Every where I go and have the opportunity to discuss, intervene, or give supportive direction or information to those who suffer from chemical addiction, I hear a common perspective. “Am I drinking because I’m depressed, or am I depressed because I’m drinking?” This holds true to situations involving other chemicals like opiates or cocaine as well.

If you have had the experience of either hearing me speak or reading my other article in the April 2011 edition of CoSozo Living then you know that I’m serious about helping individuals and I believe in real information from a foundational approach to communicate, learn, and solve problems. It’s well known that many individuals caught up in the pitfalls of addiction use substances to self-medicate feelings and to obtain a sense of escape or avoid life’s many situations. Let us look at this foundationally.

Many individuals have a difficult time naturally expressing true objective feelings. Particularly through the adolescent years, people can struggle until they learn clear, concise methods to further enhance communication. Parallel to this, individuals often have a difficult time asking for help and appearing wrong in some circumstances. There are those, however, who have a good sense of self awareness and positive communication skills. Consider where you tend to fall in the following examples:

Have you ever had a friend try to describe to you a person or situation from the past, of which you truly have no recollection and instead of saying no you don’t remember, you act as if you do? Or perhaps in your early adolescent years you were taught to hold in anger instead of expressing it verbally. Messages sent may have literally been like this: “You need to pull that lip in before I really give you something to be angry about,” or maybe it came in the form of “kids are meant to be seen, not heard.” Either way these types of messages foster “acting out” methods of expression since direct, honest communication is not encouraged. These examples may or may not be relevant to you, yet it’s helpful for all of us to extend efforts and increase our competence and skill in developing a natural comfort level with emotion identification and expression.

It appears that emotion identification and expression is not a solely and consistently learned behavior. Often, it is learned through a combination of life experiences as well as formal avenues of learning such as workshops, seminars, etc.

There are four basic methods of communication and behavior:

1. Non-assertive (better known as passive)
2. Assertive
3. Aggressive - (sometimes mistaken for assertive through some of the early messages received during childhood)
4. Non-assertive aggressive - (referred to as passive aggressive, which may be the most confusing of the four and is ultimately assertive)

Our focus is on assertive. A foundational definition for assertiveness includes standing up for personal rights and expressing thoughts, feelings, and beliefs in the direct, honest, and appropriate way that does not violate another’s rights. For example: “I’ve decided not to see violent movies any more. Let’s find another movie we can both enjoy or do something else tonight.” The message sent is that this is what I think, this is what I feel, and this is how I see the situation. The message expresses who you are and is said without dominating, humiliating, or turning off the other person. Notice the messages are based on “I” statements which, with increased self image, are the foundation of assertive behavior.

Following is a list of basic personal rights of assertion. These can be used as a foundation for enhancing one’s ability to be assertive.

• Right to refuse requests without feeling guilty or selfish.
• Right to express my feelings including anger, as long as I don’t violate the rights of others, and to experience the consequences of those feelings.
• Right to be competitive and achieve.
• Right to have my needs be as important as the needs of other people.
• Right to decide which activities will fulfill my needs.
• Right to make mistakes and be responsible for them.
• Right to have one’s opinions given the same respect and consideration that other people’s opinions are given.
• Right to change my mind.
• Right to be treated as a capable human adult and be taken seriously.
• Right to be independent.
• Right to say “I don’t know,” and “I don’t understand.”
• Right to get what I pay for.
• Right to ask for information from professionals.
• Right to decide when to be assertive.
• Right to rest and leisure.
• Add your own…

A good school of thought around asserting these rights is to remember: I am responsible for myself. I have the responsibility to recognize that everyone else has these same rights. Assertive communication and behavior is at the gateway of an enhanced quality of living.

The more you are able to sit with your feelings and identify what they truly are, you begin to be more skilled at using assertive behavior to honor those feelings, choices, and needs. If you find yourself uneasy with your feelings, first identify what those feelings are. Then evaluate whether you’re uneasy because of feelings, the thoughts in your mind, historical reactions to situations, etc. Once you are clear about what feelings you are having, and why they are causing discomfort, you can use your new skills in assertiveness to make choices that align with your needs. Until next time remember “time is your most valuable gift, use it wisely!”

Reference: Assertion training for trainers, Western Michigan University