How to be Assertive Help with Assertiveness needed Please
Assertiveness and being assertive has always been one of my issues and i am starting this topic as i need help and or ideas on how i can be more assertive.
Usually i get too aggressive when i feel someone is going to try to take advantage of me or my things. I don't know how to do a normal NT assertive statement. My NT gf has been a buffer for years. Yet i need to know how to tell people no and be clear and not bite their heads off.
I have also had in the past, instances that have built up where i did not know how to be assertive and it lead to aggressive outbursts against the culprit.
It is obvious to NTs that i am different and some of these NTs live around here and they're drunks and they want our oranges (we have fruit trees). So they suggest they come over use a rake to knock oranges off the top of the tree. I was like no i can get them myself.
I am afraid they will ask again and i will get to aggressive about it and then they will get mad at me.
So it's pretty much i need to know how NTs be assertive enough so that people leave them alone, with out having to get aggressive about it.
I am afraid they will ask again and i will get to aggressive about it and then they will get mad at me.
I would start with "no". If they don't get the hint, say "no, and please leave the property".
If they are drunk when they are asking, it's more of a public drunkeness issue, which is messy, but that has nothing to do with your assertativeness.
You have every right to your property, and they have no right to your property.
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Our first challenge is to create an entire economic infrastructure, from top to bottom, out of whole cloth.
-CEO Nwabudike Morgan, "The Centauri Monopoly"
Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri (Firaxis Games)
In my experience assertiveness is arrived at by being able to set aside feelings of anger, fear, woundedness, and also of superiority or inferiority. Meeting someone on equal footing and being both tactful and honest about what is bothering you or what you consider your rights.
How to arrive at that ... it takes practice, and there are situations in which I've not been able to achieve it. I do know that the heat of anger isn't a good time to try to be assertive. Take a break from the situation, come back to it when both parties are calm and can be reasonable.
Maybe it would help to think about Mr. Spock or Data.
But it also helps to add a little empathy in there, not be overly logical. In order to see both sides of a situation it's important to understand there are rational and irrational aspects to every human being.
Politeness helps too. The rules of etiquette were built around people getting along. Many of them are the beginning of assertiveness.
When I have someone come to my door that I don't want around, I'm polite but also firm. "No thank you." If they persist I keep saying no thank you, even as I'm closing the door.
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Female
INFP
Thank you both with your help in answering my question.
Usually i try and avoid situations as such, yet sometimes they get forced on me.
Like the time my MIL tried to force a feline onto us (we already have 3 in a trailer) and so it's not healthy for more of them.
I told her no several times then started yelling it. No one was listening so i started screaming about it.
I felt the mother in law was taking advantage that i like animals.
If her younger daughter found the cat, make her learn the responsibility of finding a home for it instead of pushing it onto me or my wife.
I guess it's easier to be firm with strangers, the problem is worst when it's those people i know.
