TOWARD BALANCING SELF-INTEREST AND THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS
Many people find it difficult to say “no,” or to stand up for themselves. To keep the sweet peace, people often let people walk all over them. Some always take on the tedious jobs at work, while at home they don’t let themselves off the hook. Others have private problems holding off compelling loved ones. Still others generally lack resilience; they are good at defending the interests of others but not their own.
In itself, this is not so bad; not everyone needs to build a fortress wall around themselves.
But sometimes a little more resilience is desired, especially when symptoms arise: sleep problems, emotional instability, loss of concentration, back and neck pain, headaches, all kinds of fears, reduced self-confidence, burnout and even relationship problems. Then it’s time to set boundaries.
Psychologists Marjan de Vries and Aagje Gest (PDI, Naarden) teach people to recognize and set their boundaries. This book provides practical advice and assignments based on a simple model and using recognizable situations.
Review(s).
Many people struggle to some degree to delineate their own space. Due to ineffective communication or lack of resilience, these people face negative feelings such as dissatisfaction, restlessness, insecurity and so on. In this book, the authors describe a method in which people learn to deal with such excesses differently through directive therapy. The various chapters outline the negative feelings that can be a consequence of inadequate demarcation of one’s space. It then shows how people can change the behaviors that lead to these negative feelings. Each chapter presents various situational sketches from therapeutic practice. The method is described in such a way that each reader can recognize and possibly modify their own (negative) behaviors. A very accessible book for anyone who sometimes finds themselves short-changed.
