4 Tricks to Help Cultivate Assertiveness to Improve Your Communication

How to communicate confidently whilst being respectful

The thought of communicating our needs or what’s important to us can make us feel anxious.

For example, if you want to tell someone their idea isn’t the best and it doesn't sit with your values, this can be extremely challenging.

On one hand, you don’t want to come across as rude or hurtful. On the flip side, you know it’s important to let them know the truth.

This is where being assertive is crucial. Assertiveness is a skill that enables you to stand up for what you believe in — in a confident manner — whilst showing respect to others.

I had to work damn hard to build my assertiveness. I was that person — sat in the corner — who would nod their head and go along with whatever was discussed. I would be terrified to speak up about my own beliefs and thoughts. I didn’t want to look bad.

Improving my ability to be assertive has provided me with peace of mind, increased my confidence and self-esteem.

Even in my time as an assistant psychologist, I noticed benefits towards people’s mental health when they learned how to be more assertive. Research shows assertive training can improve anxiety, reduce depression and improve our self-esteem.

Whilst cultivating assertiveness can be tricky, there are simple things we can implement to help cultivate assertiveness.

1. Know Your Beliefs and Affirm Them

A crucial step in being assertive is not shying away from communicating your needs and beliefs.

However, it’s hard to do this without identifying exactly what you believe in.

Many of us think we know our beliefs — which may be true — but it can be so easy to go against your own beliefs, boundaries and wishes just to please someone else.

For example, you might believe you have way too much work to do but you want to please your boss by completing it all. In this situation, it’s likely you won’t be assertive in telling your manager the workload is too high.

On the flip side, someone else might have the same belief of having way too much work to do but they affirm this through self-talk. They’re more likely to stick to this belief and raise it, assertively with their boss. That’s because this belief is being reinforced through affirmations.

So, to cultivate assertiveness, identify what you believe in and affirm these beliefs.

How to implement:

• Look at past experiences to identify beliefs — we will always have a range of experiences that highlight our beliefs. Look back on things in your work, personal life, hobbies and good and bad experiences. This will help you identify strong core beliefs that sit right with you.
• Affirm these beliefs — Stanford psychologist Dr. Kelly McGonigal has a value-affirmation strategy. She says “describe why this value is important to you and/or your family or community. You could also write about how you express this value in your everyday life.” You can use this for your beliefs too.

For example, if you believe in having a good work-life balance, write about why that is important in your everyday life. It could be to help with stress levels or to spend a good amount of time with family, etc.

This will help with highlighting why these beliefs are important. If you know why, it’s much easier to stand up for them and communicate the importance of them too — all of this is crucial in cultivating assertiveness.

2. Practice Saying Assertive Statements

Being assertive can be tricky because sometimes we don’t have the confidence to be assertive.

Without this confidence, it becomes difficult to portray a message that is firm, clear but also respectful.

An easy way to build this confidence is to practice using assertive phrases. The more you do it, the easier it becomes.

Studies show assertiveness can increase in individuals who learn and practice expressing their thoughts and feelings openly.

So, the key to being assertive is to keep practicing it.

How to implement:

• Practice using “I” statements — these statements help with being clear, direct and as Healthline says, “focus on your needs and feelings, rather than assuming those of others.” Licensed professional counsellor Meg Selig provides examples such as: “I didn’t appreciate ____ (what you did, your tone of voice),” “I would like you to respect my point of view,” and “I disagree with you. I see the situation this way.”
• Acknowledge the other person's view in your statement — when practicing assertive statements, it’s important to show the other person you’re respecting their view. An easy way to do this is to say “thank you for sharing” or “I appreciate what you’re saying.”
• Practice with close family/friends first — we will often test out new things with those closest to us first to gain confidence. So try using your assertive statements to those closest to you. They can also give you feedback on your tone of voice and how you’re saying your assertive statements.

3. Reflect On Your Assertive Moments

Reflection is a massive tool that enables you to dissect a situation and see what went well and what didn't go quite so well.

It can help cultivate assertiveness because your taking a scenario and seeing what you can add to it or remove from it to help you become more assertive.

A study published in the Journal of Contemporary Nurse found nurses who reflected on their action plans were able to become more assertive due to a direct result of their reflections.

If you look at a situation where you attempted being assertive, you’ll be able to evaluate the assertive situation and then plan and implement new techniques to help.

It can really help with developing and perfecting assertiveness.

How to implement:

• Evaluate the situation — the first step is to always see what went well and what didn’t go so well in your assertive moment. For example, were you able to communicate your belief well but then show a disregard to others' beliefs? Whatever the success and challenges are of the situation, make a note of them.
• Plan new actions — now you can adjust your behaviour to help with becoming more assertive. Part of the reflective process is to think about new ways you can demonstrate assertive behaviour. So, if you did show a disregard for others' beliefs, now is the time to plan a few ways to show you respect their opinion. This could be with a simple phrase of “thank you for sharing…”

4. Learn to Manage Your Anxiety

Several studies have found that anxiety, in particular, social anxiety is associated with difficulties in being assertive.

It’s easy to see why. If someone has to communicate to their co-workers that they don’t agree with the way they’re working on a project, that can stimulate a lot of anxiety.

Even just thinking about speaking up about something is nerve-racking. And, when we feel this anxiety creep in that’s when it can be difficult to get our point across.

Instead, if we find good ways to manage our anxiety, we’re more likely to display assertiveness.

That’s because our confidence increases and our nerves decrease, enabling us to feel able to communicate assertively.

How to implement:

There are a ton of ways to manage our anxiety:

• Progressive muscle relaxation (PMR) — PMR involves tensing one muscle group at one time, followed by slowly releasing the tension. Take a deep breath and contract a muscle for 10–15 seconds. Slowly release the tension and move to another muscle group. It’s heavily backed by research too.
• Experiment — go and gather evidence against your worrying beliefs. It enables you to challenge your anxiety. For example, once you’ve practiced assertive statements with close friends, go and practice in real scenarios with other people. See what happens — often, it’s not as bad as we think. It’s also another strategy supported by a lot of research.
• Diaphragmatic breathing — Research has found that diaphragmatic breathing can reduce anxiety, heart rate and breathing rate. One technique involves relaxing your entire body and placing a hand on your chest and stomach. Breath in for two seconds making sure your stomach is moving outwards. Gently press on your stomach, exhaling through your lips for two seconds and repeat.

There are many other ways too such as reframing your thoughts, scheduling your worry and practicing gratitude. Here’s a step-by-step procedure for these other techniques.

Managing your anxiety will help you feel more relaxed enabling you to feel more confident in being assertive.

Final Thoughts

Sometimes it can be tricky communicating our needs, whilst still showing respect to others.

Assertiveness is a skill that enables us to do this. And, we can implement simple tricks to help with developing our assertiveness:

Explore your beliefs and affirm them.

Practice assertive statements.

Reflect on your assertive moments.

Learn ways to manage your anxiety.

These tricks can help with achieving the goal of assertiveness which psychologist Albert Ellis defines perfectly:

“Being assertive does not mean attacking or ignoring others feelings. It means that you are willing to hold up for yourself fairly, without attacking others.”