Setting boundaries in any relationship can be tough. But how do we know when to set them, and is there a 'best way' to set boundaries with emotionally draining friends?

Sometimes, our relationships can become emotionally draining. Friendships, where we don’t experience mutual authenticity, attention, and reciprocity, can leave us feeling frustrated, mentally and emotionally drained, and, over time, can even affect our overall sense of wellbeing. Setting healthy boundaries isn’t just important in your romantic and family relationships. Clear boundaries can help create the foundations for long-lasting friendships that can grow and flourish over time.

If you find yourself feeling anxious, tired, or frustrated whenever you talk or spend time with a friend, it can be a sign that your friendship has become emotionally draining. If it feels like you’re spending all or most of your time talking about their issues, like you can’t be yourself or ask for support in return, or you're less excited to spend time with them, it could be a sign that new personal boundaries are needed to get things back on track.

What is a boundary in a friendship?

Boundaries are a simple and clear way of letting others know what you are and aren’t ok with. Setting healthy, effective boundaries can help you to look after yourself by protecting your personal space, as well as your mental health and wellbeing.

Creating boundaries within a friendship allows you both to set out what you want and expect from each other. This doesn’t mean that you have to say yes to every request (especially if any proposed boundaries make you uncomfortable!), but it can make it feel easier to speak up when you are feeling hurt, overwhelmed, offended, or taken for granted.

In this video, Life coach and author Michelle Elman explains more about the benefits of setting boundaries.

What are examples of setting healthy boundaries between friends?

Communication is key to both setting and maintaining healthy boundaries with any friend. What that actually looks like can vary depending on different friendships, and the individuals themselves. But what are some boundaries you might set up, and what could encourage you to take action?

• You’re feeling overwhelmed. Just dealing with our own lives can feel overwhelming. Family issues, work deadlines, financial worries - whatever the cause, you may feel like you’ve got enough to deal with, and don’t have the headspace to take on someone else’s problems right now. Prioritising your own needs is important - and a true friend will understand if you let them know that you’re dealing with too much to give them the time and/or attention they need right

As our wonderful columnist Grace Victory embarks on an exciting new chapter in her life, and pens her final column for us, she reflects on the passage of time, as well as the lessons from endings – and new beginnings

If I’ve learnt one thing in the past few years, it’s that nothing lasts forever. Whether it’s a particular feeling, trauma, a job or a friendship, sometimes things run their course, seasons change, and what we once wanted or needed, we no longer desire.

Emotions like happiness are fleeting, often depending on outside sources, and feelings like sadness can be due to weather, or hormones, or scrolling aimlessly on Twitter (we all do it LOL).

Our feelings can change so dramatically through the day that we can’t place too much attachment to them. They can transform. They end. They don’t usually last too long. And I think that’s actually a pretty beautiful thing about humanity. Difficult relationships can eventually reveal a way out and forward, we might be made redundant from a job we absolutely loathe, and childhood trauma could end when we grow into adulthood, put the work in, and heal.

Endings are the place where beginnings can start, and while refreshing and beautiful, they can often feel messy and uncomfortable – especially if, like me, you have a need to feel in control.

Life is unpredictable, and we must ebb and flow like water to become resilient to what is brought our way. This includes doors being shut in our faces, or us having the courage to slam them shut ourselves. The end of something can be a mourning period, but also a time to reflect on what’s been, how we feel, and how we’d like to move forward.

As the year draws to a close, I always feel pensive and more aware of my thoughts, especially now that I’m a mother and have overcome critical illness. You don’t come back from death (both in the physical and spiritual sense) and just pick up where you left off. Everything feels different. Everything is different. And time to re-evaluate is important.

As my maternity leave is in full swing (and by the time you read this my second-born will be here), I’m in the space of starting a new chapter. A chapter where I’m a mother of two, where I’m rediscovering parts of myself that I’ve lost, but also finding parts of myself I never knew were there, and just hitting pause so I can think, focus, and decide on what the future looks like for me. Contracts and collaborations with incredible brands are ending, and I am (for the first time) taking a long break away from work and social media. The only break I’ve had in 12 years was when I was in a coma, which doesn’t bloody count!!

I’m tired.

Tired to my core, and very much in need of taking some time out to be with my family, continue healing, and find other things – new, exciting things – that bring me contentment and joy. While happiness is so fleeting, I believe peace can be a constant, and that is something I’d like to work towards. Long gone are the days of being OK and comfortable with chaos; I need stillness and to do that, I need to cut out som

Training for sports or aesthetics is all well and good, but what if your primary goal is to be able to move through your daily life with more ease? These workout videos might change your perspective on exercise completely

When we think of ‘training’, often, the first thing that comes to mind is preparing for sports, or for aesthetic goals. But there is another option.

Functional training is all about doing exercises with more ease – things like bending, twisting, lifting, loading, pushing, pulling, squatting, and hauling. It can also help with your balance and stability, as well as overall strength. And, of course, we couldn’t forget the mental health benefits of exercising, too.

Over time, you may be able to protect yourself from domestic injuries (how often do we hear about people throwing their back out after lifting something incorrectly?), as well as being able to go about chores and hobbies for longer periods of time.

Ultimately, anyone can benefit from focusing on functional training, but it may be particularly helpful for those who struggle with the link between exercise and body image, and want to find a way of staying active without focusing on aesthetic results.

Tempted? We’ve collected together five online functional workout videos, to help you take your first steps.

1. Daily strength training

This video from doctor and physiotherapist Jared Beckstrand is a great place to start. Here, he takes you through some very basic exercises that you can try out, and do whenever it suits you. These are the kinds of exercises that you can pick up in spare moments – a couple of squats while the kettle boils, for example – making them a nice way to gently ease yourself in.

2. Functional body weight training

Using just your own body weight, this video will get your heart rate going, and build strength across your whole body. Now, this class is listed as suitable for beginners, but it's definitely meant to be a challenge. As the instructor says, go at your own pace. If what you see on the screen is too fast for you, slow it down – the aim is to get your heart rate going and to challenge yourself, but you should still be able to complete the workout.

3. Targeted core training

Strengthening your core can support your overall wellbeing in many ways. It can help you improve your posture, so that you’re less likely to injure your back, and it can also help with your balance and stability. This targeted workout is short and sweet, coming in at just eight minutes, and it doesn’t need any equipment for you to complete it. Some of the moves are reasonably advanced, so if you are struggling, slow it down, or repeat another move that you’re more comfor

How to set up your own book club

One evening each month, I can be found in the cosy cubby of a pub, spending the next few hours diving into the pages of that month’s read with a group of diehard bibliophiles. I’ve always felt that there was something romantic about book clubs, not solely in the sense that they make great meet-cutes for main characters, but because they feel old-timey and warm, and they are a means of coming together and connecting over what is normally a solitary hobby.

Book clubs open doors to new worlds, new genres, as well as to lasting friendships, and topics and experiences that you hadn’t previously considered.

Thinking about setting up your own book club? Here are some points to ponder and tips to help you get started.

What are you going to read?

With so many options out there, how do you decide what you’re going to read? Well, you might choose to have a theme for your book club, for example, is this club going to be devoted to minority or female writers? Or is it going to focus on a certain genre, such as crime books, or fantasy? Alternatively, the club could be devoted to working through prize lists, like the Booker Longlist.

If you don’t want to go so niche, you could consider changing the theme each month (romance, then translation, then a book set in your region), or find other ways to narrow the pool, such as only picking paperbacks under 300 pages. From there, you just need to figure out how the decision process is going to work – will you put forward options and allow the group to vote on which book they’d like to read as you go? Let a different person pick each time? Or will you take lots of suggestions from everyone, and allocate books throughout the year?

Who are you going to invite?

First things first, how many people do you want to have in your book club, and what kind of atmosphere are you looking to create? Do you want intimate chats, where each person has space to freely express their thoughts, or are you looking to create a larger group where everyone jumps in and thoughts are bounced around?

You might have queues of friends and family who are keen to join the club and get reading – in that case, all you need to do is send the invites out. But if you’re looking to get to know new people, and connect with other readers over a shared interest, you might want to turn to the internet.

You can start your own group that people can search for on sites such as MeetUp, where others hunting for book clubs like yours are likely to discover them. Or you could try putting a call out in local Facebook groups.

Where are you going to meet?

You might prefer the physical presence of your book clubbers, in which case you need a space to meet up. Would you like to come to an arrangement where you meet in each other’s homes, and take it in turn to host? Or would you prefer the neutral ground of a pub or other social space?

If you have a lot of people attending, it might be worth seeing what spaces are available to hire in your area – such as town and village halls, and other community hubs. These spaces may charge an hourly rate to hire, so depending on how much that is, you might wish to ask your group to chip in to cover the cost.

Alternat

If you’re feeling anxious, low and questioning what the point of life is, you could be having an existential crisis

There are certain things that happen in life that make us question the meaning of it all. The death of a loved one, illness, the breakdown of a relationship or other life transitions. For many, the pandemic and the general state of the world have left us reeling in uncertainty and angst.

It can be hard to know what to do with this feeling, but putting a name to it can help. Everyone is different of course, but I think some of us are having existential crises.

What is an existential crisis?

This is a term used to describe that sense of unease you feel about the meaning of life, the choices you make and your freedom. You may be asking ‘what is the meaning of life?’ or ‘what’s the point if I’m going to die one day?’.

You might feel isolated, overwhelmed and unmotivated. This feeling may have come out of the blue, but many of us experience existential crises after a major life event. Some mental health conditions like anxiety, BPD, depression and OCD can also make you more prone to existential crises, but they don’t cause them.

If this is all sounding painfully familiar, know that you’re not alone in how you feel and that there are tools to help you break free.

What can help?

First of all, it can be helpful to recognise that an existential crisis may not be a wholly bad thing. It could give you the nudge you need to reassess what makes you happy in life and how you can find a sense of fulfilment.

When we’re in the midst of existential thinking, we’re zoomed way out. We’re thinking about the big picture and some big topics, so it’s no surprise that we get overwhelmed. Thinking in this way isn’t necessarily bad, but if it’s causing you anxiety, it could help to zoom back in.

Try to narrow your vision to your life and what you find enjoyable and meaningful. Gratitude journaling can be a helpful way to keep track of what makes you smile and what you find personally fulfilling. Connecting with loved ones can also help to lift any feelings of isolation and bring you back to the here and now.

Speaking of the here and now, mindfulness could also be a tool to try. Helping you ground yourself in the present moment, mindfulness encourages us to simply ‘be’, which could be exactly what you need.

What is existential therapy?<