5 Techniques to Communicate Assertively

Assertive communication is the type of communication that everyone should aim for when talking with others. It is the balance between passive communication and aggressive communication. It is communicating your thoughts, feelings, and opinions clearly and effectively without disrespecting others around you. Use the five techniques below to help you communicate assertively.

Be Confident

Be confident when you speak or walk into a room. Confidence means that you believe in yourself and your abilities. When other people see your confidence, they won’t feel the need to question or challenge it to do your confident behavior.

Be Clear

Make sure you deliver your message clearly and concisely. Be sure your talking points are aligned and flow with the direction the conversation is moving. Don’t confuse people with too many talking points or subjects that don’t align with one another.

Be Controlled

Be calm and controlled with your tone of voice and the speed at which you are talking. You want to sound relaxed and not rushed or irritated. Talking fast can make people feel confused, which will not make them feel trusting.

Stop Being A People Pleaser

Assertive communication does not mean you will change everyone's mind and get your way every single time. However, assertive communication does include making sure those around you know who you truly are while preventing them from trying to walk all over you. People pleasers, as lovely as they are, tend to get taken advantage of because they want to make sure everyone is happy.

Be Present in The Moment

When communicating, be present and in the moment. Don’t dwell on past mistakes or think about others who are not in the conversation unless it leads in that direction. Truly listen to what is being said. Repeat the message to be sure you and they know you understand them. Pay attention to every word they say, don’t say, and their body language, too, so you can respond appropriately. Missing details or bringing up other things can cause distrust and will ultimately lead to aggressive communication.

Practice Fogging

Fogging is an excellent technique designed to eliminate hostile confrontation in a conversation with passive or aggressive communicators.

For example, if a co-worker asks, “Why didn’t you turn in the assignment, you said you would help me with? I am over your lying and trying to deceive me!” You can reply, “Yes, I did not turn the assignment in when I thought I would. I can see this has upset you.” The idea is to have a response that is calm and truthful but doesn’t fully agree with what they are saying to prevent arguing or a negative response.

Developing assertive communication skills takes time and practice. Remember these techniques, and you will be more successful in your career and relationships.

Analyze Your Efforts Over Time

Everything you do is a process of leveling up. You start out as a complete newbie – an unknown – and grow into a formidable entrepreneur who starts to set the pace for how things go in your industry.

In order to achieve that level of expertise and authority, you’ll want to periodically analyze how you’re doing things. Every successful company does this – looks at ways to improve over time.

It’s the same for online marketers. You need to know when to drop something or add something to your business. You have to know when you should replace a strategy with something new, or pursue something you had hesitated on before.

To improve, it means you embrace the process of wearing both your employee and your boss hat when you analyze your efforts. Be blunt with yourself about how things are going.....

Stay Ethical and Align Yourself with the Right People

Ethics in this industry are paramount to your success. Reputation is everything, and if you ruin it with poor decisions, and a poor understanding of how others can affect you, all of your efforts will be wasted.

The first thing you have to do is maintain a system of ethical standards for yourself. For example, what’s your rule on refunds? Is it one rule across the board, or are you flexible?

It’s okay to be hardnosed about it, but you need to ensure everyone is made aware ahead of time, and don’t sneak some small print into your copy that hides it from your prospective buyer.

What about things you recommend? Are you the type who sees it as a free-for-all where you’ll promote anything and everything to your customers, and say it’s their fault if they buy something wrong?

Or do you shoulder the responsibility of giving your audience good advice on what to spend money on, even if it’s not something that you, yourself are selling? Think of how you would want to be treated.....

Get Committed to the Routine of an Entrepreneur

Routines are important when you’re working for yourself. It holds you accountable to whether or not you’re making progress versus allowing yourself to get away with being a slacker just because you can.

Not only that, but it helps you step up and serve your audience better, too. They rely on you for consistency, and if you’re not in a routine of carrying out tasks like posting to your blog or emailing them, the random communication will wear thin.

The first thing you want to have in your routine is to check emails. You want to stay on top of customer support issues, so that if someone needs your help, they know they’ll have your attention right away.

You may want to do it more than once a day – such as checking morning, afternoon and evening. You want to set up a schedule for how often you do things, such as creating a blog post or email – or posting to a social networking site....

Develop a Love of Learning

If you’re going to be a leader or coach of any kind, helping people with their goals in any niche, you have to develop a love of learning. This isn’t the typical school type of learning you couldn’t wait to escape.

This is driven by your passion to help people. One thing that intimidates many people and prevents them from succeeding is that they mistakenly believe that if they have no degree or certification, they can’t compete in the marketplace.

But when you’re helping others with things as a leader or coach, you don’t need all of that. As a doctor or lawyer, you would – but not for these purposes. Your job is to stay informed!

You just need the ability and desire to help people. To do that, you should want to stay informed of cutting edge information and a variety of strategies that you could pass along to your audience.....

Be Your Biggest Supporter, Not Your Worst Enemy

A lack of confidence is a dream killer, so if you go into this business assuming you’ll fail, you’re probably right. One of the things that intimidates most people is comparing themselves to other, already successful marketers.

You see their incredible earnings and hear their tale of rags to riches and it sounds like lightening couldn’t possibly strike twice. The most basic mindset you have to possess is that you are capable.

You’re going to have enough people not believing in you along the way – your friends and family who have no idea about online marketing and think everything is a scam, your prospective customers who look at everyone suspiciously until they prove themselves, and affiliates and others in your industry who wonder if you’ll be a legitimate and ethical person or someone who ruins their reputation....

The Low Threshold of Entrepreneurial Success

Most people who dream of success as an online entrepreneur imagine it to be some out-of-reach endeavor that may only be achievable by a stroke of luck for a few people who attempt it.

But the reality is, the bar is actually set pretty low for people who want to earn a living online. The fact is, many view basic work tasks as insurmountable obstacles, when in reality, they’re not doing much more than a corporation would require of them if they got hired to work for someone else.

The only difference is, you’re creating your own path, and the insecurity that comes with that is what defeats you, not the industry itself. There are five fundamental things you can do to ensure you coast through this process with ease.....

Give Yourself a Green Light to Succeed

Call it quitting or call it long-term procrastination. It's all the same. You're not moving forward and crossing the finish line to success. You have to develop a mindset that shifts from wishy washy to go getter.

When you have the rude awakening that you’ve been a quitter for too long, it’s time to give yourself some tough love. Today is the day you decide if you should be in this business or not.

After all you’ve learned about importance of a positive entrepreneurial mindset, if you can’t muster up the energy, determination and commitment to this career, you should stop draining your finances, stop putting yourself through the emotional rollercoaster and just find a job offline.

Those of you who remain dedicated – today is the very last day of excuses, panic, fear, confusion and other childish reasoning you want to give for not achieving your goals. It’s time to send that childlike mentality off for a nap while you work on your success. 

You have to give yourself permission to succeed. To stop failing yourself time and time again. No one else will boost your morale or push you to the finish line like you can. You just have to make a plan of action for those moments of weakness when it seems easier to pull back than push through your obstacles.

When Everything You've Been Through Leads to a Dead End

Think of all the things you’ve been through on this journey to succeed as an online entrepreneur – the fear, the overwhelm, the time management problems and more. It could all end in one drastic and sorrowful thing – giving up.

Many people look at their past journey and the failures they’ve experienced with shame. They’re embarrassed by what’s happened, and often compare themselves to the overnight (often phony) success stories other marketers share openly on sales pages.

Instead, you need to look at everything you’ve done with immense pride. You’ve gone after something you’ve wanted. You made efforts. You attempted something that few people have the guts to do.....

5 Effective Ways To Deal With Pressures In Life

Do you ever feel like you're carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders? Or, at the very least the weight of the people around you? Nothing weighs you down like pressure and too much of it is likely to leave you feeling frustrated, angry, and sad. In extreme cases, you may find yourself bubbling over and knocked out by overwhelm and burnout.

It isn't just work deadlines that get you, it can also be financial obligations and the burden of daily life. Money, in particular, is a rising cause of anxiety and stress for Americans. Combined with the stress of excessive working hours, a lack of control and support, and it's no wonder so many people are feeling under pressure.

We all react differently to pressure, some people swear it makes them perform better while others recognize the damage it can do to their performance. It is much easier to remain focused on a task when you're calm. So, let's look t five effective ways to deal with pressures in life.

1. It's The Process, Not The Outcome
Sometimes, the best thing you can do for yourself is detach from the outcome and remain focused on the work that you are doing. It is much easier to live your potential if you remove the obstacles you face mentally. If you focus on the process, rather than the outcome, it will reduce the likelihood of performance anxiety.

2. Organize
How do you organize your day? How do you manage your thoughts? You can't store it all in your head. The best way to deal with thoughts and responsibilities is to have an external organization system. It might be that you write out a daily to-do list, it could be that you prefer a digital calendar. Whatever it is – it removes the pressure of memorizing everything you have to do and worrying about forgetting something. Your list is your bible and will serve as a reminder for everything you need to do or deal with. You will notice a serious dip in the pressure you carry.

3. Deal With Negative Thoughts
If you struggle with negative thoughts this will only add to the pressure you feel. One of the ways you can manage these thoughts is through re-framing them. When you are faced with a negative thought, start by putting things into perspective. As frantic worry starts to overtake you, stop and remind yourself that no matter what it is you're faced with that you can handle it. It's not the end of the world, work through it by deciding your next steps – first, I'm going to do x and then I'll do y, and do this until you have successfully reframed your thoughts and empowered yourself.

4. Know Your Limits
Your brain can only keep it all together for so long. So, if you're dealing with tens of thousands of thoughts daily (you are), as well as a list of things to do, and a glut of problems, your brain can only maintain for so long. Understand that your brain has limitations and start going easy on yourself. Be realistic. Do not expect to carry all of the solutions all of the time. You literally can't.

5. Breathe Through It
When you are faced with a crisis, too much pressure or you feel overwhelmed, press pause and breathe through it. Count to ten as you inhale deeply and exhale and allow yourself a moment to clear your brain of worries. Let your mind have enough time to recalibrate so you relieve some of that pressure and allow yourself to think more clearly to deal with the problem at hand.

6 Ways To Stay Calm Under Pressure

How often do you feel under pressure to act? In those moments, what you really need is calm, but that can be difficult to achieve when your stress levels are so high. It's one thing to feel occasionally frazzled, but to feel panicked constantly is a serious problem. When you start to feel the pressure mounting, you need to have go-to tactics to help you beat the weight bearing down on you. Let's talk about it.

1. Facts
As pressure mounts, it's easy to get caught up in worst-case scenarios. Instead of catastrophizing, deescalate the situation by focusing on the facts. Calm yourself by identifying facts and looking for the evidence in any situation. By making a list of facts and evidence you can calm your nerves and get your brain back into shape.

2. Hit the Brakes
Think of the stress that comes from pressure as a broken car alarm. It doesn't matter how many times you hit the button to silence it, it keeps alarming. The alarm system is broken because it's drowning in stress hormones and can no longer accurately judge or understand the signals it is being sent. The only way to remain calm under pressure is to hit the brakes, downshift, and decelerate. The question is how? This will be different for anyone, but deep breathing, meditation, and calming music are all effective ways to do so. Music, in particular, can help you get a grip on organizing your rational thoughts in a bid to overcome the catastrophizing your brain is trying to do.

3. Impulse Control
As we have evolved, our brain hasn't moved with the times. Once upon a time, the fight or flight syndrome was triggered by serious danger (think: a wild animal trying to eat you). Unfortunately, that hardwiring remains, and when it kicks off it's like a volcanic eruption. It's normal to feel fear and it's normal to start panicking. However, you can use impulse control to help manage this. This is a tool you use daily – think about all the times you bite your tongue instead of telling someone what you really think. You're more than capable. You just need to use self-regulation to calm yourself and stay in the moment.

4. Reactionary
The greatest challenge we face as humans is coping with responsive emotions when someone or something is pushing our buttons. When someone attempts to get a reaction from us, we generally respond exactly as they intended. It might feel good to let it fly at that moment, but it's not the best way to respond to pressure. This reactionary response we turn to is often the result of ego or a complete inability to manage emotions. If you find yourself in this position, your best bet is to silently remind yourself that you don't react and give yourself time to calm down before you respond.

5. Patience
Do yourself a favor and practice this virtue. The more you practice patience the better you will be at exercising it when under pressure. When you have the strength to step back from a stressful situation and pause your reaction you show patience in the face of pressure. Take this moment to do some deep breathing to calm the tension in your muscles, waylay your emotions, and get control of the situation.

With patience, you can slay the dragon of pressure and stress, giving yourself plenty of time to identify a solution.

6. Attention
When faced with pressure, your attention is often swept away. Your ancient brain kicks into high gear building a fictitious future to derail your progress. By building your attention you can keep this ancient brain at bay because you will be more adept at identifying the many false alarms trying to hijack the narrative. How can you build attention? Choose an activity that focuses on the moment and requires your attention – think learning a new language, playing an instrument, chess, or even dancing.