Personal boundaries are the imaginary lines you draw around yourself that no one should cross either physically – unless invited in – or emotionally. You are entitled to respect, privacy, decency, kindness, love, truth and honour, to name but a few rights. If people cross the lines, blur the boundaries, you are entitled to stand up for yourself and say, ‘No, I won’t put up with this’.

But you have to draw the lines first. You have to know what you will stand for and what you won’t. You have to set the boundaries in your own mind before you can expect others to respect them, stick to them.

The more secure you become with your boundaries, the less power other people will have over you. The more clearly defined your boundaries, the more you realize that other people’s stuff is more to do with them and less to do with you – you stop taking things so personally.

You are entitled to basic self-respect. You can’t expect others to respect you unless you respect yourself. You can’t respect yourself until you have formed a clear picture of who you are and what you are. And setting boundaries is part of this process. You have to feel important enough to set those lines. And once set, you have to be assertive enough to reinforce them.

Setting personal boundaries means you don’t have to be scared of other people any more. You now have a clear idea of what you will put up with and what you won’t. Once someone crosses the line between appropriate and inappropriate behaviour, it gets really easy to say, ‘No, I don’t want to be treated like this/spoken to like this’.

Probably the best way to start this is with your own family. Over the years we get set in patterns of behaviour. Say, for example, you are used to going to visit your parents and coming away feeling bad because they put you down or made you feel inadequate. You can change things by saying to yourself, ‘I won’t put up with this any more’. And then don’t put up with it. Speak your mind. Say you don’t like being criticized/told off/made to feel small – you are an adult now and entitled to respect and encouragement.

Setting personal boundaries enables us to resist pushy people, rude people, aggressive people, people who would take advantage of us, people who would use us unwisely and unwell. Successful people know their worth and don’t get messed around. Successful people are the ones who can recognize emotional blackmail, people playing games with them, people on the make, people who themselves are weak and needy, people who dump on others, people who need to make you look small to make themselves feel big. Once you’ve got those lines drawn around you, it gets a whole lot easier to stay behind them and be firm, resolute, strong and assertive.