It is often easy to see problems, but difficult to make the hard choices and risks that result in change. Let's look at the steps toward personal change in a marital relationship.

1. Inventory the symptom. First, you need to recognize the problem and agree to take action to solve it. You will not resolve the problem by wishing. You need to own the problem, whether it be s.e.x, discipline of the children, lack of togetherness, or unfair spending of money.

2. Identify the specific boundary problem. One step beyond identifying the symptom is putting your finger on the specific boundary issue. For instance, the symptom may be that one person does not want s.e.x; the boundary problem may be that this person does not say no often enough in other areas of the relationship so that this is the one place that she has some power. Or, she may feel as if she does not have enough control in the s.e.xual arena. She may feel powerless; she may feel that her choices are not honored.

3. Find the origins of the conflict. This is probably not the first relationship in which this boundary issue has arisen. You probably learned to relate this way in a significant relationship in the family in which you grew up. Certain fears that were developed in that relationship are still operative. You need to name these original issues; you may need to stop confusing your parent with your spouse. No other relationship repeats parental conflicts more often than the marriage relationship.

4. Take in the good. This step involves establishing a support system. Remember, "Boundaries are not built in a vacuum." We need bonding and support before we build boundaries; the fear of abandonment keeps many people from setting boundaries in the first place.

For this reason, establish a support system that will encourage boundary setting in your marriage. This may be a co-dependency group, Al-Anon, a therapist, a marriage counselor, or a pastor. Do not set boundaries alone. You have not set boundaries because you are afraid; the only way out is through support. "And if one can overpower him who is alone, two can resist him. A cord of three strands is not quickly torn apart" (Ecc. 4:12). Boundaries are like muscles. They need to be built up in a safe support system and allowed to grow. If you try to shoulder too much weight too quickly, your muscles may tear or be pulled. Get help.

5. Practice. Practice new boundaries in safe relationships, relationships in which people love you unconditionally. Tell a good friend no when you can't do lunch, or let her know when your opinion differs from hers, or give something to her without expecting anything in return. As you practice setting limits with safe people, you will begin to grow in your ability to set limits in your marriage.

6. Say no to the bad. Put limits on the bad in your marriage. Stand up to abuse; say no to unreasonable demands. Remember the parable of the talents. There was no growth without risk and a facing up to fear. Being successful is not as important as stepping out and trying.

7. Forgive. To not forgive is to lack boundaries. Unforgiving people allow other people to control them. Setting people who have hurt you free from an old debt is to stop wanting something from them; it sets you free as well. Forgiving can lead to proactive behavior in the present, instead of pa.s.sive wishes from the past.

8. Become proactive. Instead of allowing someone else to be in control, figure out what you want to do, set your course, and stick to it. Decide what your limits are, what you will allow yourself to be a party to, what you will no longer tolerate, and what consequences you will set. Define yourself proactively, and you will be ready to maintain your boundaries when the time comes.

9. Learn to love in freedom and responsibility. Remember the goal of boundaries: love coming out of freedom. This is the true self-denial of the New Testament. When you are in control of yourself, you can give and sacrifice for loved ones in a helpful way instead of giving in to destructive behavior and self-centeredness. This kind of freedom allows one to give in a way that leads to fruit. Remember, "no greater love has anyone than to lay down his life for his friends." This is to live up to the law of Christ, to serve one another. But this must be done out of freedom, not boundaryless compliance.

Setting and receiving firm boundaries with your spouse can lead to a much greater intimacy. But you not only need to address boundaries with your spouse; you need to address boundaries with your children. And it's never too late to start.

10.

Boundaries and Your Children

Shannon couldn't stop crying. A young mother of two preschool children, she couldn't imagine herself being angry, out of control, and certainly not abusive. Yet a week ago, she had picked up three-year-old Robby and shaken him. Hard. She had screamed at him. Loudly. And it wasn't the first time. She had done it numerous times in the past year. The only difference was that this time, Shannon almost physically injured her son. She was frightened.

The experience had so shaken Shannon and her husband, Gerald, that they called and made an appointment with me to discuss what had happened. Her shame and guilt were intense. She avoided eye contact with me as she told her story.

The several hours before Shannon had lost control with Robby had been horrible. Gerald and she had had an argument over breakfast. He had left for work without saying good-bye. Then one-year-old Tanya spilled cereal all over the floor. And Robby chose that morning to do everything he'd been told not to for the past three years. He pulled the cat's tail. He figured out how to open the front door, and he ran outside into the yard and into the street. He smeared Shannon's lipstick all over the white dining room wall, and he pushed Tanya to the floor.

This last incident was the straw that broke Shannon's back. Seeing Tanya lying on the floor, crying, with Robby standing over her with a defiantly pleased look, was too much. Shannon saw red and impulsively ran to her son. You know the rest of the story.

After she had calmed down a little, I asked Shannon how she and Gerald normally disciplined Robby.

"Well, we don't want to alienate Robby, or quench his spirit," Gerald began. "Being negative is so . . . so . . . negative. So we try to reason with him. Sometimes we'll warn him that 'you won't get ice cream tonight.' Sometimes we try to praise good things he does. And sometimes we try to ignore the bad behavior. Then maybe he'll stop it."

"Doesn't he push the limits?"

Both parents nodded. "You wouldn't believe it," Shannon said. "It's like he doesn't hear us. He keeps on doing what he jolly well pleases. And generally, he'll keep it up until one of us explodes and yells at him. I guess we just have a problem child."

"Well, there's certainly a problem," I replied. "But perhaps Robby has been trained to not respond to anything but out-of-control rage. Let's talk about boundaries and kids. . . ."

Of all the areas in which boundaries are crucially important, none is more relevant than that of raising children. How we approach boundaries and child rearing will have enormous impact on the characters of our kids. On how they develop values. On how well they do in school. On the friends they pick. On whom they marry. And on how well they do in a career.

The Importance of Family

G.o.d, at his deepest level, is a lover (1 John 4:8). He is relationally oriented and relationally driven. He desires connection with us from womb to tomb: "I have loved you with an everlasting love" (Jer. 31:3). G.o.d's loving nature isn't pa.s.sive. It's active. Love multiplies itself. G.o.d the relational Lover is also G.o.d the aggressive Creator. He wants to fill up his universe with beings who care for him-and for each other.

The family is the social unit G.o.d invented to fill up the world with representatives of his loving character. It's a place for nurturing and developing babies until they're mature enough to go out of the family as adults and to multiply his image in other surroundings.

G.o.d first picked the nation Israel to be his children. After centuries of resistance by Israel, however, G.o.d chose the church: "Because of [Israel's] transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious" (Rom. 11:11). The body of Christ has the same role as Israel had-to multiply G.o.d's love and character.

The church is often described as a family. We are to do good "especially to those who belong to the family of believers" (Gal. 6:10). Believers "are members of G.o.d's household" (Eph. 2:19). We are to "know how people ought to conduct themselves in G.o.d's household" (1 Tim. 3:15).

These and many other powerful pa.s.sages show us how G.o.d "thinks family." He explains his heart as a parent would. He's a daddy. He likes his job. This biblical portrayal of G.o.d helps show us how parenting is such a vital part of bringing G.o.d's own character to this planet in our own little ones.

Boundaries and Responsibility

G.o.d, the good parent, wants to help us, his children, grow up. He wants to see us "become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. 4:13). Part of this maturing process is helping us know how to take responsibility for our lives.

It's the same with our own flesh-and-blood kids. Second only to learning how to bond, to form strong attachments, the most important thing parents can give children is a sense of responsibility-knowing what they are responsible for and knowing what they aren't responsible for, knowing how to say no and knowing how to accept no. Responsibility is a gift of enormous value.

We've all been around middle-aged people who have the boundaries of an eighteen-month-old. They have tantrums or sulk when others set limits on them, or they simply fold and comply with others just to keep the peace. Remember that these adult people started off as little people. They learned long, long ago to either fear or hate boundaries. The relearning process for adults is laborious.

Instilling vs. Repairing Boundaries

A wise mother of adult children once watched her younger friend struggle with her youngster. The child was refusing to behave, and the young mother was quickly losing her mind. Affirming the mother's decision to make the child sit on a chair by himself, the older woman said, "Do it now, Dear. Discipline the child now-and you just might survive adolescence."

Developing boundaries in young children is that proverbial ounce of prevention. If we teach responsibility, limit setting, and delay of gratification early on, the smoother our children's later years of life will be. The later we start, the harder we and they have to work.

If you're a parent of older children, don't lose heart. It just means boundary development will be met with more resistance. In their minds, they do not have a lot to gain by learning boundaries. You'll need to spend more time working on it, getting more support from friends-and praying harder! We'll review age-appropriate boundary tasks for the different stages of childhood later in this chapter.

Boundary Development in Children

The work of boundary development in children is the work of learning responsibility. As we teach them the merits and limits of responsibility, we teach them autonomy-we prepare them to take on the tasks of adulthood.

The Scriptures have much to say about the role of boundary setting in child rearing. Usually, we call it discipline. The Hebrew and Greek words that scholars translate as "discipline" mean "teaching." This teaching has both a positive and a negative slant.

The positive facets of discipline are proactivity, prevention, and instruction. Positive discipline is sitting someone down to educate and train him in a task: fathers are to raise children "in the training and instruction of the Lord" (Eph. 6:4). The negative facets of discipline are correction, chastis.e.m.e.nt, and consequences. Negative discipline is letting children suffer the results of their actions to learn a lesson in responsibility: "Stern discipline awaits him who leaves the path" (Prov. 15:10).

Good child rearing involves both preventive training and practice, and correctional consequences. For example, you set a ten o'clock bedtime for your fourteen-year-old. "It's there so that you'll get enough sleep to be alert in school," you tell her. You've just disciplined positively. Then your teen dawdles until 11:30 p.m. The next day you say, "Because you did not get to bed on time last night, you may not use the phone today." You've just disciplined negatively.

Why are both the carrot and the whip necessary in good boundary development? Because G.o.d uses practice-trial and error-to help us grow up. We learn maturity by getting information, applying it poorly, making mistakes, learning from our mistakes, and doing better the next time.

Practice is necessary in all areas of life: in learning to ski, write an essay, or operate a computer. We need practice in developing a deep love relationship and in learning to study the Bible. And it's just as true in our spiritual and emotional growth: "But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil" (Heb. 5:14). Practice is important in learning boundaries and responsibility. Our mistakes are our teachers.

Discipline is an external boundary, designed to develop internal boundaries in our children. It provides a structure of safety until the child has enough structure in his character to not need it. Good discipline always moves the child toward more internal structure and more responsibility.

We need to distinguish between discipline and punishment. Punishment is payment for wrongdoing. Legally, it's paying a penalty for breaking the law. Punishment doesn't leave a lot of room for practice, however. It's not a great teacher. The price is too high: "The wages of sin is death" (Rom. 6:23), and "whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it" (James 2:10). Punishment does not leave much room for mistakes.

Discipline, however, is different. Discipline is not payment for a wrong. It's the natural law of G.o.d: our actions reap consequences.

Discipline is different from punishment because G.o.d is finished punishing us. Punishment ended on the cross for all those who accept Christ as Savior: "He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree" (1 Peter 2:24). Christ's suffering paid for our wrongdoing.

In addition, discipline and punishment have a different relationship to time. Punishment looks back. It focuses on making payment for wrongs done in the past. Christ's suffering was payment, for example, for our sin. Discipline, however, looks forward. The lessons we learn from discipline help us to not make the same mistakes again: "G.o.d disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness" (Heb. 12:10).

How does that help us? It frees us to make mistakes without fear of judgment, without fear of loss of relationship: "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" (Rom. 8:1). The freedom of the cross allows us to practice without having to pay a terrible price. The only danger is consequences-not isolation and judgment.

Take, for example, the mother who tells her ten-year-old, "You smart off again, and I won't love you anymore." The youngster is immediately in a no-win situation. She can either rebel and lose her most important relationship in life, or she can comply and become externally obedient, losing any chance of practicing confrontational skills. Now, compare that response with this, "I'll never stop loving you. That's a constant in my heart. However, if you smart off again you've lost your boom box for three days." The relationship is still intact. There's no condemnation. And the child gets an opportunity to choose responsibility or suffer consequences-with no risk of losing love and safety. This is the way to maturity, to learning to eat solid food: the safe practice of discipline.

The Boundary Needs of Children

What specific needs do boundaries meet in our kids? Limit-setting abilities have several important jobs that will pay enormous dividends throughout life.

Self-Protection Have you ever seen anything more helpless than the human infant? Human babies are less able to take care of themselves than animal babies. G.o.d designed the newborn months as a means for the mother and father (or another caregiver) to connect deeply with their infant, knowing that without their minute-by-minute care, the baby would not survive. All this time and energy translates into an enduring attachment, in which the child learns to feel safe in the world.

G.o.d's program of maturation, however, doesn't stop there. Mom and Dad can't always be there to care and provide. The task of protection needs to ultimately pa.s.s on to the children. When they grow up, they need to protect themselves.

Boundaries are our way of protecting and safeguarding our souls. Boundaries are designed to keep the good in and the bad out. And skills such as saying no, telling the truth, and maintaining physical distance need to be developed in the family structure to allow the child to take on the responsibility of self-protection.

Consider the following two twelve-year-old boys: Jimmy is talking with his parents at the dinner table. "Guess what-some kids wanted me to smoke pot with them. When I told them I didn't want to, they said I was a sissy. I told them they were dumb. I like some of them, but if they can't like me because I don't smoke pot, I guess they aren't really my friends."

Paul comes home after school with red eyes, slurred speech, and coordination difficulties. When asked by his concerned parents what is wrong, he denies everything until, finally, he blurts out, "Everybody's doing it. Why do you hate my friends?"

Both Jimmy and Paul come from Christian homes with lots of love and an adherence to biblical values. Why did they turn out so differently? Jimmy's family allowed disagreements between parent and child and gave him practice in the skill of boundary setting, even with them. Jimmy's mom would be holding and hugging her two-year-old when he would get fidgety. He'd say, "Down," meaning, "Let me get a little breathing s.p.a.ce, Ma." Fighting her own impulses to hold on to her child, she would set him down on the floor and say, "Wanna play with your trucks?"

Jimmy's dad used the same philosophy. When wrestling with his son on the floor, he tried to pay attention to Jimmy's limits. When the going got too rough, or when Jimmy was tired, he could say, "Stop, Daddy," and Dad would get up. They'd go to another game.

Jimmy was receiving boundary training. He was learning that when he was scared, in discomfort, or wanted to change things, he could say no. This little word gave him a sense of power in his life. It took him out of a helpless or compliant position. And Jimmy could say it without receiving an angry and hurt response, or a manipulative countermove, such as, "But Jimmy, Mommy needs to hold you now, okay?"

Jimmy learned from infancy on that his boundaries were good and that he could use them to protect himself. He learned to resist things that weren't good for him.

A hallmark of Jimmy's family was permission to disagree. When, for example, Jimmy would fight his parents about his bedtime, they never withdrew or punished him for disagreeing. Instead, they would listen to his reasoning, and, if it seemed appropriate, they would change their minds. If not, they would maintain their boundaries.

Jimmy was also given a vote in some family matters. When family night out would come up, his parents listened to his opinion on whether they should go to a movie, play board games, or play basketball. Was this a family with no limits? On the contrary! It was a family who took boundary setting seriously-as a skill to develop in its children.

This was good practice for resisting in the evil day (Eph. 5:16), when some of Jimmy's friends turned on him and pressured him to take drugs. How was Jimmy able to refuse? Because by then, he'd had ten or eleven years of practice disagreeing with people who were important to him without losing their love. He didn't fear abandonment in standing up against his friends. He'd done it many times successfully with his family with no loss of love.

Paul, on the other hand, came from a different family setting. In his home, no had two different responses. His mom would be hurt and withdraw and pout. She would send guilt messages, such as "How can you say no to your mom who loves you?" His dad would get angry, threaten him, and say things like, "Don't talk back to me, Mister."

It didn't take long for Paul to learn that to have his way, he had to be externally compliant. He developed a strong yes on the outside, seeming to agree with his family's values and control. Whatever he thought about a subject-the dinner menu, TV restrictions, church choices, clothes, or curfews-he stuffed inside.

Once, when he had tried to resist his mother's hug, she had immediately withdrawn from him, pushing him away with the words, "Someday you'll feel sorry for hurting your mother's feelings like that." Day by day, Paul was being trained to not set limits.

As a result of his learned boundarylessness, Paul seemed to be a content, respectful son. The teens, however, are a crucible for kids. We find out what kind of character has actually been built into our children during this difficult pa.s.sage.

Paul folded. He gave in to his friends' pressure. Is it any wonder that the first people he said no to were his parents-at twelve years old? Resentment and the years of not having boundaries were beginning to erode the compliant, easy-to-live-with false self he'd developed to survive.

Taking Responsibility for One's Needs The group therapy session I was leading was quiet. I'd just asked Janice an unanswerable question. The question was, "What do you need?" She looked confused, became thoughtful, and sat back in her chair.