The topic of assertiveness is very important to me. For much youth, I was largely under the impression that others should be able to divine my needs, and if they really cared about me, they would see that my needs are met (within limits, of course). While this is possible and sometimes relationships work like that, this puts a huge amount of responsibility on my friends and family, when communicating my needs more clearly would have been better for everyone involved.
Thankfully I had a big wake-up call when I was about 18; I left my hometown to go to university, which put more strain on the nascent relationship I had with my partner than it could take. I often felt victimized in this relationship. When I started working through what happened, it came to me that I never really made my needs known or insisted on them. This lead to me feeling slighted or disrespected, making me resentful.
Assertiveness and Responsibility
Ever since, it has been of importance to me to become more assertive and overall clearer in the communication of my needs because to be able to communicate my needs, I need to discover and examine them. This moves the responsibility of my happiness from others to me (and let’s be honest – making others wholly responsible for one’s happiness is a recipe for disaster).
As long as others are responsible for my happiness and needs, I will forever remain in a fog of uncertainty because this comfortably shields me from ever needing to make decisions. It allows me to keep open all options, and whenever something goes wrong, I get to blame others for it because I never took action myself. I genuinely think that trading in responsibility for credible deniability is a very, very bad deal!
Becoming more aware – Individuation
If I try to communicate my needs, this does not only mean that I have to figure out what I need but also how to put them into words. This is a whole extra cognitive level and forces me to make them fully conscious, allowing me to become a more aware individual.
Uncovering resentment and previously hidden desires is a very healthy endeavor (at least according to Jung) and leads one on the way of individuation. Learning about one’s subconscious desires can uncover previously unknown facts about oneself. The end goal is to become a potent and responsible person with increased awareness of one’s actions and thoughts.
Assertiveness =/= Selfishness
Being assertive is not the same as being selfish. One can be assertively selfless or passively selfish, and I do not believe these two terms to be equivalent. If I am more assertive, I will more actively take charge of situations that matter to me; my personal needs or goals do not have to be hedonistic, and I believe that many people find meaning in improving the world we live in.
I also think that many of the twentieth century’s authoritarian regimes would not have existed if the average citizen had been a little more unrelenting and stubborn when faced with totalitarianism and ideological repression.
Conclusion
Way too often do I still feel annoyed when others slight me and ignore some of my needs that I didn’t even know I had in the first place. I really try to use the instances when I become passive-aggressive or resentful as learning experiences.
I think the road to becoming more assertive is worthwhile, but one must be careful not to become a self-obsessed bully. Being more assertive and clear about one’s own needs should be a way to become a more complete individual, not a tyrant. I know that I am more comfortable around people who can tell me what they need, but this does not mean I will not do nice things for them or ignore them unless they speak up. If we can all learn to voice our desires and be mindful of what the people around us want, the world would be a much better place.