Setting boundaries: why it feels selfish even though healthy relationships depend on it

On Friday afternoon a colleague asks whether you could take over her part of the project as well. A clear, loud “no” sounds inside you — you are tired, you only just fought your way to this weekend. And then you hear yourself say: “Yes, of course, no problem.” In the evening you are angry — at her, and above all at yourself. Do you know that gap between what you feel and what you say?

Boundaries are talked about a great deal these days, but often in a way that makes them sound cold — like a wall you retreat behind, away from people. In fact the opposite is true: boundaries are the condition for closeness. Without them we do not draw closer to relationships, we lose ourselves in them — and then we withdraw, resent, burn out.

In this piece I set out what boundaries really are, why setting them feels selfish to so many of us, what kinds of boundaries there are, how to say a boundary so the other person can hear it — and why the guilt that follows is a sign you are on the right path, not the wrong one.

A boundary is not a wall — it is a door

Imagine your inner space as a house. A wall with no door means isolation: nobody comes in, you do not go out. A house with no walls means anyone can walk in at any time, move your furniture around and settle into your living room. A boundary is a door: it opens and closes, and you decide when, for whom and how far.

A boundary, then, is not the message “go away”. It is the message “this far you may come, and no further” — and equally “this is what I need in order to be able to stay with you”. Boundaries determine what I let in (how many demands, criticisms, other people’s feelings, other people’s crises) and what I let out (how much of my time, energy, vulnerability, money). A person with healthy boundaries is not someone who always says no — but someone who can say both, no and yes, and mean both.

Boundaries, therefore, are not the opposite of love. They are its frame. A relationship in which you are not allowed boundaries is not asking for your closeness — it is asking for your availability. And those two are not the same.

Why setting boundaries feels selfish

If the word “no” makes your stomach clench, you did not choose that — you learned it. A child is existentially dependent on the adults around them, so they work out very quickly which of their sides are welcome and which are not. Where a child’s needs, anger or disagreement were met with a withdrawal of love, with punishment or with offendedness (“you used to be such a good girl, what’s all this now”), the child learns an equation they then carry into adulthood: if I have boundaries, I lose love.

Out of that equation grows people-pleasing as a way of surviving: guessing in advance what the other person expects, and becoming it. Such an adult notices their own needs late or not at all; yet at any moment they know precisely what everyone around them needs. Their “yes” is not a choice — it is a reflex. How a child who was not allowed to be angry grows into an adult who cannot say no I wrote about in detail in a separate piece — if you recognise yourself, read it as the sequel to this one.

So let us say it plainly: setting boundaries is not selfishness. Selfishness is when my needs count and yours do not. People-pleasing is when your needs count and mine do not. A boundary is a third way: both sides count — and I am responsible for actually saying my side out loud. Because nobody can respect a boundary they have never heard.

Boundaries are not one single thing: four areas where you need them

When I explore boundaries with people, it often turns out that they are firm in one area and entirely absent in another. It is useful, then, to lay them out by area:

• Time boundaries: how much of my time I give — and to whom. This includes work outside working hours, “just a quick” favour, visits without notice, and also the right to rest that does not have to be earned.
• Emotional boundaries: the dividing line between your feelings and mine. I can feel with you in your distress without taking it on; I can hear your anger without it becoming my guilt. Without emotional boundaries we become a sponge for other people’s moods.
• Physical boundaries: touch, personal space, sexuality, and also rest, food, sleep. The body is the first place where boundaries are breached — and the first to report that they have been crossed: with a cramp, a tightening, exhaustion.
• Digital boundaries: availability. The right to answer a message tomorrow; to have work apps fall silent at nine in the evening; to have your phone not dictate the rhythm of your day.

A question for yourself: in which of these four areas do you most often say yes when you mean no? That is your training ground.

Passive, aggressive, assertive: three ways of speaking, one language of respect

Psychology distinguishes three basic ways of responding when someone steps onto our territory. The passive response sacrifices yourself: you keep quiet, swallow it, adapt — and resent. The message: your needs count, mine do not. The aggressive response sacrifices the other person: you attack, accuse, humiliate. The message: my needs count, yours do not. Often an aggressive outburst is in fact passivity arriving late — a hundred swallowed “no”s exploding all at once, usually over some innocent trifle and at the wrong person.

The assertive response, by contrast, holds both: I say clearly what I feel and what I need, and at the same time I respect you. I neither attack nor retreat — I stand. Assertiveness is one of the oldest and best-supported skills in behavioural psychology; its classic text is Your Perfect Right by Alberti and Emmons, while the review by Speed and colleagues (2018) wittily calls assertiveness training “a forgotten evidence-based treatment” — so reliably does it improve relationships, self-respect and mental health, and yet it has unjustly fallen out of fashion.

Importantly: assertiveness is not a technique for always getting what you want. It is a stance that keeps you whole — whatever the other person does in response. The outcome of a conversation is not always in your hands; your clarity is.

How to say a boundary: the anatomy of an I-message

A boundary spoken as an accusation (“you never listen to me, you always dump everything on me”) triggers defence, not attentiveness. So the most useful tool is the I-message, introduced into communication by the psychologist Thomas Gordon. Its structure is simple:

• The situation, without judgement: “When the meeting overruns by an hour for the third time …” (not: “because you’re chaotic”).
• My feeling: “… I get restless and angry …” — an emotion, not a diagnosis of the other person.
• My need or request: “… so I’ll be finishing at the agreed time. Please let us put the important items at the beginning.”

And now the hardest part: the full stop. No five apologies, no three explanations, no “you know I love you, but, maybe, if it’s not too much trouble”. Every extra apology says that your boundary is an opening position for negotiation rather than a fact about you. “No” is a sentence. A kind tone and a short sentence are not mutually exclusive — in fact they are the strongest pairing there is.

One more distinction that often brings people relief: a boundary is not an order to the other person, but a statement about you. “I forbid you to shout” is not something you can enforce. “If the shouting continues, I’ll leave the room and we’ll carry on when we’re both calm” — that is entirely within your power. A real boundary always stands on your own territory: it says what you will do, not what the other person must do.

To begin with, you can prepare a few sentences in reserve — in a heated moment the hand reaches for whatever is ready: “I won’t be taking that on, my week is full.” “I need this evening for myself today; let’s talk tomorrow.” “I’m not prepared to discuss this in this way — let’s talk when we’re both calm.” “Thank you for thinking of me, but not this time.” If a request takes you by surprise and you cannot judge it on the spot, the buy-back sentence is worth gold too: “I’ll check and let you know tomorrow.” That buys you time to answer out of choice rather than reflex — because most insincere “yes”es happen in the first three seconds.

Guilt after saying a boundary is normal — and it passes

This is where most good intentions break down. You gather your courage, say the boundary, perhaps even calmly and clearly — and then in the evening guilt floods in: “Was I too harsh? Will she be offended? Maybe I really am overreacting.” And next time you swallow it again.

So remember this: guilt after setting a boundary is usually not a sign that you did something wrong. It is a sign that you did something new. For decades your inner system measured safety by how satisfied others were with you; every boundary shakes that gauge, and the alarm goes off in the language of guilt. It is an emotional patch on the old equation “boundaries = loss of love” — not a report about reality. How guilt often serves as a false sense of control, and how to tell healthy guilt from toxic guilt, I wrote about in my piece on guilt.

In practice this means: expect the guilt after a boundary, name it (“ah, there’s that old guilt”) and do not use it as evidence. Wait a day or two. Almost always it turns out that the relationship has not fallen apart — and every time a boundary holds and the world does not collapse, the old equation is rewritten a little. And, to be fair: people who benefited from your boundlessness often do not greet your boundaries with enthusiasm. That is not proof that the boundary is wrong either. Most often it is proof that it was necessary.

Boundaries in the family and in a couple: staying yourself and staying close

The hardest boundaries are not the ones towards colleagues — they are the ones towards your mother, your father, your partner, your grown-up children. Where there is the most love, there is also the most entanglement: unannounced visits, comments about how you raise your children, the expectation that you will be available “as always”, the partner’s silence that punishes every act of independence.

The family therapist Murray Bowen used the term differentiation for the capacity we need here: to be emotionally connected with the people who matter and at the same time to keep your own self — your opinion, your decisions, your pace — even when those around you press. Low differentiation knows only two options: to fuse (to please, to submit, to lose yourself) or to cut off (to break contact, to run to the other side of the world — though the old dynamic travels with us). Boundaries are the third way: I stay in the relationship and I stay myself. Because this is one of the central themes of my therapeutic work too, I devoted a whole piece to it — on differentiation: how to stay yourself and stay in relationship.

In a couple, one more thing applies: boundaries are not only an individual matter, they are a shared agreement. A couple who can say to each other “I can’t manage that” without penalty and “this is what I need” without mockery argue less and trust each other more. Where this does not work — where every “no” sets off an hour of offendedness or an outburst — it is often a good subject for couples therapy: not to find the culprit, but to understand what each of them actually hears in the other’s boundary.

Start with a single boundary

Do not try to become a person with flawless boundaries overnight — no such person exists. Choose one situation that keeps recurring and costs you the most, and prepare one sentence. Say it, ride out the guilt, watch what happens. Then the next one.

And be prepared for it to feel clumsy at first. First boundaries are almost always a little too hard or a little too soft — like the first steps in any new skill. Some people, carried away at the start, overdo it and set a boundary even where an ordinary conversation would have done; others say it so quietly that nobody hears. Both are part of learning, not proof that “this isn’t for you”. Nor is the measure of success the other person’s reaction — that is theirs — but a simple question: did I tell the truth about myself in a respectful way? If the answer is yes, the boundary succeeded, even if the other person rolled their eyes.

But if every “no” runs you into a wall of panic, if a boundary with a particular person simply “will not come out of your throat”, or if you notice that your body is setting boundaries on your behalf — with exhaustion, migraines, insomnia — then this is not a matter of technique but of a story worth looking at more deeply. In therapy we explore where you learned that your needs do not count, and how to rewrite that lesson gently. You can reach me through the contact page. Boundaries can be learned — in a relationship that respects them, perhaps for the first time.