A short group discussion about how people who are passive (or overly aggressive) can learn healthy assertiveness. Speakers recommend practicing assertive requests in safe, low-stakes environments (e.g., restaurants, ordering coffee), asking trusted people to role-play or give feedback, visualizing difficult conversations beforehand, and identifying specific recurring situations (family gatherings, work tasks, vacations) where one can plan a small, concrete assertive step.
So if we aren't normally assertive, and I think for people listening, they can probably find themselves on that continuum. You were talking about that for some people, they maybe recognize I go into aggression too quick and I need to learn to maybe scale it back and learn healthy assertiveness. But many others listening probably would say, but I'm more on the passive end. I tend to just let others do what they want. I don't speak up. If we're more in that category, how could we practice or learn appropriate assertiveness?
This is a great question, because I always think that since this is a learned behavior, we definitely need to practice it, and we need to practice it with safe people and in safe environments. And I have found that, as I've learned to be more assertive, that one of the best places for me to learn was like, in a restaurant or ordering coffee or something. I've noticed with people who are so passive that they will even avoid going to a certain restaurant because they don't want to have the conversation. Like maybe that with every single meal they serve this certain kind of soup, but the person doesn't like that kind of soup, but is not assertive enough to say, you know what, could I get salad instead? Because that would be a huge risk for them. And so it is taking the opportunity to practice those kind of things. I've noticed too, in restaurants that eating out at restaurants is just challenging for me because I have a bunch of food allergies. But if I order something and it comes out wrong, which happens a lot, people who are more passive, they'll just eat it anyway, or they'll figure out how to make it work. People who are more aggressive usually will become angry and they exchange words or even yell a little bit like, why.
Can'T you shame the person?
Exactly. And then an assertive person is gonna say, oh, you know what? I didn't know this had dairy, and I thought I ordered it that way. Would it be possible to get something without dairy? You know what I mean? And you have this positive, polite exchange with somebody that's clear. And most of the time people are like, oh, I didn't catch that. I'm so sorry. Let me fix that for you. But again, it has to do with this interaction more than it has to do with either I'm just going to accept my life and that they got it wrong again, and I'm not going to say anything about it or I'm going to get angry. But it isn't any of those things. It's just recognizing that we make mistakes, all of us do. We're human. But yet how can we have this exchange that's not going to end up in conflict, that's not going to end up in anybody getting their feelings hurt, but is going to be a positive experience and really proactive to making sure that our needs and expectations are met.
I was thinking that. And this might sound silly, but you could just. With another person or a couple people say, I would like to work on being assertive. Is it okay if I practice with you guys? And it's funny. One of the things that helps make goals more doable is making them known to other people. And so I'm just thinking if you have a couple people in group or you have a spouse or even people inside your family where you're like, I realize I'm not very assertive, and it's something I wanna work on. Can we practice it and even set up that if I come off as aggressive, will you tell me? And then it's almost like you're deciding the rules of the game before you ever play. And then once you get into it, then it's like someone's like, o, that's right, you're practicing being assertive. Thank you for doing that. Or, yeah, you totally did come off as aggressive. And I know that that may seem silly, but, like, the question is so interesting to me because what are ways of practicing? It's practicing, like, that's how you do it. So maybe creating that environment with people around you that are safe, that you can do that in that safe environment with them.
Yeah, which. And I'm just going to say that that's a very good suggestion. And especially if what you're practicing to say is something that really could end up being a conflict or even has become a conflict in a relationship beforehand. And that goes along with that whole idea of visualization, too, of just like, practicing what this actually could look like, especially if it's gone sideways in the past.
Yeah, well. And if you warn other people or those safe people that you're around to say, hey, I'm working on this, I'm practicing, you may find that they will actually affirm that desire. Because it's very likely that safe people in your life, people that love you and care about you, they know your tendency towards passiveness. And it probably is helpful to them to see you be more assertive. And they've likely seen some of the downside of others being passive. And, like, why didn't you just tell me you didn't want to go that place or why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you speak up? Because then later, if it does become a conflict or grumbling or I never wanted to go there to begin with, or whatever comes out. I think for people that are around you, they would have preferred your assertiveness. And you might not see that because you've typically seen it as a bad thing. But if you tell them, hey, this is something I work on, they might affirm you and say, man, I would really appreciate that. That would be great. I'm excited that you're taking this step because I think it will help in a lot of situations. And then the other thing that came to mind in terms of practice, I think we can identify places in our life where we tend to gravitate towards passiveness. Heather mentioned restaurants, but I think all of us probably have places. Even if sometimes we tend to be more outspoken or aggressive, we probably have places where we go a little bit into that passive category. And it might be with our families that we gather with around Christmas. It could be when we're on trips, it could be with certain relatives or parents. It may be in a work situation. It could be related to how we use vacation time or spirit. There's just any number of places. If we looked at our life, if we looked at our week, we might realize, man, here's an area where I am always feeling something or more often than not, and I rarely, if ever say anything, okay, what could I do? How could I, in that specific area take one step towards assertiveness? And maybe that's the plan also that you could tell other people to say, you know, at work I'm always being given this task that's not my job. And I don't think my supervisor realizes how much time it's taking or adding to my plate. My goal is this week, if I'm asked, I'm at least going to ask them if they realize that it's a three hour job, that that's how long it takes, or you know, something along those lines that then you're kind of planning because you know yourself well enough to see. Just like Heather said about restaurants, when I go there, I just kind of go into passive mode and it never works out well. I'm going to try to do things differently. And again, maybe that will happen with some of the holiday gatherings. You kind of know where you're going to go quiet. So have a plan, communicate it to others and then try to take that one.
