Your Boundaries Aren't Hurting People — They're Revealing Who Was Benefiting From You Having None

**Matthew Gottesman** (0:02)
Welcome to The Niche Is You. My name is Matt Gottesman, at Matt Gottesman on Instagram, and this is my daily podcast where I create short, quick hitting episodes to help you uncomplicate life, creativity, and the pursuit of your highest self. There's only main character energy here. Now let's get into it.
Welcome to episode 845, Your Boundaries Aren't Hurting People. They're Revealing Who Was Benefiting From You Having None. Your boundaries aren't hurting people. They're revealing who was benefiting from you having none. I get asked about boundaries all the time. I get asked about boundaries from family. I get asked about boundaries from friends. I get asked about boundaries from some talks that I give or from the community or just in general. Sometimes people reach out and just say, hey, I'm trying to do some things with my life and I feel like some people keep trying to overstep into that, et cetera. Boundaries are essential. They are discernment. They are about being honest about who you are and what you're needing and keeping yourself on track and on path for what you feel called to do and keeping you and holding you to standard and to your integrity and just your walk in general. Now, I know that that term gets thrown around a lot online. Boundaries, sometimes people will end up creating walls and calling those boundaries, you know. And so we have to be very careful about shutting everything out versus holding things to a higher standard and honesty, right? I was reading, and I wanted to share a few that I found, Proverbs 14, 15, The simple believe anything but the prudent give thought to their steps. Right? Discernment, boundaries. Isaiah 30, 21, Whether you turn to the right or the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, This is the way. Walk in it. Why is that important? Because discernment, boundaries. This is the way. No, go this way. Yeah, but what about these people over here in this environment? No, this way over here.
Right? What about Proverbs 423? Above all else, guard your heart for everything you do flows from it. Right? Your heart is a wellspring. So everything you build, love, produce will flow from that. So guarding it isn't selfishness. It's about how are you stewarding your path. Boundaries are a great way to say, Here's what I'm, here's who I am. Here's what I'm, my capacity. Here's what I'm able to do. Here's what I can't right now. And you'll see real quickly how people respond. Usually people who are doing the same thing get you. They just get you. Hey, I'm in it. I get it. You know, great, no problem. Don't worry about it. Let me know if you can help. If you can't, no worries or, you know, or whatever. Just they're in it. They're in the race of life as well too.
Proverbs 22, 24 through 25 Do not make friends with a hot tempered person. Do not associate with one easily angered, or you may learn their ways and get yourself ensnared. Boundaries, right? Right? Proverbs 13, 20, walk with the wise and become wise. For a companion of fools suffers harm. Boundaries. Boundaries. Now, why do boundaries become tough for so many? And I completely understand this because this is all about each person's personal growth and development. People-pleasing, over-giving, proving your value, proving your worth. Everything external that I have constantly been talking about on this podcast and in my writing, why we have to be so careful of the external, is when we need that validation or that worthiness or that prover mentality.
Now, there's a very fine line because I think there's just the goodness of our heart that says, hey, I want to do good by people. I want to show up. I want to be the things. Yes. And where is it respected? Where is it reciprocated? Where is it loved on? Where is it honest?
You are not meant to carry other people's stuff. You are meant to respect and be respected. You are meant to love and be loved. You are meant to give and receive. Right? So this makes you also responsible for being very present. You know what? These people over here, I'm not really sure, are really honoring and respecting me. I'm not going to lash out. I'm not going to respond. I'm just going to create a boundary. You know what? These people over here really love and respect me and they show up. And if anything, they're helping you see how you can show up even more for yourself and for others because of their presence in your life. I heard a mentor say a long time ago, are they moving you closer to God or further away? Now, if we're not careful, we can think that that just means God alone. It's like, yes, it does, but it's deeper than that. It's are they moving you towards your better and better and higher self? Deeply rooted, deeply anchored, deeply honest, doing better. Their presence makes you want to do better. Or are they consuming you? Are they draining you? These are why we need these boundaries, right? So in this episode, I want to talk about why setting boundaries so often gets confused with hurting people. It's not. When what's really happening is that boundaries are exposing dynamics that were never sustainable in the first place, and why the discomfort others feel is not the same thing as harm being done, right? So again, like what boundaries seem like, I will not do that. You're not trying to hurt someone's feelings. You are the initial, the idea of boundaries is say, hey, here's where I'm at, what I'm capable of, what I can and cannot do. Here's what I need. Here's what would be respectful to me. I also want to talk about the specific way that a lack of boundaries quietly benefits certain people in your life, and why the loudest resistance to your new limits almost always comes from the ones who are quietly gaining the most from your old lack of them, right? So when you don't have those boundaries, you'll see who benefits, who sticks around, who leans in, who gives back, who doesn't.