Work Life Tech Boundaries

Rich Heller

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSa-IqedNWI You finally sit down for quality time with your partner… but your phone pings with a work email. A quick check turns into 20 minutes of scrolling. Sound familiar? In today’s always-connected world, the line between work and personal life has blurred, leaving many couples struggling to stay present with each other.  In this episode, we’ll unpack how screens disrupt work-life balance and erode emotional intimacy. From endless notifications to the pressure of being “always available,” we’ll explore how technology hijacks attention and creates resentment in relationships. You’ll learn practical strategies for setting boundaries, reclaiming undistracted time together, and building a partnership that thrives in the digital age.  💡 Struggling to reconnect? Our men’s groups are starting soon—visit richinrelationship.com to start rebuilding your connection today! Follow us on social media for more relationship advice: Facebook -  https://www.facebook.com/richinrelationship/ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/richinrelationship/  Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/richinrelationship/_created/ Tiktok -    https://www.tiktok.com/@richinrelationship LinkedIn -  https://www.linkedin.com/company/rich-in-relationship Website - https://www.richinrelationship.com

Transcript

00:00Today in Rich in Relationship, we're going to talk about how screens are eroding away

00:06your relationship.

00:08When one person is using work as a buffer in their relationship or as a way to feel

00:13fulfillment in their relationship, and the other one is critical of it, they go further

00:17apart.

00:18This is, it's really a tough spot to be in, and it's super common.

00:27Welcome to another episode of Rich in Relationship.

00:29I'm your host, Rich Heller, and today we're talking about work-life tech boundaries, or

00:36why is it those screens seem to be stealing you away from your family?

00:41It doesn't matter if you're a man or a woman, screens just seem to intrude more and more,

00:47and very often it's the work screens in particular.

00:51I can't tell you how many times I have turned to my own partner and said, what are you doing?

00:56Oh, work.

00:57And you know what I say?

00:58Something about that, it's work, suddenly makes it okay, but is it really?

01:06That is a question I am posing to you and myself as we explore this really key issue of work-life

01:15tech boundaries.

01:16So you're finally sitting down for some quality time.

01:19Maybe it's date night and God, she's going through emails, or maybe you're in bed and

01:26you're hoping to just get a good night hug or something, and she's scrolling through her

01:31emails and you say, hey, what's going on?

01:34She says, no, it's something important's happening at work.

01:37And you go, oh, all right.

01:38Yeah.

01:39Work equals survival.

01:40But how do you feel in that moment, right?

01:43A part of you blesses it, work is survival.

01:45But a part of you, if you're honest, feels like, why aren't I as important as that?

01:52There's a sort of taken for granted quality that comes with it, or for some of us, even

01:57outright ignored.

01:58What if you could reclaim that time and deepen your connection without ditching tech completely

02:06or work for that matter?

02:07Well, that's what this episode is about is how do we, how do we reprioritize our relationship?

02:13During the pandemic, I worked with a lot of couples on this, right?

02:17People were freaked out.

02:19It was the pandemic.

02:20They felt like they were lucky to be working, even if it was from home.

02:24And their priority would be work, kids, partner, self.

02:31And that prioritization will not work in life.

02:35Always.

02:35The first thing we need to do is charge our own batteries.

02:38This is like a litany with me.

02:39If you've heard this before, forgive me.

02:40You got to charge your own physical battery at the very least.

02:44Keep the organism running.

02:46Spiritual, mental, emotional, not too shabby either.

02:49Relationships should be second, right?

02:52Because they're in a strong working partnership.

02:58Synergy happens.

02:59So I would work with these couples and they'd start charging their own batteries.

03:02And then they would take time just to talk to their partner about, all right, hey, how

03:06are we going to make this work?

03:08And I've gotten my gym time in.

03:10How are we going to make this work so that meals happen on time, kids attend school virtually,

03:14and we both get our work done.

03:16And we maybe even get to have some intimacy somewhere in there.

03:20And by doing that, things would fall into place kind of magically because there's a synergy

03:26that happens when people work together in tandem.

03:29Somehow, now that we're no longer in an emergency, we're no longer in the pandemic, that thing

03:36has slipped by the wayside.

03:38Somehow, it's like we've fallen back into the pre-pandemic habits that really didn't serve

03:45us.

03:45There is this always-on-work culture that's coming back, right?

03:49Not only are offices steadily eliminating working at home, which might be a blessing for a lot

03:54of us if we're honest, but we're back to emails at night, Slack messages at dinner,

04:00texts on the weekends.

04:02When does work actually stop?

04:06And screens have become the vehicle through which this goes on and on.

04:11Pre-pandemic screens were definitely a thing, but it seems like before the pandemic, we

04:16were able to separate our work life from our home life more.

04:19Somehow, through that two years of working at home and having it all melt together like

04:26overheated wires that just glom together, it never came undone.

04:31Well, it's time to take it apart.

04:34We want to move from scrolling separately to unwinding together from work, right?

04:40That's where we want to be.

04:42And the way to do that is to reset boundaries.

04:46For some of us, and I'm one of us, our home is our office.

04:51I mean, I work from home.

04:52I work from Starbucks.

04:54I work on the plane.

04:55I work in the airport.

04:56I can work from anywhere.

04:58And for others of us, we have an office, but we allow ourselves to bring our work home.

05:05I want you to start thinking about what is a boundary and how does it apply to this experience?

05:12Boundaries are things we create to have safety for ourselves.

05:17Sometimes it feels like we're using a boundary to push other things out, but really we're

05:22creating safety for ourselves.

05:24And what happened during the pandemic in the particular was a movement that had been going

05:28on for a long time.

05:29That boundary between work and personal time got really blurred, maybe even got wiped out

05:36completely.

05:37Gwen, remember Gwen and Brad?

05:40Gwen comes home and she's really excited to talk about her day, but Brad is totally distracted

05:46by work email.

05:48He's having some kind of crisis at work and he's, just a minute, hon, let me just take care

05:52of this.

05:52And she feels ignored.

05:54He feels totally obligated.

05:56He's certain that if he doesn't get involved, this crisis cannot be solved.

06:02And if this crisis does not get solved now, it means losing a lot of business, maybe losing

06:08his job.

06:09Their night feels off before it even begins.

06:13What is happening there?

06:15Well, when we start blurring the lines between the personal and survival or the personal and

06:21work, it's because there are a number of reasons.

06:25We're either very uncomfortable with what's going on at home.

06:29And so we're avoiding it by burying ourselves in work.

06:32Or if we're not uncomfortable, we're not getting nurtured at work, excuse me, nurtured at home.

06:40And so we take it to work.

06:42And when we bury ourselves in work like that, it's because we're finding, we're either escaping

06:48from something painful and, or we are finding fulfillment as an individual at work in a way

06:57that our marriage isn't allowing us to.

07:00Work has actually become a boundary for Brad in this instance, right?

07:05His discomfort with talking with Gwen has driven him to work at home, to interrupt his

07:12time with Gwen at home.

07:14His discomfort with his own lack of fulfillment in his marriage has driven him to go someplace

07:21for comfort.

07:21It's almost like work infidelity is what's happening here.

07:24And the only way to set it right is first to recognize that part of what's going on when

07:32we place work before our family is one of these things.

07:37We're either feeling unfulfilled or unsafe at home.

07:42And we're feeling like when we work, we're doing the right thing.

07:47For a lot of men, what this looks like is they have an urge, an important urge to be providers.

07:54They're getting a constant complaint at home that they're not hearing their partner or they're

07:59not showing up for their partner in some way.

08:01And so they work harder.

08:03This is like a typical nice guy syndrome.

08:06There are a lot of guys who, and I've been there myself, where we're trying to do the

08:11things that our wife complains.

08:13She complains that we don't hear her.

08:16And so we spend a lot of time in front of her receiving the words, listening, but she

08:22keeps complaining that we don't hear her.

08:24So we spend more time listening, but she keeps complaining that we don't hear her.

08:27And we say, I don't understand.

08:29I'm here listening to you.

08:32She says, yeah, but you don't hear me.

08:33I don't see how I don't hear you.

08:35I heard what you said.

08:36You're upset with Mandy.

08:38Uh, you know, I, and honestly, if I were going to tell you the truth, I think you could fix

08:44this whole thing with Mandy like that, but, and I, so I don't understand how you say it.

08:47I can't hear you.

08:48And then we take that dissatisfaction with that experience where we're trying to do the thing.

08:53She says that we're not doing.

08:56We seem to be failing at it.

08:58No matter how much we're doing it, we start to feel like she's going to criticize us no

09:02matter what.

09:03And so we go and do the thing that we know we can do, which is we can work harder and

09:08come up with more money and get a better house and better clothes.

09:12And we can go on vacations together.

09:13Maybe when we go on vacations together, we can take her away from freaking Mandy and have

09:17a good time together.

09:18But the act of working harder and providing more feels to her like we're pulling away.

09:25And that's then we start putting our emails like Brad in front of her, right?

09:29For men, there's a lot of that going on.

09:31Now, women are not alien to this, right?

09:34It's a little different though.

09:36For women, it might feel like, um, work is the place where they can finally validate that

09:42they're equal to men.

09:44Work is the place where they can finally kick some butt.

09:46Work is the place where they can have some personal fulfillment.

09:50They're not feeling safe.

09:53Gwen's not feeling in the case where Gwen's doing this.

09:55Gwen's not feeling safe with Brad, but she feels safe at work.

09:59And the only way she can feel safe with Brad is when she takes the mindset that she has

10:04at work and brings it home to Brad.

10:05So the mindset she has at work is, I can compete here.

10:08Um, I know what I know I'm competent.

10:11And then she takes that home to Brad and he feels threatened in some way, shape or form.

10:16She, he, uh, they, and they get into a fight.

10:19They get it because it feels competitive.

10:21What it is, is Gwen brings home the attitude that's working for her work, which is competitive

10:26and triggers Brad's competitiveness.

10:29And instead of having healthy, safe competition, they start having aggressive competition.

10:34And that turns into a fight, right?

10:35These are kind of the two scenarios where work supplants relationship.

10:39And there are a lot of different versions of this.

10:41And the reason why it's different with women than it is with men is that men tend to be

10:47very linear.

10:48Women tend to be very ecological.

10:50And so the way they take home work is different or men take it home and replace relationship with

10:57it.

10:57Women take it home and try to use a strategy that's working for them at work in their ecology,

11:02but both ways it blows up.

11:05And I'm not saying that men can't do what Gwen did.

11:07And I'm saying, not saying that women can't do what Brad did.

11:10What I'm saying is in broad generalities, when this is going on, there can be missed emotional

11:18outreaches or misinterpreted emotional outreaches.

11:21One partner reaches out subtly, but gets ignored and it ignores the sense of safety and

11:27trust and intimacy over time.

11:28There's less emotional intimacy.

11:31And when there's less emotional closeness, there's less fulfilling sexual intimacy.

11:37I'm not saying there isn't going to be sex, but when there is, it's going to be less

11:40fulfilling.

11:41The most fulfilling sexual contact a married couple can have is when both people feel

11:47emotionally naked, not just physically naked.

11:50When we go into sex just for physical fulfillment, but we're not emotionally present.

11:54Yeah, there's release.

11:56Yeah, there's orgasm.

11:57Yeah, there's, we hope.

11:59Yeah, there's some tension that drops, but there isn't the same synergistic experience of

12:06mutual love, care, and tenderness as when two people come emotionally bare.

12:13And when this kind of dynamics happening, there's no room for that.

12:16So typically there's no sex or very little of it.

12:20And when there is, it might be after a fight and it's okay.

12:23It might even be physically fulfilling, but it's not emotionally rocking the boat like it

12:27was.

12:28Let's go back to Brad and Gwen.

12:30Gwen starts assuming that Brad cares more about work.

12:32She might even think he's having an affair.

12:36Brad is stressed from work.

12:39He resents the pressure to disconnect from Gwen and moves away.

12:46They move away from each other.

12:47So very often when one person is using work as a buffer in their relationship or as a way

12:53to feel fulfillment in their relationship, and the other one is critical of it, they go

12:58further apart.

13:00This is, it's really a tough spot to be in and it's super common.

13:06All right.

13:06So here's some key strategies.

13:07There need to be work-free zones.

13:11Now, a work-free zone could be an actual area where you're not going to work, or it might

13:17be a time that you're not going to work.

13:20So as someone who works at home, I like to move around from space to space.

13:24So I have specific times that I stop working.

13:28And if I start working again, something's wrong.

13:32I stop working at five or six, and then we sit down to dinner.

13:37Sometimes, honestly, I have trouble unplugging.

13:40And if I notice that I'm having trouble unplugging, I will take time.

13:44It might be because there's a loose end that I didn't attend to, and I go attend to it later.

13:48But if I'm picking up my phone at dinner, I'm called out for it.

13:52If I still have my laptop open, I'm called out for it and vice versa.

13:56It might be that there's some places where you never work.

14:00And it really depends on your ability to separate emotionally, mentally from it.

14:07The beauty of never working in your bedroom is your bedroom becomes a sanctuary for you

14:13and your partner.

14:14So it might be that, and this is something I'm actually thinking about, it might be that

14:19it's worthwhile to have a bedroom where there's no screens at all.

14:24It's just the two of you.

14:25Office hours need to be by mutual agreement when, by mutual agreement.

14:32If you can have the same office hours, that's ideal, of course.

14:35Some people don't have that luxury, but it's really important to schedule.

14:42I'd say rather than scheduling office hours, in that case, you want to schedule blocks of

14:47time that are never office hours, right?

14:50These are the times early in the morning, we're going to have coffee together, no working

14:55during those hours.

14:56Late in the evening, at dinner, there's going to be no working.

15:00We may need to clear or download stuff at the beginning of dinner to stop and move into the

15:06next thing to feel complete.

15:08You give yourself five to 10 minutes for that.

15:11But then at dinner, that's it.

15:13In Brad and Gwen's case, they have a no screens at the dinner table rule.

15:19And then they, they, they also had no screens when they're on vacation together, or if they're

15:29going to be screens when they're on vacation together at very limited hours.

15:32And by doing those two things, honestly, at first they told me it was uncomfortable because

15:39they didn't have the screens, but they didn't know how to talk to each other anymore.

15:45And at first they tested the no screens.

15:48One would pick it up and just to see what would happen.

15:51And the other one would say, Hey, that's really urgent.

15:53I get it, but we do have an agreement, right?

15:55How you confront that is really important.

15:57Now, the way that they would confront it was very gently.

16:00If you say, what are you doing?

16:02We have no screens rule.

16:04That's not going to create, that's not conducive to safety, right?

16:07The idea is to set the screens aside.

16:09And the intention is not just to not look at the screens or not work.

16:13The intention is to focus on the relationship.

16:16So what your intention is, is huge here.

16:19Studies show that when we have a negative emotion as a motivator, I'm going to move away

16:23from screens.

16:24It's less effective than we have a positive emotion.

16:27I'm going to move towards intimacy, right?

16:30When we're moving towards a positive goal, we're more motivated, more energized, we're

16:35more consistent.

16:36When we're moving away from, we might even forget why we were moving away from that thing

16:40and go back to it.

16:42And so for Brad and Gwen, it was super important to have the intention be, we're going to rebuild

16:48our sense of closeness and make it safe again.

16:51And since the first goal was safety, they worked on caring communication.

16:56That was the next step after the uncomfortable time.

16:59After a couple of days, they had caring communication.

17:02They, for the first caring communication was about how uncomfortable they had been not having

17:06screens and just sitting there together.

17:08And they laughed about it because they both had the same experience.

17:10They made a connection based on their shared experience and built on it from there.

17:15If screen time is affecting us that much, what's it going to do to the next generation?

17:20I want you to think about that.

17:22For a lot of us, we didn't grow up with smartphones.

17:26I didn't.

17:27A lot of, a lot of people I work with didn't grow up with smartphones.

17:29Smartphones are really, what, the last 20 years.

17:33What's happening to the generations that grow up with smartphones, with screens in front of

17:37them all the time?

17:39So once you've on the same page and you're rebuilding that intimacy, once you have that

17:45foundation in your relationship, the next step is to work on what's happening.

17:50How are my children being impacted on the screens?

17:53Why is it that Bill Gates's kids didn't have any screens for a long time, but my kids had

17:59them from age five?

18:01And what does that mean?

18:02What's the impact on them?

18:04That's what we're going to talk about in the next episode, raising children in a tech

18:09saturated world.

18:10And hint, much like work-life balance, it's about the intention.

18:17If your intention is to use screens to build your relationship, then you'll use screens

18:22to build your relationship.

18:23Your intention is to use screens to build your work.

18:25You'll build your work.

18:26If your intention is to use screens to build up your children, you can use screens to build

18:30up your children.

18:31But if your intention is to shunt your children off so you can get five minutes to yourself

18:35and you don't know what they're watching,

18:37you may be in some dangerous waters.

18:41In the meantime, I hope you have an awesome day

18:43and an amazing tomorrow.

18:46Thank you for listening to Rich in Relationship

18:48and go to our website, richinrelationship.com

18:51for more useful tools and information.

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