Quite often, when coachees tell me that their situation requires them to set boundaries, they are talking about boundaries they want others to respect.

The imagination in those moments is that they can tell others what to do or not to do by declaring boundaries.

What they rarely think about are the boundaries they’ll choose and implement themselves.

Deciding on such boundaries is there to allow them to have a means to protect themselves. However, using such boundaries can only work if they are within their control.

One of the simplest such boundaries is deciding what one will share with someone else and thus how vulnerable one is willing to make oneself.

No one I know doesn’t do that within their normal social behavior. However, they may still find themselves oversharing or keeping things to themselves as they navigate what they experience as the social challenge of adapting to a given culture.