The major 5 areas to set boundaries for are work, your relationship, friends, family and personal time.

For each of you, these areas will look a little differently so it’s important to sit down and really evaluate each area of your life and create boundaries that make sense for you and ultimately help you get closer to whatever personal or career goals you have for yourself.

When it comes to work, it can be hard to determine what boundaries are needed because you have a variety of variables to look at. What type of work do you do? What is your work setting like? What is your position? Who do you have to communicate with in order to do your job? What are the hours like? What is your income? Some of you may be working more than 1 job so it can get even harder.

Whatever your position, look at creating boundaries within these areas:-Co-workers
- Clients or Customers
- Your Time

With your friends/family:
I’m going to address friends and family at the same time because they pretty much fall in the same boat. Your friends and family are the people you love and care about the most. So it’s safe to say, they will consume a good amount of your time. Nothing is wrong with that, as long as you have boundaries in place.

You never want to pour so much out of your cup that you have nothing left to give yourself. You also don’t want to be the person who is constantly taking from someone else either. There should be a balance.

We all have those 2-3 people who we know we can talk to when we’re going through things and that’s good to have. Just be mindful of how much you are requesting of someone and vise versa.

Something that comes to mind when I think of boundaries with friends and family is the information you disclose about your significant other.

Your relationship is your business and many of the things you go through with your partner should stay between you and your partner, especially if you’re married. However, I do think outside council is good to have every now and then. My advice is this, if you’re married, find a married friend who could be your support friend. If you’re dating, have a friend who is also in a relationship as a listening ear, and if you’re single, talk to you whoever you please.

I hate when girls who are in relationships go to their single friends for advice. Not saying that your single friends can’t have good advice it’s just wise to receive a council that can relate to your situation and properly guides you because they are in a similar or better boat than you.

Relationships within your friend circle or family can also get a little complicated when people tell you their business. So another boundary to think about is gossip. You should have an expectation for your friends and family not to share your business, just as they wouldn’t want you to share theirs.

Your Personal Time:
My absolute favorite! We kind of talked about this in each of the other areas and it’s because your personal time is valuable!

Set limits and boundaries to the things you say “yes” to and the things you say “no” to. This is huge with creating balance in your life. If you haven’t read my blog post on “the power of saying no” definitely check it out! I go into detail about determining your yes and no items and ways to politely turn things down and master the art of saying “no”.

Whenever we overextend ourselves to others, we are ultimately depriving ourselves of “me time”. When this happens too much, we are left with an empty cup and nothing else left to give to the people we love. This is the cause of imbalance, stress, and anxiety.

Set clear boundaries and commit to a schedule that allows you to give a generous amount of time and effort to yourself and the people and things you care about most.