Firm Foundations: Exploring Various Types of Personal Boundaries

You’ve recognized that you need to set boundaries in your life.  You need to protect your physical, mental, and emotional resources so you can focus on the things that are most important (including you).

I’ve found it helpful to use Terri Cole’s visual of your side of the street versus their side of the street.  Your boundaries are protecting what’s on your side of the street.  They aren’t trying to control what’s on their side of the street.  For example, when trying to protect your off-hours, we may be tempted to set a boundary that sounds like “don’t email me after hours,” but that’s trying to control other people’s behavior and their side of the street.  A more effective boundary, that’s completely on your side of the street is “I don’t check my email off hours.”
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Where do you start in setting boundaries?
I’ve found it helpful to give lots of examples of boundaries people have set.  These are starting points for you to borrow, modify, or give you ideas for where you can set boundaries to have the biggest impact on your life. 

Photo Credit: Anne Nygård Unsplash

Respecting your time and space
You can set boundaries to protect your work hours and non-work hours.

• I don’t check emails from 5pm to 8 am.
• I sent this email during my normal working hours, please respond to it during your normal working hours.
• Here is a SHORT list of acceptable reasons to call me while I’m at work
• I have time-blocked my day and 2-4 pm I’m working on a high-focus project.  I’m available to meet at 1 or 4:15.  
• While I’m on vacation, Susan will be available to help you.  
• I need 24 hours notice of any meeting added to my schedule.

You can set boundaries to create buffers and transitions in your day.

• I need 20 minutes when I get home to decompress, then I’d like to hear about your day.
• I don’t schedule meetings on Mondays or on Friday afternoons.
• I commit to a 50 minute meeting to protect transition time between meetings.

Respecting your priorities
You can set boundaries around the tasks you take on.

• I can get this done by the end of next week.
• If I add this task, what other task on my plate can I drop, delegate, or extend the deadline?
• My role is X, it does not include reminding you to get your work done.  
• I can see this task is urgent, but please explain to me the impact and importance of this task before I rearrange other items on my plate to get this done.  
• When I get home, I’ll set a timer and only do what chores I can get done in that amount of time.  

Protecting your priorities is about protecting your ability to spend your limited bandwidth on the things that are most important and most impactful in your life.  Remember: 

Not everything needs to be done.
Not everything needs to be done by you.
Not everything needs to be done with an A+ effort
Not everything needs to be done by its original deadline.  ​

• Can you get things off your plate by deciding they don't need to be done?
• Is there someone (or something) else that can take on all or some of this task?  Get creative here.  It could be a service like meal delivery or grocery pickup, it could be a person in your house or work, it could be a tool like calendar reminders or using ChatGPT to rewrite an email.  
• Try shooting for 80%.  Most people won’t notice a difference.  ​ 
• Many things have manufactured urgency.  

​Respecting your mental and emotional bandwidth 
Your mental and emotional bandwidth are limited resources.  When we engage in invisible labor, we are spending more mental and emotional bandwidth that is strictly required to simply execute a task.  Most articles on invisible labor (emotional labor and mental load) focus on invisible work at home done by women in cisgender relationships, but many people can relate to the experience of engaging in invisible labor.  

The goal in setting boundaries to protect mental and emotional bandwidth is to minimize the additional invisible labor we engage in, and decrease the amount of frustration we may experience.
For additional resources on addressing and redistributing mental load and invisible labor, check out Fair Play by Eve Rodsky (available in book, audiobook, playing cards, and documentary).  
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Boundaries to protect your mental and emotional bandwidth 

• Tell me what you want to see when I turn this into you? 
• What do you think I’m looking for when you turn this back into me?
  • These two examples decrease the frustration of going back and forth later because we weren’t clear in the beginning.  It also prevents us from doing extra work that wasn’t necessary, protecting our bandwidth for other priorities.  
• Look in 5 places before you ask me to find what you’re looking for.
• Are you looking for emotional support and validation or are you looking for help with solutions?
• Set limits on where you’re engaging in inefficient overwork.  After you send an email, are you rereading it multiple times?  After you’ve made a decision, are you spending a lot of time second-guessing yourself?  Are you filling your time with busywork that’s not affecting the quality of the product?

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In your journey towards establishing firm boundaries, remember that it's a process of self-care and self-respect. By prioritizing your well-being, you're better equipped to navigate life's challenges with resilience and grace.
What boundaries can you start setting now?


References
Cole, T. (2021). Boundary Boss: The Essential Guide to Talk True, Be Seen, and (Finally) Live Free. Sounds True.
Eatough, E. (January 4, 2022). The invisible workload that drags women down. BetterUp.
Rodsky, E. (2019). Fair Play: A Game-Changing Solution for When You Have Too Much to Do (and More Life to Live). Penguin Random House.

Do you want to learn more about boundaries?  Check out my series on boundaries here:

The Silent Language: What Your Boundaries (or Lack Thereof) Say
Respecting Your Space: The Art of Boundary Communication
​From Guilt to Grace: Navigating the weight of guilt in boundary setting.