How To Speak Up For Yourself

Do you feel fearful, hesitant, or unsure about saying what you really want to? Do you struggle to speak up powerfully, clearly and directly for your desires so people know your real self whether that’s in your social life, dating life, or career life? Back when I was held back from speaking up, I was at lunch one time with some friends and Brandon who was the leader of our crew because he was the most outspoken, boisterous, and charismatic, turned to me and said, “You know what, Josh? You don’t say much, but everyone needs someone like you as a friend.” That really annoyed me because he was pointing out that I didn’t contribute much to conversations, and I was only really useful because I was quiet and always there to listen to him talk. Yuck! That is not what I want to be known for! I was also held back from speaking up in my dating life. I struggled to communicate clearly, powerfully, and directly my more intimate thoughts. As a consequence, I always eventually ended up becoming a really good friend to women I found attractive. By not directly communicating I was into them, I never allowed a conversation about whether they might like me back. So stuck in the friend zone I was :( Reflecting on my days of not speaking up for my desires, I’ve identified 2 obstacles that got in my way of speaking up boldly and being authentic with others. 1) Not knowing what I wanted, not self-aware. I realized that a major reason for why I didn’t speak up in conversations was I didn’t know myself very well. I didn’t know what I wanted to talk about, I didn’t know what I found interesting in my life that I could share, and I didn’t know how I wanted to steer or add to a conversation. In short, I didn’t really have an opinion on much. So I just floated around in conversations, being quiet, which probably made people who liked to hear themselves talk like me haha. And, of course, that’s not why we want to be liked because it’s not our most authentic and powerful selves! 2) Even if I did identify something I wanted to bring up, I was too hesitant to speak up because of a fear of what others might think of me. I was too scared and unwilling to face people judging me as weird or embarrassing. So, I ended up not saying much so I didn’t have to face the possibility of getting rejected. I played it safe. And that was super unfulfilling. The Solution To Not Speaking Up For Yourself 1) Repeatedly ask what do I want? If I was being completely authentic right now, what would I say or do? What do I want to share? By asking yourself these questions, you are giving yourself a chance to determine what you want to doin a conversation. You also form your own opinions based off your wants. For example, identifying you want to go to a certain Mexican restaurant because you think it’s the best in town. And when you share that, you get to show people that you know what you want and people can connect with you authentically. 2) Before conversations, play a different movie in your mind of how you want to show up in a social interaction that isn’t getting rejected and staying quiet and not speaking up. Anxious and shy people tend to play on repeat the movie of how they will get rejected, and that keeps them stuck in anxiety and they end up not speaking up. Our thoughts dictate our feelings, and our feelings dictate our actions. By imagining, visualizing, and playing on repeat the movie of how you will step up, be bold, and share what’s on your mind, you influence yourself to take that action. Overtime, this energy will grow so that it becomes your new way of interacting. 3) Work through the guilty, bad, selfish, wrong feelings of overly nice programming you may get when you speak up, take the spotlight for a moment, and say what you want. You may experience a backlash of “it’s not okay to say what you want because it’s selfish and rude. You should be nice and let others talk and get what they want.” This overly nice conditioning dates back to parenting, schools, and other organizations that ingrained this doctrine that we need to place so much emphasis on being nice and not be rude or show any sign of acting negatively. In short, they influenced us to disregard our negative feelings. As a result, most of the time, we didn’t get good instructions on how to deal with negative feelings, so we learned overtime to ignore them, shut them out, and stuff them– all in the name of being nice. Find those shameful, guilty, and otherwise uncomfortable feelings in your body and feel into them. If you send them love and lean into those feelings, they will get let go over time. Another way to let those feelings go is to repeatedly speak up and face the guilty and shameful backlash until you no longer feel it. By applying these 3 steps, you’ll gain a sense of power to boldly speak up for yourself in any social setting. You’ll feel confident that no matter who you are talking to, you can have fun and add value with many interesting and engaging things to talk about. This will make you more decisive and opinionated. And, you’ll get more of what you want for speaking up clearly, powerfully, and directly. People will know you authentically, and consequently feel connected to you. More people will want to hang out with you, you’ll get more dates, and bosses and supervisors will want to help you accelerate your career. Best of all, you’ll feel good in conversations, knowing you are showing up as your real self and not holding back. This means you won’t feel resentment from not expressing enough of yourself. Awesome work. Until we speak again, you were born to be real, not to be perfect. So go out there and be who you are. 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