by Anne Dickson
The above examples show that we are so used to just two positions – top dog and under-dog, the powerful and powerless – that we easily forget there can be a middle path. The tension and effort needed to win does not allow you to develop a genuine respect for the needs, feelings or rights of others or yourself. The principle of equality is one of the most important hallmarks of assertive communication and behaviour.
3
Equality and Power
To truly understand the concept of equality, we first have to understand the nature of power. Power, as evidenced in the institutional, social, national and global structures of the world, has one familiar form: perpendicular. It is easy to image this kind of power as a ladder because this represents the vertical movement along ascending or descending rungs, each related to how much or how little power any person has in relation to another.
We absorb this shape of power as an internal reference from our earliest years: we learn there are only two options, that movement is restricted to either up or down and that we are always – in relation to others – higher or lower at any given moment in time. The up/down ladder system infiltrates into every area of our lives with the result that knowingly or unknowing, we are constantly in a process of mental assessment of our position – our power – in relation to the power of others. This I call perpendicular power, always assessed in terms of over and under.
Perpendicular power operates in four main categories:
Legitimate power
This describes any power that is conferred through the particular social or civic arrangements of the culture in which we live. So whether you’re a queen (over one’s subjects), a parent (over a child), a manager (over a department) or a teacher (over a group of students), this aspect of power derives from the professional roles that come with a job or appointment or birth-right. We all experience having less or more legitimate power over others at various times in our lives.
Resources
When we have access to resources of some kind that others don’t have, we have power over them. Resources include wealth, key information, land, water, weapons, oil and technology. So if you’re a teenager with a car or an executive with a private jet or a nation with huge mineral wealth, these resources give you power over others: without resources, we are powerless.
Expertise
When you have knowledge or skills that someone else needs but doesn’t have, you have power over them. You can be a computer expert or a plumber, an interpreter or a baker, an eye surgeon or a dog-handler: when someone else needs your expertise, they automatically have less power than you in this particular context. Charisma Finally, a less concrete form of perpendicular power but, nonetheless, it is a significant dimension. Genuine charisma describes the power and influence generated by someone’s personal presence: their beauty, charm, moral integrity, holiness, sometimes referred to as force of personality. This can have a profound effect on others. Charisma can also be manufactured – as with the cult of celebrity – so it is then more the product of publicity and hype than grounded in any intrinsic personal qualities. The power of celebrity enables stars of stage, sport and screen to exert a larger than life appeal, influencing us to look like them, dress like them or act like them. We may be even influenced into giving them our money or our votes or, in extreme cases, laying down our lives for them.
What do all these four aspects of power have in common?
First, perpendicular power is measured always along the lines of a ladder. This means that you may exert some kind of power over others at the same time as being powerless in other contexts. A variety of ladders co-exist in our society: we may have less money but more expertise; be less skilled but more youthful; less intelligent, but far prettier.
Secondly, this kind of power is only ever temporary. It doesn’t last forever. Professional and personal roles end and when they do, the power that accompanies that role disappears with it. Resources are finite and exhaustible and subject to unpredictable forces such as market fluctuation and political or climatic changes. Expertise is only relevant when it is needed: social and professional needs change, and with them, some skills become gradually or suddenly redundant while others start in ascendance. Even charisma is affected by time as physical prowess, youth and beauty fade and fashion moves on.
Thirdly, such power is conferred from outside us: by the organisation in which we work, by the norms of society or cultural trends. This external source means that it can be given and taken away in equal measure: it is not dependent on any intrinsic worth or personal characteristics. Even charismatic power which may emanate from some inner qualities is totally dependent on the existence of admirers or devotees to remain effective.
In this context, power is not dependent on merit: history shows that charismatic individuals can just as easily be sinners as saints. We gain power over others whether we ‘deserve’ it or not. It is quite arbitrary. Sometimes we don’t choose it or even welcome this power: it just comes with a function or particular responsibilities with which we find ourselves.
Perpendicular power, with which we are most familiar, can be seen as a useful structure, an easy way of measuring which gives us useful information – like using a ruler – to assess relative positions. The reason for examining power at this stage of the book is that consciously or unconsciously, structures of power impact on all our communication because they influence our thoughts and perceptions of others.
The relevance to communication lies in the fact that the perspective of the ladder dominates every aspect of life and especially our relationships. Even without being aware of it most of the time, this particular viewpoint affects our communication in subtle ways. When we consider criticising or challenging someone or expressing our feelings or saying ‘no’ to them, this structure hovers in the mental background so that, even without thinking about it, we automatically approach a difficult conversation with a strategic assumption of winning or losing, largely dependent on how we assess our respective positions on the ladder. All kinds of imaginary outcomes and attendant anxieties – based on these relative positions – prevent us from speaking up: won’t it be pointless to challenge someone in that position? Will I get punished? Isn’t she too vulnerable for me to be truthful? Is it my place to say anything? Will I end up looking stupid?
These anxieties can be eased by understanding and developing a different kind of power – personal power – which is not attached to our relative positions in the hierarchy. As you will see in the following chapters, embracing personal power provides the key to all assertive communication.
Personal power
Instead of a ladder, this power is more easily understood symbolically as a continuum, a continuously moving force which accompanies us from birth to death. It is something that abides within us alongside all the trappings of external power which come and go throughout our lives. Personal power can wax and wane but it exists independently of movement up or down the many ladders of external power. Even in times of anguish and despair, it survives like an ember that can be breathed back into life when circumstances change.
Personal power does not depend on outside circumstances so is not tied to rank or class, wealth or background, beauty or age. It cannot be measured in conventional ways. The natural compassion radiating from a very inexperienced young nurse or the quiet assurance and wisdom of a man who has led a humble but fulfilled existence bear little relation to the structures of power in society.
Some of the more recognisable hallmarks of personal power are balance, honesty, emotional awareness, integrity and equality. Balance signifies the commitment to weighing up your own needs, opinions and desires against those of others: the underlying goal of all assertiveness training is to develop personal power to the extent that you can interact with others from a place of much more security and balance than when you are teetering on one rung, trying to regain or retain a precarious foothold.
The quality of honesty applies especially to being truthful to your
self about your needs, your limitations and your feelings: not being truthful – being in denial – always weakens our personal power. Emotional awareness follows on from honesty: developing a more familiar relationship, for example, with anxiety or anger helps us move through these feelings and still say what we want to say instead of being overwhelmed. Integrity – being true to yourself – gives a boost to personal power because it provides the inner strength to risk disapproval and disagreement.
Equality is a crucial facet of personal power which derives from responding to both models of power at once: you open your eyes to see the person you are communicating with as either higher or lower than you in terms of perpendicular power, while also acknowledging your equality as human beings. This may strike you as a bit vague and unfamiliar at this point but the concept and its implications will become clearer as you read through these pages. Once you’re clear about what it really means, you’ll see how it provides the key to effective communication.
4
Putting Theory into Practice
In the last chapter we looked at a few examples of the sort of situations that have cropped up in workshops and training programmes. What follows are some exercises which can be done on your own, as well as guidance as to how you could set up a context for working with one or two other people who are similarly interested in learning to be more assertive.
Exercise 1 Set aside fifteen minutes on your own. Find something to write on and make a list of ten situations in which you would like to be more assertive. They can be taken from any area of your life – like those described in the first chapter – with strangers or your family, with friends, relatives, children, neighbours, colleagues, partner, patients or customers – anyone you come into contact with in the course of your life.
When you have the list in front of you, write down next to each interaction how you behave now – aggressively, passively or manipulatively (if you have so far avoided dealing with the issue, this is one for the passive category). You may find that you need to write down more than one response if you behave both aggressively and passively, for example, on different occasions.
If you have another fifteen minutes, continue to Exercise 2. If not, then wait until you have the time. It does not matter if you leave it for a while.
Exercise 2 Look at your list and see if you can range the items in order of difficulty. Look through it and find one which you think is the easiest: one which you can almost handle assertively but not quite. Write ‘Number 1’ next to that on your list. Now find the one which makes you shudder when you think about it: the one that you feel is the most difficult and unlikely ever to happen. This one becomes Number 10. Then take the next easiest one and put Number 2 next to it. Find the next most difficult one and make that Number 9. Continue until you have a range of situations, starting with the easiest one and continuing down to the worst. If you cannot manage to find ten or if you find that most of your list is bunched together around the top and bottom, don’t worry: the important thing is to have a range with some easy ones to start with so that you can gradually work your way down the list.
‘Working down’ the list brings us to the principal method we use in assertiveness training, a method called role-play. As I said in the Introduction, this aspect of assertiveness training has virtually disappeared because it takes time and it takes commitment: it also takes a belief that the person who wants to change has the answer somewhere in her and, although she may well need guidance and support in finding this answer, she doesn’t need steering, general advice or counselling.
Without role-play, change remains in the realm of thought and conjecture. Talking and thinking about your behaviour is a start but only of limited value. The way to change is to try it out for yourself: this is how you learn to feel anxiety and move through it; how you learn that when you express what you feel instead of denying it, the physical sensations actually disperse and you find yourself getting stronger (from within) in what you want to communicate.
Role-play is borrowed from the traditional techniques of behaviour therapy. It helps the person rehearse what she wants to say or do in a given situation. Another person takes the complementary role: for example, someone else might sit in for the queue jumper, the shop assistant, the child, husband, friend, parent, boss and so on, in order that the first person can practise handling the dialogue assertively. Without any learned skill, the person taking the complementary role can identify the essence of the exchange and will often surprise herself and everyone else by spontaneously finding the right words to use, the correct intonation, and many subtle ways of making the role-play scenario very real for the person who is practising.
If you doubt the effectiveness of this method, you have only to try it to see how helpful it can be. Most people initially express great reluctance to try it out and everyone feels self-conscious at the beginning but after taking part in role-play, they are surprised and utterly convinced of its value. It is not the same as ‘playacting’: once you are involved in the role, you find that you feel the same feelings that you do in the real-life circumstances: anxiety, indignation, guilt or disappointment. What’s more, the person taking the opposite role can be a very helpful source of insight and feedback. There are many tiny details – the tone of your voice, the way you stand or your eye contact, for example – details which you do not notice yourself but all of which contribute to the overall impression. In this way, someone else can observe and tell you when you are coming across more assertively.
Setting up a role-play at home The other person can be anyone you feel safe to work with. It is not always advisable to choose one of your family unless you are sure they will take what you are doing seriously and that they understand what you are trying to achieve. For this reason, some women find it easier to practise with a friend, especially if the friend has some understanding of what assertiveness is about. The important thing is that you trust the other person because for role-play to work, you have to be genuine: you have to be able to acknowledge that you don’t have all the answers and that you find some situations difficult before you practise dealing with things more effectively. In other words, you have to stop acting and be yourself: this is why you need someone who is on your side and preferably someone who will trust you in turn.
You will probably feel a little silly and self-conscious when you both begin but after a couple of awkward moments, you will begin to get absorbed. I know that whenever I have tried something out with a close friend, I have always felt a little embarrassment at first but it soon disappears. It is quickly replaced by the excitement of learning with someone’s interest and encouragement and the satisfaction is shared by both of you when you finally get it right! Apart from being fun a lot of the time, it is also a very useful and positive additional dimension to friendship.
How do you start? Whether just one of you is practising or both of you intend to take a turn, whoever starts must decide specifically on what they want to achieve. It is no good saying ‘I want to deal with my messy son’, ‘I want to feel more confident talking to my boss’ or ‘I wish my hairdresser would listen to me’. You have to learn to be specific: ‘I want my son to tidy his room once a week’; ‘I want to ask my boss for a promotion to the next scale’ or ‘I want to tell my hairdresser not to cut more than half an inch off my hair’.
You do not have to go to too much trouble over this but it helps to recreate the scene a little. For example, the first role-play might need the person playing the son to be at the computer. In the second example, the ‘boss’ might sit at a desk (you could use a table). The boss could pretend to be on the phone or watching a screen or doing whatever makes the scene more realistic. In the third, the ‘hairdresser’ could stand behind the other person who could be on a chair, just as you would be in a salon.
Be open to feedback from the person playing the son/boss/ hairdresser: ask them to tell you what you say or do which is unhelpful and suggest how you could improve. The other person’s feedback ca
n be revealing and useful. Don’t spend too much time in discussion: the most effective use of time is in the actual role-play. Keep practising again and again until you feel happier with the way you handle the conversation.
If you’re temporarily in the shoes of the son/boss/hairdresser, you do not have to worry about having dramatic ability. Everyone finds it remarkably easy once they relax into it: we are often better observers of one another’s behaviour and gestures than we give ourselves credit for.
Start with the easiest first Practise a situation from the Number 1’s or 2’s on your list. The reason for doing this is important. It is always tempting to dive into the deep end too soon. The hardest problems are the ones you most want to be rid of, the ones which cause you most heartache and frustration. But any long-lasting problem usually involves a relationship with someone who is or has been important to you in some way: it may be a person at work, a spouse, a parent or close friend. Any relationship that matters to you will have a history attached to it and therefore feelings will run high because they have accumulated over time. It is more difficult to be clear about what you really want and feel when the issue is emotionally loaded.
For example, it is almost impossible to say ‘no’ assertively to your mother when you have been saying ‘yes’ for thirty years and swallowing back the resentment every time. Long-standing relationships of any kind are fraught with hidden complications. It is no good pretending all you want to do is simply ask your teenage daughter to come home on time when deep down you are feeling sad that she is growing up and growing away from you. If you start with your Number 9’s and 10’s, you will find that you’ll get too anxious and that it won’t work. Then you risk becoming discouraged and convincing yourself that there is no way of dealing with it so you might as well give up.