There was a day when, in response to the poem “If I Were Another” by Mahmoud Darwish, I made my students (and I) do a writing exercise: What is the difference between a border and a boundary?
Yes, a very heady exercise. And yes, arguably quite pretentious.
It was challenging to articulate. During our discussion after, students felt borders were firmer, more rigid. Some saw boundaries are more fluid and porous, a suggestion rather than a hard and fast rule. Borders were characterized as more masculine, boundaries as more feminine, but then that was reversed. A few students said it was like porn: you know a border when you see it, you know a boundary when you see it, but you can’t define either one.
Regardless, the line between the two words was murky.
And I’ve been thinking about this writing prompt again in light of the recent Jonah Hill news which, if you haven’t been on the internet, involved his ex leaking screenshots of controlling text messages he had sent her during their relationship. She was a professional surfer, and he objected to her posting pictures in bikinis, being near other straight men, and, bafflingly enough, having female friends who were currently “unstable.” Which…what?
Hill sent these texts all under the guise that these were his “boundaries” and if she couldn’t respect them, their relationship was over. They reeked of insecurity and bitterness. They were the words of someone who needed to feel big.
This has prompted a lot of internet discourse about the weaponizing of so-called “therapy-speak,” in which a lay-person uses psychological terms to describe something, typically as a way to justify something unsavory. Look at what has happened to words like toxic and narcissist—oftentimes those words are used almost interchangeably, when in a therapeutic context their definitions are more refined.
I want to be clear that the issue isn’t so much that Hill uses “therapy-speak:” it’s that he uses a word under the umbrella of therapy-speak to be a total controlling asshole. And it’s not a stretch to think that, considering he made a documentary about his own beloved therapist, his own perception has been shaped by unethical therapeutic methods. (I mean, am I the only one who saw the Stutz documentary about his CURRENT THERAPIST listed on Netflix and immediately got the ick?!)
To be clear, he is misusing the word “boundary” by implementing rules as a means of control. And in all fairness, it’s not as if he’s the only one to ever do this.
The word “boundary” has certainly been weaponized by people long before Jonah Hill ever dared to angrily type those messages. But there’s something so insidious about the way he brandishes his “boundaries” in these texts. Whether or not his ex-girlfriend uploaded a picture of herself surfing in a bikini for a sponsored post (her literal job!!!) has nothing to do with Hill’s boundaries being violated. It’s weaponizing his own anxiety against a person he claims to love. It’s a wild but sadly common misunderstanding of where the self begins and another ends. If anything, it sounds as if he’d crossed his own boundary, steeped in internalized misogyny and ignorance.
It’s all very fucked up.
Plenty of people far smarter than me have written and posted about his misguided thinking about “boundaries” this week, but what has rung most true to me is that a boundary, unlike a border, is set by a person for themselves.
In other words: I determine my own boundaries. What I am comfortable wearing; what I am willing to say or do for a loved one; what I am NOT willing to do or say for a loved; what/who I allow in my home; what food I choose to consume; the list goes on. My boundaries can, and do, evolve and transform over time based on my values, my goals, and my beliefs. Aspects of personal boundaries can be murky or context-dependent or hard to put into words, but they are always, ALWAYS, self-determined.
The key here, I think, is agency. Boundaries are not set for you by another person—that’s coercion (unless that person is under guardianship for their own protection). Boundaries are set for yourself, by yourself.
Hill’s text messages are so disturbing because he is quite obviously using his own extreme anxieties and insecurities as a means to make his now-ex even more self-conscious. It makes her the bad guy for not immediately altering her entire life. When really, he refused to alter his own understanding of her life, her career, and her values.
What I’m trying to say is this: going to therapy is great and everyone should do it, and I certainly get being fascinated by mental health and psychology and wanting to learn more about it for your own benefit. But using words you’ve heard your therapist or someone on the internet say to exert control is shitty as hell. There’s a reason I make sure to say explicitly on the about page for this newsletter: I’m not a trained mental health provider. What I offer here are ideas, provocations, and an analysis or two. I can’t tell you what to do and impose a boundary on you. Only you can.
While writing this, I revisited Darwish’s poem, which, ironically enough, invokes the idea of a boundary between self and other through his exploration of exile.
Perhaps the next question I ought to write to is this: where do my boundaries—glorious as they might be—separate me unnecessarily from others? And when do my boundaries, in all their opaqueness, allow me to show up better for the ones I love the most?