What's the proper way to enforce boundaries?

[Chromeo]

This is an amazing thread, I've done some studying on boundaries so I had to add.

First off, EVERYONE has and sets boundaries. A boundary is a personal preference for how someone wants to be treated or what they feel is acceptable. In fact setting boundaries is a indicator of a mentally healthy and mature person. People who do not set boundaries are typically emotionally immature and lack self worth.

The overall debate here seems to be whether or not explicitly establishing your boundaries is a sign of insecurity. (BTW why are so many of you guys attacking each other and calling each other liars lol. Lets try and figure this out.)

Now lets analyze a few scenarios/example of boundaries

Boundary: No smoking in your car
Someone begins to light up in your car (rude) or asks if they can smoke in your car. You have a boundary about smoking in your car. This is not because you are insecure about your car being smelly but because you don't like it. You have a decision to make, Explicitly state your boundary OR Implicitly state your boundary by withdrawing from the person and riding in a carful of smoke in anger or pretending not to care until your destination. I think most people would find the latter to be a bit strange and passive aggressive.

Boundary: You don't like texting at the dinner table
Someone you're out to dinner with begins texting at the table. You have a boundary about texting while at a table out to dinner. Not because you are insecure about who that person is texting or that you look like your being ignored but because you find it rude, you don't like it. Explicitly state your boundary telling the person you find texting at the table rude OR Implicitly state your boundary by withdrawing from conversation, pulling our your own phone or maybe even leaving. Again I think most people would find the latter to be a bit strange and passive aggressive.

Boundary: You don't think your gf should "hang out" with another man
Now this scenario is very different than the other two as there are many details that could change how this situation triggers your boundary. Is this a man you know? Has your gf introduced this man to you in a group setting? Is this man an old friend or new friend? How does this man treat you? How does this man treat your gf? Have you seen him hit on her or has he been totally respectful of your relationship? As well their are also many ways to "hang out". Is your gf going out for drinks with this man? Out to dinner? To a movie? Ice Skating? Maybe their studying for a class together or working on a new business venture together or they're going to play tennis and you don't enjoy tennis. Which particular details would you make you uncomfortable in this scenario. I would argue that the right set of details would make anyone uncomfortable. How would you feel if your gf wants to play tennis with some guy you've never heard mention of before vs her going to play tennis with a friend from highschool who you've met numerous times, is a good guy and she had already asked you to go but you have to help your grandmother move a shelf.

Now the anti-boundary side's argument with this third boundary (correct me if I am wrong) would be that no combination of those details should effect you and you should totally be cool with it. A woman that really loves you should be allowed to be free and will come back to you and not cheat on or disrespect you.

We've all heard "If you love it, set it free, if it comes back to you, it's yours to keep"

Let the girl play tennis with her friends, what's the harm?

But some people in the anti-boundary group have said that they pre-screen women that will not put themselves in such situations. So I argue, there is a boundary there a rule, an expectation of how they feel they should be treated. At a certain point, this kind of a behavior by gf would result in a non-boundary setter to withdraw and or dump them.

Why can't your girlfriend wait until the next day you're both free to play tennis?

If this is a prerequisite for a entering into a long term relationship with a woman is in fact a boundary. We've already established that having boundaries is healthy and that boundaries are preferences not insecurities. So why are we arguing that explicitly stating them shows insecurity?

In my last relationship I dealt with this very issue. I abided by the anti-boundary frame of thought, I was cool as a cucumber. I let me gf hang out with whomever she wanted. Eventually my gf began making these other people she was hanging out with, guys and girls, a priority over hanging out with me. When we broke up, and I stated that was one of the reasons, she explained that she had thought that her hanging out with other guys bugged me. However when she asked if I was cool with it and I said "yes" she went ahead with it and felt like I just didn't care about the relationship very much.

Was this girl just of low quality? Maybe so. But ask yourself this, how many times have you treated someone disrespectfully solely because they didn't respect themselves? If your dating multiple woman which one are you going to treat the best? The one with high respect for themselves or low respect?

Most people understand that a relationship is one exclusive sexual exclusivity. But their is also an underlying emotional contract. I don't think it's healthy when in a relationship to spend all your free time together and do everything together and not have friends. But at what point is the time you spend with someone else beside your significant other become disrespectful and detrimental to the relationship?

I think this is the real issue not so much as the setting of boundaries. Clearly every man has an imaginary line that can be crossed by a woman hanging out with another man. I'd also like to raise the question of whether or not the negative thought of your gf cheating on you is an insecurity or a personal preference.

Should you be afraid or insecure that your gf will cheat on you? No
But would you be ok with your gf having sex with someone else? NO!
Ok your cool with your girlfriend hanging out with another guy but are you cool with her going on a date with another guy?

Let me also state that the only difference between "hanging out" and "a date" is whether or not the people involved are sexually interested in each other.

What would you think if you ran into your buddies wife at the mall with another guy?

I am a big believer in that many issues can be solved and prevented by proper explicit communication. This is the Boundary camps mentality. However 55% of communication is body language, 38% is the tone of voice, and 7% is the actual words spoken. This co-insides with the anti-boundary camp, as actions speak louder than words.

I propose these questions to you because I'm not ready to take sides in this debate. I'm not so sure we have gotten to the actual issue yet or their shouldn't be ideas taken from both arguments. I really want to get to the bottom of this.

 

[BrainDamage92]

LTR, or living together, serious ****, for young people is BS for me and doesn't make any sense at all (judging from my experience (I did it, full hard mode, living together since day 1 basically when I was 19 ) and observations, but hey, I may be wrong).

Friendship between males and females is a myth. Even if its an old friend, the dude would still gladly fvuck the girl. The myth of female+male platonic friendship is such BS.

It happens so that:

Loser guy + attractive female = friendship (lol)
Ugly woman + attractive male = friendship (lol again)

Couse I know damn well what happened when I was, what 13-14, and was madly in love with this girl, but still, she dated guys that were more than the 14 y old chumy chump I was

Then Ive had this same **** thrown at me by ugly women its disguisting to be on the other side.

The only true friendly relations I can have are with the girlfriends of my friends, couse I wouldnt touch them, moreover, I always encourage them to take their girls when we hang out, couse I know how parasitic hanging out seperately, esp with single friends is to a relationship from my experience. I also wouldnt touch a taken woman, but I wouldnt be her friend either.

Now old aquaintances is normal, you have them, she has them.

Basically if a girl has low self esteem for some reason, she will percieve all the male attention, deliberately, as a praise to her good personality, not her good looks. Deep down she knows they just want to fvuck her, but she dont even admit it to herself. Moreover, most other women wont be able to stand her for a long time, so its likely this kind of girl feels better around males.

Then she will talk about it to her boy - how great her male coworkers treat her for example - she achieves much this way:

1. Makes you jealous (jealousy is when you feel ashamed of all the things you shouldn't be ashamed of), like other guys treat her so nice while youre such a jerk;

2. Lets you know she has other dudes waiting to take her in their arms the moment she decides;

3. Shows shes valued.

Now dont get me wrong, you flirt with other women too, its natural, fact is, if the girl feels the need to shove it in your face like this shows she has 0 self respect unlike you and you have no bussiness being with her at all. And showing you have options is a trick males can use to keep a female interested,

while when females use it its repulsive. At least for me. Too many doormats dont think like that, so they think like females if they get affected.

There are two ways to fight it, acting all indifferent and concealing any jealousy, or talking about it.

Both things would work, problem is, if it comes to the point such an annoying behaviour is present, the war is lost so nothing to fight for, and you shouldnt be with this girl in the first place. Just break it off, walk away, dont be a pvussy, anything you invested so far is less than what youre going to lose if you play this game.

Now if she says stuff like she goes to play tennis with some random guy tomorrow, this is just... How can anyone tolerate **** like this I'd break it off on the instant without explaining.

In the end, every male knows when his woman is cheating or is about to cheat. Us men are taught to be too rational though and ignore our instincts, so its funny the elaborate excuses females come up with and men buy into the crap

Also, female love is ephemeral, and can dissapear as quickly as it appeared, couse you werent playing your cards rigght. But how to play your cards right, when females have such low self esteem from media brainwash, facebook, and the idea of "male-female" friendship, which is a free ticket to the attention shower...

So setting boundaries is not bad, but I know if I want to be exclusively dating a girl, the only boundary I set is us not fvuking other people, from a strictly hygenic point of view, to which any sane person would agree. But are you living together? Are you a family? You got kids? No, you go to dates. So you cant control to whom she gives her time. But you can carefully take notes and dump her instead of going living with her or worse marrying her.

So its kinda like, if you want to survive the wild beast, do you play dead, or do you cage it. Or maybe befriend a puppy and not a bear?

My advice also, my younglings, is cheat from time to time without her finding out, **** that **** man, this is very good for a male psyche and very bad for the female one when she does it, it will help you appreciate your girl more, when you fvuk some random girl, then a couple of hours late you fvuk yours, you will see the difference. Damn it feels good. But she musnt do it. Never. Couse later when you fvuck her, she will know she had another **** inside and will fell dirty, she cants just wash it like you'd wash your **** you gotta realise that.