A Field Guide to Feelings
Boundaries and Trust
Think of your Self as a house.
There are some people in your life who you never have to trust. They’re like people who never come in to your house. You pass them on the street and go by. You see them all the time, but they don’t know you.
Others, you trust in some small way. Waiters, shopkeepers, clerks, and customer service workers are like delivery people who leave things on the porch of that house, ring the bell, and leave. They have contact with you as a house, but it is very brief and task oriented. You trust your waiter to bring you your soup, but you examine it before you eat it.
Others come to visit you on the porch. You’re friendly and spend some time with them, but never really let them in. The porch of your Self has a little bit of you in it, but it’s a public part of you. Most of you is kept private from them and safe.
Your Self as a house has a formal living room, a parlor where you receive some visitors and act with civility, just to be polite, but you never let them into the rest of your house. The people you let in here, as opposed to meeting on the porch, are significant people to whom you want to show respect, but not intimacy. This can be that relative you have that you wish was not your relative, but you still must invite. This part of the…
