Can you effectively separate your professional and personal lives?

I can separate my personal and professional life, but it also depends on the context. I've had shop function bbqs with all ranks and even though we were in a casual setting, I still addressed my superiors by their ranks because it was the right thing to do.

That being said though, I can distance myself from the job. At work, I'm all business. I might smoke and joke with you, but if work needs to get done, work needs to get done. At home, I'm relaxed. I don't talk about work and I try like hell to avoid any form of news source. If you're at my house, we can talk sports, Marine Corps, video games, movies, food, whatever. But don't come to me with your work gripes in my place of relaxation. Bring it up with me at work.

Hanging out should be limited to others of your same pay grade. NCOs should not hang out with E3 & below, or higher ranking NCOs who will be giving you orders the next day. It is not professional to say the least, and possibly damaging to mission and morale if yr buddy tells you to do something you don't like. As an O3 I would never think of hanging out with an O4 buddy or not because there is a world of difference between us. If a higher ranking officer or NCO allows you to hang out with him, you should be very careful about how far you carry the good will stuff.

I've always kept my social life and my professional life separate. No one I work with has ever been to my house, and I don't go to the homes of people I work with... I want to be able to step out of my work persona completely when I'm not at work and that just isn't possible if I am mixing those two worlds.