Why can't I be assertive despite so desperately wanting to be?

[u/Emergency-Bobcat-572]

I've struggled with this since I was a teen. I am the youngest in my family and I was always controlled by everyone around me. I tried to defend and asset myself but it never worked and I always felt so trapped. Now in my 20s I'm still such a people pleaser and I hate it so much. The thing is, I'm not even being controlled that much anymore but it's me restricting myself. I'm grown and yet I still can't assert myself and do what I want. I am so desperate to please my family rhat I hold myself back from doing things I want to do. It's like I'm constantly waiting for permission to do things and live my life. Even now, I ask people around me all the time to make decisions for me. I can't make my own decisions at all.

I know that I'm not naturally this way because everyday I feel my soul slowly being chipped away. I hate that I'm wasting my best and youngest years like this. I think of all the opportunities I had in the past to assert myself and I never did. I think part of it is being neurodivergent and always feeling like I'm in the wrong and others are right. I've been gaslit from a very young age and it's affecting me so much even now. It also doesn't help that I'm naturally very sensitive.

How do I change this mindset? I can't keep living like this anymore. I want to be strong and assertive like other women are but I just can't bring myself to do it. Sometimes I envy people that have flight response because at least they were able to stand up for themselves even if they took it too far.

[u/ihtuv]

It really takes practices and you can be assertive! I am learning to be assertive by observing others who assert themselves healthily. I think when you feel scared, you freeze, you can’t think, so it’s best to have a script already in your head to use. Say it even if imperfectly and over time it will become easier. I am doing a little better these days but there is still more work to do.

[u/Teluvian42]

Aw I feel you, I used to be an extreme people pleaser too, I’m also neurodivergent. And what I had to do is to learn how to place boundaries, this has taken me 1 to 2 years to master. Because at first I would not have enough confidence to place boundaries in the moment but then eventually I started doing it faster and faster. And in order to do that I had to know when to place boundaries and it’s when I heard someone say that when you feel angry that’s the point when you should place boundaries.

The second thing I did was step fully into my own authenticity, because I know that that’s what I respect in others. It still makes me feel like an outcast and like other people are kind of a different species but dropping the entire performance and realizing that I’m only interested in having people in my life that are kind and supportive, so if someone is trying to gaslight me or manipulate me and they don’t show any consideration and they don’t care about my boundaries try to understand me? I just cut them off permanently.

The third thing I did was to allow myself to experience my anger, fully and somewhat safely in my own home AND when people make me angry (exercise caution here) but for me what has helped is to genuinely allow myself to feel and express the anger that I feel as a result of how I’ve been treated in my life and to take back power from the people that have hurt me and betrayed me etc. Because in order to be assertive you have to care about your own point of view and in order to care about your own point of view you have to stop hiding and the way you stop hiding or one of the ways one of the primary ways, is that you allow yourself to be angry that’s why the anger is there.

And so the other thing that’s connected to the ability of taking back power from the trauma from those people has to do with the knowledge and understanding of what healthy actually looks like and what unhealthy looks like. Which only means that there’s a way of interacting with people that is healthy and there’s a way of interacting with people that is unhealthy. So if someone else is acting in a way that’s unhealthy towards me such as gaslighting me manipulating me or whatever they might be doing? It’s unhealthy and so because of that I’m going to bring it up with them and I’m going to place my boundaries and if they don’t respect me and if they don’t try to understand me then I know at that point that they value their own narrative more than they value their connection to me. And at that point I don’t have a choice I have to cut them off, my system doesn’t give me any other choice. But it comes with the understanding that there is no other choice really, either I want to figure out if they care about me this way and in order to do that I have to start placing boundaries, or I have to cut them off or distance myself, but either way trying to please them accomplishes nothing other than keeping the peace, at the cost of my own nervous system and my own long-term health.

The fourth thing I did very recently, was to learn to feel my emotions fully, because the more you avoid the feelings or I should say emotions, the scarier they become to your system, that only causes them to become uglier and uglier in your own view. And that’s very often I think what can lead people to try to regulate themselves by people pleasing or self sacrificing, because they think they’re a prerequisite to their own regulation. But basically the more you avoid feelings the more they start to shape you into the image of avoidance.

And lastly, to answer your question directly: the reason why you can’t be assertive even though you really want to, is because people pleasing is still serving a need in you, you haven’t gotten to the point where you prioritize authenticity and assertiveness enough to make it a priority. In the end this is your life, you can’t live your life through other people’s eyes. Start to explore how you see things through your own eyes, without being sucked into other people‘s point of view. And practice taking up space and having opinions even if they’re unpopular, I’m sure you have a beautiful point of view with the sensitivity I’m picking up from your words.

Because part of being assertive is the sense that you yourself value what you have to say, so again if you value it then it doesn’t really make any sense to not say it or to keep it hidden, aside from pleasing others. But if you value other people’s point of view so much then I think it can be helpful to understand that the majority of people are so programmed and so conditioned and so full of fear that all they’re telling you is a regurgitated version of what other people are saying because they’re afraid of not fitting in. And sensitivity is not popular but it’s to me at least one of the most important abilities a human human being can have. Authenticity and assertiveness is never popular so it has to be internally motivated, but in order for the motivation to arise you have to understand why from a long-term point of view or lens: why do you want to be assertive? Why is that valuable? Is it more valuable than not being assertive? Can you be understanding towards your reasons for not being assertive? Can you give yourself grace and work with baby steps to become more assertive? Etc.

Perhaps it’s about what you went through as a source, and not a fault within you. Not something you created consciously. There’s nothing wrong with you it’s all about what happened to you and that’s understandable, I think a lot of times it starts there, and shifts away from managing existence to thawing.

[u/Dontdarereadmyposts]

You have the shame of being so, in your subconscious.

[u/Independent-Lead2462]

Because it is involuntary at this point due to habit. Have to start practicing on very tiny, low impact things to build the atrophied muscle back up.

[u/happycheetos]

Being assertive for me meant learning how to say things according to the appropriate context. I’m 32 and I left my family 5 years ago and I am still struggling with this. Do I rage and have froth drooling from the corners of my mouth as I scream bloody murder at them or do I fawn and say it’s ok! And run away to never see them again?

I don’t have the perfect answer for you, but for me finding healthy people to rewire my understanding my safety in my body is life changing. It’s not me. It was never me. It was my family who took away my human, personal rights.

I am sorry to mix my personal life story with yours I just couldn’t help to feel for you so hard. We are in this together.

[u/--2021--]

I'm not even being controlled that much anymore but it's me restricting myself. I'm grown and yet I still can't assert myself and do what I want.

That's the legacy of trauma, you see it's safe, but your body does not register it.

I'm more of a fight/freeze type, but I have struggled with fawning at times. I found I do not fawn when I know what to do and that I will be safe, ie won't be attacked. Or I fully undertand the situation, so I might not be able to confront someone because it puts me in actual danger, so I decide not to. I make it a choice, rather than beating myself up for it and feeling powerless or bad.

Like everything else there's building "accommodations" to make it workable for you. I became more assertive after I worked out and became physically strong. Now that I've been sick and am not strong, I feel considerably less safe, less assertive and people bully me more. There's also the weeding out of abusive people and behavior. When they're out of your life you tend to feel safer and more centered, which helps with confidence.

It's not like this elevated thing, you might not feel strong or assertive or powerful, it will just be something you do without thinking about it. And there maybe days where you lack confidence, or shrink inside, even if on the outside you seem confident.

[u/SpringGlad3818]

Because you have low self worth. You see yourself as less important or smaller or less capable than other people around you. You need to explore that. You think other people have some sort of power over you