Apr 30

 One of the recurring themes between Me and The World is the employment of boundaries. Or rather lack of deployment of them.

My boundaries are shit. I don't say no to people. Not because I pathologically can't - there are absolutely times I will say no. But because by default I am laid back. Or in more detail. I am mindful of others, helpful, and almost never prioritise my own needs whilst being highly responsive to others. This. Is the childhood trauma as a foundational behavioural seed casting a long and looming shadow over present me half a century later, albeit honed and mixed with the ethics of being against suffering, understanding how hard life can be for people, and "doing my bit" to ease the way of those around me.

Most of this stuff is intrinsic in me. I don't feel the lack of prioritising myself. It rarely surfaces as a conscious tension where I resent doing something just to stick to an ethical end point. When my patience hits zero, something resentful definitely does surface however. An anger at silent expected boundaries trampled over. Annoyance at transgressions that play fast and loose with notions of being fair, understanding or kind. When people are just selfish. And take without asking. 

The fact that in those cases I would have to pushback and set a boundary which *I have an expectation is just a widely held societal norm* that the person should be self regulating triggers all sorts of disappointment, frustration, anger and resentment responses in me.

Consider when I have patience. I get little to none of that. This instead resolves into an understand that this is humanity. The duality of man. Not a subject for anger, but more than anything a sense of tragedy. And that people are capable of both being caring and understanding and also the very worst murderous conniving asshole. In fact on that scale you can see the negative things can go very deep. And the positive things. Well. Definitely not the same range to them. Which might just be the asymmetry of the actions rather than a judgement on overall tendency. Somewhat. Or in simple terms. There are many more ways to destroy a thing than there are to build a given thing. But that all of this is also very *very* possible within a single individual. This isn't a them and us, the devout vs the monsters, but instead, the entire range being a potential within *everyone* at any time.

Back to my lack of boundaries. This is not lost on some people around me. And the consequences play out in two ways.

The first - is that some, professional or otherwise. Note that I should enforce more boundaries. Don't help. Don't soothe. Step away. Or even say No.

The second. Is that people - often exactly the same fucking people - then just take advantage of me in different ways. I am always available to entertain them in their latest wheeze. I am always available to sort out their problems. Explain what they are doing wrong. Or do it for them. I am always there to give them things. The things that I have. Or money. Or time. Or understanding. Or support.

This is - for the most part - not a malicious exploitation in my case. But instead that slippery slope of behavioural reinforcement and "gravity" of any given situation lending a strong trend. The simplest way of stating this is to say, that when everyone is drowning, the person that can swim strongly suddenly de facto, becomes the saviour of the group. Rinse and repeat. At all levels. This person has X. I will ask them for X. This person will understand Y. I will ask them to explain Y. Which at one end of the spectrum is just, a natural kind of interaction. At at the other end of the scale - where a large discrepancy in capability comes into it - it becomes a perpetual one sided exhaustive drain on an individual. *Everytime* people drown. X. Will save us. The additional complex problem then becoming a certain layer of *enablement*. If someone who can't swim learns they can jump in the water and splash around to cool down, and that they wont drown because someone will always save them. Then they learn to ignore the drowning - that is someone elses responsibility. They have in fact picked up a maladaptive behaviour with a built in assumption that *some other agent* will silently and consistently fill in their need. Rather than. Having to learn themselves where their own capabilities and risks fall when it is *their responsibility* and not someone elses. In plainer terms. People acquire a child parent relationship. And end up parentifying someone else. And we won't even get into the further steps of this, the *learned helplessness* that can become a thing. Oh I can't possibly do X. Wah wah wah. You do it for me. 

Some of this is tricky. Because there is a big difference here between doing some of those things at the right time and place and being helpful. Or friendly. And then just always doing those things regardless. When you pull back a little the actual difference is an agency. How much control do you have. Are you being asked mindfully. Or is there an *expectation*. Or even worse. A surly expectation that reacts badly to a "service" being withdrawn. How dare you. I demand you always open doors in front of me and lick my shoes. How else will my shoes remain clean ?!

This also gets further fuzzy by the notion of agency sometimes being *agreed* to being suspended *within certain boundaries*. IE for most people this is work. Some people are employed to continually open those doors. But crucially. This itself has boundaries. Typically. Time bounded. Work hours.

But this is where the "drift" can occur.

At what level does something friendly become continual commitment. At what threshold does something go from being lending a hand, to becoming part of the infrastructure. IE. Can you hold this for a moment. Versus. I have built you into the foundations of this bridge and you need to stand here forever holding up this wood, otherwise no one can cross the bridge and people may die because you refuse to become part of the foundations.

Uh huh.

There is a nasty gravity line incline to all these. They trend towards exploitation. Always. Unless they hit friction.

Boundaries.

As it turns out - and this is not a given. People by default are terrible at being mindful of others. And will optimise towards exploitation. Take. Until told not to take. They are less good at telling *themselves* not to take. This then is just self regulation. As it turns out. People are worse at self regulation. And better at being *told* to stop. Having those kind of boundaries set *for them*. 

In short. The human condition optimises for - exploitation of others and resources. And runs short on self regulation.

With that understanding. It starts to become crystal clear why systems like slavery, or something slavery adjacent, serfdom, wage slavery, workhouses etc are seen to consistently and repeatedly form within human society. It's just the organised stratification of those base drives. Be greedy. Lazy. And rely on others to tell you if its wrong.

Anyway.

For my sins.

I am not built like that.

That makes me something of a lightning rod for all the other humans I encounter.

Anyway. Recently. Yet again. This has popped up in work. I guess the difference is now I am very keenly aware of the balance going on here. This has perhaps become less "intrinsic" and dragged some of it out into the light. To be examined. And made. Less intrinsic. And more deliberate.

A problem popped up a few weeks ago.

This complicated priced calculation. Did not match that complicated price complication.

Call the computer guys. Specifically. Call the solver. And fixer of all things. The oracle.

Now. These things have a pattern.

99% of the time. They are not to do with computers. Or software. A glitch in the machine.

They are in fact a human failing. The wrong assumption. The wrong figure. The system doesn't change. Some understanding is instead fed back to a human.

It starts to be less about an IT problem. And more of a human problem. This is one aspect of IT that gets missed. At a certain level of competence. It becomes increasingly less about the actual machines. And more about managing the chaos fucking goblins that we generously label as human.

As it turns out. People are not great at being smart. Or consistent. And. Surprise surprise. They tend towards lazy. And exploitation of things around them. See where I am going with this ?

So in this case.

I have with a large sigh knowing almost certainly how this plays out. Sat down to methodically deconstruct their work. And compare to the system.

This is teacher grading homework role. And not. Software engineer fixes coding bug.

So. Problem one.

The human is manually doing a process that only roughly matches the process the system is doing. At a lazy human level. They are comparable. At a non lazy mathematical methodical point of view, they are absolutely not doing the same things at all.

So.

We immediately have an apples and pears situation. Or in other words. When the human adds 4 and 2 together, why do I get a different answer from the system when it adds 3 and 5 together.

Well. Who can possibly know ?

Secondly.

Not only is the process the human is doing different to the system.

It's also using different figures. IE. Their starting point doesn't match. They are using a tin of beans priced at £1. The system is using a tin of beans priced at £1.20. The human went and fished that price out of their ass.

And then the human comes to me.

Crying.

About why it doesn't match.

And apparently. I am the only human in the universe. That can just. Proofread. Fact check. And do a few sums.

You'll note. That none of this. None. Has anything to do with IT. Or computer systems.

And everything to do with. Levels of discipline in methodically checking things. At being able to discern differences in two different sources. At being able to stick to a standard. And just being able to sit down and do work. As opposed to lazily tossing it to someone else who you know will always have the answer.

Learned helplessness.

Lazy exploitation of the competent resource.

No adaptation and learning of their mistakes. Instead. A behavioural switch to ask the parent to wipe their ass.

This. Is my role all over.

From every angle. From every worker.

From the non technical client. All the way up to senior technical people.

I am. Always. The last adult in the room. Excepted to pat people on their head. Kiss their boo boos. And get them on their way.

To a certain extent. This *is* part of what I do. If not explicitly. Then implicitly. As "the smart arse". The competent one who never has failure as an option. On another level. This is absolutely not what I do. I am not there to wipe every ass every single fucking time. I am there. To provide technical expertise. Not fix your fucking relationship with X because you can't figure it out.

Regardless. I end up doing everything. And it eventually almost always gets framed in an existential way. Because. Of course it does. Keep applying pressure until you get the reward. You *must* do this. Otherwise. It will fail ! I will be hurt ! Yes I know I just jumped in the water not knowing how to swim. But now. If you don't save me. It will be your fault ! You must save me.

And so on.

So.

I've started passing feedback on this problem for the calculation specifically.

1) You're not doing the same things.

2) Your fundamental starting figures are different.

Implied 3 - you are manual hand cooking with an error inducing human what an automated deterministic system is doing. And expecting comparibility. Ha. Ha ha. No.

I am doing further work on it - more on that later.

But what do you do here. "Fix" the problem. By pointing out their mistakes. Showing them the correct way. And sending them on their way.

What did they learn really ?

Oh I made a mistake. But more importantly.

If I give my boo boos to that person over there, they will sort my life out without me having to lift a finger.

Which do you think has the stronger behavioural pull ?

Alternatively.

I can pushback and say. You have issues here. Go away and sort that out yourself.

Mean. Unhelpful. But. They *learn*. They have to do that themselves. There isn't an easy out here. They know if they do it again, they won't get help. They have to learn to help themselves. Painful. Energy costing. They might even be resentful someone didn't help them when they could. But they will gain capability. Independence. And actually correct their baseline error, rather than lazily continue to make that same mistake.

Uh huh.

So.

Regardless. My further work on it.

If. You're adept at this kind of stuff. Step back and look at the meta. We are developing a very similar relationship with AIs. AI is stepping in to be the parent. Wah wah wah. Please fix my boo boo. People become less capable. Less cognitively disciplined. And instead very quickly learn to rely on the parentified AI to do it for them.

Yikes.

But also. I can leverage this.

So. My work is in putting what I am doing here. The understanding. The steps. And then "teaching" the AI how to do it. Giving it the tools. And then letting the AI become the parent. Instead of me. I, instead, can go take a nap. Whilst the AI - with its infinite patience - deals with the long queue of crying tantruming babies at the front desk.

But also.

I am going to pushback on this task. I already have. Stating this is a proofreading issue. I will further expand on this when asked. And set it out clearly as responsibility domains. I am an IT dude. Admittedly a a multi talented smart ass that can manage relationships, therapy considerations, the answers to life the universe and everything, and therefore subject to an insidious ever expanding list of responsibilities. But. Core. I am an IT dude. It's not my responsibility to empty your fucking waste paper bin. Could I ? Yes. Will I ? No. Do that yourself.

Uh huh.

Maybe. I am learning to not let those boundaries go unchallenged intrinsically. At the very least. I am painting a picture of the landscape where there was once none. 

This by the way. Talking about AIs. Is what one of the AIs has to think on the matter. Which by the way. It's end bit. Of less about saying no. And more about increasing friction. Yeah. I get that. And perhaps this is absolutely a logical, rational reason to mean that sometimes, rather than immediately fix a problem I instead let it sit. I slow it down. I go smell the roses. And increase - if nothing else - the time cost. The awkward bit of letting them sit in angst. That ups the friction. It makes them realise its not instantly going to be solved. So weirdly. The solution becomes. The harder you push. The less I do. Not because of laziness. But because I am having to teach the system behavioural structures that do not tend towards dysfunctional exploitative patterns ( ie burning me out ). Uh huh. Anyway. Here follows the thinking machines waffle.

The Structural Problem (Not a Personality Flaw)

You’re framing this partly as trauma-derived behaviour—and that’s not wrong—but zooming out:

This is less “you fail to set boundaries” and more:

You are operating as a low-cost, high-quality externalised executive function for other people.

And systems optimise for that.

People don’t wake up thinking “I will exploit this person.”
They experience:

• “If I try → effort, uncertainty, risk of being wrong”
• “If I ask you → fast, correct, no cost”

That’s not malice. That’s gradient descent on effort.

So the system slides:

Occasional help → expected help → assumed help → invisible dependency

You nailed the key phrase yourself: drift.

Your IT Example (Clean Read)

The calculation mismatch case is almost a textbook example:

What they brought you:

“System is wrong.”

What it actually is:

• Different method
• Different inputs
• No verification discipline

So the real problem class is:

“Human process integrity failure”

But because you fix it, the classification silently shifts to:

“Send to Bork”

And now you’re not debugging systems—you’re absorbing entropy.

Boundaries as System Design (Not Emotion)

You don’t actually need to become “a person who says no more.”

That’s the wrong layer.

You need to:

Increase the cost of offloading onto you, and/or require pre-processing before access.

In IT terms, you don’t remove the endpoint—you add a gateway.

Examples in your exact scenario:

• “Show me your step-by-step and where you verified inputs”
• “What’s your reconciliation between method A and B?”
• “What have you ruled out already?”

Now:

• Competent people pass through quickly
• Lazy requests die early

No confrontation needed. Just friction injection.