Managing Boundaries With A Workaholic

Is there anything you can do to change the relationship your partner has with their work?

In one of the conversations I have had recently the need to set boundaries effectively was raised.?I do believe that setting appropriate boundaries is important but I believe it is much more complex than that.?

Setting out your boundaries and expecting that to make a fundamental difference to how your partner feels and acts may have an impact in the short term.?I believe in the longer term you will find yourself renegotiating those boundaries time after time.?The problem lies in why your partner is a workaholic.?Each person will have a different take on why they choose to act as they do.

Every person who is driven to be a "workaholic" will have a different underlying cause.?There are themes of course, it is entirely possible to work to unpick why, and to change beliefs and behaviours.?Those beliefs and behaviours are created through our experiences throughout our lives.?To create a new approach and attitude to work and how we feel about ourselves it is important to identify which of our beliefs and values are actually getting in the way of enjoying life to the full.

General Principles:

Throughout our lives we make judgments about who we are and how we fit into the world.?Think about medieval times.?The vast majority of people believed the world was flat.?They did not venture far from shore in the belief that they would fall off the Earth with dire consequences if they went too far from land.?Their belief coloured their behaviours.

All of us make sense of our world and others in it through our own particular filters.?We use every day incidents as evidence to support our theories.?Another person may put quite a different interpretation on the same event as their filter will give them a very different perspective.

If you want to change the way a person acts and thinks you need to understand their beliefs about themselves and their world.?Simply nagging is unlikely to effect a significant change in their belief in fact it usually has the opposite effect.

In the first place, why not simply watch and listen for clues about what your partner believes about themselves and their sense of worth.

Where do they feel most confident and in control?

What beliefs have they around success?

Talking to one client revealed that they had failed their 11+ examination.?The disappointment expressed by their father had resulted in an ongoing search to find a way to appease their sense of failure.?

From the outside they had every trapping of success.?They were at the top of their profession, highly paid, well respected and full of confidence.?In reality they still felt the same emotional need to prove themselves as they had aged 10 when they received the news that they would not be going to Grammar School as they weren’t good enough.?

His partner nagged regularly because he worked too hard.?Did it make him work less? In fact it had the opposite impact as the nagging fired off all sorts of childhood memories of being nagged because he had failed to live up to expectations.

Am I saying “don’t create boundaries”??No.

What I am saying is choose your time to set boundaries.?It us rarely effective when you try to create meaningful boundaries on the back of an argument or in a naggy voice.

• Be clear about what you want and why – it can be useful to write it down ahead of time.
• Choose a good time – not as they are falling asleep, going out of the door, you have just had a row, they are worried about a difficult interview etc.
• Remember over 60% of what we say is non verbal.?Use eye contact, body language and touch to build rapport and an open trusting approach
• The use of questions can be effective (use wisely – this is not about arranging the desk lamp and carrying out an interrogation)
• Be clear to state things in the positive, rather than coming out with a long string of negative demands (however justified you may feel).
• Identify that it is the behaviour you have a problem with not the person.
• Explain why you want things to change – his/her physical, emotional health and yours
• Identify your needs in a clear way –?be positive
• Be realistic – incremental step change can be more effective than making one huge demand they simply cannot cope with
• Remember people go towards pleasure and away from pain. Think about how you want your partner to feel about your relationship

You can only be part of the solution.?It is about helping your partner to recognize that they have choices about how they want to spend their time.?The old saying ‘you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink’ is absolutely true.?

See also:

Learning to Love Who You Are https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/learning-love-who-you-profits-enhancer-for-enlightened-leaders

It Is All About Perception https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/all-perception-gina-gardiner-profits-enhancer-for-enlightened-leaders

Limitless Possibilities – Are You Expanding Your Leadership So You Can Harness The Opportunities Which Are Waiting For You? https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/limitless-possibilities-you-expanding-your-leadership-gina-gardiner

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