Human Assertiveness

Proper assertiveness is not always an easy thing. Much depends on upbringing. Standing up for your rights and not being taken advantage of; communicating what you really want in a clear fashion, respecting your own rights and feelings and the rights and feelings of others; and honestly and appropriately give vent to feelings, opinions, and needs - that is worth going for. Some sound self-exploration and practice should yield fruits you like. There are many keys that may serve you. Some may appear to be spoken in jest; others not.

Most people are not assertive for fear of displeasing others and of not being liked. Being taken advantage of may be a result of that.

We discern between these four: basic, emphatic, escalating and language assertion, as they are called.

Married to a Nymph

Many good insights could have to give way to your delighful children: "Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children and no theories," says John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester. And if you don't treat your children tolerably well, your self-respect may go down the drains for it by-and-by. If you don't respect yourself, there are many means to signal it, many of them unconscious, in part by the body language.

A charcoal burner was out in the woods working his kilns. One evening a handsome woman appeared and said she did not know the way - easygoing and nice she looked. He thought that she should stay with him. She agreed, but made the promise that whenever he had been away someplace, he would first knock three times on a certain tree before coming home. She pointed it out. After that she stayed with him for three years. They had three children.

But one day he had been drinking much Scotch whisky, he forgot about the knocking. When he got to the kilns, he saw how she really was with her nose and claws and her tail dipped in a bucket of water. He got very frightened - he was living with a wood sprite. He turned to an old Finn and asked him for advice.

"Take her and the children with you on a sleigh," said the Finn. "Sit on the horse yourself, but do not tie any tight knots in the harness. When you come to the middle of the frozen lake, ride away from them: get shaggy and hairy for yourself."

The charcoal burner sobered up somewhat and next went back and knocked on the tree as he usually did, and he found her handsome as usual. He mounted the horse and invited all the four of them for a ride. When they got to the middle of the frozen lake, many wolves appeared on the ice. It dawned on them that he was going to make a sacrifice.

"Have pity, or I will call my brothers and relatives." his wife said in the wind.

He did not, he chose differently, and next rode off after letting the sleigh loose. When she saw it, she called for help and thundered like cannonballs, hitting the ice. It was blue, Swedish ice. Yet the charcoal burner rode away unscathed; his wife and children were devoured by wolves.

[Adapted from the Swedish. More Swedish legends] [#3.2].

❖ Man and blossoming wife had better be fairly congenial for things to work well.

Antopomorphic

Says a worthy Sufi: "I found I understood the language of angels and animals and went up to an ant. "Do you believe in God?" I asked.

"Of course," the ant said.

"How is your God, then?"

"Why, we have only one sting, but the Big Queen, she has two." - [Freely rendered from a story by sheikh Idries Shah.]

Jester Assertiveness

Triboulet was jester to King Francis I. A great lord, offended at his sallies, threatened to flog him to death. Triboulet went to complain to his master.

"If he does it," said the king, "I'll hang him a quarter of an hour after."

"Thank you, cousin," piped the jester, "but if it's all the same to you, couldn't you do it a quarter of an hour before?"

Fit Assertiveness

There are many books on assertiveness. It may feel a bit awkward to be told by someone else that you need to assert yourself, how to do it, and pay good money for being told so too. Many feel a need to stand up for their rights, and others feel a need to balance the assertiveness needs of many that are supposed to cooperate.

Assertiveness may not need to rest on proofs to work well, and does not have to threaten aggressively the rights of others, or submit to the end that someone ignores or denies the rights or points of views of others. It you claim to be a genuine follower of Jesus and his teachings, turning the other cheek and let demanding robbers take all your possessions and force you into their service, then you do yourself no good turn, and probably not the wider society either, in the long run. If you take slaves and deny their rights to be free (enough), and if you comply with "God-persons" who say that keeping slaves is OK, you deny the slaves normal Human Rights, and step on their assertiveness in the long run. Maybe your complience with bad things help them on and up. Non-cooperation with evil was a paradigm of Mohandas Gandhi's satyagraha, which means "holding on to truth (and integrity)", depending on how you understand the Sanskrit word satya, truth, integrity.

Much too little self-esteem has to be combatted. Also, in no small way assertiveness skills may be learnt and mastered. Many personal development experts, behavior therapists, and cognitive behavioral therapists make a living in such a walk of life. Assertiveness Training has been popularised, and its goals include: increased awareness of personal rights; discerning between non-assertiveness and assertiveness; discerning between passive–aggressiveness and aggressiveness; and learning both verbal and non-verbal assertiveness skills.

How people deal with their own boundaries and those of other people, helps to clarify things a bit:

1. VICTIMS. Passive communicators do not defend their own personal boundaries and thus allow aggressive people to abuse or manipulate them. Fear may be into it. Passive communicators are also typically not likely to risk trying to influence anyone else. They may become victims by passively permitting others to violate their boundaries. At a later time, they may come back and attack with a sense of impunity or righteous indignation.
2. OFFENDERS. Aggressive people do not respect the personal boundaries of others and thus are liable to harm others while trying to influence them. They may judge, threaten, lie, break confidences, stonewall, and violate boundaries of others.
3. BALANCED GUYS. A person communicates assertively by overcoming fear of speaking his or her mind or trying to influence others, but doing so in a way that respects the personal boundaries of others. Assertive people are also willing to defend themselves against aggressive people. If others' actions threaten their boundaries, balanced guys communicate this to prevent escalation. At the same time they may keep an eye to shared interests of many of the parties involved, may perhaps focus on issues more than persons unless the persons do havoc - and seek to maintain their own self-respect.

A bit depending on circumstances, the properly assertive guys with fit self-esteem may feel free to express their feelings, thoughts, and desires; initiate and maintain comfortable relationships; know their rights; can handle their anger to their benefit - not repressing it, but sticking to sensible reason; compromise at times on minor issues; and enter friendships with due consideraton of the needs of one another.

Techniques of assertiveness can vary widely. here are three of the better-known ones:

1. When your partner will not take no for an answer, one may simply simply repeat one's requests or refusals as much as it takes. If your no's are not respected enough, it may be fit to have some decent sanctions on hand.
2. Finding some limited truth to agree with in what an antagonist is saying; agreeing in part or in principle on a thing.
3. I-statements can be used to express your own, dear feelings and wishes without expressing a judgement about the other person or blaming your feelings on them.

There are better odds for not ending up as a drunk by proper assertiveness training, according to research studies. Social skills - knowing what to say, to whom, and when and so on - may help too, and make public life lighter.

Being over-assertive is not beneficial either. A sound balance is needed, and it depends on part on circumstances. If they change a lot, our optimal assertiveness may have to be adjusted - carefully. If you go too far you may end up as one of the aggressive ones without enough sensible skills of adjustment, and without much respect for the rights of others.

Basically, self-assertiveness is being who you are and go on from there, developing skills of handling and the like, understanding things better, and so on. Also bear in mind it takes two to a tango. You may find yourself in a reciprocality web of a sort, where others may not feel they benefit from your proper assertiveness. That can be problem for those who rise among the classes and social spheres to enter your comfort level, or whatever we may call it. Upward moves may meet with many sanctions by others that are left behind somehow. Another side to it: Life transitions makes you vulnerable to manipulation, Harriet Braiker points out. [Wp 1]

As proper assertiveness training bears its fruits in your life, maybe you find it best to change your job so that you get an increase in pay, and you may far more easily say no to unreasonable requests along the road too. [Edo 3]

[Key source: Wikipedia, s.v. "Assertiveness"]