Dear Blog visitors, what does “guarding your heart” look like to you?

I’ve mentioned several important areas of life where women usually need to set boundaries, including relationships, home, workplace, church, and self. We’ve distinguished between helping and enabling, but I’ve deliberately set aside the most critical difference for this chapter. It’s that important.

Before a woman makes relational and psychological boundaries, she must consider her most necessary boundary—that of guarding her own heart. By that I mean a woman should know and respect the boundaries God has given for her heart’s protection. Protection is, after all, one of the purposes of boundaries.

According to Scripture, everything we do flows from our heart. Therefore, once this primary boundary is in place, we can set all other boundaries much more easily

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it” (Proverbs 4:23).

(Excerpt from Setting Boundaries® for Women, Six Steps to Saying No, Taking Control, and Finding Peace by Allison Bottke, Harvest House Publishers, © 2013. All rights reserved. Page 57).