#5 Ways Assertiveness Can Help With Anxiety
What causes anxiety?
There are many reasons that someone may suffer from anxiety. It can strike at any time in our lives, be a fleeting moment or be a permanent feature that we learn to manage and live with.
It can be brought on by any of the following external events that are mostly out of our control. A key feature to anxiety is the fear of the unexpected. When you have an apprehensive feeling something unpleasant or overwhelming will happen, that we feel unable to cope with nor control how and when it could happen. We also may feel that we simply don’t have the skill or confidence to deal with a potential or perceived future event. Real or imaged we feel overwhelmed and panicked even at the thought of being presented with it.
Anxiety can be caused singly by any of these below, or by a combination of a few together:-
The fallout of dealing with a traumatic event such as financial crisis, grief, PTSD, drug taking, personal crisis or extreme stress
Being a victim of crime or violence
Long term exhaustion or a build up of stress
Long working hours or unable to get a job
Having high expectations of success
Being made redundant from work
Feeling under pressure while studying or in work
Having money problems
Homelessness or housing problems
Losing someone close to you, a parent or a child
Feeling lonely or isolated
Being bullied, harassed or abused
Being socially excluded or trolled on social media
Being a carer or single parent
Genetic or inherited (there is scientific correlation but whether this is nature or nurture is uncertain)
Chemical imbalance or other psychological / personality disorders
Being subject to physical or emotional abuse
Being neglected (as a child, disabled or elderly person)
what assertiveness can help with
Assertiveness can help with dealing with some of the contributing aspects of anxiety, depending on each individuals circumstances and life events. Everyone’s life, responsibilities and experiences are unique. Assertiveness can help you deal with what you can control and teach you to cope to some extent with that which you can’t. Your thoughts, opinions, feelings, words spoken and actions are under your choice and your control. Generally you can work on the following:-
• Cyclical anxiety - eg. being anxious makes you eat then you feel anxious about putting on weight so you eat more etc… this covers things such as smoking, addictions (gambling / drugs), eating disorders etc.
• Anxiety caused by events that you can control
• Anxious thought patterns - learned behaviour from others such as family behaviour traits
• Lack of self confidence, low self esteem and self worth (self-approval)
• Lack of self-assurance - lack of confidence in own skills to handle difficult situations / unexpected situations
• Lack of social skills or a strong persona - generally just not knowing what to say or how to react. Feeling directed through life by others because you don’t know how to stand up for yourself.
• Taking on too much or putting oneself under too much pressure or having overly high expectation of success
• Previously being bullied, trolled or rejected by peers
• Not learning to rebuff others subtle (deliberate or non deliberate) attempts to undermine, criticise or manipulate
• Not learning to deal with failure or criticism (constructive or non-constructive)
how assertiveness can help with anxiety
If you’ve read through the above list, here’s how assertiveness can help with some of those. Assertiveness cannot help you deal with chronic anxiety caused by psychological or biochemical reasons. Learning to be more assertive can, in the general sense, help with building up your confidence and strength. You cannot change others and their behaviour but you can learn how to mentally weather and react to external events and other’s behaviour.
#1 with being bullied, trolled, unfairly or rudely criticised
Anxiety can be caused by having to deal with bullying behaviour in many forms. Bullies have always been around in society but it is still an unacceptable way to treat people. Sometimes bullies are obvious to spot by being large, loud and threatening. Some are quietly aggressive and use manipulative emotional and mental tactics, such as guilt tripping, exclusion, undermining or criticism to control others. One thing is clear you never know where you stand with a bully. Are they on your side today or not? Social media has brought about a vicious new nature to bullying. Similar as to road rage, trolls feel more freely expressive with their negative feelings (and less responsible for the repercussions) if they are removed from actually physical confrontation with another person.
There are assertive mindset and behavioural solutions to deal with bullies and their effects. The first solution that being more assertive can bring, is to build your self confidence, self-approval and self-assurance. These are the mindset foundations and protection for your emotions. All bullies like to feel that they are in charge of how you value and judge yourself (it makes them feel in control and important) and they enjoy taking this from you and then minimising this as much as possible. If they believe that you accept their judgement and are upset by their criticisms and devaluation, then they feel that they have found a victim.
It really is true that bully’s are scared of courage and confidence (many would be muggers choose victims that they think will put up less of a fight). Many bullies get bored of non-reaction and nonchalance and will move on. Assertiveness can help you to be strong, clear and firm and have the confidence to complain to higher powers of any bullying behaviour that you experience in the work place. It can also give you the confidence to escape accepting abuse, in the many forms that it takes, be it physical removal or speaking up to complain.
#2 dealing with rudeness or overstepping on your boundaries (your time & space)
Anxiety can be caused by working long hours, being a carer, looking after a family (in a partnership or alone) while juggling a job or simply by people invading on our time, expecting or demanding constant favours and support. Everyone needs and has a right to rest, re-energise and enjoy their own time and space, even if they have responsibilities for care and support of others. Learning to be assertive can help you to erect these boundaries and create respect for yourself. Passive people can often find themselves feeling obligated to hold a supporting role in other peoples lives. This can manifest as people arriving unannounced at your house, or demanding your time and efforts without warning nor consideration for your own responsibilities. When you find that people feel it’s acceptable to actually chastise you for not adhering to this obligation, that’s when you know that boundaries need erecting.
If you work on feeling confident that you can assertively deal effectively with attempted invasions or people pushing you to over exert yourself into exhaustion, this can be a way to ease anxious thoughts and feelings regarding facing people down.
#3 resisting being manipulated or led by intimidation (fear), guilt or obligation
Anxiety can be felt by people with a more passive nature when they think about confronting others with a more demanding nature. Assertiveness can give someone a feeling of confidence in their own value and rights as an individual to back up any arguments.
Sometimes people have a feeling that they are unable to object by being led by others via emotional blackmail such as fear of a reprisal (being ignored or excluded), obligation (they say you owe them back for a supposed favour) or guilt (that you are being mean or selfish). Assertive techniques can help you to feel confident that you have a right to your own value and how to identify such manipulative behaviour and deal with it effectively.
#4 dealing with failure / not living up to high expectations
There is a lot of pressure from general society to seek perfection, to be top of the class first time. Children can feel that they have to be top of the class, compete with their peers and siblings or get straight A’s. Students regularly put themselves under much pressure, that anything less than perfect achievement is seen as a failure, rather than seeing failure itself as part of the learning curve and part of the growth process.
General media perpetuates the feeling that individuals have a set to rules of perfection to adhere to such as weight, shape, dress sense, clothing, lifestyle and career. The pressure to attain and maintain this high level, can cause anxiety. Similar to the bullying issues from point #1, there is a sense that an external entitiy holds your value and sense of worth and you are at their mercy for approval. Unfortunately general media, who inadvertently set this high bar, is not governed by an individual but peer pressure. There are pressures to be unhealthily thin, dress designer and be made up like a model. Straight white teeth, perfect make up, pouty lips and cosmetic surgery are sold as a must as are tanned skin and an athletic gym body. While it is healthy to invest in your appearance for self respect’s sake, when it becomes a necessity for your self confidence it becomes the reverse.
It is with this in mind that I can see why failure or set backs hit people so hard. Mental resilience is needed to weather events such as job redundancy, relationship failures or financial set backs. Suicide, especially with young men (but women too), is on the rise as people put themselves under great pressure to create a perfect life. This pressure for perfection without an outlet for personal emotional expression can leave people less able to cope with set backs or failure. Learning to be more assertive can help to bolster your mindset to cope with set backs, process events, express feelings and move forward. Obviously chronic deep depression must be handled by qualified proffessional and anyone suffering from suicidal thoughts should contact an appropriate support such as the Samaritans phone line (tel: 116 123) or their personal doctor.
Assertiveness can help you reclaim your own sovereignty and can help you build self-confidence and develop your own self worth. Being assertive actually helps improve personal relationships (maybe avoiding break ups) and can be a useful skill when negotiating financial worries (such as discussions with the bank, getting promoted or negotiating a job interview). Life will always bring us challenges and learning to develop a growth mindset is key to building assertive skills. An assertive mindset and attitude fosters drive, self control, self reliance, emotional and mental resilience.
#5 retraining your thinking processes
Anxiety can be caused by the style of thought processes we have grown up with regarding situations or the perceived skills we think we lack. I think most people feel that they are a product of their family environment and how they have been guided as they have grown up. Many of us I’m sure have quotes from our parents that reflect their attitudes towards life or how they suggest that we should deal with things. We may feel that we disagree with some of them once we grow older but we may also feel some of these have helped us along and made us stronger. We learn from our environment growing up, life rules, mottos, what we can expect from life and what we value as a family. Many people catch themselves mirroring behaviour or phrases from our parents, usually when we are talking to our own children.
The problem arises when we are taught (or not taught) phrases or behaviour that mean we fail to learn appropriate solutions from our family for common social situations ie. a shy family breeds shy children. Assertiveness training can help you to retrain your thought processes or build up skills where they may be missing. Learn to build confidence in your verbal skills and learn affirmations to counter and replace weaker phrases that lurk in your psyche.
There will always be events in or lives that are uncontrollable, that hit us from nowhere such as job loss, death, illness, accidents, misfortune and crime. We cannot stop these from happening, all we can do is be as resilient as we can be for what life throws at us and grow stronger as a result.
Assertiveness cannot replace prescribed medication, or doctor’s advice regarding physical or psychological issues. Please contact a trained professional if you feel you need help, guidance or support.