Assertiveness is not being rude

 Actually, yesterday I was talking about standing up for yourself at the cost of the momentary rudeness, however, I was actually wrong about it and today I am going to write about assertiveness. I had one of the days where I had to be assertive in a moment, but apparently when I talk about standing up for myself, I found that I was a little rude towards people and you know what happens when you are rude, you start losing respect of the people who really respected you, so first and foremost folks, if you are following this blog, please please understand don't standup for yourself at the cost of being rude, because there's a fine line between standing up for yourself without being rude and standing up for yourself with being rude so today I am just going to correct myself in that very area. 

The first thing out here is to recognise that you can be assertive without attacking others and it is possible to do that. Don't be an example of a person who's just plain rude to gain importance within the team. You can be fair and assertive and still not attack others. Like always I will talk about the what, why and the how. However, currently I am just saying that it's possible to be assertive and non attacking to others.

So if we really define assertiveness in the realest terms, "being assertive means communicating your needs, wants, feelings, beliefs and opinions to others in a direct and honest manner, while at the same time being receptive to their needs and without intentionally hurting anyone’s feelings." I have pasted the above quote from a channel called as better health channel. But here they say that being assertive is all about communicating your needs, wants, feelings and beliefs to others in a direct and honest manner, while at the same time being respective of their needs and without intentionally hurting anyone's feelings. So in short it's more about being honest but still being non offensive to others. 

Many people think of assertiveness as being clear about your own view points, pointing out your own thoughts and feelings, but people forget about being fair. We all have our own opinions and all of them want benefits to be on their side, but the truth is every coin has 2 sides and so does being assertive. Being assertive also means to do what is fair. If a chocolate needs to be equally distributed amongst 2 brothers, you might want more, but your brother also wants more, so what's fair, dividing the chocolate by 2 and splitting in half. That's what real assertiveness means and if the days of one of the brothers are bad, give that brother some of your share, that's what we need to understand. That's what family is all about, but never mind, let's not get there. 

I can type all of these points, but the summary of it all is valuing other peoples opinions, your own feelings and view points, and speaking about it confidently being fair and unjust. That's what real self confidence comes from. 

 

One mistake we all make while being assertive is that we bring up the topic in front of someone else. That's not being assertive, you have to bring up your points to the other person directly. 

This is extremely important, being assertive is not speaking too softly nor too loudly but in the right conversational tone. Makes great eye contact, shows expression which matches the message, not intimidating or no expression, relaxes and adopts an open stance and expression. These are so much of valuable points, they also participate in the group being an equal in the group, not too polite or not too rude, just the right balance. They value themselves and they value others, do not try to hurt anyone, including themselves. Usually, they reach their goals without being rude or hurting others, whereas an aggressive person reaches their goals by hurting others. So in order to live a good life, its very important to be assertive, rather its an essential and a must have skill rather than a good to have. 

Okay so now we understand what assertiveness is and it's not about being rude, it's about being yourself. Even if it's tough, saying what you feel without the fear of judgement is more important. More importantly, I feel like if you say certain things, but if you say them well enough, the message will go across really well. So now why do we want to be assertive? So let's first think of what will happen if we are not assertive. 

1. Stress: Whether in our work life or in our personal life, there are times when we just overcommit something inorder to please someone, or we just say yes when we want to say no. This creates a feeling of loss of control and in turn gives you stress. 

2. Resentment: Let's say someone said something really nasty to you, now rather than responding to the nasty comment, you took all the insult in and did not say any word to the other person. Wouldn't you have resentment about that situation and try to retaliate in a passive-aggressive way?

3. Victimisation: This is the most important, like I said, a feeling that you have lost control over the situation and you can't do anything about it, that's what is victimisation. You will feel like a victim and you wouldn't do anything to standup for yourself. 

4. Doubting or questioning your own judgment: Sometimes in life, when we do not speak up about something, we start doubting our own judgement, let's say your boss asked you to do some work in a way that you had to stay late, over work, just because someone else had already committed to a deadline that was not right. Now suppose you feel that the deadline is too near and you don't speak up, you would feel that this is what is normalised. You would start doubting your own judgement and say maybe it's actually less work. 

5. Self Confidence : When you speak up, you know you are doing the right thing, you feel in control, you feel less stressed and when you feel less stressed you naturally feel more confident. So in order to feel self confident as well, it's pretty important. 

Now what are the benefits of being assertive? 

1. Gain a sense of empowerment: When you are assertive about your needs, your wants, your feelings in a assertive way, that is being honest about it in such a way that it does not hurt someone else's feelings. You would be able to speak your mind easily and thus gain a sense of empowerment against any injustice that's done against you. 

2. Earn respect from others: Believe it or not, people like who speak their mind in a way that's non aggressive but still honest and real. Being assertive will earn you respect from others because they would know that you have a backbone about it. 

3. Improve communication: When you are assertive about one thing, you are being honest in a very direct way, and you are making sure that you are not hurting anyone's feelings. This will make you honest in every other way as well, you would see that you would be able to communicate things easily and well with others. Whether that's business or personal life, improved communication will eventually mean improved relationships as well. 

4. Create win-win situations: Now that you are assertive, you would be able to ask for what you want in a very easy way. Moreover, you would also be respectful and receptive to someone else's ideas or suggestions. This way you would be able to create more and more win-win situations. 

5. Improve decision making skills: When you are assertive, you are more likely to make better decisions. Think about it, you have an exam tomorrow and a friend calls you to play cricket/football, if you are not assertive you would just say yes. If you are assertive you would prioritise your exam and say no to the game thus making better decisions in the longer term. When you are assertive you are able to say no without feeling guilty. 

So anyways now we know the why and the what, but the how is equally important, here are some tips to make sure that you are being assertive in the right manner: 

1. Keep a calm voice tone: It's very important that whenever you go in an argument or when you go into a heated debate, it's very important to keep your voice tone calm and unhurried. Sometimes it's not about what you say, it's about the way you say it. So the number one thing is to have a calm and an unhurried voice tone. If you want you can also do some deep breaths before speaking. 

2. Focus on your body language: I have said this multiple times, communication is not just verbal but non verbal as well. Keep an open posture, don't try to hide anything and while listening make sure you have a decent eye contact. 

3. Talk about how you felt: Let's say someone said something to you, you felt really bad about it, talk about how it made you feel. For an example, I felt really bad when you said ...... . This way you are talking about your feeling and not your thinking. People cannot debate on what you felt, or what your opinion about something is because that's personal. 

4. Don't accuse: Rather than attacking another individual by saying things like, "You are wrong", "This is not right", say you disagree with something. That way you are attacking the idea and not the person. 

5. Practice: Like any other skill in the world, nothing comes for free, but everything is free of cost. Not free of time. So practice is an essential thing that's required to become good at being assertive. It wouldn't come on the first day, but the more you practice the better you will get. Find situations where you can be assertive first, whether that's with your friend, your mom, your brother, whatever is easy, start with that, but then keep getting feedback and keep getting better from there. 

So yeah remember to practice being assertive, and yeah make sure you set the right boundaries as well. Have a wonderful rest of the day !