I'm not convinced setting clear lines is a net positive. A line means digging your heels in. The act of setting a line makes you resistant to change: you anchor your values as they are today, and it comes at the cost of tomorrow.
Domestic violence is an obvious line to set, but are you really going to cut a good friend off for not repaying a loan? I would argue that the former is a net good (protects people from abuse) while the latter is a net harm (causes people to abandon their friends when times are bad, without helping to get repaid). I would also argue that most lines fall into the latter category.
Setting lines to protect moral, philosophical, or political beliefs seems even worse, because it's preventing you from changing your mind about those things. Once you've set a line, you can't adapt to change as easily. Having criteria for changing your mind is a band-aid over the problem, because those criteria are set by you as you are today, and they're biased by your current beliefs.
Most people don't treat their line setting as holy scripture. Besides, nobody stops you from putting your actions on a sliding scale.
Did your good friend not repay his loan? Okay, what's the size of the loan, and how did they react when you reminded them? What's the circumstances surrounding the loan itself - did they borrow for the down payment of a mansion, or did they borrow to buy cheese?
Also, if you're treating your life as a game theory set piece then perhaps that's a place where you should start making changes. Just sayin'.
This is missing the most important step: get out there and practice.
You're not going to succeed at steps #6 and #7 in situations as dire as what the author describes without practicing a bunch. You have to choose low stakes, real situations to gain experience:
* a cashier asks you if you want to round up by donating to charity
* a friend asks if you want to do an activity with them, and you do not want to do that activity with them
* someone suggests splitting the check down the middle, but you only had a tiny side salad
* etc.
You can of course handle these however you want. But if you want to learn to set a line when it's important, you should have already practiced in a dozen or so cases like this, without apologizing: No, thank you / No, I'm not into that / I'm leaving enough to pay for my tiny side salad plus a nice tip
Practice doesn't guarantee you won't buckle in tough situations. But you'll definitely buckle if you don't.
Here's a remark I made about setting boundaries in a completely different forum:
More from the pasture: The herd has settled. The chestnut mare is boss, and she's a good alpha. My paint mare is second. The old draft horse gelding is third, and the grey is fourth. Today I went into the pasture to catch the paint. I call her, and she comes to me. But chestnut boss comes up and herds the paint away from me. So I have to have a talk with the boss.
I make eye contact with her, and walk up to her. She glares at me, but doesn't show hostility. I wave my hands a little at waist level, and she backs up one step. That's a mild submission, and all I needed. Now I can halter the paint mare. The boss mare watches closely, but does not interfere.
As someone else says, handling horses will teach you about setting boundaries in a very practical way.
When abuse done to parents by their child. When parents keep denying lines have been crossed. They live in delusional state everything good, wait for one more day and it will stop. But it keeps aggravating till everything fall aparts, other members of family affected. When one child goes wrongway and parents are reluctant to accept it they kept clinging to them, they never settle upon line's crossed now it should stop as they can't hurt their child, they can't give up on them, ultimately that child starts feeling invincible whatever they may do they won't be stopped or punished by parents, and eventually parents unknowingly destroying life of their other child, other members of family, for their love of one bad element that they can't give up.
Thats my personal experience, having my life destroyed, good happy smiling family teared apart, because one of sibling gone wrong way started abusing our parents, and they did'nt drew lines, kept forgiving.
It’s ok, Harlan, you save up for that baby and don’t let the cult browbeat you over it.
(People are fuzzy and while game theory is fun and even sometimes useful, this kind of stuff skeeves me out and I think it lures “smart” people in and gets them to empower the SBFs of the world. My altruism is ineffective and I’m happy that way.)
This is neat in theory, but unworkable in practice.
The hard line trigger almost always happens in a wider context. You often want the wider context, but it's impossible to fully define. Let's try a few examples from the article:
"Hard line: Annual raise is 0%" -> What if it comes with a much larger stock grant? Or additional paid time off? Or something else you value? Will you really just mechanistically quit?
"Hard line: A friend doesn’t repay an $X loan" -> really? What if, say, they lost their job? You want to make friendship contingent on your friends employed. There's a reason there's an adage saying "Don't loan money to a friend, you might need to decide whom you like more".
"Hard line: A government blatantly violates a constitutional amendment" -> Not even waiting for a court decision? What if it's Abraham Lincoln suspending Habeas Corpus? Or Wilson enforcing the espionage act, if that's more your political leaning? What if the government first repeals the amendment - will you be pro-slavery if it's made legal?
The world isn't a series of if-then statements. Even a hard line requires more than a single condition - at best, that condition reminds you to re-evaluate where you are.
> "Hard line: Annual raise is 0%" -> What if it comes with a much larger stock grant? Or additional paid time off? Or something else you value? Will you really just mechanistically quit?
I don't want to be a pedant but more stock or time off are raises by another name. They're literally money the company gives you.
The line is “It’s not necessarily helpful to be clear about lines.” combined with “who the hell are you to tell us how to live, kiddo?” with a little bit of “let’s all silently agree that each human should be defensive and prickly at all times instead of ever being soft and accommodating to their friends and family and colleagues.”
Some will downvote this comment just because I am being trying to be clear about my lines right now, which proves my point. If popularity matters to me, I need to do more smiling and shrugging.
Domestic violence is an obvious line to set, but are you really going to cut a good friend off for not repaying a loan? I would argue that the former is a net good (protects people from abuse) while the latter is a net harm (causes people to abandon their friends when times are bad, without helping to get repaid). I would also argue that most lines fall into the latter category.
Setting lines to protect moral, philosophical, or political beliefs seems even worse, because it's preventing you from changing your mind about those things. Once you've set a line, you can't adapt to change as easily. Having criteria for changing your mind is a band-aid over the problem, because those criteria are set by you as you are today, and they're biased by your current beliefs.
> Lines Will Move Further Away If They Aren’t Defined
Is that necessarily a bad thing?
Sometimes I think some line is important, then I move closer to it, and realise the line is less important to me, and so I'll be less cautious of it.
Some might say "slippery slope!" or "boiling a frog!", but I think of it as me updating my values as I learn more.
Some people are prone to black-and-white thinking, and so I can see why they might be drawn to hard lines.
Did your good friend not repay his loan? Okay, what's the size of the loan, and how did they react when you reminded them? What's the circumstances surrounding the loan itself - did they borrow for the down payment of a mansion, or did they borrow to buy cheese?
Also, if you're treating your life as a game theory set piece then perhaps that's a place where you should start making changes. Just sayin'.
is it? the example given for things implied to disallow are playful pinching/punching.
Even the author's implied choice of line is suspect here.
You're not going to succeed at steps #6 and #7 in situations as dire as what the author describes without practicing a bunch. You have to choose low stakes, real situations to gain experience:
* a cashier asks you if you want to round up by donating to charity
* a friend asks if you want to do an activity with them, and you do not want to do that activity with them
* someone suggests splitting the check down the middle, but you only had a tiny side salad
* etc.
You can of course handle these however you want. But if you want to learn to set a line when it's important, you should have already practiced in a dozen or so cases like this, without apologizing: No, thank you / No, I'm not into that / I'm leaving enough to pay for my tiny side salad plus a nice tip
Practice doesn't guarantee you won't buckle in tough situations. But you'll definitely buckle if you don't.
More from the pasture: The herd has settled. The chestnut mare is boss, and she's a good alpha. My paint mare is second. The old draft horse gelding is third, and the grey is fourth. Today I went into the pasture to catch the paint. I call her, and she comes to me. But chestnut boss comes up and herds the paint away from me. So I have to have a talk with the boss.
I make eye contact with her, and walk up to her. She glares at me, but doesn't show hostility. I wave my hands a little at waist level, and she backs up one step. That's a mild submission, and all I needed. Now I can halter the paint mare. The boss mare watches closely, but does not interfere.
As someone else says, handling horses will teach you about setting boundaries in a very practical way.
(People are fuzzy and while game theory is fun and even sometimes useful, this kind of stuff skeeves me out and I think it lures “smart” people in and gets them to empower the SBFs of the world. My altruism is ineffective and I’m happy that way.)
The hard line trigger almost always happens in a wider context. You often want the wider context, but it's impossible to fully define. Let's try a few examples from the article:
"Hard line: Annual raise is 0%" -> What if it comes with a much larger stock grant? Or additional paid time off? Or something else you value? Will you really just mechanistically quit?
"Hard line: A friend doesn’t repay an $X loan" -> really? What if, say, they lost their job? You want to make friendship contingent on your friends employed. There's a reason there's an adage saying "Don't loan money to a friend, you might need to decide whom you like more".
"Hard line: A government blatantly violates a constitutional amendment" -> Not even waiting for a court decision? What if it's Abraham Lincoln suspending Habeas Corpus? Or Wilson enforcing the espionage act, if that's more your political leaning? What if the government first repeals the amendment - will you be pro-slavery if it's made legal?
The world isn't a series of if-then statements. Even a hard line requires more than a single condition - at best, that condition reminds you to re-evaluate where you are.
I don't want to be a pedant but more stock or time off are raises by another name. They're literally money the company gives you.
The line is “It’s not necessarily helpful to be clear about lines.” combined with “who the hell are you to tell us how to live, kiddo?” with a little bit of “let’s all silently agree that each human should be defensive and prickly at all times instead of ever being soft and accommodating to their friends and family and colleagues.”
Some will downvote this comment just because I am being trying to be clear about my lines right now, which proves my point. If popularity matters to me, I need to do more smiling and shrugging.