A recent 20/20 revealed that Deal or No Deal star, comic, and actor Howie Mandel suffers from obsessive compulsive disease (OCD.) For years he hid his fear of touching, while managing to have a successful career. On occasions where someone succeeded in shaking his hand or otherwise invaded his boundaries, he receded into a frenzy of hand washing to make himself feel clean.
For most people, simple touching does not provoke such an extreme reaction, yet we all feel irritated with our boundaries are invaded. It can be physical invasion when people stand too close or make themselves too much at home in our office, missing appointments, or wasting our time when we have made it clear we were in a hurry. Sometimes, the boundary invasion is very clear. Other forms are subtle enough that we may not recognize them for what they are and wonder why we feel irritated when they occur, or if we even have the right to feel irritated. All of the seemingly harmless activities that are listed in the PDF document involve boundary invasion, if they happen habitually.
For additional information and guidance on this topic we have posted an article on our website entitled "Ways That People Invade Your Boundaries" for you to review. Incidentally, you may want to use this list to check on yourself, too. Many boundary invaders are quite unaware of what they are doing.
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