Assertive Behavior means that you express yourself aggressively and stand up for your own personal rights and point of view. Being confident.
Assertive behavior is a life skill which can be both useful in your inner being, as well as, outward appearance. It doesn’t happen overnight, but through continued practice and possibly years of fine tuning.
And while you may not always get what you want, when you want, you will always know that you gave it your best effort.
“Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside of ourselves will affect us.”–Stephen R Covey
Some tips for improving your Assertive Behavior:
1. You Must Believe in Yourself.
Practice always thinking positively and feeding yourself with positive inner dialogue. Daily stand in front of a mirror, look yourself in the eye, and tell yourself how wonderful you are!
2. Realize That The Only Person You Can Change is You.
You can only change what you do; and that a change in your behavior will often afford others the opportunity to behave differently towards you.
3. Respond Instead of Reacting!
Begin to start choosing how to behave, based on admitting and accepting the consequences. Accept the fact that you – and only you – have made the choice. No one can force you to make a choice.
4. Never Beat Yourself up For Past Behaviors and Decisions!
Instead, turn every situation into a positive learning opportunity for future behavioral change.
5. Be Aware of Your Body Language.
Make sure your body language matches your words: people tend to believe what they see rather than what they hear.
6. Instill the Green Cross code:
Stop, Look, and Listen – then Think, before you respond. This will ensure that you will stay in control of your emotions, as well as, the situation at hand. This will also afford other’s the opportunity to do the same.
7. Always Aim for a Resolution-Never Self-defense.
Concentrate on the “situation at hand” rather than your own feelings, recognizing that the other person is more probably angry about the “situation” -not necessarily you.
8. Always Choose Your Words Wisely.
Lose the words which signal you’re a pushover. Such as: “I’m terribly sorry”, or “I’m afraid”, or “Could you possibly…?” or “Can I just …?”.
Substitute big “I” statements followed by factual descriptions, instead of, judgments or exaggerations. This will encourage the other person to do the same.
9. Just say “NO.”
Learn to afford yourself all of the rights you allow everyone else to have. You are not refusing them personally, you are refusing their request.
10. Possess a “Can Do” attitude.
Believe that things don’t just happen to you – but that you have the ability to make them happen.
Assertive Behavior is a positive form of aggressiveness. When we are assertive in our behavior, we have the strength to resist negative or hurtful influences. We have the ability to think for ourselves, ask for what we need, and speak up to protect ourselves, as well as, others.
If you enjoyed this article, please “Like and Share.”
Angela Valadez
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Comments
Thank you Merle and Timothy. Hope you both had an awesome Valentine's Day!
Some great goals to shoot for Angela!
Love it Angela. Great tips and advice. Thanks for sharing.
Thank you Sandy. It can be a Thin line sometimes. That is why the Green Cross code:)
This is a great post, Angela. Sometimes it is hard to be assertive withouth being overly agressive ...these are important points to remember. Thanks for sharing them.
Amen to that Terri. Thanks for your comments and great support here on Syndication Express.
Awesome post Angela and some great advice my friend. Shared and liked. Keep it coming love. You are too blessed to be stressed. Your words tells me this much.