Boundaries Workbook

What this is

About the workbook

Knowing you should set a boundary and having the words ready are different problems. This workbook deals with the second one: actual scripts, and a way to audit where your time and attention are going.

Written for people who are reliably the responsible one, and who find that saying no costs them the next two days.

What is in the pack

Eighteen pages, printable whole or a page at a time. It opens with a How to Use This Workbook page, then two education pages. Understanding Boundaries Part 1 sets out what a boundary is — a limit plus your own action — and what it is not, with a list of signs that boundaries need attention. Part 2 lays out six types: physical, emotional, time, material, mental, and digital. Each type comes with example phrasing, and a short piece on whether a boundary is rigid, porous, or healthy.

The Boundary Audit follows: a six-row table where you rate each area from 0 to 10, name who or what tests it, and note one recent example, then pick a single area to work on first. Why Saying No Feels So Hard names the reasons it can be difficult — early learning, fear of conflict, fear of being disliked, guilt confusion, and identity — and asks you to write down the feared story in your head, and whether it has ever actually come true.

The scripts and the planners

Scripts for Saying No collects six kinds, word for word: the simple no, the warm no, the delayed no, the partial yes, the broken record for people who push, and the no for repeat offenders, which attaches your own action to the limit. There is space to write the request you keep saying yes to, your own version of the script, and when you will practise it out loud.

The Values-Based Decision Tree is for requests you are genuinely unsure about. You name your top three values for the season, then walk the request through five questions covering values, capacity, fear, your future self, and resentment. Several branches end in declining; the verdict line asks you to record a full yes or a partial yes with your terms named, plus one sentence on why.

The Difficult Conversation Planner is for boundaries that need more than a one-line no. It uses a four-part assertive formula — describe, express, specify, outcomes — followed by a page for wobble moments: the pushback you expect, your calm reply, and your steadying move if you get flooded.

The reusable pages

Some pages are read once; others are meant to be reprinted. The decision tree, the conversation planner, and the Weekly Boundary Reflection are all built to be used again. The reflection page in particular is set up for one fresh copy a week, with two 0-to-10 ratings, a checklist of the week's boundary moments, and written prompts.

The Two-Week Boundary Practice Log gives you one row per boundary moment: the date, the situation, what you said or did, how it landed, and how you feel now. There is a check-in at the end of week one and a longer set of questions at the end of week two. A page of Pocket Boundary Cards is there to cut out and carry, and a short closing note ends with two final prompts, ahead of the workbook's information page.

The order the workbook suggests

The How to Use page gives a sequence: print what you need, read the education pages first, then do the audit before anything else. It suggests working on one or two areas rather than all six at once. After that, borrow the scripts and rehearse them aloud, plan the high-stakes conversations on paper before having them, and track boundary moments for two weeks.

What the workbook is

The cover states that it is built on assertiveness and cognitive behavioural (CBT) principles, and the closing page describes it as an educational self-help resource drawing on widely used assertiveness, communication, and CBT approaches. It is not psychotherapy, counselling, or treatment, and using it does not create a professional relationship with anyone here.

The audit and the rating scales are there to organise your own thinking. They do not diagnose anything and they deliver no verdict about you; the ratings are there to help you choose which area to work on first. The workbook also carries one caution worth repeating: its tools assume relationships that are basically safe, even when they are difficult. Where a relationship involves fear, control, threats, or harm, it says plainly that a workbook is the wrong tool, and points to professional support and support lines instead.

Who this is for, and who should wait

The workbook is for someone who says yes on autopilot, feels responsible for other people's moods, and ends the day with nothing left — and who wants words, not only insight. Its scripts are meant to be borrowed verbatim and rehearsed out loud, so it suits a reader willing to practise. It is also a good companion to therapy, where a script drafted on the planner page can be rehearsed in session before it is used.

It is not the right first tool for every relationship. The workbook is explicit that its exercises assume people who are basically safe even when they are difficult; where someone is frightening, controlling, or has answered a small limit with threats or harm, it says not to rely on a workbook and points to a professional and to support lines instead. If the guilt after a no tips into panic, or if the fear of being disliked is tangled with an old history of harm, bring the workbook to a clinician first. It is educational material: the audit and the ratings organise your thinking and deliver no verdict, and nothing in it is an assessment or a treatment.

How it fits with therapy at TEO

The workbook is built on assertiveness training and cognitive behavioural (CBT) principles: the feared story behind a no, the evidence for and against it, a rehearsed alternative. That is the shape of CBT-informed work on self-esteem and people-pleasing at TEO, where Mohamad Shabib and Alison Shaji (British Columbia) both work in CBT; the self-esteem and identity page describes it. Where the reflex to please has roots in early experience, Alison also works psychodynamically with clients in British Columbia, and Mohamad, the practice's IFS-trained clinician, brings Internal Family Systems to the part that says yes — the free Getting to Know Your People-Pleaser handout in this library is the paper version of that conversation.

Therapy adds a room to rehearse the script in and a person to notice what the guilt is protecting. Sessions are by video across British Columbia, Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Newfoundland & Labrador, evenings and weekends included, with a free 15-minute consultation first and individual sessions at $150 per 60-minute session.

Related pages: Self-esteem and identity therapy · Getting to Know Your People-Pleaser · IFS therapy.

Common questions

About using this workbook

This workbook is educational. It is not therapy, not an assessment, and nothing in it is a diagnosis. If you are in crisis, call or text 9-8-8 (Canada, 24/7); 911 in an emergency. Kids Help Phone (for young people): 1-800-668-6868, or text CONNECT to 686868.

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If you want to go further

Working on this with someone

A workbook can take you a surprising distance on its own. If you would rather not do it alone, TEO offers virtual therapy in British Columbia, Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Newfoundland & Labrador — evenings and weekends, with a free 15-minute consultation first and no obligation afterward.

Related: Self-esteem & identity.

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