We Know No Limits....

it's what we feel that restricts us.

Boundaries, what they are and how to utilize them is a crucial component in the success mechanism of any personal or professional enterprise.

Too often I hear the word boundary used in a negative context associated with restriction and limits. I’d like to reframe boundary and focus on its potential to provide support, clarity and strength.

I don’t know of any topic, discipline or profession that doesn’t incorporate the word “boundary” in the course of discussion. One example of the pervasiveness of this concept can be found in a comment made by @Ali Anani when discussing social media. He said that we are witnessing the “death of geography and time”. What a powerful image to reflect the changes in the boundaries of spacetime and human experience in relation to technological development in communication.

“Expansion of boundaries, changes in boundaries yes, elimination of boundaries, no.”

There are “limitless” references to boundaries. One reference can be found in KJ Orr’swriting

“For me, part of the compelling energy of short stories comes from the way they can cross boundaries. More than simply geographic, these boundaries can be crossed in acts of transgression or empathy, in shifts of understanding or emotion and formal innovation.”

This is one reason storytelling is becoming a popular tool or means of engagement when communicating ideas to individuals, teams or audiences.

According to Dr. Foust’s work:

“Boundaries are defined in Webster’s dictionary as “something that indicates a border or limit.” In a healthy state, this “limit” is flexible and changeable, responding moment to moment to both inner and outer conditions. Through boundaries we are able to screen input from the world, to know what input is appropriate to let in and assimilate, and what input we need to protect ourselves against. With boundaries we create a holding environment for our individual sense of self and we also can be sensitive to and respect the rights and boundaries of others. We can maintain both differentiation and connection.”

In his description of the healthy state of boundaries, Dr. Foust is relating some of the attributes of a successful entrepreneur or leader in business; flexibility, adapting to change, awareness, decision making, sensitivity and respect.

“The Box” and its boundaries.

There was always something that bothered me about the expression, “Think out of the box.” I understand it and agree with its message. But as a “metaphor” junkie I struggled to figure out what it is about this metaphor that just didn't sit right (metaphorically speaking). Well, I'm happy to say, I finally got it!

I got it when I was reading Eli Shostak’s post, Execs Gone Wild! 4 Reasons to Retreat Outside the Box. One of the things Shostak is saying is how important it is to leave the company box and get the employees out into nature. Then I realized, as humans we exist in boxes. Well, not literally, but more importantly, we exist in structures, in containers. Each of these containers has different forms, shapes and qualities, but we exist IN them.

We start off our lives in an amniotic sac filled with an amazing sound conductor, the amniotic fluid, and we begin our lives in sync with our biological mother; her heart rate, her voice. We leave that container and enter a larger one, the birth room, and experience all the sensations in that new environment. And so on…each stage of our development, each aspect of our lives can be described from within a container. Our planet holds us, through gravity, and grounds us. Yes, we have open skies above us and we can use various containers to transport us from place to place on earth, across the sky, into space, under the seas and oceans, but all along we remain contained.

“You can take the box out of the thinker but you can't take the thinker out of the box.”

Not all boxes are restrictive or suppress creativity. Not all structures are limited. Not all boundaries prevent you from moving. It is the type and size of the box or container that determines its potential fit for your thinking needs at any one particular moment in time (itself a container with boundaries). For example; routines are structures you want to be in, while ruts keep you stuck and you want to move out of them.

"Believing in negative thoughts is the single greatest obstruction to happiness and success. Your perspective on life comes from the inner emotional cage you've been holding yourself captive in."

What is striking about this observation is that it reinforces that we are the creators of our boxes. Our thoughts use elements, both internally and externally, that will design the various boxes or containers in which we place or imprison ourselves.

Boundaries between the known and unknown.

“The Catalan Atlas was the definitive mappomondo of its time. It included the latest information brought back by Arabic and European travelers. But perhaps the atlas’s most important contribution was what it left out. On other maps, unknown northern and southern regions were included as places of myth, of monsters, anthropaphagy, and sea serpents. But the truth-seeking, fact faithful Catalan Atlas instead left unknown parts of the earth blank. This blankness was labeled simply and frighteningly Terra Incognita, challenging every mariner who unfurled the chart. Maps of history have always been less honest. Terra Cognita and Terra Incognita inhabit exactly the same coordinates of time and space. The closest we come to knowing the location of what’s unknown is when it melts through the map like a watermark, a stain as transparent as rain. On the map of history, perhaps the water stain is memory. ”

— Anne Michaels, Fugitive Pieces

We are our own mapmakers. But our maps are not two dimensional. Our maps are our boxes with four sides, a top, a bottom, an inside and an outside. The boundaries we map out clearly demarcate the boundaries which are more “fixed”, more flexible, known and unknown, in a dynamic and perpetually moving dynamic.

Think out of the box and move yourself into a Tesseract. 

To be a mapmaker means you have to be an explorer and a navigator. No boundaries can limit your ability to move out there and in there to find your place and thrive.

photo credit: www.hollywood.com