Are You Too Willing To Go Along To Get Along?

How do you respond to the following questions?

I worry a lot about what people think of me.
I am easily upset, touchy and quick to take offence.
Being teased bothers me much more than it does my friends.
Any sort of critique or criticism that I receive bothers me a lot.
My feelings are easily hurt.
I have trouble letting go of my mistakes including misspeaking.
I often feel like people run over me verbally.

If you answered yes then you might be described as thin skinned, very sweet, always agreeable, fearful of confrontation, overly sensitive, never one to argue, and willing to go along to get along.
If you want to change, then the place to start is with your self-esteem. This is not a rapid or easy task to accomplish but with insight, self awareness, commitment, persistence, hard work and, perhaps, some professional counseling you can change.

Consider that sometimes insensitive statements are made by people when they are angry and upset about something totally unrelated to their statements made to you. They may have had a bad day, or they may have simply not picked their words carefully. If you can accept this then it is much easier to deflect and depersonalize their statements and move on.

If you are trying to develop healthier responses to other people’s statements, then you should examine any tendency that you may have to “overanalyze” what people say to you. Be cautious about looking for hidden meaning or underlying motives for things said to you.

Take into account what people say to you but don’t let it get to you. The world is not totally full of kind and caring people. Some people are habitually sarcastic and non-empathetic and, not surprisingly, these same people are usually friendless.

Learn to be assertive and speak up for yourself. Being like Charlie Brown can open you up to all kinds of negative comments and verbally bulling behavior. A very good resource for developing assertive behavior is Your Perfect Right: Assertiveness and Equality in Your Life and Relationships (9th Edition) by Robert E. Alberti and Michael L. Emmons.

Another suggestion is to join a self improvement group like Toastmasters International to help you develop self confidence and communication skills.

Finally, my own archives of past newspaper columns, www.haplecrone.com, contain a lot of suggestions on building healthy self- esteem and learning to communicate more effectively.

Here’s to healthy change for those in need.