We're always hearing about boundaries and that we should set them and stick to them and be firm on them, but how do we even begin along this journey of recognizing where our boundaries begin and end to know how to communicate and enforce them? Let's take a look!
First and foremost, there is a quick way to find out where your boundaries lie and that is with the experience of them being pushed, broken, or otherwise ignored. On one end of the spectrum, our boundaries being fiddled with will leave us feeling uncomfortable. On the other end, the experience could be easily identified as a trauma to you whether it be physical, mental, or emotional. Luckily for us (not so much for me), readers, I have had my boundaries pushed or broken in every facet of life! So, I have some insight on how to avoid all of that.
An easy way to get your boundaries tested is by continuing to people please. It's something we're all taught (ridiculous) and need to unlearn. If you get into your adult life a little too far with your people pleasing habits, you will find yourself eventually morphing into a doormat. Avoid this, please! Doormats have no boundaries and they live life mostly dirty or wet or both. Either way, people are wiping their shit all over you so they can be more comfortable. Gross.
If you've ever heard, "Just smile," "Don't rock the boat," or "Let it go," you have been taught some of the most common people pleasing habits; which, at their very core, ask you to swallow your own valid experience of something to accommodate the other persons' equally as valid experience. If both experiences are valid, then how can we make sure someone isn't turning into a people pleaser? Great question!
Perception allows us to validate our own experience of things, but it also allows us to see the flexibility in what the "truth" of an experience may be. For example, if you're in the lunch line at school and you get to the cashier and ask for a cookie to find that the person in front of you got the last one, you will have experienced the lunch line that day in a very different way than the person who received the last cookie.
I'm not totally impressed by this analogy, but I'm sticking with it. It's simple. If someone took a survey of the people in the cafeteria about their experience of the lunch line, the person who received the last cookie might consider it to have been a fateful or even lucky experience! The other person? Disappointing. But it's the same lunch line, how can the answers vary so much! Perception and experience, baby! We all experience the world differently and every experience is just as valid as the next no matter how much they differ.
Now that that is settled and we can all agree that perception allows for variety in experience and how we absorb our world, let's consider people pleasing! Anytime you are faced with the choice to swallow your feelings or rock the boat? Rock the boat. That's what setting up boundaries feels like. It feels like rocking the boat. And this is only in situations where your boundary has been tested and you did not like it! This is how most of us discover our boundaries, unfortunately. Experience really is the best teacher.
Basically, this rocking of the boat you are doing by firmly stating boundaries can feel a lot like confrontation and being selfish. Only because we're taught to "put others before ourselves" which I think is one of the most dangerous sentiments out there. Help people when you can. That's what should be said. Always offer to help when you yourself have the capacity to do so but do not put anyone in front of your own needs and capacity for aid. Put your own oxygen mask on first!
"Just smiling" and "letting it go" are just dandy in the temporary, and you can continue to just smile and let it all go forever and ever but you will eventually burn out or otherwise explode. Which is what happened to me circa Spring 2017.
I had been working in a bakery as a baker and decorator for 4 years at this point. When I first took the position, I was desperate for a job. When you're in desperation? It's much easier - or almost not even your choice, but a necessity - to be flexible on your boundaries and I made this erroneous choice when accepting a position as a dishwasher. My hourly wage started at 8 american dollars. Within the first year, I rose to become a baker, cake decorator, manager, front desk worker, cake tasting organizer, etc. etc. the list is long and ranges from admin to the physical baking. My hourly wage was now, after 4 years, at 9 american dollars. The average cake decorator who is solely decorating? Closer to $50.
So, at this point I'm getting burnt out and this was a little family-owned bakery - fucking run from "family" environments - so I had agreed to the lower wage as times were tough and they were new and I just wanted to be supportive! I also really needed any income at all. I was just happy to be off dishes! On top of all this were overtime shifts that I was never compensated for, tips given that were never doled out to the other employees; only family members, and I was reprimanded for using the bathroom.
On this particular spring day in 2017 I had arrived at the bakery in the wee hours of the morning to find absolutely no one there. It was a Sunday and we opened later on Sundays so I wasn't too concerned, but the list was long. We had a cake tasting that day as well as orders going out that hadn't even been baked yet. I got to work.
That's when I noticed a note in the decorating room from my boss's asshole father complaining about a recipe that flopped - carrot cake always flopped and I was the only one who could do it; this time I was unlucky - in the note I was demanded to fix the carrot cake issue by re-baking everything and using the original cake to make cake balls. "DO NOT CLOCK IN UNTIL THIS IS DONE" the note said.
I rage quit that day.
Time to open rolled around and the family still wasn't there. I was expected to open the entire bakery by myself while also doing a cake tasting, taking care of customers, and finishing orders for the day. All for a whopping $9 an hour. I found my boundary!! It took me 4 years to finally stop smiling and letting it go. I left a nasty little note detailing just how fucked over I felt, I turned the oven - with the half-baked cake-tasting cupcakes in it - off, and walked out.
I did leave my CD case behind which was a huge bummer, but obviously I can't go back. Pride and whatnot.
Readers, don't wait 4 years to finally speak up on all the malpractices in the workplace. If they are collecting tips and you're up there helping the people that are giving the tips? Demand your percentage of them. If other people in your position are making 5x what you're making? Demand a sizable raise or walk.
And when you're desperate for a job, and not in a place to demand such things because the risk of job loss is a threat to your life, that makes this harder. And that's the situation I was in but I'll be damned if I was opening that bakery by myself on a weekend while also fixing problems that weren't my fault all while not getting paid? I had a choice. I chose boundaries.
Am I proud of the nasty note I left? Honestly? Yes, yes I am. I'm not usually proud of my rageful antics, but this was overdue and my candles burning at both ends were spent. I am (a little) tickled to report that after quitting they were only able to stay open for a few years without me, HA! If that doesn't properly indicate the workload I had compared to the rest of the family... By the time I quit, the other 4 employees had already quit due to their shit management. So, I really tried to stay loyal, but even I couldn't do it in the end.
This is an experience of when I did not initially state boundaries. When my position changed, I should have demanded a raise. I should have demanded a raise with each new task added to my plate. I did not, and it left me feeling burnt out and underappreciated.
My advice with boundaries is to reassess yours every time you go through a change. Change is a good indicator of your own necessity for evolution. If something is changing, your boundaries may need to as well.
Another opportunity to set boundaries is whenever you're feeling uncomfortable. The asshole father at the bakery? Used to pry about my social life which I found incredibly inappropriate. I said nothing though, just smiled and answered.
His awareness of my participation in extracurriculars (like going to bars on the weekend - shocking for a college student) led him to "joke" about me doing coke - something I had never mentioned I was into - in the bathroom at work because he was upset at how often I used the bathroom. I should have told him to leave me the fuck alone when prying about my personal life, but me allowing him insight to it a bit? Gave him the illusion that joking about drugs with me would be funny. I don't think that's a funny joke in the workplace. I mentioned that in my note, too.
Anytime I'm presented with an opportunity to set boundaries, I take it now. I refuse to be in that position again.
I hope this will serve as a cautionary tale to encourage you to be firm on boundaries in every facet of life. Start in the workplace if you don't want to start with family! The more you set boundaries, the easier it will become and the less time you will spend trying to accommodate everyone else.
Don't be a doormat! :)
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