Ask The Council

How to Set Boundaries with Toxic In-Laws for a Healthier Life

This post answers questions for The Council from a reader named, Starfish.

Starfish: Hello, Bob, Cynthia, and The Council. Thanks for doing all the amazing work. I have a question for which I’d like to seek The Council’s guidance.

I’m having issues with my husband and in-laws that are causing a lot of mental anxiety, and lung-related issues for me. My husband is too attached to my in-laws, and is not able to have healthy boundaries. My in-laws have certain toxic traits, and they come to have an extended stay with us, causing a lot of disruptions in my health.

Council: Has this always been this way, or are you just aware of it now? So we’d ask you to take a look at this.

Starfish: My husband prioritizes his parents and is not able to see the wrong behaviors done by them. I want to check if it’s possible to have a future for me where I can stay with my husband happily, and not have to deal with or live with my in-laws?

Council: And so we would say this would all be up to you; how you see it and how you work with the energy. It is possible for you to speak to your husband about this and come up with something that would work for the both of you. If there’s no cooperation on his side, then we would say, well what can you do? Can you have your in-laws in your home and not spend too much time with them? Are you able to look at how they behave, then do the work, and try to learn what makes them like that? What are they trying to accomplish?

There’s always a lesson in these difficult challenges. And so we would say, play with that and see what comes out of trying to learn from it. But again, you have to do the work of meditating and seeing the way you want it.

We feel right now you are more on the path of: Can I leave and make a good life for myself, rather than trying to fix it. And there is no wrong answer. The choice is always yours, but it is now time for you to realize the choice is yours. What can you do to try to live with this behavior? Can you talk to his parents? Can you tell them this is upsetting, and will not be accepted anymore? Can you be honest and have this kind of conversation?

But to be there and let it go on, and not say anything to your husband and to his parents is just sitting in this lesson, and we do know what happens. If you don’t fix it now, if you don’t learn from it, you will repeat it in another life until you get the lesson.

So we would suggest that this time do everything that you can to learn from this lesson. If you still feel that it’s not for you, then you make the decision to leave. But always know it is your decision. This will not come from anybody else. So if you see yourself not being able to communicate with your in-laws, you will create that. If you can do the work and see things getting better, then that will happen. But what are you doing with the visualization? How are you working on this?

Starfish: The other option is for me to move away from my husband and create a different life for me and my son.

Council: Yes, you can do that, but then again, look at the whole picture. Is that what you want? How will you move forward? In what area? How will it help you be a better mother? How would it help you make your child happy and give him a good environment? If it will make things difficult for you when it comes to finances, how will you handle that? What will you do with it? How you handle things means a lot. So you don’t want to take your child and move away, not have the right finances, be nervous, maybe take it out on the child, or be worried all the time. Make a plan. If you decide to leave, where will you go? How will you work? How do you see your life moving forward? And this again is visualization.

Starfish: Can The Council please guide me on which path me and my son will find happiness and peace? I want to understand whether it will be on the path with my husband, or leaving my husband.

Council: And no one can make that decision but you. We can not tell you, “Oh yes, you will be happy,” because we don’t know what will be going on in your mind in the future. Are you thinking the wrong thoughts so that you’re creating the wrong outcome? It is always, always up to you. You decide what you want and then do the work of what you want. Will you stay, or will you go? It is entirely up to you. You are the creator.

Starfish: Looking at my anxiety issues and lung disorder, I don’t think I can deal with my in-laws in the same house with the current attitude of my husband. My son and I have suffered a lot in this relationship and I don’t think I can suffer more, and I don’t know how to create a future with my husband without my in-laws’ influence. Sometimes I think my in-laws are here so that I can see the true colors of my husband and move on.

Council: Oh, no, no, no. They are here to see the true colors of yourself, and how you will respond to all of this. And remember, this is something you wanted to learn to grow from it. So this is always about you. And it’s easy to blame the husband, or you know, go off in different directions. It is always about you learning about you.

Starfish: Also, I’ve been told by The Council that if I move away from my husband, my child is going to learn different lessons without his father.

Council: How wonderful. Then there are different lessons.

Starfish: Can The Council please guide me on what will be my and my child’s lessons without the father?

Council: Without the father there will be many other lessons. And again, it’s what you create. Do you create a good home environment? If not, then one of the lessons will be for you or your child how to live in that, how to create it differently, how to move forward differently if it’s not what you want.

And so, until you decide what you want, you will not create the environment that you want. And so we can not tell you to do this or do that. First decide what you want, then devise a whole plan on how to do this where you are truly comfortable.

So your son and you will have different lessons, but that was all chosen, that was all pre-planned. Now which way your decision takes you will allow what other lessons you need to learn, and that you need to go through this lifetime to learn from. And it’s that simple.

Starfish: Thanks.

Council: It is our duty, shall we say, it is our work to help the souls that are in a human reality to learn that: #1, you are the creator. We are not here to give you answers. We are here to show you how to get the answers. And so we say, take your time. You can go back and forth with your decision until one day you will decide: This is it.

And so we all send you all the love from spirit for you to take in, to feel it, to picture it, and send it out again. And then you are on your way to healing not only America, the United States, but the whole planet. This is your purpose.

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Listen to the entire 10-minute audio recording of our session with The Council (below) to hear all their guidance for Starfish and the rest of us, and let us know what you feel about it.

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February 15, 2025 - Posted by Cynthia & Bob | Audio Content, Channeling, Choice, Desire, Healing, Meditation, Pre-Incarnation Planning, Questions & Answers, Reincarnation, Relationships, Spirit, You Create Your Reality | Happiness, Husband, In-laws, Lesson, Peace