Download Honesty/Straightforwardness

Session One: Honesty/Straightforwardness
Introduction: Assertiveness is a style of communication as well as the characteristic mode of behavior. It
involves the ability to express feelings, thoughts, beliefs, and opinions in an open manner that doesn’t
violate the rights of self or others.
Common alternative styles of communication include passive, aggressive and passive-aggressive.
A passive style of communication tends to violate the rights of the self, putting the desires of others
before one’s own. An aggressive style of communication violates the rights of others. A passiveaggressive style of communication is essentially aggressive communication enacted through passive
behavior. For example, someone may be angry with another but s/he doesn’t act in an overtly aggressive
way toward the other by aggressive communication such as yelling or aggressive behavior such as
hitting. Instead, they may not speak to her/him for a few days or pretend to forget to complete such tasks
as running an errand.
Passive: Violates own rights. Others needs are given priority. While both passive and avoidant behavior
involve the over-prioritization of the needs of others; passive-avoidant behavior is characterized by a
hypersensitivity to potential or actual rejection and criticism, a strong need for uncritical acceptance,
social withdrawal in spite of a desire for affection and acceptance, and low self-esteem.
Assertive: Respects both own needs and the needs of others.
Aggressive: Violates the rights of others. Own needs are given priority. While both assertive and
aggressive communication involve stating ones needs; they are distinguished by the level of respect
given to the rights of others in the process of communicating – expressed in the choice of vocabulary,
tone, and body language.
Assertiveness and Problem Solving: Being assertive does not mean that you always get what you want.
Being assertive is not a guarantee of any outcome at all. Being assertive is about expressing yourself in a
way that respects both your needs and the needs of others. Sometimes this means you get what you
want, sometimes you won’t get what you want at all, and sometimes you will come to a mutually
satisfactory compromise.
Assertiveness Responses to Aggressive Behavior: Understanding how to be assertive provides you with
the choice of when to be assertive. Assertive behavior is not always the effective approach to managing a
conflict when the other individual involved is behaving irrationally. Techniques to be employed at such
times range from basic re-direction for argumentativeness to passive avoidant behavior if the other
individual is aggressively acting out. This is particularly important, as it represents a situation when being
assertive may place you at risk. In such instances the best decision might involve a passive approach.
Even so, it was enacted in response to a decision that it was the most effective choice for the situation at
hand. Learning to be assertive is about providing you with a choice.
Assertiveness and Self Esteem be it passive or aggressive, non-assertive behavior can lead to low selfesteem. By communicating in a passive manner, we do not say what we really feel or think. This means
we can end up agreeing with and fulfilling other people’s needs or wants rather than our own. This can
result in feeling a lack of purpose, and a feeling of not being in control of our own lives. If we never
express ourselves openly and conceal our thoughts and feelings, we may become chronically tense,
stressed, anxious or resentful. It may also lead to unhealthy and uncomfortable relationships. We may
feel like the people closest to us don’t really know us.
If we constantly communicate in an aggressive manner our communication will not be effective and
individuals both within the work place and the home may lose respect for us. Again this can lead to low
self-esteem.
Assertive individuals tend to be emotionally balanced and have better health outcomes. Less assertive
people, in general, have a greater likelihood of substance abuse, often to self-medicate anxiety and
depression.
Assertiveness as a Family Based Style of Communication and Behavior
Introduction: Assertiveness is a learned style of communication and social behavior.
We are all born with an innate temperament before we are socialized. Socialization may reinforce our
innate tendencies; including passive (avoidant) and aggressive (approach) styles of problem solving.
However, socialization may also curtail our innate tendencies; toward the goal of molding an acceptable
response in accordance with the culture around us. This could range from extreme passivity (e.g. Culture
of the Amish) to open aggression (e.g. Culture of Gangs).
Development: Beginning in infancy, the individual adapts her/his behavior to fit in with responses s/he
receives from the environment -- responses received from family, peers, co-workers, and authority
figures. For example, if your family or peer group dealt with conflict by yelling and arguing, then you may
have learned to deal with conflict in that way. Alternatively, if your family taught you that you should
always please others before yourself, then you may find it hard to be assertive about your needs. If your
family or peer group believes that you should not express negative emotion, and ignore or ridicule you if
you do, then you will quickly learn not to express negative emotion.
Current Self-Assessment: Questions that can be useful to ask when you are evaluating your own style of
communication and interpersonal behavior include:
•How did your family handle conflict?
•What did your family do when they disagreed with somebody or were upset with people?
•How did your parents teach you to deal with conflict?
•What were their messages?
•In what ways did you learn to get what you wanted without asking for it directly? (e.g., crying, yelling,
making threats etc.)
•Do you still use these ways to get what you want today?
As children and teenagers we learn to behave in a way that works for us at the time. If we were assertive
to aggressive parents or friends it may have gotten us into trouble, so we learned to stay under the radar.
Or we may have learned to be aggressive to survive. And it is likely that the family members and friends
that we learned this from also learned their behavior from someone else.
It is important that you don’t blame yourself or your family for your lack of assertiveness. It can be more
helpful to think of it as a family or cultural cycle of repetitive behaviors; perhaps recurring for many
generations. Now, in order to more effectively manage relationships, you are going to learn how to break
the cycle and develop a new, more effective way of communicating and behaving.
Impediments to Assertiveness: What stops us from being assertive?
Self-defeating beliefs - We might have unrealistic beliefs and negative self-statements about being
assertive, our ability to be assertive, or the things that might happen if we are assertive. This is often a
major cause of acting non-assertively. Examples of such beliefs are:
•It is uncaring, rude and selfish to say what you want
•If I assert myself I will upset the other person and ruin our relationship
•It will be terribly embarrassing if I say what I think
Skills deficit - It may be that we just don’t have the verbal and nonverbal skills to be assertive. We may
watch other people being assertive and admire their behavior but have no real idea how to be like that
ourselves.
Anxiety and stress - It may be that we know how to be assertive but we get so anxious that we find we
can’t carry out the behavior. We may be so stressed that it becomes difficult to think and act clearly. We
need to learn how to manage our anxiety and reduce the physical stress in our bodies.
Situation evaluation - It may be that one can’t really tell which behaviors to use in which situations. There
are three main mistakes people can make with evaluating situations:
1) Mistaking firm assertion for aggression
2) Mistaking non-assertion for politeness
3) Mistaking non-assertion for being helpful
Summary: Assertiveness is a way of communicating that expresses ones needs, opinions and emotions
while respecting the rights of others. It is different from aggressive behavior which violates the rights of
others and passive behavior which violates the rights of the self.
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Even if we are assertive in most situations there can still be certain situations in which we find it
difficult - or even disadvantageous - to be assertive.
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Habitual unassertive behavior can lead to low self-esteem.
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We are all born with an innate temperament and a potential to be assertive. But often as we
develop we learn different patterns of communication.
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Our environment can make it difficult for us to be assertive.
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We can make it difficult for ourselves to be assertive by holding unhelpful beliefs and
assumptions about ourselves, other people and the world.
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Assertiveness is learned behavior. You can learn to develop a new, more effective way of
communicating and behaving.