Finding Your People: A Teen Guide to Healthy Friendships

TEENSFRIENDSHIPBOUNDARIES
Written By Taylor Locke-Ribble, Registered Psychotherapist

Sometimes the most powerful choice you can make is the one that feels right to you, not the one everyone expects you to make.

Friendships can feel formative in the teen years, they lift you up, support your growth, they share in moments of joy and meaning. But what happens when a friendship comes with challenges, unwanted pressure or boundary pushing? It can certainly be an uncomfortable experience, but when you learn what healthy and supportive friendships look like, it can be easier to set boundaries, even with your friends.

Together we’ll explore the importance of friendships for teens, how to recognize peer pressure and how to build meaningful friendships with confidence, which being conscious of your own comfort and boundaries.

Why Teen Friendships are Important

The importance of friendship in the teen years goes deeper than it being “just social connection”. Friendships help to shape your identity, how they move through the world and what they value. Friendships that align with your values, model empathy and show emotional depth and maturity can support long-term well-being in teens as they begin to rely more heavily on their peer groups for support [1]. As a result, teens may develop deep and lasting connections with their friends that last long after their teen years. But what does a healthy friendship look like? Healthy friendships can:

  • Support emotional regulation and coping skill development

  • Positively impact self-esteem and body image

  • Reduce stress and feelings of overwhelm

  • Create a sense of connection and belonging

When teens feel understood by their friends, it results in decreased feelings of loneliness and positively impacts their ability to move through challenges and transitions. However, the same can’t be said for unhealthy friendships, which may negatively impact feelings of connectedness and influence behaviour [2].

Recognizing Peer Pressure

Unfortunately, peer pressure is something that most teens will experience at some point in their life. While peer pressure can be more obvious (“If you don’t do ____, we won’t be friends with you”), it can also be more subtle, where you feel you need to alter yourself in some way to fit in [3]. Now, I’m sure you may be able to think about moments of peer pressure that seem harmless, maybe someone pushes a friend to join a club with them, however there are many situations that push friends into uncomfortable situations where they may feel they are compromising their values.

What can unhealthy peer pressure look and feel like?

  • Feeling guilty or anxious when you say try to say no

  • Friends making fun of your boundaries or discomfort

  • Being pressured into unsafe situations

  • Feeling like you cannot be yourself around your friends

  • Feeling excluded if you assert your boundaries

Even when someone has good intentions, boundary violations can happen amongst friends, however, it is important to remember that your boundaries are important and deserve to be respected. Boundaries may be emotional (ex. guilt-tripping) or physical (ex. pushing for a hug after being told no) in nature, and both are completely valid [4].

Emotionally unhealthy friendship patterns may involve: one-sided effort, jealousy or controlling behaviour, being dismissive of your feelings or not respecting privacy. Physically unhealthy friendship patterns may involve: putting you in risky situations or pushing for physical touch that you do not wish to engage. Many teens struggle to set boundaries out of fear of losing their friend or being ostracized from larger peer groups, even when the connection is unhealthy [5]. By taking time to reflect and understand unhealthy peer pressure, you can be better prepared to address it and set appropriate boundaries (and hold them!), should the situation arise.

Setting Healthy Boundaries

Learning how to set and hold healthy boundaries is an important skill for teens to learn, but it can also be one of the most challenging. Is setting boundaries a bad thing in your friendships? Not at all! Boundaries allow for a clearer understanding of limits. They can help both you and your friends feel a sense of safety and security in your connections, where you can be yourself without fear of judgement and pressure. Additionally, they help the boundary setting to understand their own needs, and better understand how to communicate them clearly [5].

What do healthy boundaries look like?

Healthy boundaries aren’t about shutting your friends out, they allow for meaningful understanding. They help to protect your overall well-being, your feelings and even your relationship to yourself or those around you [4]. For teens, this may look like:

  • Saying “I would rather not talk about ____ right now." or “I’m not comfortable with _____, please stop.”

  • Choosing not to share every detail about yourself.

  • Expressing your needs, such as asking for space without feeling like you’re being a “bad friend.”

While not an exhaustive list, boundaries help teens feel a greater sense of security and reduce the chance of being overwhelmed by expectations.

Building Confidence and knowing when to step back

Setting boundaries can feel quite awkward at first, especially if you tend to “keep the peace”, seek to avoid conflict or place others’ needs above your own. Like most skills, boundary setting gets easier with practice, so fear not recovering people pleasers, there is hope. Teens can develop their understanding of boundaries through their own emotional exploration, and physical understanding of their body (ex. understanding they feel tense in their shoulders when stressed) [5].

Here are a few helpful tips that you can use in your day-to-day life:

  • Start small. Practice boundary setting in low-stress situations, ex. saying no to plans when you’re tired.

  • Use “I” statements. They can help bring the focus on your needs while reducing defensiveness.

  • Keep communication clear. You don’t need to provide a long explanation, short and respectful boundaries can be just as effective.

  • It’s okay to say no. At anytime you can say no, no one has a right to all parts of yourself.

  • Notice how people respond. Healthy friendships will respect your boundaries, if they continue to pressure you or react in anger, it may be time to reevaluate the connection.

Take time to reflect on past boundaries you’ve set, what encouraged you to set them? This is a great point to start when you think about what boundaries may need to be set in the future. Boundaries can foster powerful friendships and emotional safety, without them they may become draining or even unsafe [4].

Luckily, many friends are happy to accept your boundaries, however that is not always the case. If someone repeatedly ignores your boundaries, pressures you, or makes you feel guilty for setting boundaries, it may indicate that this is not a healthy or respectful friendship [3]. You may want to ask yourself:

  • Have you had to repeat your boundaries, if so, have you noticed any change?

  • Does this friend add to my life, or take up emotional energy?

  • Do you feel safe, emotionally and physically with this person?

  • Do you feel lighter or heavier when you imaging letting go of this friendship?

If you’ve taken the time to reflect and you don’t see a healthy path forward, it may be a sign to step back from this connection. While letting go can be hard, so is remaining in a relationship that does not protect your well-being. On the other hand, if you feel safe and that the friendship is worth remaining in, take some time to consider how to maintain your boundary and what you may need moving forward. Knowing what you need from yourself and your friends can help you rebuild the connection in a way that feels better for you both.

Final Thoughts

These aren’t just skills for teens, these are foundations for healthy relationships throughout life.

Boundaries are a skill that everyone can benefit from, and learning how to set and maintain them with confidence can make a huge difference. Friendships don’t have to be perfect, but it is important they are mutually respectful, communicative and hold space for meaningful connection and support. When teens take time to step back and understand their own needs and how they show up in their friendships, it will be easier to practice setting meaningful boundaries.

Boundaries support the ability to notice what does and doesn’t feel good for a teen, and how to speak up in a way that feels authentic to their needs. With practice and confidence, teens can build friendships that feel meaningful, respectful, and safe; many of which they may carry into adulthood.

Taylor Locke-Ribble, Registered Psychotherapist https://newhorizonspsychotherapy.com
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