How To Set Boundaries in Your Personal and Professional Life

1. Intro: Welcome to the course how to set boundaries and cones Tucker, I'm a CEO entrepreneur and kinda crater focused on helping people become better humans. I'm obsessed with big ideas, taking action, and taking personal responsibility for life today is one of those examples of personal responsibility being so important to getting what you want out of life. If you don't set boundaries for yourself and communicate those to those around you, people will take advantage of you and you will suffer and more ways than one. This is very much a mindsets, comes a time to develop this. I'm going to give you some big ideas for thinking about this and then developing strategies on your own. Let's get right to it. 2. Values and Principles: First most important thing about setting boundaries is being truthful and honest with everybody around you. That means you can't avoid upsetting people. You can't worry too much about what the response is going to be other than at least controlling how you deliver, what you need to deliver. They say that most communication is a result of how you say things, not what you say. So if you approached people with a compassionate, empathetic perspective, they will probably receive what you're going to tell them pretty well if you come out them aggressively or you accuse them and try to make them feel bad or put them on the defensive, they're going to respond exactly the same back to you. So the key is talking about you and what you will, will not accept. Rather than saying, I don't want you to do that anymore. When you do that, it does this, whatever. It depends on who you're talking to, some people that you have really good relationship with and that can receive critical feedback. You can potentially do that with them. But what I've found is that generally people just don't want to be told things like that. Part of their brain shuts off. The part that doesn't want to hear these things. The part that doesn't want cognitive dissonance or pain to the ego in any way, you're much better off becoming very settled in what you want as a person and what values you're going to live your life by, and then communicating those to others. Now, this doesn't always mean that you bluntly come out and say a lot of times, you might have to do things like we recommend in the course later. Certain tips and tricks for changing the conversation and things like that. But the foundation is always coming back to you. What will you accept? What are your standards, what are your values? Because that directs how you interact with people. And over time, you will interact with people in a way to which they will respect what you want and who you are. And those that don't, what kind of filter themselves out of your life, which is a good thing. The most important thing, that foundation is to have your principles and your values down so that you can then communicate what you will, will not accept in your life. 3. Give immediate feedback: The most obvious way to do this is to give immediate feedback in real time. Meaning, don't take somebody later, don't call them later. Don't say, Hey, last week you said or did this. Now, if you can't deliver the feedback in a non-confrontational way or non-emotional way, then maybe you do want to approach this later and kind of sit somebody down and be very calm and then communicate that way. For me, my style is generally to try to offer feedback, try to offer it in a playful way, or just ask clarifying questions to try to almost get them to realize that they shouldn't be taking this line, are doing this thing. Sometimes I just try to be like, that's not cool, don't do that or whatever. You kinda have to understand your personality and you have the definitely practice different means of communicating this. Some people can use sarcasm, some people can use straight up jokes and laugh about it. Some people come off as serious and so they have to be very, very measured and how they give feedback. But generally, you want to, in real time give feedback to people based on things are doing and saying. Sometimes it could even be body language return away from someone or you make it obvious you don't really want to talk about this or whatever. I prefer to just straight up say it and communicate that because humans can be, we can misinterpret things and we can be blind to the body language right in front of us. Start practicing ways to give immediate feedback to people about what is okay and what's not okay. 4. Change the subject: This is an easy way to do this. And over time, if you're spraying on time or somebody, they'll kinda get the tune. If you change the subject every time somebody starts coming at you with something or other gossiping or they're being negative or they're complaining. And you just strip change subjects. You don't even have to be obvious, that's what you're doing. You can kinda like, you know, nod your head, let them talk, whatever. And then at a stopping point, B, like, you know, last week I was thinking that this thing or whatever, or that's a good idea, we should do that literally just give me a 180. It could be related to the topic. It can be whatever you want, but it should be done in a way that kind of catch them off guard so they don't really realize you're doing that. And over time subconsciously for most people, they'll just not bring those things up to you anymore. And this is one of those, this is one of those habits where when you adopt it, you realize how powerful it actually is. Like most people go through life and they don't realize how much power they have to actually shape their own reality. Instead, they just are passive receivers of the things around them. Instead of dictating what they want and saying what they want and what they need and going after it. So much of the relationships in your life can be dictated rather than received. Changing the subject is one good way to do that. 5. Know your audience: This is a combination of changing the subject, but also giving feedback and real-time. Now, you have to know your audience. Some people are hypersensitive. You can't say anything to them. You have to be very, very subtle beat around the bush. Some people you get to shred up say, Hey, I don't wanna, we wanna talk about this. Let's talk about some else. In fact, most people should be able to receive that feedback and you say it calmly, they should be able to receive. That doesn't always mean they will. And you can always add a statement on the end. Like, I just don't like gossiping or I don't want to talk about people for not here. Or I much prefer to talk about ideas or things are something other than people in their lives or whatever, whatever the flavor is for you and how you want to communicate this. So much of the negativity and the gossip and the drama that comes from interpersonal relationships is easily dropped out of your life. If you do simple things like this, change the subject, slash, give feedback. Just say, I don't want to talk about that. Let's talk about something else. That's it. It's amazing how powerful that is and what's equally amazing is how few people actually use it. They feel so afraid to give people feedback there, so passive in their discussions in relationships that they just don't even tell people. And the thing is, most people are very malleable. They're very understanding, they're very empathetic. They will literally respect your wishes if you tell them what your wishes are. 6. Steer your reality: Steer your reality into the direction you want. Maybe you have a change in subjects. Maybe you have to subject yourself. Maybe you have to dictate and be the leader in this discussion or relationship or role. The more you do it, the more comfortable you get. But like I said in the last lesson, people don't realize how powerful it is to create your own reality. And when you create that reality, and you are living by your principles, understandings and what you believe, what you want for your life. You manifest more of that from the people around you, and you attract more of that. And you get more of that. And then slowly over time, you don't really have much drama and people don't really come out you with things. People don't really complain to your gossip to you. It's amazing when that happens. So if you're stuck in the muck, if you're hanging up negative people that are bringing down your first-line defense is to do something about it. Start shaping your reality. Unfortunately, some people, maybe you can't spend the most time with them, whatever. Some people are not going to want to change and they're not going to want to respect your wishes. And that's just life. You've got to figure out how to deal with that and whatever way you want to. And some people just have to exit. Unfortunately, that that's just the case, that's life. We outgrow people and it is what it is. 7. Use time strategically: Ignore, ignore. Ignore is such a powerful tool that we don't use. I'll apply this first to things like e-mail, Instagram messages and comments and things like that when people come at us with negativity or there's some kind of contentious thing. We feel the need to respond. Like if you're like me, it's really, really hard for me to not respond to something. Especially if I have something to say about what I found is every emotional responsive ever given every rash e-mail I've ever sent or message everything I've ever said in person when I was angry has always made things worse. And then through this process, through this learning throughout life, I've looked back and reflected on a lot of those instances and realize that like 99 percent of the stress and drama that came as a result was completely my fault. I manufactured it. And it was because I responded. Because when I look back at the actual things, are the actual reasons why I said something or that or the thing that triggered me or whatever it was. It was always not a big deal generally, and it was always something that with time could have passed. It could have passed itself. And that's why we have to take away a process, a Daoist concept known as action through an action, not responding or ignoring is actually an active activity. You're deciding to not respond to something. If somebody comes into your attention and it's asking for a response or it's provoking you in some way, you then have a decision to make. Making it a decision is the action. Making a decision to not do anything or to ignore is an action, and it's literally usually the best thing to do. Now, if you do decide to respond, Here's one strategy you can do. Ignored for certain period of time as a strategy, give it a minimum of a day, maybe give it a seven days. I purposefully will ignore messages or e-mails where it's become contentious because I know that if I dive right into it, I'm going to be emotional and I might, you know, the risk is I might respond a certain way. So what I do is I let a few days to kinda cool off, cooling off period. I come back to this topic and I'm always less invested in emotional about it. I'm always more objective. Time is a very powerful healer of things like this and you have to use it to your advantage. But like I said, we are prone to want to respond and to respond right away. And that usually gets us into trouble. 8. Exit the game: If somebody's pestering you, here are some strategies. So first you try to not respond, but some people are persistent. They'll go out, you go out, you go out, you, they're trying to stoke it. They want you to respond. That's what they're looking for. So first understand that if somebody's constantly proud of you and they don't really have to, and they just want to come ask you about something. Realized that what they want is a response. So actually the best thing is not respond. But if you decide you do need to respond because you need to salvage the relationship, or it could get out of hand because, you know, if this person can be or whatever, then you can respond with something like, I'm not going to talk about this or I'm not discussing it. The most important things you have to then stick to your guns. You cannot go back on that and you can't say, I'm not responding or I don't want to talk about this. And then they texts you, recall you, and get pulled into some discussion because what you've done is you've trained them to be able to do this in the future and they will do it. Humans will always default to whatever you will accept, whatever you will let them get away with. They will do, right? That's why having principles and standards and communicating that is so important. An unfortunate reality of life is that people will try to pull you into arguments, debates, and drama. They will project on you. They will blame you. They will always have something to say. They will always have some excuse. This is just human nature. The most powerful way to avoid this. Cut it off right at the source, nip it in the bud as they say. Because when you engage and when you get pulled into the muck with them, you're already there, you've already lost. What you'll learn is people that engage in this kind of behavior. They just watching the MAC, they don't really care about right or wrong. They wanted to keep playing the game. They want keep just fueling the fire. That's what gets them excited. You have to completely exit yourself from that in the first place. 9. In closing: Finally, to close out a few important big ideas to think about, like we talked about the beginning, you have to live truly who you are, the more you live who you are and embrace your identity. And you know your principles and your values and what you're trying to do, and what you will accept and what you will not. The more you do that on a daily basis, The more the universe will respond. It's pretty amazing how it actually works. When you're drama free and you don't put up with it. You don't have drum in your life. It's crazy. In fact, when dramatize enter your life, you're like sometimes almost caught off guard because you're so not used to it. And you've kinda reactivate those defense mechanisms and then you get it out. And then you've returned to your baseline of being drama free. And then you're kinda like scratching your head like it's so crazy that people who can do this on a regular basis. You want to adopt strong opinions. You want to ask a lot of questions. You want to make people define the things that they're saying. That's very, very important for communication and it will resolve a lot of conflict early on, most people use words and phrases and they don't even understand the definitions are. So they're not using an accurately, we're not really understanding what they're implying are saying. Get them to focus on and critically analyze what they're saying. And you actually help them because they'll bring clarity and self-awareness to what they're actually thinking and saying. And you'll likely prevent a lot of things that would have flamed into a bigger ordeal. Finally, Biao going through principles, you should have a core set of principles of things that you are out and you're not about for me, responsibility, drama free. I don't like victim, I don't like blaming, I don't like projecting. And I think that generally, yeah, there's always a negative, but you might as well focus on the positive to get more of that. And that comes back to the personal responsibility and take ownership of my life and everyone should be doing the same. That's what I believe everything else I start my shoulders do or I tried to and I was good at this. Of course none of us are. But I at least know what I'm trying to accomplish. And I know that when I veer off this path and I get angry and traffic or let somebody get to me on social media and I comment aggressively or whatever. I know that I'm veering from my path. Right. So it's not that hard to self-correct and come back and that's what I do. I regressed to my mean, my average, my mean of my life is drama free, low stress, simplicity. I get pulled into complexity or drama or stress. I rise back to my mean. And we have good days, we have bad days. But the more we can identify and the more I remind myself of my principles, what I'm trying to accomplish, how life is sure to be grateful, et cetera. The easier it is flexible, just bounce off. I probably can't even count the amount of things that I just let it bounce off because I've identified who I am, what my principles are. And when you do that, it'll be the same for you. So I hope this was helpful. I hope you have some ideas about how to set boundaries in your life, in your personal and professional life. And I hope you live a great life and be drama free and realize that life really is a gift. And to be grateful.