Melody Beattie writes:

Boundaries aren’t limited to saying no. Boundaries reflect what we believe we deserve. Some people were born into situations that encouraged listening to and trusting themselves. Others had their right to self-respect violated at an early age. If our ability to trust ourselves was tam­pered with when we were young. we may have to work extra hard to acquire and keep boundaries—and self­esteem—in place.

“Someone who barely knew me mentioned to a friend that he thought I was selfish,” a woman said. “For the next six months, I had the worst time setting limits. I kept trying to prove how unselfish I was.”

No matter how many boundaries we’ve set, it’s not unusual to still feel guilty each time we say no. We may be afraid that we’ll lose the other person. or that he or she will go away if we say no. But when we don’t honor ourselves by setting boundaries, we’re the ones who disappear.

Challenge: The hardest thing about boundaries can be recognizing that we’ve lost or misplaced ourselves again. Maybe we could look at setting boundaries as an on­going process of discovering who we are.

via December 15.

In her meditation for February 20, she writes:

We are powerless over other people’s expectations of us. We cannot control what others want, what they expect, or what they want us to do and be. We can control how we respond to other people’s expectations. During the course of any day, people may make demands on our time, talents, energy, money, and emotions. We do not have to say yes to every request. We do not have to feel guilty if we say no. And we do not have to allow the barrage of demands to control the course of our life. We do not have to spend our life reacting to others and to the course they would prefer we took with our life. We can set boundaries, firm limits on how far we shall go with others. We can trust and listen to ourselves. We can set goals and direction for our life. We can place value on ourselves. We can own our power with people. Buy some time. Think about what you want. Consider how responding to another’s needs will affect the course of your life. We live or own life by not letting other people, their expectations, and their demands control the course of our life. We can let them have their demands and expectations; we can allow them to have their feelings. We can own our power to choose the path that is right for us. Today, God, help me own my power by detaching, and peacefully choosing the course of action that is right for me. Help me know I can detach from the expectations and wants of others. Help me stop pleasing other people and start pleasing myself.

Beattie, Melody (2009-12-15). The Language of Letting Go (Hazelden Meditation Series) (p. 49). BookMobile. Kindle Edition.