A lack of healthy boundaries is a super common contributing factor to burnout. It makes perfect sense. If you continually take on too much, try to rescue others from their problems, or struggle to say “no”, you can easily wind up feeling completely overwhelmed and chronically stressed. Although we often think of boundaries in our relationship to others, an often neglected but just as important form of boundaries is those we set with ourselves. If you really struggle to assert yourself or set limits with others, this can be a great place to start. When you start setting and maintaining personal boundaries, you’ll start to build confidence in your ability to maintain them in your closest relationships.
So what boundaries can you start setting for yourself right now? Here are 5 examples that will help you manage stress and prevent burnout:
1.Set aside time for self-care and play
When life is busy, we often neglect to take care of ourselves at the most basic level, disregarding our needs for nourishing food, sleep, and hydration. Our culture often talks about neglecting these basic needs like a badge of honour. How often have you heard or said the following: “Who needs sleep?”, “I’ve been so busy I barely had time to eat!”, or “This is my fifth cup of coffee today” (often uttered with a tone of pride and self-sacrifice)? But forgetting to eat or drink and messing with your sleep routine puts you on the fast track to burnout town. These should be priority #1 - you’ve got to put your own oxygen mask on before you can help someone else with theirs.
During times of stress, it’s often the activities that bring us joy and relaxation that fall to the back burner as well. The reality is that these are the times we need these activities the most. Exercise, creative projects, and time with loved ones all help our bodies release the stress we’ve accumulated throughout the day and show our nervous system that the world is a safe place. This can help bring us out of the fight or flight state we get trapped in when feeling chronically stressed. Not to mention, it’s often these activities that bring us meaning and fulfillment, and remind us that life is worth living.
What’s the antidote to letting these activities fall by the wayside the instant things get busy? Schedule them into your calendar, ideally on a daily basis. You experience stress on a daily basis, so you need activities to clear that stress on a daily basis too. Treat these scheduled activities with the same importance that you would an appointment with your doctor, a big exam, or your kid’s dance recital. You wouldn’t just decide to not show up to these events, so you shouldn’t no-show your ‘you time’ either. Remember, this doesn’t make you selfish. You’ll be able to be a more patient, compassionate partner, parent, friend, or child when you’ve fulfilled your own needs.
2. Release comparisons
It’s human nature to compare. We’ve evolved to size ourselves up to others, to see if we fit in or measure up to those around us. This made sense for our ancestors who depended on belonging to a tribe for their survival. But in today’s world, where we’re constantly exposed to the highlight reels of other’s lives through social media, we tend to base these comparisons off unrealistic standards and curated posts that don’t show the full story.
Constantly comparing ourselves to others’ lives - the trips they go on, the houses they own, the fancy jobs they work in - can make us feel like we’re running on a hamster wheel, constantly hustling and seeking more but never finding the happiness we’re looking for. It can be totally crippling. One of the easiest ways to avoid this is by limiting your social media use: try unfollowing or muting those who trigger negative comparisons and using an App blocker like Stay Focused to put formal limits on your use (for example, not using social media in the morning/before bed or limiting to 30 mins a day).
Although we can put strategies in place to minimize comparison, we can never avoid it completely. So when comparison rears its ugly head, try acknowledging what your mind is doing, and gently bringing yourself back to the present and your values. You can even try one of my favourite strategies of ‘thanking the mind’: “thank you mind, for trying to motivate me and do what it takes to belong, but I’ve got this. I’m going to focus on what’s within my control right now to bring more peace and fulfillment in my life”.
3. Prioritizing work-life balance
Stressful, emotionally draining work is one of the primary causes of burnout, so work boundaries are key. I always recommend a way of transitioning from work to home, especially for those who actually work from home. This might mean shutting the door to your office space (or if your office space doubles as your bedroom or living room, literally cover up your computer), changing your clothes, or going for a walk to shake off the day. Other examples of work boundaries include shutting down your work laptop after hours, keeping your work email off your personal phone, or not answering work-related calls during certain hours.
I know what many of you are thinking - “but I’m a business owner and need to be accessible to my staff!”. I hear you. Although I don’t manage staff, I do run my private practice and understand the pressure to feel like you have to be accessible and responsive at all times in order to succeed. But I encourage you to challenge those assumptions. Does that employee truly need a response at 10pm, or can it wait until tomorrow? Will the business burn down if you take a few days of vacation, or will people learn to either answer their questions independently or wait until your return? Consider that by setting healthy work boundaries, you’re modelling the same for your staff, and actually fostering more respect from customers/clients (at least the kinds of customers and clients you want to keep!).
Another common concern voiced around work boundaries is “my boss would kill me if I didn’t respond to their call/email immediately, even after my formal working hours”. Have you had a discussion with your leadership about how valuable time away from work is for your well-being and productivity? If not, it might be worth doing so. If you have and they didn’t respect your boundaries, or if you fear retribution for expressing these needs, it’s time to look for a new job.
4. Live by your values
Values are your desired way of behaving on an ongoing basis - what you want to stand for, how you want to show up in the world, and how you want to treat yourself and others. Burnout can arise when we’re living out of alignment with our values. This might look like working in a job that feels purposeless or unappreciated, or neglecting your values of adventure and curiosity by doing the exact same thing day in and day out. You'll want to consider ways you can more closely live by your values to feel more fulfilled. This could mean changing jobs to something that more closely aligns with your passions or finding meaning within your current job. It could also look like intentionally planning in more activities outside of work that challenge you, help you grow, or allow you to demonstrate values like contribution, fun, or learning.
Most often in my practice, I see clients with burnout who are incredibly empathetic and caring towards others in their life. They’ll drop everything to help a family member in need and bend over backwards to please their partners, kids, siblings, or parents. But they don’t extend their values of kindness, generosity, and compassion toward themselves. Values go both ways - it’s just as important that you treat yourself with the same care and compassion that you treat others. If you don’t, you guessed it, you’ll burn out, and can get caught up in resentment.
5. Create a spending plan
On top of work stress, financial stress is another major cause of burnout. When you’re living in scarcity and in constant fear of paying the bills, it’s pretty difficult to be present and enjoy your life. The simplest way to feel more in control of your personal finances is to start tracking your income and spending and to create a realistic spending plan that focuses on areas of your life that bring you the most joy and fulfillment while also planning for the future. I’m a huge fan of my friend Friggin Finances’ Spending Tracker and Ramit Sethi’s Conscious Spending Plan because they’re super simple and user-friendly.
Creating and sticking to a spending plan is difficult at first, especially if you’re accustomed to impulsive spending or shopping to fill a void. Be gentle with yourself as you make these changes - we’re looking for progress, not perfection. If you’ve created a spending plan that’s realistic and puts the focus on things or activities that you truly love, it shouldn’t feel like total deprivation. There may be some short-term sacrifices, but the long-term rewards, including lower financial stress and more peace of mind, will be well worth it.
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