Being assertive

For those of you who struggle with people pleaser syndrome, who are passive, depressed, are experiencing conflict with someone or are having anger issues, assertiveness training can be very beneficial.

When someone is unassertive, this involves violating their own rights by failing to express honest feelings, thoughts or beliefs.It also means that someone might try to express their thoughts and feelings but do it in a very apologetic, modest way and others just disregard them.

Unassertiveness has a lot to do with a lack of self-esteem or due to a threat to one’s self-esteem.

In order to understand what being assertive means, here is a list of some assertive rights. This list was compiled by Palmer & Dryden, (1995).

  • The right to say ‘no’
  • The right to consider my needs important
  • The right to make mistakes
  • The right to express my feelings in an appropriate manner without violating anybody else’s rights
  • The right to take responsibility for my actions
  • The right not to be understood
  • The right to respect myself
  • The right to be me
  • The right to be assertive without feeling guilty
  • The right to set my own priorities

Assertiveness training uses methods such as role-play, modelling and rehearsal before actually trying it out in real life situations.It is something that can be very helpful. Something that is important before the training is for the coach to make sure that the coachee doesn’t have any emotional blocks. If there are emotional blocks then these must be resolved first in coaching and then the coachee can move on to the training.

Love Athina ♥

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Author: Courage Coaching

I provide empowerment, empathy & support. I specialise in dealing with dysfunctional relationships, particularly narcissistic abuse & encouraging self-compassion.

3 thoughts on “Being assertive”

  1. A friend and I were just talking about this a moment ago. I find it very difficult at times to feel i have the right to my own needs…I know it is my achilles heel and so important to overcome not putting others first and feeling guilty in confronting others…assertively.
    Hopefully this is post one of further posts on this issue.

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    1. Thank you for your comment and I can completely relate on the difficulty of this. If you have grown up in a dysfunctional home where you were taught that your needs don’t matter as much as your parents’ needs, then being assertive doesn’t come naturally at all! It feels alien and needs a lot of practice! Guilt and anxiety are the 2 things that always pop up first when practicing assertiveness.It is something that needs to be learned in small steps and then needs to be practiced.

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