Kind doesn’t mean available for anything. Even soft people get to have edges.

Kindness gets mistaken for unlimited availability, mostly because the two look identical for a while. You help, you say yes, you are easy to be around, and people start treating the yes as automatic. Then the first no lands like a personality change instead of a normal answer. Being gentle and having limits were never opposites.

Say one no this week in your own normal voice, without hardening it first. Warm tone, clear answer, no long justification attached. People who like you will not notice anything strange, and the ones who only liked the access will, which is useful information.