how we handle conflict in our relationships and reconcile with others. If the church can't get this one, we're in trouble. I want to help fellow believers learn how to set healthy boundaries that lead to healing and progress. I want them to see the consequences of setting up toxic barriers, how they stunt our growth and development, and how you can successfully break them down.
With that being said. let's talk abut the differences between healthy boundaries and toxic barriers.
Defining the terms "Boundaries" and "Barriers"
I define relationship boundaries as the following:
"Boundaries keep bad things from entering into your life that will cause damage".
On the other hand, I define barriers as the following:
"Barriers keep good things from challenging us so that we can become healthier".
Both boundaries and barriers are designed to keep something from entering or influencing our lives. Because they're similar, people often confuse them and feel good about themselves for avoiding conflict with others and even cutting the person completely off.
But while boundaries and barriers seem similar on the surface, underneath their roots and soil couldn't be more different. In fact, there are five distinctives that I've come up with that can help us define the difference between the two. Let's take a look.
1. Boundaries focus on Growth. Barriers focus on Decline.
Boundaries are expectations or guard rails between me and another person to help our relationship become stronger and healthier, and hopefully the person and I both grow and learn from each other.
Barriers on the other hand are assumptions or beliefs that harm the relationship and can cause isolation and a decline to learn from the other's perspective.
The purpose for a boundary is to give the relationship a shot. A boundary says "Hey I value the growth and development I've gotten from our relationship, so let's set up some guidelines and goals to help maintain that relationship."
A barrier on the other hand says "This conflict in our relationship is too much, and I'm willing to sacrifice the blessings and trust we've built over this issue."
If you want to have healthy boundaries in your relationship, then you need to reframe the situation and ask yourself the following growth-based questions:
- Is there a lesson I can learn from this situation?
- Can I become more self aware because of this?
- Is there a different perspective to my opinions?
- Is there any truth I need to be aware of?
- Is this one conflict worth the sacrifice of our friendship?
- Can this person grow in their perspective?
- Is there an area I can lovingly hold this person accountable for?
Barriers kill the relationship, abort any investments and choke out any attempts to grow from the conflict. Boundaries focus on bringing life to a relationship, making it stronger by overcoming hurdles.
2. Boundaries focus on Protection. Barriers focus on Defensiveness.
In harmful relationships such as abusive or manipulative ones, boundaries are designed to keep you and your family safe from mental or physical harm.
Barriers on the other hand don't protect us - we use them to get defensive, and they're rarely from dangerous people.
For example, I have a family member who get's extremely defensive when their friends don't ask them to hang out or return their calls right away - to the extent, this family member of mine will write some pretty nasty posts that are bully-based in nature but are masked with a victim mindset. This person will block others if they say one wrong thing.
This is an example of barriers being defensive based.
Boundaries don't get easily offended. They do however protect against real harm. Boundaries say, "I called the cops on you because you abused our kids", or, "I'm letting you go because you're stealing from the company and putting the business in jeopardy."
But make no mistake, and don't confuse these two - protection and defensiveness are not at all the same. Defensive people who put up barriers are typically people with unhealthy egos and live behind a mask. When others challenge or disagree with them, the mask comes off and the barriers go up.
3. Boundaries attempt Reconciliation. Barriers affirm isolation.
Healthy boundaries will always look for a way to keep the relationship alive through the process of reconciliation. Barriers will sink us into a passive state of mind that ignores opportunities to keep the relationship alive.
Reconciliation has gotten a bad wrap - sadly even from Christians - for being a weak approach to letting others walk over you for the sake of peace and unity.
Some of the unhealthy myths about reconciliation include:
I have to agree with the other person
I have to acknowledge I was the one in the wrong
I must affirm their behavior
I have to forgive them by forgetting what they did
I shouldn't require any changes from them
I'm not allowed to voice my opinion or views
This couldn't be farther from the truth though. Reconciliation isn't affirming the behaviors of others. It's simply saying "Hey, I value and respect our relationship and want to see if we can save it."
True reconciliation includes the following steps:
Being the first one to initiate a conversation
Humbly listening to what the person has to say
Sharing your concerns with love
Addressing the problem, not attacking the person
Being honest about changes you need from the other person
Being open to brain storm or negotiate your own changes
For a deeper lesson on how to address reconcile with someone, check out my blog article: 7 Practices for Healthy Conflict Resolution
At the heart of reconciliation is a desire to understand the truth so we can love one another better. This leads us to our next boundary:
4. Boundaries look for the Truth. Barriers thrive on Narratives.
Barriers are almost always completely founded on rumors, gossip or narratives we either hear from others or we make up ourselves about someone. Personal narratives about someone else are usually birthed from the following process:
THE NARRITIVE PLANT
Seed planted: We see someone do or say something concerning
Seed watered: We form unfair thoughts like "why is this person being such a jerk by acting this way?"
Seed sprouts: We fuel that thought with unhelpful assumptions such as "They just want to see me fail."
Seed produces fruit: We take actions toward that person by avoiding them, punishing them or hurting them
Fruit produces more seed: We begin sharing our narrative about this person with others around us, influencing them with the same behaviors
If you can coerce yourself and others into believing a family member or friend is a dangerous enemy through a narrative you've spun, why wouldn't you cut them off? That's how barriers work.
Boundaries on the other hand avoid accepting second hand information or unhelpful personal thoughts, and focus on getting to the root of the matter - the truth. People with healthy boundaries will follow these steps:
Evaluate the concern - is what this person did worth making an issue over?
Qaulitate the response - If I need to address this, how serious should my approach be?
Give the Benefit of a Doubt - As you're planning your response, don't pass judgment on the person's heart. This doesn't mean you give them a pass on their actions. Simply give them the benefit of a doubt first.
Communicate data - don't use accusatory language when trying to understand the truth from someone. Simply tell them what you're seeing and ask for their impute.
Be Understanding - Let the person know you're coming from a place of wanting to understand and you're giving them the benefit of the doubt. This isn't an interrogation.
Talk to others - If you have to talk to others who were involved, do so, but refrain from coming off as gossiping. Don't attack the person's character. Simply ask others for their perspective and focus on the facts.
Think about the people you've cut off in your life.
Did you reach out to them to gain clarity on the truth? Or did you rely on yours or someone else's narrative and base your actions on that?
5. Boundaries are Win-Win driven. Barriers are Win-Lose driven.
Remember our definition of a healthy boundary:
"Boundaries keep bad things from entering into your life that will cause damage".
They also exist to encourage others to take responsibility so that bad things don't damage their lives either. Boundaries help you become more healthy and encourage the other person to be healthy too.
Boundaries comes with a set of goals and next steps for the purpose of healing or maintaining the relationship for both people. Here are some examples of Win-Win boundaries:
Alcohol Boundary - If you join a AA meeting and I see massive changes in how you treat me and the kids, I will move back in with you. Until then, we will be staying with my parents.
Work Performance Boundary - If you can close the number of sales in your quota in 30 days like you agreed to when you applied for this role, you can stay employed here. If you don't, then you're going to force me to have to terminate your position.
Children's Boundary - If you can stay on top of the dishes each evening for the week, I'll give you back your phone privileges. If not, then I'm going to assume you don't care about your phone and don't need it.
Marriage Boundary - I need you to let me know if you're going to be late coming home from work so I can plan out dinner. If not, you're going to have to warm up your food on your own.
Abusive Relationship Boundary - You need to get professional, licensed help before we can talk again. Once your therapist has confirmed to me that you've gone through all the necessary steps, then we can schedule a Zoom call to talk about moving forward.
You cannot force someone to accept your boundaries, but you can at least present the opportunity to them. If they accept it and actually do their part, it can be a win-win situation.
Barriers on the other hand are Win-Lose. They usually are selfish in nature, focus on the one person's needs without giving the other a chance to rectify or reconcile. A Win-Lose boundary can involve:
A person blocking someone on social media for a comment they found offensive
A person not returning calls or texts from someone they have a concern with
A person talking bad about someone to others, especially without talking to that person first
Withholding favors or help for someone when you have the ability to help them
Withholding words of praise and encouragement from someone
Withholding rewards from someone who deserved it
Purposefully keeping someone in suspense about a situation and leaving them confused about it
Threatening consequences on someone simply because they disagree with you on something
Attacking someone's character openly based on a conflict with them
Get rid of your barriers
Having a barrier in your life that's causing a relationship to not heal is the worst thing you can do for you, for your family and for your church family.
Allowing a barrier to fester in your life is like letting a broken finger heal without setting it back. A dislocated bone will eventually heal, but it will heal in it's broken form and it will create limitations for your life in the future.
As I write this, I look at the bone sticking out of my ankle from an accident I had when I was 13. I broke my ankle and never went to the doctor to fix it. Because of that, it healed back the wrong way, and to this day, I'm limited on how much pressure and physical activity I can do on it.
To this day, I have close family and good friends with relationship barriers in their lives. I've seen their dreams, hopes and potential for greatness effected - even destroyed - because they opted for a passive, easy approach to dealing with conflict in their relationships.