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Refine Your Work Life Balance
by Setting Healthy Boundaries
by Molly Gordon, MCC
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.
* * *
 Learn
more about Authentic Promotion - a comprehensive small
business marketing resource that turns marketing and self promotion into
a path of increasing self-awareness, authenticity, and right livelihood.
In particular, the strategies of maintaining your work-life
balance you learn to apply will build the solid foundation for your
authentic prosperity as an entrepreneur.
* * *
Contact an acknowledged expert
on work-life balance issues for small business owners Molly Gordon at:
Shaboom Inc. Life could be a dream…
PO Box 195
Suquamish, WA 98392-0195
mgordon@authenticpromotion.com
As a business coach and small
business marketing consultant, Molly Gordon, MCC, is available in Greater
Seattle Area and internationally |
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