Boundary Issues: Using Boundary Intelligence to Get the Intimacy You Want and the Independence You Need in Life, Love, and Work - Hardcover

by Jane Adams (Author)

Psychological boundaries determine how we reconcile our seemingly contradictory needs for both intimacy and independence, closeness and separateness. The struggle to reconcile these needs dominates our emotional lives. In this fascinating book, journalist, coach, and social psychologist Jane Adams explains how boundaries can allow us to invite others in to share our deepest selves while they protect us from "emotional trespass."

Psychological boundaries are no less real than physical ones, and how you act them out in your relationships-your Boundary Style-is uniquely personal. In BoundaryIssues, you'll learn how to use your Boundary Intelligence to manage your boundaries. Moreover, you'll learn how to adjust your Boundary Style to improve your relationships without endless hours on a therapist's couch, a complete psychological makeover, or the sacrifice of your own authenticity and autonomy.

Informed by psychological theory and research and illustrated with real-life stories, anecdotes, and examples drawn from everyday experiences, this ground-breaking book explores how boundaries develop and change at every stage of your life. Boundary Issues features a unique self-assessment questionnaire to help you identify your own Boundary Style and recognize how it influences all your relationships. Using the four basic skills of Boundary Intelligence-insight, awareness, intention, and action-you'll learn how to use boundaries to resolve conflict, transform your important personal and professional connections, and satisfy your deepest emotional needs.

This smart, engaging, helpful, and accessible book will forever change the way you interact with everyone in your life-the people you love, the friends you treasure, and the colleagues you work with.

Front Jacket

Psychological boundaries determine how we reconcile our seemingly contradictory needs for both intimacy and independence, closeness and separateness. The struggle to reconcile these needs dominates our emotional lives. In this fascinating book, journalist, coach, and social psychologist Jane Adams explains how boundaries can allow us to invite others in to share our deepest selves while they protect us from "emotional trespass."

Psychological boundaries are no less real than physical ones, and how you act them out in your relationships--your Boundary Style--is uniquely personal. In Boundary Issues, you'll learn how to use your Boundary Intelligence to manage your boundaries. Moreover, you'll learn how to adjust your Boundary Style to improve your relationships without endless hours on a therapist's couch, a complete psychological makeover, or the sacrifice of your own authenticity and autonomy.

Informed by psychological theory and research and illustrated with real-life stories, anecdotes, and examples drawn from everyday experiences, this groundbreaking book explores how boundaries develop and change at every stage of your life. Boundary Issues features a unique self-assessment questionnaire to help you identify your own Boundary Style and recognize how it influences all your relationships. Using the four basic skills of Boundary Intelligence--insight, awareness, intention, and action--you'll learn how to use boundaries to resolve conflict, transform your important personal and professional connections, and satisfy your deepest emotional needs.

This smart, engaging, helpful, and accessible book will forever change the way you interact with everyone in your life--the people you love, the friends you treasure, and the colleagues you work with.

Back Jacket

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR BOUNDARY ISSUES

"Jane Adams gets at the heart of human relationships by illuminating the boundaries that create and sustain them. Taking on a subject that everyone talks about but few people really understand, she breaks new psychological ground in this accessible, empathetic, and original book that offers concrete assistance and wise counsel to all who struggle with the central dilemma of being human--being both separate and connected, intimate as well as autonomous, without sacrificing the self."
--Edward Hallowell, M.D., coauthor of Delivered from Distraction

"Understanding and respecting our own boundaries and others' is at the core of a happy life. Boundary Issues is a terrific journey into our own psychological needs, strengths, and weaknesses. We could all save a lot of therapeutic intervention by reading and following Dr. Adams's observations and suggestions."
--Pepper Schwartz, Ph.D., author of Love Between Equals: How Peer Marriage Really Works

"All too rarely someone comes along who is able to turn a single phrase into a changed outlook on life. Dr. Jane Adams does that with Boundary Issues. By following Dr. Jane Adams's guidance and helpful exercises, each of us can find the freedom to love, work, negotiate, play, and live on our own terms."
--Suzanne Braun Levine, author of Inventing the Rest of Our Lives:Women in Second Adulthood

"I find this book vitally helpful, both personally and in my work as a psychotherapist. Learning to negotiate distance and intimacy is a huge issue for women who think that being joined at the hip is necessary for a relationship to survive."
--Colette Dowling, author of The Cinderella Complex and You Mean I Don't Have to Feel This Way?

"With her trademark wit and clarity, Jane Adams pulls at the threads that tie us together and tear us apart. She has translated decades of research into wise and inventive tools. Boundary Issues is the definitive book about finding both intimacy and independence."
--Dr. Barbara Mackoff, author of Leadership as a Habit of Mind and Growing a Girl

"Through her prescriptive advice and fascinating and relevant personal stories, Jane Adams helps us understand how to use Boundary Intelligence for happiness and personal growth."
--Carole Hyatt, coauthor of When Smart People Fail: Rebuilding Yourself for Success

Author Biography

Psychologist, speaker, and coach JANE ADAMS, PH.D., has written several books, including the bestselling I'm Still Your Mother and Women on Top. Her articles, columns, and essays have been published in many major magazines and newspapers. A frequent media commentator, Dr. Adams lives in Seattle and New York City. Visit her Web site at www.janeadams.com.