Every time I tell someone to speak up for themselves, they usually are afraid to do it. I’ve heard each of the following statements multiple times:
- “If I speak up for myself, he will get mad.”
- “If I speak up for myself, I’m afraid she will abandon me.”
- “He didn’t do it on purpose, so I’m not going to say anything.”
There’s a million excuses not to speak up for yourself, and each excuse is responsible for an unhealthy relationship. A healthy relationship can only happen when both partners feel safe to express themselves authentically and fully.
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The Reason Why You Don’t Speak Up For Yourself
If speaking up for yourself leads to healthy relationships, why don’t most people speak up for themselves?
Why do most people bury their true feelings?
Most people don’t speak up for themselves and bury their feelings because they experienced childhood emotional neglect.
Though their parents might have met their physical needs, such as food and shelter, their emotional needs were neglected. This causes the child to grow up to believe his or her feelings don’t matter and discourages speaking up.
According to Kayla Tricaso, “If you felt as if your feelings and emotions were invalid in childhood, you likely thought you had to learn to bury them.” She continued, “Not only is it often hard to express emotions, but it can be equally challenging for survivors of childhood emotional neglect even to identify what their exact feelings are.”
Examples of childhood emotional neglect includes:
• a parent fails to notice their child is sad about something
• a child is told to “stop crying”
• a child never receives affection or praise from his or her parents
• a child’s opinion is dismissed when he or she speaks
Each of these are examples of childhood emotional neglect and leads to major problems in adult relationships, such as not speaking up and setting boundaries. Childhood emotional neglect also leads to attracting relationships with emotionally unavailable partners, such as narcissists, sociopaths and other avoidant personality types. If you are a survivor of childhood emotional neglect, you need training on when and how to speak up for yourself. This is what you will learn in this article.
When To Speak Up For Yourself
If you don’t know when to speak up for yourself, then you will not.
To help you better identify these situations, here’s a list of them that require you to speak up for yourself:
• anytime you feel disrespected and mistreated
• whenever you need space and don’t feel like being bothered
• when feelings of frustration and resentment develop towards someone
• anytime you feel uncomfortable
• whenever you feel like you are losing yourself in a relationship
• when something feels unfair
Each of these situations will require you to speak up for yourself. Unfortunately, these situations happen too often in relationships and most people don’t see them as opportunities to speak up and set boundaries. Learning when to speak up for yourself is key to maintain your relationships. If you don’t learn, not only will the health of your relationships suffer, but also your mental health will suffer.
How To Speak Up For Yourself
Once you understand when to speak up for yourself, you are ready to learn how to speak up for yourself.
What good is knowing when to do something if you don’t know how to do it?
There’s a three step process when learning how to speak up for yourself:
Have The Right Intention
Ninety-three percent of communication is non-verbal.
There’s many things besides words that communicate your message. This includes hand gestures, your tone, your energy, and your intention.
The most important nonverbal communication is your intention.
Intention is the basis of human behavior. If your intentions are wrong, nothing can go right.
In general, there are two intentions:
1. Love – being trusting, being compassionate and being peaceful
2. Fear – being controlling; to protect or defend something
If your intention for speaking up for yourself is motivated by love, then you are more likely to get a loving response in return. Your partner will be more responsive. This is how karma works in relationships.
On the other hand, if your intention for speaking up for yourself is motivated by fear, then you are more likely to get a bad result with your partner. In other words, your partner will become less responsive.
There is power in intention. Therefore, before you speak up for yourself, always ask, “Am I doing this from a place of love? Or am I doing this from a place of fear?
Wait Until You Are Calm
If you do not have a calm and compassionate tone when you speak up, then you are not ready to say anything.
Oftentimes, when you are not calm, you will say the wrong thing or your message will be received the wrong way.
Unfortunately, too many people communicate when they are frustrated and angry. Too many couples don’t calm down before addressing a conflict. This leads to saying things they don’t mean and doing things they regret. Imagine how many relationships could be saved if couples learned to take a timeout when they’re upset.
Use The Sandwich Approach
The sandwich approach is a communication strategy you use to provide feedback.
Providing feedback is an important part of relationship development. It tells your partner what you like and dislike, what you will allow and will not allow, what you enjoy and what you despise.
However, how you deliver the feedback determines how successfully your partner will receive it.
Research has shown that the best way to deliver feedback is to use the sandwich approach.
The sandwich approach involves offering a piece of negative feedback “sandwiched” between two positive affirmations. This helps ease the pain of criticism and reduce defensiveness. For example, let’s say you need to give your partner feedback about him being on his phone too much during your quality time. Using the sandwich approach would go something like this, “Honey, I appreciate you and how hard you work for us to maintain our lifestyle. You work so hard at work and at home and it means a lot. I know you want to check out sometimes, but do you mind spending less time on your phone during our quality time? I really love you and want to fully enjoy the little time we do have.“
Do you notice how much positive affirmation is involved when using the sandwich approach? It really helps creates a safe space for productive conversation and reduces feelings of rejection and abandonment. It is much use strategy when speaking up for yourself to provide feedback.
Conclusion
There’s one thing that will always be a primary human need: the need to be seen and heard.
You cannot be seen and heard if you don’t speak up for yourself.
Speaking up for yourself takes a lot of courage and confidence, but like all skills, you get better with practice. If you are someone who struggles to speak up for yourself, sit down with your partner and ask for his or her help. Ask your partner to help you create a space for you to share how you feel. Explain to him or her that this is something you want work on.
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