Where I run into difficulty is if the other person seems to be in something other than their right mind. For instance, over the years I've had three or four neighbors with obvious drinking problems. I could imagine being them and wanting to be allowed to drink, drive, make noise, smoke in bed, or whatever felt most comfortable to me at the moment. I could equally well imagine wanting to be rescued in some way, even though rescuing never seems to work very well. I settled for taking a step back, trying to imagine myself as that person if they were in their right mind, and dealing with them that way.

One such neighbor decided to go for a drive while obviously very drunk. Fortunately the route from the garage to the street was a little tricky, with a couple of tight turns. I watched from my window as she managed to get her car hung up between the house and the fence, struggled for 5 or 10 minutes, and eventually gave up. Meanwhile I'd phoned the police to be on the lookout for her in case she did make it out of the driveway.

I can think of quite a few other cases where imagining myself as the other person in their right mind has led me to assert my boundaries and not let them get away with stuff that wasn't likely to benefit either of us.