Learning Boundaries

I'm learning boundaries, probably healthy ones for the first time. Anyone who really knows me knows that my boundaries suck. I say yes to all the wrong things, and no to the things that would actually be beneficial to me and help me grow. It's usually that way, well beyond the point of being able to do anything about that it dawns on me what I have done, in one of those Homer Simpson 'DUH' moments. It's become classic Amy after 30 years really, but I've come to hate it. So this book has been on my list things to read for years, and the pile of books to read after graduation was at least up to my knees, but Boundaries by Cloud and Townsend was one book that I took with my on my trip to Jamaica with my family, and I am so glad I finally got around to starting it. The way that they use scripture and psychological insights... well, it's just a great insight for someone who needs better boundaries personally. This analogy hit me hard as I was reading yesterday.

p.93 in talking about law#6, The law of Evaluation and using the analogy of going to the dentist.
"Well, have you ever gone to the dentist?" I asked.
"Sure."
"Did the dentist hurt you when he drilled your tooth to remove the cavity?"
"Yes."
"Did he harm you?"
"No, he made me feel better."
'Hurt and harm are different," I pointed out. "When you ate the sugar that gave you the cavity, did that hurt?"
"No, it tasted good," he said, with a smile that told me he was catching on.
"Did it harm you?"
"Yes."
"That's my point. Things can hurt and not harm us. In fact they can even be good for us. And things that feel good can be very harmful to us."

Hurt vs. Harm. Even after a master's degree in counseling, this explanation seems so simple, and yet so monumentally huge. The depth and weight that it conveys, and the sheer magnitude of the difference between hurting and harming. Wow. I am just learning a lot right now, reading a lot of books that are making me think and grow in ways I didn't know that I needed to (in a good and healthy way) about a lot of different things, but this area for sure. This is one of the key books to do something about it in my life and help me grow in this area and learn to do something about the things that I've never known how to do something about. I just want to grow and learn to be healthy in this next season as I grow into it, whatever it might be.
Love,
Amy Christine