Assertiveness Begins With…..

Most of us will not recognise where we lack assertiveness, so ingrained are our patterns…….. And, all is not lost…. You can bet that if you suddenly find you are stuck in a loop, where you recognise you are consistently not getting what you need, it may be showing you an assertiveness issue.

So, are you asking for what you need?

This makes tee assumption that we even know what we need. Deep down of course we always know what we truly need. However, layers of external conditioning and misaligned self perception can help to negate our trust that we are entitled to need or want anything. Be it a promotion or someone to pass us the stapler, often we do not believe we have the right to even ask.

My own lack of recognition is often around food …. When I become irrational or start ranting, my husband only has to say “eat something…. For goodness sakes eat and then we can decide” to know I’ve gone overboard. Who knows where this originates, but what is important in the here and now is that I practise learning to recognise when I am hungry, earlier, and get that need met, and my marriage might survive…..

“If you don’t ask you don’t get” is a good northern saying that I am reclaiming from my childhood. This does not mean you are directly entitled to receive, but, it does mean do not fear asking the question!

There will come to consciousness the slow dawning that a situation is not working out as we had hoped…. Again…. And, with that the growing realisation that the frustration is rising until….. We snap, and demand, and rage at the unfairness of it all…..

Perhaps it is only then that we realise that we could have asked for the stapler earlier… That we were entitled to ask, that we might not have had to get up over and over to get it, that has we risked the question, we might have received help. And we may not have needed to accrue all that anger and frustration. 

This stuff takes practise…… The more we ask for that which we want, the more we realise we are within our rights to do so. The more often we get our request met, the more affirmed we are that it is ok to try. The more we survive recovering a ‘no’, because that ‘thing’ is not possible right now, does not lead to any kind of punishment and nor does the sky fall in, the safer it will feel to notice our desires.

Sometimes we will recognise a desire and know it’s a ‘not right now’ desire. Sometimes we will recognise a need and know it’s worth the risk of asking.

Fundamentally, we learn to recognise the want or need we can choose how and when to deal with it

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