You Can Be Lovingly Assertive.

You can be lovingly assertive.

For a lot of my life I associated assertiveness with abusive personalities- as a sort of warning sign of violence to come. But that's not right: we need to have the courage to defend ourselves. Sometimes assholes just get ahold of that power and misuse it.

There is a happy medium between saying "Shut up, you're a piece of shit and I'm going to do what I want" and letting people walk all over you.

You can enforce your boundaries and refuse to accept mistreatment and disrespect without being verbally demeaning. If you don't speak up and let people know when they cross your lines, though, you can be taken advantage of. You owe it to yourself to fight in your corner, and for the benefit of everyone involved. It doesn't make you an asshole to say that the way you are being treated is not okay. You're an asshole when you use disrespect and your own anger as an excuse to say things to hurt others more than the situation demands.

It doesn't matter if you piss others off for standing up for yourself, and for what is true. Anyone who wants to hate you for protecting yourself is invariably an asshole.

You can stand up for what is right and kind, even if everyone around you hates you for it, and you can do it in a firm, loving way. Assertiveness is not abusiveness.

There’s a lot of pressure for your looks and your life to look a certain kind of “perfect” way. But life is so much more beautiful because it’s imperfect! I hope little penguin and little pear can help remind you of this fact. 🍐

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actually you will not enjoy hearing this but you literally have to abandon your self deprecating humor. besides the fact that it can drive people away you literally are only hurting yourself by constantly making jokes that further cement the idea in your head that you are not good enough. I do not care that you think its a good coping mechanism it is absolutely not and you need to start challenging negative thoughts instead of feeding into them.

This chibird charged the 2021 good luck charm by drinking warm tea, humming Animal Crossing music, and watching videos of baby corgis. ✨ There’s no way it’s not effective! I’m wishing you all a bright start to the new year. 💛

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