All men are created equal. It is only men themselves who place themselves above equality.
David Allan Coe

Assertiveness is about the way we behave in our relationships with others.

Assertiveness means: a willingness to be forceful if a situation requires it.

Assertiveness doesn’t mean being cold, callous, heartless, selfish, and uncaring. It means that we can still be warm, sensitive, caring, and empathetic, BUT we do have the RIGHT to protect ourselves from harm.

Harm can be physical, emotional, sexual, and spiritual in nature.

Physical abuse can include pushing, shoving, shaking, slapping, punching, stabbing, excessive spanking, biting, burning, kicking, and any activity that causes physical harm to another.

Emotional abuse can include repeatedly being shamed, humiliated, terrorized, ignored, put down, criticized, rejected, dismissive, and any activity that causes emotional harm to another.

Sexual abuse is the exploitation of any unwilling, unsuspecting, or underage person for sexual pleasure or gratification.

Spiritual abuse is the result of a spiritual leader, organization, or system that tries to control, manipulate, or dominate a person, often through fear and intimidation.

All human beings are equal. No human being has more or less value than another. While we may have different jobs, positions, responsibilities, talents, abilities, skills, and gifts, that doesn’t mean one human being has more value than another.

For example, a top corporate executive doesn’t have more value as a human being than a person without a job or home. They have equal value as human beings. The executive’s role or position may carry more responsibility, but that doesn’t mean he or she is more valuable as a human being than the other. God created us all equal: one not higher or lower than another.

As human beings, we have the right to protect ourselves, to live our lives according to our choices, and to express ourselves any way we choose, as long as this expression doesn’t physically, emotionally, sexually, or spiritually abuse another.

As part of our “rights,” we have the right to protect ourselves from anything we don’t want or like. Certainly, we have to obey the laws of the country we live in, but nonetheless, we DO have rights that we SHOULD exercise every day.

As we further discuss living assertively, the tips we are going to share with you are based on the rights you already have, and are entitled to, simply for being a human being. So living assertively is NOT gaining something new, it’s simply applying what you are already entitled to.

For those who think they are inferior to, or less than others, you may want to recognize that that notion, while it may be a long-held belief you’ve had, actually isn’t true. It’s a “false belief” or “unhealthy belief”: a belief that, while we believe it to be true, is actually unhealthy and false.

The truth is, YOU ARE EQUAL TO EVERYONE, regardless of what anyone tries to tell you, including what you are saying to yourself about yourself.

So the first tip in living assertively is: YOU ARE EQUAL, AND HAVE EVERY RIGHT TO LIVE YOUR LIFE THE WAY YOU WANT TO, as long as you don’t violate or abuse anyone else’s rights and freedoms.

Having said this, do you really believe it? Do you believe that you ARE equal to others?

You can cast your vote here:

[Sorry, this poll is now closed.]

Have a great week.