Refine Your Work Life Balance by Setting Healthy Boundaries
 |
Free Download - Some Reality Testing Around Coaching By Molly Gordon |
Setting healthy boundaries is essential for a healthy work life balance. That sounds true, but what does it mean? What do healthy boundaries look like, and how can you know where and how to set them?
I notice a tendency among small business owners and free agents to think of boundaries as ways to keep something or someone out, as if they could achieve work life balance in this way. This emphasizes protection of their time, energy, and resources. This kind of boundary is a line in the sand. When a customer, colleague, or vendor crosses the line, an alarm goes off, signaling the business owner to say "No."
Because most owners want their businesses to be accessible and to offer excellent service, they are naturally conservative in setting this sort of boundary. After all, they want to say, "Welcome" to prospective customers and partners, not "Keep Out." As a result, they set boundaries at the last possible point to keep invaders at bay.
I've done this, by the way, so I know of what I speak. I know how confining this sort of boundary can be. There is no room to move. There is barely room to breathe. The longer this boundary stays in place -- even if no one ever tries to cross it -- the more confined, cramped and edgy those inside the boundary will be.
After working inside this boundary for a while, it is natural to become unbalanced, impatient, cranky, even resentful. It is uncomfortable inside this boundary, and it feels as though this is the fault of those pushy customers, colleagues, and vendors out there. After all, if it weren't for THEM, you'd be out in the fresh air.
But wait -- a client is not an invader. A vendor is not a spy. A business is not a castle on a hill, placed there for strategic advantage against enemy forces. Let's take a big breath and take another look at this business of setting boundaries.
What if boundaries were not last-ditch protections against marauders? What if you set them so that they were lovely, sturdy fences defining a spacious and resource-rich territory in which you can do your best work and enjoy your life at the same time? What if boundaries created a pasture rather than enclosing a cell?
Further, what if boundaries were designed to let in light and air? What if you could see out and others could see in? Working inside of these boundaries is quite a different experience. For one thing, there is plenty of room to move. When someone approaches your boundary, you have lots of choices about how to respond.
Maintaining these healthy boundaries feels entirely different, too. With what pride of ownership and delight in the scope of our pasture we walk the fence line. How pleasing it is to oil the latches on the gates, to replace broken posts, to trim the hedges.
Check in with your boundaries this week. First, notice what constitute the fence posts and gates in your business. Are they the hours that you work? The rates you charge? The terms you offer for special services? Get familiar with the structural elements you can use to build your beautiful fence and gate.
When you have identified those elements, look at where you have set them. Do your rates give you room to do your best work? Do your working arrangements give you breathing space? Examine your boundaries, and notice if they are giving you room to live and to do your best work or cramping your style. Experiment with moving your boundaries out a bit, not to keep your customers away, but to create a bigger space from which you can serve them wholeheartedly and well, maintaining a healthy work life balance.
* * *
Read more Molly Gordon's articles on work life balance written to help you change course without abandoning the destination and restore your equilibrium. Find out how you can improve your resilience and your hopefulness by acquiring solid positive thinking skills.
Refine Your Work Life Balance by Setting Healthy Boundaries - To learn more about this author, visit Molly Gordon's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
| Article Tags: |
 | |
 |
No article feedback found. |
| |
Leave Your Feedback |
 | |
| |||
George LudwigGeorge Ludwig is a recognized authority on sales strategy and peak performance psychology. An international speaker, trainer, and corporate consultant, he helps clients like Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, Northwestern Mutual, CIGNA, and numerous others improve sales force effectiveness and performance. Though it's George's strategies and processes that help corporations increase productivity and performance, it's his tremendous energy and dynamism that spark the transformation. Again and again, clients remark on his amazing ability to unleash human capacity and inspire men and women to break out of their comfort zones. The result is a whole new type of salesperson. His customized presentations teach achievers to make stunning advances in their lives. From helping salespeople realize cherished dreams to helping corporations exponentially accelerate revenue streams, George Ludwig leaves audiences and individuals empowered, emboldened, and clamoring for more. George is the best-selling author of Power Selling: Seven Strategies for Cracking the Sales Code and Wise Moves: 60 Quick Tips to Improve Your Position in Life & Business. - Visit George Ludwig's Website |
|||
Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is a best-selling author, top-rated speaker and thought leader on sales development. He is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
|||
|
To learn more about the Evan Elite Author Program please contact us. | |||
 | |
|  |
Subscribe to Molly's articles
 |
|
Shaboom - Life Could Be a Dream - Shaboom is our name and dreaming in all its manifestations is our work. Dreaming for the sake of innovation. Dreaming for the sake of beauty. Dreaming for the sake of meaning. Dreaming for the sake of life itself. Dreaming and living the dream of a life worth living, work worth doing.
|
|
 |
 | |
|
| |
 | |||||||
|
 | ||
 |
||
 |
||
 |
||
| ||
 |
| Have you written articles that would be of value to entrepreneurs? Become an expert on our site by publishing them! Expose yourself to a wide audience, drive more traffic to your website and get more sales! Click Here for details. |
|
|
 |
| Modeling the Masters: Learn the true secrets behind Walt Disney's business success factors & grow your company! Video produced by Phanta Media |
|
|
 |
|
Get advice & tips from famous business owners, new articles by entrepreneur experts, my latest website updates, & special sneak peaks at what's to come!
|
|
|
 Instant Yellow Pages Teaching to the Student Brain Strategic Plan Start Right High Quality Sales Leads |
|
 | ||
 |
Top 50 Business Plans
Top Business Plan Blogs | |
 |
Top Social Business Blogs
Top Social Entrepreneur Blogs | |
| ||
 | ||||
| ||||
|
 | ||||
| ||||
|
|
 | ||||
| ||||
|
 | ||||
| ||||
|
|
|
||||||||||||
 |
|
|
|
