How to Set Boundaries That Actually Create Peace

Busy has quietly become the most accepted excuse in our culture — and it’s slowly killing connection. In this episode, I break down the difference between being busy and living in a constant state of hurry, why both steal your peace and relationships, and how weak boundaries keep you stuck in overwhelm. I’ll share practical ways to create margin in your life, simple mindset shifts that change how you use your time, and specific phrases you can use to protect your focus without guilt. If you’ve ever felt rushed, exhausted, or like life is moving too fast — this one’s for you. Order The Next Conversation Workbook: https://www.jeffersonfisher.com/workbook Thank you to our sponsors: Cozy Earth. Upgrade Your Every Day. Get 20% off at cozyearth.com/jefferson or use code JEFFERSON at check out. Monarch Money. 50% off your first year at https://monarchmoney.com/jefferson Our Place. Visit https://fromourplace.com/JEFFERSON and use code JEFFERSON for 10% off sitewide. BetterHelp. Click https://betterhelp.com/jeffersonfisher for a discount on your first month of therapy. Order my new book, The Next Conversation, or listen to the full audiobook today. Like what you hear? Don’t forget to subscribe and leave a 5-star review! Suggest a topic or ask a question for me to answer on the show! Want a FREE communication tip each week? Click here to join my newsletter. Join My School of Communication Watch my podcast on YouTube Follow me on Instagram Follow me on TikTok Follow me on LinkedIn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. You can go deep, keep it on the ground, or draw up something nobody sees coming. And whether you want to run a flea flicker or the tush push, you need a plan to fit your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you, so they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

• 0:29Jefferson Fisher?

  There is a silent killer of connection, communication, conversations, relationships in our life. And it's the word busy.

• 0:42Jefferson Fisher?

  Busy is probably the number one excuse in our culture, and it seems to never be challenged. In this episode, I'm going to be talking to myself just as much I'm talking to you. Busy and hurry. The two combined have a way of destroying just about everything that brings fulfillment in our life. And it's something that's been resonating with me a lot, because if I am too busy for other people, one day I'm going to get to an age where they're going to be too busy for me. And I don't know if I feel that way because I'm a parent, or I have parents and they have parents that are getting older and having a harder time.

• 1:26Jefferson Fisher?

  And you kind of get to a place where you start to see what's really important. And even though you see what's important, you have a hard time doing what's important. In this episode, I'm going to talk about the difference between busy and hurry and how they hurt us, the ways we see it every day. Next, I'm going to give you some tips and things that have helped me in my life. And I'm certainly no model for it, but I have learned quite a bit and to share things that I think are going to help give us a little bit more margin in our lives. And three, I'm going to give you some phrases that you can use to help establish those boundaries to eliminate the busy and hurry from your life.

• 2:06Jefferson Fisher?

  Ready? Let's go. Welcome to the Jefferson Fisher Podcast where I'm on a mission to make your next conversation, the one that changes everything. Some exciting news. The next conversation workbook is officially on pre-sale. You can find the links down in the show notes. It's something I've been working very hard on. So if you enjoy this episode, you enjoy this podcast, and you enjoy the next conversation, go and get the workbook. This podcast is sponsored by Cozy Earth. I love Cozy Earth for a multitude of reasons. And if you're like me and you like wearing cozy things, meaning you like to stay warm, you like sweatpants. Am I right? Can I get a witness to that? If you like sweatpants, Cozy Earth is where it's at. I use Cozy Earth for a lot of different products, whether it's our bed sheets, it's towels, even my house shoes.

• 2:49Jefferson Fisher?

  So you can be like me and get cozy and get comfortable, especially on these cold weather days. You can go to cozyearth.com/jefferson, use the code Jefferson, and get up to 20% off. That's cozyearth.com/jefferson, use the code Jefferson, and get up to 20% off. Is there a cure for busy? Not sure. You might be listening to me right now and you go, okay, Jefferson, just can you get to the point, look, I'm really busy right now, man. If that's you, you're probably too much in a hurry to listen to this whole podcast anyway. So go ahead and stop and listen and go and do whatever you need to do. But if nothing changes, then nothing changes. So let's talk about things that can actually change your life. Number one, busy

• 3:31Jefferson Fisher?

  comes from having no margin. I want you to think of your life as a book. Every day, let's think of today or yesterday, think of it as a book. All right. How would you imagine the text on those pages? Would they be fully justified? Meaning it went from one end of the page to the other end of the page? Would it be single spaced? Would it be 10-point font? Would it be a serif font where it was terrible to read and you could barely see it? You almost had to get a magnifying glass because it's just so full of stuff where there's no room for anything for your eyes to have any kind of rest? Or?

• 4:12Jefferson Fisher?

  Would you consider white space in terms of being able to see the page? A bigger font, there's spacing, there's lots of space on the side and above. The margins are clear to where you can actually breathe. You can see, you can read, you can move your eye through the pages. That's what I mean by margin. When you fill your schedule so full of things, you eliminate the chance for magic to happen in your life, for connection to happen in your life. I can't tell you in my own, my own point of view of times where I think, oh, I need to call that person. And I think about it and I mean to, but I don't.

• 4:54Jefferson Fisher?

  And I realize it's two months have gone by and I've never reached out to this person. Or am I say, you know what, I need to call my grandfather. I need to call my sister, somebody who I love and they know that I love them and somebody who loves me. And yet I look back and I haven't made time for it. And my excuse is I've just been so busy.

• 5:17Jefferson Fisher?

  What does that even mean? To say I'm so busy. Busy is defined as constant action. I don't know about you, but I don't want that life. It's where I'm in constant action.

• 5:32Jefferson Fisher?

  When somebody gives that excuse to you, say, what's been going on? They go, ah, you know, I've just been so busy lately. I've just been real busy. What does that really mean? It doesn't mean anything. It's like saying, ah, I've been moving. I've been in action. I've been living. It, it, it gives no specificity. It's vague. It's ambiguous. It's only to describe a state of being and it's generally not a positive one. They say, well, busy is good for business. Yes, I, I agree. Customers, things that are good for your business, that you need some amount of busyness. But most of the time when people say busy, they don't mean it positively. They mean it as like, ah, they're rubbing their neck going, ah, I've just been so busy. Haven't been able to do so much.

• 6:16Jefferson Fisher?

  There are two things I want to distinguish. One, there's a difference between busy and hurry. Busy is the volume. How much am I doing? How much do I have on my plate? Right? Let's, I'm kind of hungry right now, so let's put in a food metaphor. Sorry if you haven't eaten lunch yet.

• 6:36Jefferson Fisher?

  So busy would be the equivalent of let's say a plate of food and you just put so much food. You're at a buffet and you put so much food on your plate. You have a big mountain of it, right? Whereas hurry is your pace, how quickly you're going through it. Right? So that would be like, even if you had one scoop of food, let's say mashed potatoes, but yet you're in a hurry to eat it. So busy talks about volume, hurry talks about pace. Together, they are a horrible combination because they, they, they have a way of snuffing out any connection that we can have with other people, including connection with yourself.

• 7:19Jefferson Fisher?

  If you're somebody who go, Jefferson, look, I don't know who you're talking to.

• 7:24Jefferson Fisher?

  Uh, this is for all these other people in your life, but not for me. I'm going to ask some questions that might spur your thoughts. And these are the ones that are just coming to me. So I'm spitballing here. What would it look like? I want you to imagine right now that you are driving on a highway and you're in the right-hand lane and you're driving the speed limit. So let's say the speed limit's 60.

• 7:52Jefferson Fisher?

  And everybody else is flying by. People are passing you and the speed limit's 60. What would that feel like to your body if you just stayed at 60? Or let's, let's say 65. And yes, and yet people are still passing you, but yet you're following the speed limit. I don't know about you, but to me that would be just so, I would just start rushing. I would feel the need to go faster. We rarely follow the speed limits here. We always go by like, ah, it's about five miles over the speed limit. I was only 10 miles over the speed limit. We have this need when we get from point A to point B to go as fast as possible.

• 8:35Jefferson Fisher?

  We want to hurry, be in a state of hurry to pick up the pace as quick as we can. What, to get to work more to, to do what? So many times I'm in a hurry for really no reason. And I find that even when I'm as a parent and I'm trying to get my son to hurry up and get on his shoes. Come on, we gotta go to what? For, for a haircut that we can, we're probably going to get there and wait when we get there anyway. And I can't let him take two minutes to tie his shoes. I get convicted about that and that's why I'm sharing this in this way.

• 9:12Jefferson Fisher?

  This is an episode where I'm not trying to give this almost surgeon-like prescription to it all. Those things are really just, I want to raise so you can think about it like I'm thinking about it.

• 9:29Jefferson Fisher?

  When I don't leave enough margin in my life, it, it becomes hard to read. That book becomes hard to read, that page becomes hard to read. And then I feel like I am, I'm, I've wasted away to some degree. Here's another one for you. What if you were to slow down the way you walked, your pace of walking like by 10%? You have people who are like fast walkers. I'm not a fast walker by nature. My wife could win the fast walking Olympics. I, I mean, I have to get her to try and slow down or I have to speed up whenever we're, we're going somewhere. I, I just tend to be a slower walker.

• 10:15Jefferson Fisher?

  I don't know if it's because I'm taller or because I'm generally just not the super hurry type, but. I find that people that are fast walkers, or people that are fast eaters, and people that are fast talkers, it is such a rush of trying to hurry through everything. And you realize that there's really no reason for it other than the state of our anxiety. And that has to do with our state of being and how busy we are. And here's the point I want you to remember. When your life has no space, everything feels urgent. When your life has no white space, it has no margin. Everything will feel urgent to get it done as quickly as possible,

• 11:00Jefferson Fisher?

  to hurry, to be as busy as you can possibly be. When you look back and what did I accomplish? You really probably couldn't name it that much. It's just a state of where you're at. I also am somebody who feels like

• 11:18Jefferson Fisher?

  that I'll find relief from busy eventually. When I finish this project, then I'll be free. Then I'll get out of busy. And that never happens. There's always another thing that takes its place. Before we keep going, I want to take a moment to tell you about Monarch. One of my goals for 2026 is taking the pressure off finances. Not because I'm trying to avoid any numbers, but because I want to make sure that I have a plan. That makes sense for me and my family. Because when things are clear, I don't know about you, but everything feels more manageable and that feels a lot better. Managing your money doesn't have to be a struggle this year. Monarch is the all-in-one personal finance tool designed to make your life easier. It brings your entire financial life, budgeting, accounts and investments, net worth,

• 12:03Jefferson Fisher?

  and future planning together in one dashboard on your laptop or phone. What I like so much about Monarch is that it helps me kind of reset everything after the holidays because I know what it's like. When you have birthdays or events and we had Thanksgiving or Christmas or whatever it is, and you know, a lot of things happen and you kind of have to go back and look and go, okay, what, what did we do? This is so much more helpful this way with Monarch because I actually have tools that can help me stick to goals based on real numbers, not wishful thinking. This new year, achieve your financial goals for good. Monarch is the all-in-one tool that makes proactive money management simple all year long. Use code Jefferson at monarch.com for half off your first year.

• 12:46Jefferson Fisher?

  That's 50% off your first year at monarch.com with the code Jefferson. And now let's keep going. So what can we do? How do we battle the busyness of our life? The hurry of our life? Because life still happens, right? And you might be thinking, look, it's nice for you to say Jefferson, but you don't know what it's like to be me. You're right. I don't. I don't. But I can tell you from my own life, here's what I have found. Number two, if I don't have boundaries in place, other things will run things for me. Meaning if I, if I don't have a strong boundary, busyness will be my director and my producer.

• 13:30Jefferson Fisher?

  I will let my schedule dictate me. This is a question that is gonna probably step on some toes, but I think it's a really good indicator. When you wake up in the morning, what's the first thing you reach for? What's the very first thing you reach for when you wake up? What's the very first thing that you do? And I'd be willing to bet that whatever that is, is the thing that either controls you or influences you the most. There's exceptions, sure. But my guess is that's the thing that really has the most of your attention.

• 14:14Jefferson Fisher?

  Whatever it is that you reach for. It becomes your fuel. The things that you churn on, the things, it's the coal to your fire that move your train. If you are constantly consuming and absorbing negative, whether it's negative news, negative stories, if you are always trying to push yourself at work, you're always giving yourself more to do, that is your, your fuel to propel yourself forward. And what I have found is that busy is fueled by weak boundaries. Meaning the people that are the most busy are typically the people who are the most overcommitted.

• 14:58Jefferson Fisher?

  They say yes to every single thing. It is a discipline to say no. It is never easy for anybody unless those who've practiced it so much that it becomes second nature. It is hard to say no to things. I admit that, but if you don't create some type of margin in your life, it's never going to happen. How do you create margin? By having boundaries. And you go, oh, Jefferson, we've talked a lot about boundaries. Yeah, we have, but why are you still busy? When I find that I have booked myself up so busy, it's usually out of my own anxiety, rather than the truth of what it is.

• 15:42Jefferson Fisher?

  Meaning if I stop, this is what I do for me. Whenever I feel overwhelmed, I get a notepad, a notepad and a pen. It's right over there. I will write down everything that is in my brain right at that moment. And I just, I just call it a brain dump. I get everything out. That way I'm able to look at it on a cold, hard surface and say, okay, it's not that much. It just feels like a big dark cloud in my head. And if I can parse things out, when somebody asks me how I'm doing, I'm going to be able to say actually what I'm working on, what I'm excited about. When somebody says, how are you?

• 16:25Jefferson Fisher?

  I can actually describe a feeling of how I am, rather than saying, ah, you know, I'm just busy, just busy, another day in paradise, just working away, just grinding. Like you will, what kind of response is that? I'm saying it to myself where I feel.

• 16:44Jefferson Fisher?

  I don't ever want to say I'm just so busy. Again, I, there are so many better words and phrases that we have been given to use rather than say, I'm busy.

• 17:00Jefferson Fisher?

  And I'm, that's, this is me talking to myself. I'm going to commit to that. I'm going to commit to that because me saying I'm busy is not saying anything. It's not saying anything at all. And I'm equipped with a lot better language than that. Before we continue, I want to talk to you about our place. I don't know about you, but I have now gotten to an age where I really like to cook. I didn't think I would, and I would watch the Food Network. Don't get me wrong. It'd be like, oh, I could totally do that. And I couldn't. But with our place, things have changed. They make these pans. All right. I really love our place a lot. They've totally changed the game in our kitchen. They make these beautiful, high-performance kitchenware that you can use around the stove top.

• 17:42Jefferson Fisher?

  It's toxin-free, no PFAs, no weird coatings or anything like that. When I tell you that my breakfast game is top-notch, I promise you, when I cook an egg, all right, and you know, it kind of slides, that just, it feels, it's, it's a different, I don't know how to describe it other than it's awesome. Our place is what has given me that. Their four-piece cookware set has basically replaced my entire cabinet. All right. If you look in my kitchen right now, that's exactly what you'd see. They have these two perfect pots. They can sear, they can saute, boil, bake, steam, you name it, all with just four pieces. And it saves you about 150 bucks compared to buying everything separately. And their Wonder Oven, it's this non-toxic air fryer toaster oven. That's all in one. It's super easy and it's pretty amazing.

• 18:28Jefferson Fisher?

  Cookware that feels simple, cleaner, and honestly, just more fun. So stop cooking with toxic cookware and upgrade to our place today. Go to fromourplace.com/jefferson and use code Jefferson for 10% off site-wide. Plus you get a 100-day risk-free trial with free shipping and returns. I promise you, when you get it, they look great, they feel great. You're not going to want to return it. I have not returned mine. That's fromourplace.com/jefferson and use code Jefferson. And now let's keep going. How do you have stronger boundaries? It's by first saying no to things. Some people have a really hard time with that of saying no to things. Here are three things I want to give you. This is, goes into point number three.

• 19:12Jefferson Fisher?

  There are phrases and words that are going to be more helpful to you rather than saying, "I'm just so busy. I can't. I'm so busy." It's the word "capacity."

• 19:22Jefferson Fisher?

  It's the word "attention." And there's going to be a phrase that you're going to make up that's going to be your go-to. Meaning, "I don't have the capacity for it right now." "That's not something I have capacity for." Two, "I need to have my attention on this." Subject X has my attention. Whenever you're telling somebody what you have capacity for, what you have your attention on, it's a much easier way of trying to say, "This isn't where my focus is right now." Or you could use the word "focus." And three, "I need you to make sure that you have a phrase that you can use." And if you feel led, I want you to put it down in the comments. Whether, wherever you're listening, put it down in the comments. What phrase do you use to be able to turn things down?

• 20:06Jefferson Fisher?

  Because this is a phrase that might help somebody else, just as much as I'm saying it, you have the chance to help somebody to. Whenever you need to turn something down, what's a phrase, a go-to phrase that you use? If you don't have a go-to phrase, there's a problem right there. No wonder you're so busy. It's because you're overcommitting yourself to everything. And it's creating this big, dark cloud of anxiety that's mostly feeling and fear in your life. Because it's not, you're not putting enough sunshine and margin and space for yourself. You are walking too fast in your mind rather than slowing it down, walking and talking and breathing at a normal pace.

• 20:44Jefferson Fisher?

  What's your go-to phrase? I'll tell you mine. Mine has to do with, "It's not in the cards." I usually say, "That's not in the cards for me." "That's not in the cards for me right now." I like that. I like saying that something isn't in the cards. Because it picks up on this metaphor of, you know, we all have a deck that we've been given in our life. And you have cards to play, you have cards to show, you have cards to keep. Whether you play them close, what they say, "Close to the vest." Or you're sharing them, or you're saying, "Go fish," or you're Uno and you have to draw four. Whatever it is, I like that metaphor, that illustration in my mind. And so when I say something's not in the cards,

• 21:26Jefferson Fisher?

  it means it's like, that's, it's not going to happen for me. I don't, I don't have that ability to play that card for me. So, "Go fish" is, is kind of how I imagine it. But you need to have some kind of go-to phrase that you can use time and time again. I want to share something with you that, there's a book I've been reading, and it's, it's not at all,

• 21:50Jefferson Fisher?

  I don't know this author, but it's, it's called "The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry." It's by John Mark Comer, and I've really, really enjoyed it. It is, it is a spiritual book. It is a book that has really moved the needle in my life of saying, "Why am I moving so fast?" And that there could be so much more peace and joy in my life by slowing it down. And in fact, it's the simple things that are much more fulfilling than the big, busy things in my world. Busy and hurry, two things that have a way of destroying connection and communication with other people,

• 22:32Jefferson Fisher?

  because we replace it, we put it off. We're in a hurry, so we don't really listen to conversation. We're in a hurry, so we, we want to interrupt, we want to interject, we want to get the conversation over with. We want to have, and squeeze as much as we can in between meetings and schedules and everything else. And then when we finally get home to the people that we love the most, we really don't have anything left for. Why? Because I've just been so busy.

• 22:56Jefferson Fisher?

  When deep down, that, that doesn't mean anything. Some of you might be listening to me right now and say, "Jefferson, I look, I don't know what you're talking about, man, but I'm not in the business of being lazy. I like being busy." Listen, I'm not saying that...

• 23:15Jefferson Fisher?

  Busy is the opposite of lazy. I'm saying busy is the opposite of intentional. When you can be intentional about what you're doing, who you're doing it for, why you're doing it, what the purpose is behind it, what's the reason? Then I have no problem with filling my cup. I like having a full cup of things to do. But there's a difference in my hurry, what's my pace in which I'm doing it? Am I okay just sitting and being still? Can you even do that? Just sit for 10 minutes, not looking at a phone, not listening to music? Whether it's a park bench, or maybe it's walking?

• 24:00Jefferson Fisher?

  Is that something you could challenge yourself to do? Just to hear nothing? Makes me think of the people that, I forget what they call it, that'll get on the airplane and have nothing. They won't read anything, they won't listen to any music. It's like that, are you comfortable with the idea of not being so efficient with your time? It's something I'm also going to be working on too. So if you have any tips and tricks, I would love for you to share them down in the comments. Busy and hurry, two things that are silent killers of connection in our life. May we strive to simplify our life. All right, that's something I've been thinking about. As always, you can try that and follow me.

• 24:47Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by State Farm. Football has a play for just about everything. You can go deep, keep it on the ground, or draw up something nobody sees coming. And whether you want to run a flea flicker or the tush push, you need a plan to fit your unique situation. That's why State Farm takes the time to get to know you, so they can help personalize coverage for your life and budget. Now that's a solid game plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.