Where is your Boundary Line?

No one respects the invisible: whether in romances, business or friendships, one needs to regularly examine his or her boundary lines.

Business owners are great examples of this, especially solo entrepreneurs. Depending on the nature of their business, new entrepreneurs want to help EVERYONE! (Entrepreneurship 101: EVERYONE is not your client. If you think they are, you will go broke and fast!) You don’t have the stamina to help EVERYONE and EVERYONE doesn’t need your help. Take it from big business: there are a few companies with an open 24 hours policy, but they have enough sense to organize several different work teams and shifts.

There are times you simply must turn off the “phone lines/email” and display the “Closed” sign. Don’t worry about whether someone will be hurt or angry because “you’re not available when he or she NEEDED you”. I often provide this analogy, regardless of the type of relationship:

If you drop dead tomorrow, will that person’s need get met? Is there someone else that he or she can turn to in order to find a solution to the problem?

If your answer is Yes, which I cannot think of any situation where 9 times out of 10 the response isn’t Yes, then put on your Big Girl or Boy Pants and draw your boundary line. It’s okay; sometimes people have become overly dependent on you and need to be weaned off.

Another one of my personal mantras that my best selling book, Sometimes all you Have is Happy, is founded on: “Sometimes you can’t save everyone. If you have to choose between them or you, save yourself first.”