"Protecting Your Boundaries" Is One of 2026's Biggest Buzzphrases—But Therapists Say We're Using It Wrong

We’re living through something of a therapy-speak moment. Words that once frequented the therapist’s office - boundaries, triggers, attachment styles, capacity - are now part of the everyday vocabulary of friendship. With TikTok and social media offering an endless stream of opinions on how we should communicate, feel and behave, it can sometimes feel as though there’s a therapeutic diagnosis for everything.

Honestly - this is a good thing! Having the language to say this hurts me, I need something different, or this doesn’t feel healthy, is powerful. When I talk to my own mother about boundaries, she often responds with genuine awe: “Wow. I would never have thought to say that.” And she’s right. Previous generations didn’t quite have the same vocabulary for emotional needs as we do.

But what happens when the language designed to help us build healthier relationships starts to make friendship feel like something we need to constantly manage?

“Protect your peace” is the perfect example. The friend who cancels plans? Protecting her peace. The awkward conversation you’d rather avoid? Protecting your peace. The friendship that becomes too demanding? Yep, you guessed it: step back, mute the chat and call it a boundary.

Sometimes, that is exactly what we should do. But I can’t shake the feeling - are we also using the language of boundaries to sidestep what makes friendship meaningful: compromise, accountability, difficult conversations and the discomfort of being wrong? Have we simply learnt the language of psychology without understanding what it asks of us?

It’s something we’re all exploring openly. In April, the ‘But Are You Happy?’ podcast examined “weaponised boundaries”, while friendship writer Nina Badzin has argued that if everything becomes about protecting our own boundaries, friendship itself becomes rather difficult.

So, where is the line between protecting yourself and opting out of the messy business of being a friend? I wanted to find out when a boundary is genuinely necessary, when “protecting your peace” is actually avoidance - and whether, in our quest to have healthier relationships, we might occasionally be making friendships harder to maintain.

"Protecting Your Boundaries" Is One of 2026's Biggest Buzzphrases—Are We Using It Wrong?

What Does a Healthy Boundary Actually Look Like?

“A boundary is about deciding what you are and are not willing to participate in, and then acting accordingly,” explains psychologist Dr Sophie Mort. “It is about managing your own behaviour, rather than controlling somebody else’s.”

​It’s a deceptively simple distinction, and one that can get lost online. Boundaries are often presented as rules for other people: You can’t speak to me like that. You can’t expect this from me. If you upset me, you’re out.

“A healthier boundary sounds more like: If this conversation becomes disrespectful, I’m going to step away and come back to it later,” says Mort.

The difference? You can’t control what someone else does. You can decide what you do in response.

Mort cautions against confusing boundaries with the absence of discomfort. Healthy relationships involve disappointment, disagreement and difficult conversations; “a boundary isn’t designed to ensure we never feel uncomfortable, but to help us navigate those moments while respecting ourselves and the other person.”

So, what does a healthy boundary actually look like? Mort offers the example of a friend who regularly calls late at night when they’re upset. Rather than disappearing or deciding the friendship is “too much”, she suggests saying: “I love you and want to be there for you, but I can’t always do late-night calls. If I don’t answer, it’s not because I don’t care. I’ll get back to you when I can.”

Are You Protecting Your Peace - Or Avoiding the Problem?

Now, for those of us who have used “I’m protecting my peace” more than a few times - guilty- it might be time to disarm the phrase for a moment. What does it actually mean, and how do we know when it’s helping us rather than helping us avoid something?

​Clinical psychologist Sula Windgassen thinks the answer starts with being a little more honest about what’s happening underneath that urge to retreat.“Anxiety, guilt and fear often invoke automatic brain defaults that cause us to avoid,” she explains. “We have to do a little intentional work to turn towards the feelings and explore what they are and what thoughts underlie them.”

​Her advice is simple: How do I feel? What is making me feel this way? Then go one step further: what are you actually afraid might happen if you told this person what you need? From there, she suggests trying to problem-solve rather than disappearing altogether.

​Naturally, there’s science behind our instinct to dodge the difficult. Research on experiential avoidance suggests that we often try to escape uncomfortable thoughts and feelings because doing so offers immediate relief - even when avoidance can keep the underlying problem going.

​And that’s where “protecting my peace” can become complicated. Mort suggests we shouldn’t be too hasty to retire the phrase: “Sometimes, stepping away is exactly what we need. You might be too activated to have a productive conversation and need time to think.” The problem is when it becomes a way of making avoidance sound like emotional maturity. “There’s a difference between “I need a couple of days to calm down, then I want to talk” and “This is disturbing my peace, so I’m never discussing it.” One creates space to return to the relationship; the other can quietly become a way of opting out.

Has Therapy Speak Made Us Worse at Friendship?

Confession time: this feature has taken me down some rather fascinating social-media rabbit holes. But it has also made me think about just how much of our emotional vocabulary is now being shaped by our FYP.

​That’s the peculiar thing about TikTok: whatever you happen to be feeling that day, there’s probably a video waiting for you. Are you feeling overlooked? Here are five signs you’re in a one-sided friendship. Irritated? Perhaps you’re finally recognising a boundary violation. Having a bad Tuesday? Congratulations, you’ve just discovered the reason you are the way you are.

​And I’d say there’s something genuinely useful about that. But the algorithm isn’t exactly interested in nuance; it’s interested in whether you stop scrolling. Research suggests that can shape us, too: algorithmic recommendations can create “emotional feedback loops”, where our moods influence what we’re shown, which then shapes what we engage with. Another study found that highly viewed mental-health TikToks based on personal experiences attracted more engagement than those from healthcare professionals - raising revealing questions about how easily relatable anecdotes can start to feel like a psychological fact.

Which brings me back to friendship: what happens when we start applying all of this language to the people we love?

One expert I spoke to thinks this is where things can go awry: “People are grabbing the vocabulary without any of the framework that actually makes it mean something,” says Bea Chanda, licensed therapist.

“A 60-second reel can give you the word - trigger, boundary violation, unsafe - without the theory, context or nuance behind it. “And a word without the understanding behind it tends to just harden into a rule.”

The irony is that therapy language was supposed to help us understand ourselves and our relationships better. Instead, sometimes, we start talking to our friends like a textbook.

As Chanda highlights, “that doesn’t mean the language is wrong. Some relationships really are harmful, and having the words to recognise that can be life-changing. But perhaps these concepts are tools for exploration, not rules for enforcement.”

Note to self (and all our inner therapy voices): friendship needs room for people to get things wrong. To have an off week. To be complicated. Sometimes the more human response is “I’m hurt, can we talk?”, instead of saying ‘Thank you, next.”

How to Set a Boundary Without Losing the Friendship

So, where does this leave us in practice? What are we actually supposed to do when we need to set a boundary? With a therapy-approved phrase for every social scenario, it’s surprisingly easy to overthink the “right” response. Do I communicate? Take space? Set a boundary? Or just mute the group chat and hope for the best? It turns out the answer is far less complicated than we’ve made it.

Relationship therapist Aoife Drury says a genuinely nourishing friendship isn’t always one where you speak every day or see each other constantly. Instead, pay attention to how you feel within it. “A healthy friendship tends to involve a sense of safety, mutuality and acceptance,” she explains. “It can tolerate periods where one person has less capacity, and survive change without immediately interpreting it as rejection.”

“First things first, there should also be reciprocity,” says Mort, “alongside enough trust to tolerate disagreement, distance and the inevitable changes life throws at us. A good friendship allows you to be yourself, feel emotionally safe and know you don’t have to earn someone’s affection by being constantly available.”

Perhaps this is the bit we’ve forgotten amid all the talk of boundaries: a friendship doesn’t have to meet every need to be a good friendship.

We can expect our friends to support us without expecting them to be our therapist, social secretary, sounding board and 24-hour reassurance hotline. Healthy friendships involve interdependence: I can need you while still understanding that you are a separate person with your own limits.

There is, after all, a difference between having needs and expecting everyone else to organise themselves around them. A healthy boundary asks: What am I willing to participate in? Self-centredness asks: How should everyone else behave so that I never have to feel uncomfortable?

Which brings us back to boundaries. “Sometimes, a friend’s behaviour really does cross a line.” The trick, Mort says, is knowing the difference between an ordinary human limitation and a pattern that repeatedly leaves you feeling hurt, dismissed or depleted, and knowing that you’re allowed to say something about it without turning the friendship into psychological warfare.

TDLR: the healthiest boundary isn’t the one that gets you out of the relationship. Sometimes, it’s the one that gives the relationship a chance to become healthier.

MC'S Therapy-Speak Survival Kit