No More Boundaries: Vulnerability as Radical, Political Healing
no more boundaries
vulnerability as radical, political healing
your boundaries are a problem.
yes, those boundaries – the ones your therapist said were important to have. the ones you saw in that meme reminding you of self-care. the ones you spent years making, probably first without knowing and which you later made intentionally. ones you are still trying to define.
see, the thing is, we don’t struggle with recognising how boundaries are a problem.
we talk about the border and immediately understand that building a wall is ridiculous; we understand that building a wall represents much more than building a wall. we see the imaginary lines maps have drawn across the world; we wonder what it would mean to erase them. we see those who cross these lines, who are are running towards opportunity or fleeing from violence, and we welcome them into our homes. we see the mass incarceration of marginalised peoples – human and otherwise – and know that it is a violence to put someone in a cage.
most everywhere we look, we are able to see that a world with these borders, walls, and cages is not an ideal one. yet, somehow, when we look at ourselves, we think that boundaries are a healthy, natural, important part of how we relate to one another? could it be an accident that we feel this way?
to me, nothing about this process seems accidental, because it’s something we do every day. so much of how we talk about our relationships shows the borders we are constantly defining and negotiating.
“I keep my guard up until I really get to know someone”
“I’m trying, it just feels like there’s all these walls”
“I don’t know how to let you in”
“they really crossed a line”
“they got a little too close for comfort”
“things just became really distant”
“something came in between us”
“I feel trapped in our relationship”
“we separated”
we are very well-versed in how to create boundaries – limits, separation, distance – so skilled that we often don’t even recognise we’re doing it. what this also means is that creating boundaries is something we can be doing even as we think we are working to create togetherness, unaware of how we are sabotaging our relationships: the intimacy, the trust, the communication, the connection. a lot of healing comes when we begin to realise that this is a process we’re actively creating each day, not something that happens to us. without making ourselves aware, we choose to create limits, separation, distance – otherness.
when we create a boundaries, we are saying: this is me, and that is you. I am this, and I am not that. boundaries serve to create a more comfortable sense of identity.
we see this in a certain president’s efforts to build a wall along the border. is it really the physical wall that matters – what does this person hope to keep on the other side? how would this be different if they understood that what (*who) they’re trying to keep on the other side is already on this side? that, actually, the other side is an integral part of how this side functions each day, that without the other, this side likely would not exist at all – and that it has also been like this for a long time?
i would argue that the president does understand this, and that that’s why the boundary feels necessary: it has nothing to do with the wall, and everything to do with feeling a need to create an other.
othering does not just happen;
othering is something we do.
i feel strongly that what we see on a collective, systemic, global scale is also present on a personal, interpersonal level. i also feel strongly that we cannot undo the political without undoing the personal, that if we hope to release borders, walls, and cages, we must also release the ones we have created in our relationships.
the central problem with boundaries is that they are defensive, a response rather than a sincere and collaborative resolution to the deeper issue. when do most people create boundaries? from what i see, they create them when they feel attacked, violated, abused – now, i also see cultures (in new age thought, progressive politics, and mental health/wellness spaces) which are affirming the need to create boundaries preemptively, to define walls before any damage can happen.
to me, this entirely misses the point of healing, especially as it places more emotional labor on the hurting person, suggesting that they should have secured their borders more effectively, rather than asking of the antagonistic presence: why are you an antagonistic presence? what place are you coming from that you come prepared to hurt me/us? what is hurting in you that you decided to share your pains with me/us?
this defensive response makes perfect sense within a highly militaristic national (and global?) culture, but it would not make sense in a collaborative one, one where commune-ity truly exists and where the collective demands interpersonal accountability (not placing the labor on any one person to respond to what has hurt them). i do not think a defensive pattern is what would emerge if we lived in a world which viewed pain and hurting not as times to defend, withdraw, or assault, but as opportunities to listen – wounds as a symbol of how more togetherness is needed.
while this is one way to exist and possibly to heal, i want us to be able to experience many possibilities for how we can thrive. i see that boundaries help people to get by, to survive, but i do not see them helping people know what it means to thrive; people developing boundaries learn quickly how to say “no”, but i see them forgetting how to say “yes”.
perhaps, then, we can reunderstand the purpose of what boundaries are supposed to do for us?
we can begin with language, with the words we use to tell others (and ourselves) what we feel and are experiencing.
“I keep communication especially open when I am first getting to know someone, so we can understand what each of us is bringing.”
“past relationships have hurt me, but I am doing the work to understand those walls will not protect me here.”
“I look forward to letting you in, and I expect that you will hold that with care.”
“here are some lines you can follow which show you how I want and expect to be treated.”
“I want us to be closer; I want to be comfortable knowing you are near.”
“when we feel distant from one another, we can also choose to come closer.”
“something came in between us, but that just means there’s work to do.”
“I feel liberated in our relationship, knowing we adjust to continue supporting each other’s needs and dreams and passions.”
“we are deciding to be together in a different way than served us before.”
rather than defining border, separating lines, we can define guide-lines/guiding lines,
ones which help us to understand what feels right and meaningful.
we can think ahead and ask not “how can you not hurt me?” but rather “how can you come to this relationship prepared to heal and help me heal, invested in our growing together?”
we can understand that there is a major difference between what someone chose to do with us, and what we choose to do with that after. that when someone or something does choose to share hurt with us, we can transform that pain into trauma, unfeeling, anger, laughter, clarity, promise, and a million other things – that we are made of many magicks, and one of them is vulnerability. that choosing vulnerability is not the same as being made systematically, historically vulnerable. that choosing vulnerability is radical; that choosing vulnerability is a choice.
where there is a violence and we are hurting, we can invite the person to be an active part of helping us heal, reversing that energy – or we can ask, demand, and trust of community to see that both people receive the healing resources they need to show up differently. we can stop saying “that’s between you two” and understand that anything which hurts you is also my pain, that anything which heals you is also my wholeness.
may we be forever growing, and forever together.
may we be close; may we be near.
may we be aware, trusting and unafraid.
may we be inviolable.
may we be loving on our pains, as they guide us to what is right and still needed.
may we be intimately bound, from the beginning, and always remembering this is a choice.
may we be vulnerably tied to one another; may we be held by devotion.
may there be no wall which can keep us apart.
Amani Michael
intuit.hue founder + guide
