New Year, New Boundaries: 6 Steps to Set and Stick to Your Boundaries in 2024
You might be convinced that you want to strengthen your boundary, but doing so can be a whole other battle. When you’re a Christian, it’s even more important that our boundaries align and honor God. We want to help you evaluate your boundaries with six reflective questions that can help you do just that. While these questions are not exhaustive, you’ll find some guidance in how you can go about setting and sticking to your personal boundaries in 2024.
Setting your boundary
These first steps will help you evaluate deeper as you think about setting your boundaries.
1. Identify the situation and its importance.
First, identify the situation in which you’re struggling and needing to evaluate the boundary you’re setting. Is it with friends or family? Is work becoming the biggest priority and you don’t want that? Has your time, money, or energy become stressed too far? Wherever you’re finding stress, anxiety, exhaustion, or overwhelm in your life, that’s a great place to evaluate a personal boundary. Then, describe why it’s important for you to create or alter your boundary with this situation. Think about why creating or altering this boundary is an important step and needed change for you.
2. Invite God into your boundaries setting process.
As a Christian, God is an important part of your life. Inviting God into this process of boundary setting can help you see the situation and boundary setting process through a different lens. Inviting God may look like spending time in prayer, reading the Bible to learn what Scripture has to say about your situation or remind you of your values, spending time in silence and solitude to hear from God, spending time in worship, fasting, or participating in other spiritual disciplines. You can use this time to seek God for wisdom, courage, grace, and truth.
3. Search for deeper roots.
As you begin to consider your current boundary, search deeper for reasons why the boundary is set or why you want to change it. Consider how you might be led by fear, shame, anger, guilt, or hurt. Think about how you want this situation to honor God and your values and any role of sin or suffering within your life. Reflect upon whether your current circumstance is driven from habit or what you’ve been told. Whatever may be the roots, delving deeper into our actions can be helpful to have further understanding of why we do what we do. If you struggle with identifying these deeper roots, you might consider discussing with a trusted individual or counselor.
Sticking To Your Boundaries
These latter steps will help you stick to your boundaries.
4. Communicating my boundaries.
Take time now to determine how you will communicate this boundary with others. When you set a plan to communicate this boundary, you will be more likely to stick with it. Do you need to send a text? Is a phone call or in person conversation needed? Can it be communicated formally or informally? Perhaps, you practice saying the boundary a few times in the mirror to convey your boundary confidently and with more ease. If it’s a boundary for yourself only, you might need to brainstorm how you’ll remind yourself. Do you need a reminder on your phone or a post-it note somewhere you’ll see frequently like a mirror? Make sure you find something that will help you remember the importance of this boundary.
5. Seek accountability.
When you’re working on something new, accountability can be an effective way to ensure you follow through. Ask yourself: who can hold me accountable? Find a trusted friend, family member, church member, pastor, or colleague and talk to that individual about your plan. You might ask that individual to check in on you and how you’re doing with maintaining that boundary.
6. Re-evaluate.
Set a time and day to go back and re-evaluate your boundary. Is this boundary working for you? If so, great! Congratulate yourself in some way. It’s no small feat to maintain your boundary. If it’s not working, how might you alter it? Was the boundary practical? Do you need to take a smaller step before getting where you need to be?
Next steps
Often, there are further reasons why maintaining boundaries are difficult. Past or present experiences can make it difficult to do on your own and could require further mental health expertise. If you need additional support with your boundaries or mental health, it may be time to enlist help by searching for a “Christian counselor near me”. Sojourner Counseling has licensed therapists who are ready to help you in 2024 with the changes you want to make. Schedule online today to make an appointment online or in person in Raleigh, NC!
If you’re not ready for counseling, these Christian books on boundaries may be an ideal next step:
Boundaries Updated and Expanded Edition: When to Say Yes, How to Say No To Take Control of Your Life by Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend. They also have related books on boundaries with kids, with teens, in marriage, and in dating.
Boundaries for Your Soul: How to Turn Your Overwhelming Thoughts and Feelings into Your Greatest Allies by Dr. Alison Cook and Kimberly Miller, LMFTGood Boundaries and Goodbyes: Loving Others Without Losing the Best of Who You Are by Lysa TerKeurst