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EP 29: Healthy Boundaries 101: What They Are and What They Are Not · Healthy Boundaries for Moms| Christian Life Coach

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  What if one of the biggest reasons you're exhausted isn't because you're doing too much.
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  It's because you're carrying things that God never asked you to carry.
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  As moms, I think we are often told to help more, give more, serve more.
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  We need to volunteer more at schools and at church.
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  And while serving others is absolutely part of our faith, many of us have never learned
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  the difference between carrying someone's burden and carrying their backpack.
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  Today, we're talking about Healthy Boundaries 101.
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  What they are, what they are not, and why understanding the difference can completely
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  change your relationships, your stress level, and your sense of peace.
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  If you're tired of people pleasing, carrying too much, and wondering why peace still feels
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  so hard to hold on to, you're in the right place.
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  Hi, I'm Lori, mom, former people pleaser, and Your Boundaries Coach.
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  Here we talk about how to protect your peace, set healthier boundaries, and get clear on
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  what actually matters so that you can build a life that feels lighter, calmer, and more
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  satisfying.
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  So let's stop the chaos for a minute, moms, catch our breath, and get into this next episode.
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  Welcome back to Healthy Boundaries for Moms.
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  I'm Lori Grimes, and today we're talking about Healthy Boundaries 101.
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  Again, what they are and what they are not.
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  I think this is one of those topics that sits underneath almost everything we discuss on
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  this podcast.
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  Whether we're talking about people pleasing, the mom guilt we feel, those overcommitted
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  schedules, those difficult relationships, comparison, how we want to find more peace
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  in our lives, boundaries are usually somewhere in the conversation.
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  So today, I want to slow down and answer a simple question, what is a boundary really?
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  Because boundaries have become one of those words that get thrown around a lot.
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  Everyone's using it, but many of us aren't exactly sure what they mean.
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  And maybe you've heard, just set a boundary here, or you need better boundaries.
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  Protect your peace.
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  But what all does that actually mean?
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  So for years, I thought boundaries meant just telling people what to do, what they could,
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  what they couldn't do.
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  I thought boundaries were like walls.
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  And I really also thought boundaries were pretty selfish.
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  And as a Christian, I worried that boundaries might make me like a less loving person.
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  After all, aren't we supposed to help people?
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  We're told that all the time, right?
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  Aren't we supposed to serve?
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  Aren't we supposed to carry one another's burdens?
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  And yes, the answer is, we should be helping.
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  But I think many of us have misunderstood what boundaries really are.
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  So what are boundaries?
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  One of the most well-known quotes are from Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend's book
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  on boundaries.
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  And it says, boundaries define us.
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  So I love that statement because boundaries help us understand where our responsibilities
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  end and someone else's begin.
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  So think of boundary like a fence around a piece of property.
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  That fence isn't there to control what your neighbor's doing, right?
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  It's there to define what belongs to you and what belongs to your neighbor.
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  In the same way, boundaries help us understand what God has entrusted to us.
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  So what lives inside our boundaries?
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  Well, we are entrusted with time, our time, our energy, our emotions, our attitudes, our
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  choices, what we choose to believe in our values, our talents and abilities, resources
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  that we have, and our responsibilities.
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  These are all things God has entrusted to us to steward well.
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  So for example, my time is inside my boundary.
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  That means I get to decide how I'm going to spend it.
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  Just like my emotions are again inside my boundary.
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  That means I'm responsible for understanding and managing them.
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  I mean, you've heard, you made me feel that way.
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  Someone say that.
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  That's not really true.
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  You have to choose what you're going to feel and how you're going to react.
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  So that is your responsibility.
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  And my beliefs are also inside my boundary.
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  I'm responsible for knowing what I believe in and why.
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  And my talents and my abilities are also inside my boundary.
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  God gave them to me, especially to steward wisely, not to exhaust myself trying to meet
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  everyone's expectations.
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  Okay?
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  So healthy boundaries, again, help us manage what God has entrusted to us.
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  They are not walls.
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  They are stewardship.
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  So now that asks the question, okay, we know what boundaries are, what are they not?
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  So let's talk about what boundaries are not.
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  Again, we said boundaries are not selfish.
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  So this is not just turning in on ourselves and just making our world just about us.
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  Boundaries are not punishment.
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  We're not instructing a boundary to punish someone else.
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  Like, this is what you get because of how I feel.
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  I'm going to put this boundary here now.
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  Boundaries are not controlling other people.
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  So my boundary with my time isn't to control my spouse or my children.
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  It is not what we're using that for.
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  And boundaries are not about getting your way.
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  They are not walls that keep people out.
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  In fact, healthy boundaries are what make healthy relationships possible.
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  Because healthy boundaries create that clarity that we need to know about.
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  And clarity creates trust because we know what to expect from someone else.
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  Someone who has clear boundaries helps us to know where they stand and where we stand.
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  It's very clear what's important to them.
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  And then we in turn can respect that and vice versa.
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  One of the things I've learned is that healthy boundaries don't keep love out.
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  So we're not walling off people's love and attention to us.
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  They keep resentment out instead.
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  Because when we constantly ignore our limits and we say yes to everything, when really
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  we mean no, and we take responsibility for things that aren't ours, resentment begins
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  to grow.
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  And healthy boundaries are there to protect those relationships.
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  So that we don't destroy the people we care about the most.
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  The scripture that changed everything.
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  One of the most helpful scriptures on this topic comes from Galatians chapter 6 verse
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  2.
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  It says, carry each other's burdens and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
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  But then just a few verses later in verse 5 it says, for each one should carry their
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  own load.
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  So at first glance you're looking at those verses seeming like they don't make sense.
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  They contradict each other.
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  So it says we're supposed to carry each other's burdens, but are we supposed to carry our
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  own loads?
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  Yes.
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  The answer is both.
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  Yes and.
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  And understanding the difference may be one of the most important lessons we can learn
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  about having healthy boundaries.
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  So let's understand burdens and backpacks.
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  How they're different.
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  A burden is something unusually heavy.
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  This could be like a cancer diagnosis or someone died that we care about.
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  It could be a catastrophic, like a natural crisis, a house fire or a financial crisis.
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  Someone lost their job.
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  It's a season of deep grief.
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  It's something that would be difficult for anyone to carry alone.
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  When that happens, the body of Christ steps in, right?
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  We create these meal trains.
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  We babysit.
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  We offer prayer.
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  We show up.
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  We help as the body of Christ to carry the burden.
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  That's exactly what God is calling us to do.
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  But then there are loads, like the backpack, okay?
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  Every person has a backpack that they're responsible to carry.
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  So what's inside that backpack?
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  It is all the things we talked about that are within our boundaries.
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  Our choices, our attitudes, our responsibilities, commitments, habits, growth, and sometimes
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  consequences.
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  Those are our responsibility.
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  And this is where many of us are just getting into trouble.
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  We're confusing it, especially as moms, okay?
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  Especially people pleasers.
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  We are starting to pick up other people's backpacks.
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  We are taking responsibility for other people's emotions.
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  I mean, we get in there and we try to fix their daily problems, right?
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  And we feel guilty when they're unhappy.
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  We rush in when things just start to feel a little uncomfortable.
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  And we carry responsibilities that God has never assigned to us to carry.
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  And before long, we're carrying our backpack, half the neighborhood's backpack too, right?
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  So I think this is where many Christian women get stuck, because we genuinely mean well.
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  We want to help.
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  We love people.
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  We care about people.
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  And we don't want to see people suffer, especially the ones that we love.
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  But somewhere along the way, many of us started believing that helping everyone is the same
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  thing as loving everyone.
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  And that's just not true.
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  So compassion and responsibility, they are not the same thing.
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  Compassion says, I care about your struggle.
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  And responsibility says, your struggle is now my job to fix.
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  Those are very different things.
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  Now biblically, we understand Jesus was compassionate, but he wasn't responsible for everyone's choices, right?
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  We see that he taught people, he loved people, and he did invite people in, but he still
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  allowed people to make their decisions.
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  And he allowed people to walk away.
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  We see he allowed people to experience the natural consequences of their decisions.
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  He didn't rescue them from them.
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  And I think that's where we understand helping versus rescuing.
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  Sometimes helping is exactly what God calls us to do.
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  And rescuing actually prevents growth.
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  And I've seen this in my own walk as a mom.
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  When I come in and I don't let my kids experience the natural consequences of their choices,
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  I'm really not doing them a favor.
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  Because now they don't have any friction to make the choice that's not the right choice.
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  I'm not, I'm getting in the way of that friction.
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  I'm making it smoother and easier.
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  So they're not remembering that they don't want to do that in the future.
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  So say a family were to lose their home in a fire, okay, we can help carry that burden.
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  And if someone were to receive like a difficult health diagnosis, we can also help carry that
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  as well.
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  What about if a widow is grieving?
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  Well, we can step in and we can help carry that burden and pray and sit with the widow.
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  What about situations where someone continually refuses to take responsibility?
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  So we're talking about a person that doesn't want to look for work, maybe expects everyone
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  else to support them.
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  What about the person who is repeatedly making a destructive choice and expects someone else
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  to come up and clean up this mess?
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  So we could be talking about like addiction.
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  So hear me clearly, people struggling with addiction do need compassion.
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  They obviously need prayer and support and to be encouraged, but there's a difference
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  between supporting recovery and rescuing someone from every consequence of their choices.
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  And it's hard to watch sometimes people go through the consequences of their choice.
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  But consequences, like I said, with like your kids, they can be teachers, right?
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  They can tell you what you don't want to do in the future because it's showing you that
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  you don't like the consequences.
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  You want to choose something else.
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  So God often uses consequences to get our attention, right?
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  Like in our own lives to show us that this is not the right path and we need to be redirected
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  and get back on the path that God has invited us to grow in.
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  But if we constantly remove every consequence and we may unintentionally stop the path that
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  that person's on to get back to what God is trying to teach and to learn a lesson.
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  And it doesn't mean, I'm not trying to say don't love people, and it doesn't mean to
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  stop helping people for sure.
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  It just means we need to ask a different question.
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  Am I carrying a burden or am I carrying a backpack that belongs to someone else?
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  So this brings us to the idea of responsible to, not responsible for.
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  So this is taught in the boundaries book.
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  We are responsible to others and for ourselves.
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  So think about for a minute, we are responsible to others.
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  We're called to love people, to serve, to encourage people, to pray for people, to support
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  people, but we are not, not responsible for others.
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  We're not responsible for their attitudes, right?
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  For their choices, how they decide to grow or not grow, their obedience, their healing,
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  their reactions.
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  As moms, this can be life changing.
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  If we really were to understand this, that I'm responsible for my time, I'm responsible
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  for my choices, my stewardship, my obedience, but I am not responsible for making everyone
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  happy.
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  I am not responsible for fixing everyone's problems or carrying responsibilities that
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  belong to someone else.
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  So healthy boundaries allow us to stay compassionate.
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  It protects our heart and our compassion without becoming responsible for someone else's life.
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  And honestly, that's where we're going to experience freedom because many of us, we're
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  exhausted, right?
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  From not carrying what God assigned to us specifically, we're exhausted from carrying
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  what He assigned to someone else.
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  So I want to leave you with one question today.
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  Whose backpack are you carrying?
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  Maybe it's our kids' decisions or a friend's emotions.
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  Maybe it's a family member's responsibility or guilt that you've carried around for years.
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  So I want you to ask, am I helping carry a burden or am I carrying a backpack that
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  belongs to someone else?
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  Because Christianity calls us to carry burdens, but not everyone's backpack.
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  Healthy boundaries aren't about loving people less.
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  They're about loving people wisely.
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  So friend, this week, I want you to spend a few minutes asking God to show you what
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  He's actually entrusted to your care and what you've been trying to carry that belongs
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  to someone else.
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  Because freedom often begins with putting down a backpack that was never yours to pick
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  up.
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  And friend, I want you to remember, you don't have to carry everyone's backpack to be a
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  good Christian, a good friend, or a good mom.
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  Hey friend, I hope you enjoyed today's episode.
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  If so, would you take 30 seconds and go join our free Facebook page at Healthy Boundaries
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  for Moms?
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  That's where we go deeper, share what's actually working, and support each other in real life.
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  I will also share some great tools and tips to help you along this journey.
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  I have also included a link to sign up for our brand new weekly newsletter in the Facebook
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  group.
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  Don't forget to hit follow and leave a quick review on Apple.
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  It really lets me know that this podcast is helping you.
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  More importantly, it helps more women find this podcast.
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  Now go say no to something that's stealing your peace and say yes to something you actually
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  need.
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  And I'll meet you back here in the next episode.