648 - Boundaries Aren’t Mean - They’re Necessary: How to Stop Over-Giving in Business

Welcome to the Next Level Life podcast with Christine Corcoran. This podcast is made for the powerhouse business women who are ready to ignite their fullest potential. This is where we will dive deep into the mindset breakthroughs and sprinkle in some kick up the butt motivation so you can scale your business with confidence and clarity. Whether you're craving more income, impact or inspiration, this podcast will be your ultimate resource for all things next level. Listen in as we have authentic conversations with game changing female entrepreneurs as we reveal the secrets of what it takes to rise and thrive. So go ahead, ignite your inner fire and let's get you taking massive aligned action. Are you ready to elevate? Let's go. Hey. Hey. Welcome back to the podcast. Thank you so much for tuning in. I hope that you're doing really well. I am working on quite a few different things behind the scenes, super, super exciting things that I want to bring to you. And to do that, setting clear boundaries and having really great boundaries for yourself is so incredibly important. When you're working on multiple things. You're working with clients, you're working on programs, you're working on events, you're working on launching whatever it is that you're launching, I want you to know that I get how it feels. It can feel like you're being pulled in so many different directions. And when it comes to leveling up in your business and it comes to creating next level results and being the person that everyone comes to and says, wow, you're always doing so much, there's always so much happening and you've got really cool stuff happening and you're sharing all these new things and it's like, yeah, for that to happen, I have to have really great boundaries. And boundaries weren't a strong thing that I had in place for very long in my business because I am definitely a recovering people pleaser. It has been part of who I've been for a really long time. I was a rescuer. I would help so many people and I would get value from helping people. I would get my needs met. Like I was doing a good job. I was helping others and having a positive impact by giving, giving, giving and over giving and people pleasing. And it's definitely been a pattern that I've had to work on and uncover where it came from. It definitely came from relationships that I had as a kid and what I was modeled as. Well from my mom. She modeled, she was very much, still is very much a people pleaser and gives and gives and gives so much of herself. And I saw that it was modeled to me. And then I started doing it. I did it at a very young age. I was helping friends and family really from a young age. And it wasn't until I really started my business that I recognized that it was a pattern that could lead to burnout and really was not serving me in so many different ways. And so working through the people pleasing, learning to say no when I really wanted to say no, and really learning to tune in with what was important to me and not always put others first and to grow and scale my business. Putting boundaries in place in so many different areas of my business. And I'll talk about all the different areas that I put boundaries in place, not only with myself, but with others, with family, with friends, with clients, with every, with my team, like everything. If I don't put those boundaries in place, then we're literally letting everybody else walk all over us. And so for me to give my best of myself to my clients, for me to give the best of myself to my business, I also have to have really good boundaries with myself. Right? And so I want to talk to you about this and how you go about doing this. Because over giving is most likely causing your progress to slow down and the people pleasing and the over giving is most likely or being even just accessible too much is most likely causing you to again put everyone else's needs above your own, put your business's needs last and that will impact your growth. I'm so blessed to have been able to create a business where I have incredible clients and have really values aligned clients and have great groups that I get to work with. That gives me the space and the time to really work on other projects within my business. And that fuels me to be a better coach. It fuels me to be able to really serve my clients in a really high level because I'm out there in the trenches creating new things, putting it out into the world, testing and measuring it all in order for them to also learn from my experience. So this did not come along very easily. It was definitely been a lesson and a learning and a releasing of old behaviors and old patterns that weren't serving me. But I didn't know any other way. And I remember even having to learn how to say no in a way that felt kind, in a way that felt okay. Because I was so scared of disappointing people. I was so scared of, you know, letting people try and figure it out on their own when I knew I could help. And same thing with like pricing and the same thing with you Know, being accessible to clients 247 and recognizing, like, I actually wasn't actually helping if I was accessible 24 7. Because then they would learn to never actually ask themselves what the answer would be. They would always ask me instead of actually going, oh, hang on a minute. What solution could I bring to the table here? Or, how would I handle this? And so if we're always accessible, we're creating codependent relationships with our clients, with that in our. Within our business. And so sometimes you need to recognize what boundaries you need to put in place in order for you to execute well. So the first things first is recognizing that boundaries, when set in a kind and courteous and polite way, they're not mean. Boundaries are not mean. They're so necessary, like, incredibly necessary. In order for you to scale your business, in order for you to have your sanity, in order for you to rest, in order for you to be able to take care of yourself and take care of your family. Like, in order for you to enjoy your business, boundaries are paramount. So the first thing you need to always do is check in with, like, where are my boundaries are weak? Where am I laxing on my boundaries? And is that with myself or is it with others? So that's the first indicator we need to start there. Like, is it with others or was it. Is it with ourselves? Because for me, at first it was with others. I found it really difficult to say no. I found it really difficult to communicate when I wasn't available. I found it really, like, really hard to even communicate that I was taking a holiday, like, being so easily accessible. And I think that one of the things like social media has done for us as well, and obviously the world of technology that we live in now, it can feel really hard to set a boundary. And so I've practiced this over the last couple of years, and I feel like I've gotten really good at it, that I'm not creating codependent relationships anymore with my clients. I'm also creating really, really clear boundaries to give me the space to also not feel guilty when I'm working on other things because my clients have access to me via voxer. And then I also use Slack for my masterminds, and they can message me at any time. But if I'm in there checking it all the time, if I've got my notifications dinging, if even my notifications show up on my phone while I'm working on other things, it's pulling me in so many different directions, it's draining my energy. And I'm not able to truly give in the way that I want to give or serve in the way that I want to serve. And so I recognized that this was where my boundaries were laxing was with when it came to clients. And so that came back to a mindset of where my value was lying. Your value isn't in your availability. I really want you to get this. If this is something that's showing up for you, your value doesn't lie in your availability. Your value lies. Depending on what it is that you do, however you communicate that value, it might actually be in your knowledge, your expertise, right? It might be in the way that you call a client to come into their own, to be able to activate something within themselves and see their own light, their own courage, their own confidence. It may be in a deliverable that you're creating. Right? And if you're accessible 24, 7, you're most likely not going to be giving the best of yourself because your energy is being dragged in so many different directions. So we want to recognize that if you're always accessible, you're most likely going to get drained and burn out. And your value does not lie in just being accessible. Okay? You want to recognize that your clients are sovereign human beings that have been able to take care of themselves their entire lives. And they are capable because if underlying the people pleasing you believe that you are better than others, or if you believe that you can do a better job, or if you believe that you are more capable than they are, then you're actually judging their ability to handle their own problems. And so when you believe that, then you're most likely going to be someone that is like, let me help you, let me help you, let me help you. But you want to recognize like there's part of what you do, no matter what it is that you do, there's a part of what you do that ideally you want to leave your clients believing in themselves just a little bit more after they've worked with you. And so I recognize this massively as a coach, that if I was always accessible 24, 7, then I was never giving my clients space to come up with their own solutions. I was never encouraging them to find their own solutions because I was getting validation and significance out of responding to their messages when really a coach, a really great coach asked the right questions in order for the client to come up with their own solutions, not give the solution every single time. So what you think about this for your business? What belief system do you have that's causing you to people please because there's most likely something underneath that that's causing you to believe that you have to be accessible. Available, you know, answer their questions, whatever it might be. And so when we uncover that, and we recognize that by you being so accessible, you're treating people, you're teaching people how to treat you. So that was another really big thing that I needed to adopt, was recognizing like if I'm not happy with how I'm being treated, so if I'm feeling either overworked, underappreciated, underpaid, like anything like that, that's negative. We want to identify that it's actually not your client's fault, it's your fault for not having great boundaries. So putting boundaries in place to prevent yourself from over giving, to prevent yourself from being too accessible, to prevent yourself from draining your own energy, it's taking back your own responsibility with it. So boundaries are incredibly necessary in order for you to be able to be great at what you do, to be able to give the best of yourself to your clients. Plus in order for you to grow. If your business isn't growing, it's most likely because you're leaking energy in so many different areas, because your boundaries aren't great. So let me talk about how to go about setting these boundaries, starting with yourself. We want to ask ourselves, what are our boundaries? What are our non negotiables? So you may have boundaries around the hours that you work within your business, you may have boundaries about the areas that you work in your business. Right. So you might recognize that there's. You work really well from an office, that's great. For me, I have an office, I need to close my door so when I finished I can close it away. I need to be able to have a compartmentalization between life and business. And otherwise I would work all the time, like all the time, because I love it, I love what I do and I would absolutely work all the time. But I recognize that that's not good for my mental health, it's not good for my socialization, it's not good for my life if I'm always working. So we want to recognize that what are your boundaries? And you may have different elements that you need to explore with this because your boundaries that will serve you to be the best version of yourself in your business is what I always come back to. So for instance, having certain work hours works really well for me. Getting dressed for work properly, like I do my hair and my makeup and I get dressed in outfits that I want to go to the office. In otherwise, if I end up going to the office in trackies or in something too relaxed, I don't. I'm not very productive. I just know that doesn't serve me. So I get dressed for work. I ensure that I have a really good routine, so I take care of myself in the morning. So I'm doing a meditation before work. I am not rushing to my desk. I also really want to make sure that I'm moving my body throughout the week. That will actually serve my energy levels as well to be the best version of myself and to be the best coach. Because without my energy, I'm not great. And so. And I'm getting better at this. And I feel like it's something that I even need to improve on even more because I sometimes will put work above movement. And so I'll find myself working into the evening, six to seven o' clock at night, because I'm so engrossed in something that I'm working on that I forget that I haven't been to the gym or I haven't been out for a walk. And so I'm trying to improve that area. And that's where my boundaries are laxing at the moment. And so it is a work in progress. I'm just gonna highlight this. It's not like you set boundaries and you're perfect with it. Boundaries are one of those things that you actually need to set again and again and again, especially with others. With other people, if you've been one way a certain. For a certain period of time, they have learned that's how they treat you. And they've learned that you are accessible and available in that way. So when you set boundaries with clients, you need to be conscious that you may need to have to set them again and again, Especially if you've been one way and you just go and change it on them so they'll be like, well, that's not normal. I'll just go back to how I've normally treated her and expect the same way. Right. So you may need to reset those boundaries again and again. So one thing I really want to say about boundaries and communicating boundaries is that the boundary is actually more about you and the way that you will behave and not about the other person. So this is where people get a little bit stuck because we feel like sometimes if a boundary is being enforced, we can be mean the way that we set the boundary. If you have been burnt out, if you have your boundaries have been pushed so much, you can get to the point where you're literally at your wits end. And then you set a boundary from a place of frustration or exhaustion, which is it just never comes across good. Right? And it often comes across as a judgment to the other person. Whereas boundaries are more about you and how you're going to behave and how others should treat you and how they should interact with you and communicate with you. And you can do this in a kind way. Now the best way to set boundaries is in the beginning of a relationship. Client relationship, co working relationship, partner relationship, team member relationship. Like, the more that you can set them at the beginning, the better it will be. Because if you start off one way and then treat someone for six months one way and you try to change it, it will take a little bit longer. Change that because they've learned to experience and interact with you in a certain way for a period of time. So first things first, you want to set it as early on in the relationship as possible. You want to communicate boundaries in a way that helps them understand how to get the best out of working with you. So usually I will communicate this right up front. So for instance, I will communicate that clients are able to message in the slack channels or in my voxer channels and they need to keep their voice messages under 2 minutes. Otherwise their voice messages sometimes can go on for too long. And I ended up spending six hours on voxer every day. So I communicate the length of time they're allowed to voice message. Now I'm not going to. If they do 2 minutes and 50 seconds, I'm not going to be like this has to be kept back down to two minutes. No, I'm not like that. But when I'm setting the boundary at the beginning of the relationship, people understand it and they'll often keep their own boundary with it too. So if I do this often, what happens is in the slack channel, the people will be like, oh my God, I'm so sorry, I went over two minutes. I won't do that again next time. I'm like, great. So you're aware of the boundary. If they do it multiple times, I will just politely and kindly just share and remind them. Hey, remember when you first got started, I shared with you that the voice messages need to be kept ideally under two minutes. It's okay, I know enough about your business now. You don't have to give me too much backstory. So if there's any further clarification I need, I'll ask the question. So it's okay. You can just jump in and share the question or the area of business that you need support with and I will help you. And that usually works really well. So setting boundaries right from the beginning and you're communicating up front, how do they get the best out of working with you? So you need to set boundaries around timelines, around communication, especially communication. How are you going to communicate with them? What's the best channel? What's the best time of day, when are you available? How often they expect to hear from you? Like everything, like go through the details of it as much as you possibly can. So then they know how to communicate with you. You may need to set boundaries around pricing or around structured of payment plans. Communicate that up front. You need to communicate certain scenarios. So if you recognize, like with your type of clients that you work with, maybe there's challenges that come along and if you notice that people, you know, kind of step away instead of actually asking for help, you need to maybe communicate like, hey, I'm not going to know that you're having trouble unless you communicate it. So it's so important that you jump in and you share a message and let us know where you're at no matter what is happening for you. Because that way I can help you further. But if you just go quiet, I'm not going to treat you like a child. I'm not going to be like, hey, it's important that you jump in here and share. I'm not your mom. It's so important that you utilize this service and utilize the access to me in the way that's going to best serve you. So I want you to know, like, it's so important that you check in with yourself on a regular basis to be like, am I asking for questions? Am I asking for support? Am I getting what I need my needs met? Because if not, then I need to actually ask because I'm not going to be treated like a child in this container. So we want to recognize, like any challenges that will come up for clients and how you communicate what to do in those situations. If you communicate the behaviors, clients get it and then they love that you've done that. So they know exactly how to respond and how to interact and how to get the most out of it. The same thing with like utilizing resources. So if they've got something else that you can that you give them, make sure that you communicate how to use that best. Same thing with payment terms. Same thing if they have challenges. And then lastly, I would just communicate if anything goes wrong. So how will you react and how will you behave if something doesn't work out? So for instance, you might want to communicate like if this happens, then this is actually what will happen. Right? So if we have anyone that's disrespectful within the group and I notice any disrespectful behavior towards other members, this is how I will handle it. You will get a private message from me and you'll be asked to adhere to the values and expectations of the community. And if again you continue to express that behavior, then you will be removed from the group. Right. So you're sharing consequences but you're not judging. I think that's one of the biggest things. If you can always bring it back to the behavior, how you will respond to that behavior and what behavior will be expected, then people understand how to behave. But if you're like, but if you're being really judgy, if you're being really unkind and you're doing these things that I'm going to tell you that you've got to stop doing that. Right? We're not treating people like children. We don't have to reprimand them in that way. You just communicate the boundaries. If you don't adhere to these respectful boundaries that we've set in place for the community, you will be asked to improve on your behaviors. If not, if that doesn't happen, then you will be removed. The consequences, you will be removed. Right. So we want to do it in professional language. We want to do it in a way that's kind and polite and courteous and clearly articulate the boundary. Right? Same thing with my one to one clients. I have voxer access and I let them know that they can absolutely message me. Actually I say with them because they might not my one on ones, they can message me anytime. But my app switches off at 6pm every day and it also doesn't turn back on until 9am the next day. So you can message me, but you will not expect a response from me until it's within work hours Monday to Friday. And I respect your boundaries for your weekend. I expect you to take a weekend. And so then you will not have. You will be able to message me, but just know that I'll respond to you when I get back to work on Monday. Okay? So I communicate the boundaries straight up. Otherwise people just don't know how to get the best out of working with you. So that's really, really important. Now if you have anyone that doesn't adhere to those, then again you can bring them back to the conversation that you originally had. And I'm a big believer of doing it in two ways. One, in either a contract or terms and conditions that they've signed and secondly, verbally, because if you haven't communicated it verbally, you don't know whether they've read the terms and conditions. So I want communication, I want commitment, they're going to adhere to that. So usually in my first coaching session where I have with a client, I go through the boundaries and the same thing with my welcome ceremonies and my containers, I go through the boundaries so that people know exactly what to expect and how to behave in these containers. So I want you to identify like where are you leaking your most energy and where do you need to set a clearer boundary? Now you might have some team members. You need to also communicate boundaries. So again, the first thing to do is that beginning of that relationship is to set clear boundaries. If that hasn't happened, then I would go back and set clear boundaries. And again you focus on yourself, not on them. So when you will respond, how you will communicate, what expectation you have around communication, how you will respond to feedback, how you will give feedback, get them on board, if that's okay, has that worked for them? Are they happy to receive feedback in that way? More that you can get buy in. And that is even better communicating when things go wrong. So again, if you communicate it right from the beginning, then when things don't go to plan, you, you can come back to them and communicate like, hey, remember how we had that conversation? And this was really important. This is one of the top values of working with me was integrity. And as part of that integrity piece, it's important that you communicate any mistakes that are made or you communicate if timelines have been changed, timeframes have been changed. So recently when we had this timeline set out, I recognized, I noticed that this wasn't completed by the set date. Can you explain to me what happened there and also why you didn't feel comfortable sharing with me that the timeframe had changed. We want to understand so we can improve our boundaries and improve our communication because we're working with human beings. So, so important that you set really clear boundaries with your team as well, so that it nurtures and keeps a relationship strong. Because that's at the end of the day what boundaries are. They keep the relationship strong. And if you really want to have great relationships, then you need to have good boundaries in place. That then brings me to the last piece which is again kind of back around doing a circle here, back around to yourself, having boundaries with yourself and your expectations and your non negotiables So I like to set clear boundaries in order for myself, in order for me to give myself the space to work on really important projects. So if I didn't have those boundaries in place with clients and my team, I most likely would be so stressed about getting back to them every time they messaged to figure out that I had everything ready for them. And like, I would be in a reactive state majority of the time. But because I have these clear boundaries in place, I can spend hours within my business working on these projects that I want to bring to life and know that when I get back to them, it's okay. So, for instance, like in my containers, I let them know that I ideally will get back to them within the 24 hours of them putting a message in Slack, right? Usually within 24 hours. That gives me heaps of time to be working on a project and still get back to them within the day. I always get feedback in my containers that they're so blown away by my quick response and how it's so like the feedback is so great in such a short period of time so they can keep building on the momentum that they're creating. And I love that I keep my containers in a small number so I can do that. Right, because that's important to me. I know what it feels like to be in a container and then people not get back to you within days. And then you're like, I was working on this three days ago and now you're getting back to me and it slows my progress. That used to be really frustrating me. And so for me, I'm like, no, no. I want to keep my containers at a state where I can handle the questions that are coming through. And then I also let them know that if they're submitting anything for review, so they want me to look at something to give feedback. I let them know that I'll get back to them within 48 hours. Now that gives me time to make sure that I'm looking at what they've shared with me in a really good head state. So the last thing that I want to do is if they send a message through at 4 o' clock and they want me to look at something and give proper feedback, like detailed feedback. If I had the expectation on myself that I have to get the back to them straight away, then I probably sit there for that last hour of the, of the day trying to get it out, trying to work on it, when it probably wouldn't be my best feedback because I'm tired at the end of the day, and my brain might be wiped by that time. So I say 48 hours so that I've got myself enough space to be able to look at everything properly, give proper feedback. So then I give myself even space. So I might look at it then, but then I won't respond. I'll go back first thing in the morning when I'm fresh, look at it again, and then see if there's any other feedback that I want to give. And I find that works really, really well within my clients and containers. So figuring out like, and recognizing that not everyone needs feedback or a response like that they don't need to hear from you within the next 15 minutes. Right. They're most likely busy business owners or they're most likely busy in their lives. They're not expecting you to get back within 15 minutes. And if they are, it's most likely because you have not set and communicated your boundaries. So come back to boundaries. Boundaries are what keep the relationship strong. And it also helps you, gives you space to actually work on things that are important. So by not having that expectation that I have to get back so quickly, I can spend a good hour deep in a project that I'm working on and then come back to Slack and spend a good 15, 20, 15, 20 minutes. Getting back to all the messages and still be like, this still blows my clients away. They're still like, wow, I can't believe you got back to me so fast. But I still made them wait an hour, right? An hour is no big deal. And so. And neither is 24 hours. And I think sometimes we just have such a high expectation because we're so accessible through social media and through all the channels. We think that people expect that we're going to get back to them within minutes. But if you do that, you create the expectation that you will. So just be conscious of that. Because if you are doing that, you're literally setting up your clients to be codependent, and that's not going to serve them. It's not going to serve you in the long run. So if you want to stop over giving in business, it starts by setting clear boundaries and recognizing where your value lies. Your value does not lie in being accessible. Your value lies in your expertise, your coaching, or your deliverables, whatever it is that you do. So trust that you're going to need to have time and energy to focus on that, to, to deliver really good value. And if you're just being reactive, you're not going to be giving the best response. So I hope that you've really benefited from this episode and I hope that you take the time to really unpack. If you do have an over giving or people pleasing or saver kind of energy that you take the time to unpack it and figure out where it came from so you can rewire it. This is what I do with my clients, especially Next Level Mastermind. We explore all of these boundary pieces and all the energy leaks and everything that's preventing you from going to the next level. I'm currently in enrollment for the next round, so if you would like to work on this and you would like to explore how you can get your time back and you can get your sanity back and make more income and impact, then definitely check out the link in the show notes, come and have a chat with me and let's see if the Next Level Mastermind will be the perfect fit for your next level. All right, lovely. Enjoy the rest of your day and I'll speak to you soon. Thank you for listening. And if you found any value out of this episode, make sure you hit the follow button so you get access to the episode episodes as soon as they are live. And make sure you come hang out with me on Instagram. You can find me at. Christine Corcoran Underscore Coach. Have an incredible week.