It happens in your daily life that someone asks you to do a service for him, a service that exceeds your capabilities and energy because you are busy with several tasks in this period of your life, and yet you are ashamed to say to him: No, I cannot do that, and you prefer to answer yes so as not to let him down or hurt him How he feels or because you are afraid to appear rude and mean.

This may become a habit for you, so others understand that and they are constantly throwing tasks on you, thinking that you are a good and kind person and will not object or say anything.

Just entering this article, it means that you are a person who cares about yourself, and you want to help yourself to get rid of the excess kindness that is exploited by others and that prevents you from expressing what you really want. And direct solutions to the problem of others’ exploitation of you, you are in the right place, all you have to do is read this article to its end, to see the tools that will help you and the proposed solutions, but if you want to understand why this is happening to you and to understand in detail and in depth the roots of your problem and the theories that explain it, This article is a brief and practical version of another expanded article entitled: “Poor for his intentions.” Here are these scientific steps for saying “no” and overcoming excessive kindness. You can visit it at any time for further and in-depth understanding.

What can I do so that others do not take advantage of my kindness and kindness to them?

In psychology, a person who is very kind to others and is very considerate of others and their feelings is called a consensual person. In general, the therapeutic steps to get rid of excessive consensual behavior lie in behavioral, linguistic and communicative exercises, and these steps can be summarized in five main points:

  • First: Understand your compatibility traits

Like any other problem, the solution always starts from identifying the causes of the problem and deepening its understanding. Defining the problem is half the solution.

But this task will be a little critical, the culprit here is you, your character.

The solution requires some boldness in recognizing that many of the problems that happen to us, we ourselves may be the main cause of them, for the qualities of kindness and kindness are considered good virtues for their owners, but the problem lies when we use these virtues as a means of self-justification for ourselves when we are unable to take our rights or claim them We replace it by convincing ourselves that we gave it up of our own free will because we are good people.

The therapeutic step begins by alerting you to your own steps, to the way you respond and the way you deal with others, when you can monitor this aspect of your personality, and when you notice how you involve yourself by not revealing your true desires.

This good aspect of your personality (kindness) is good in specific living areas, but it itself brings burdens and damages to you when you apply it in other areas, such as the job or in front of strangers or unrelated friends, so you are unable to refuse their requests or confront them when they perform behaviors that harm you. Personally.

  • Second: Practice negotiating in your home

The main problem you have, as a consensual person, is that you are afraid of getting involved in disagreements and discussions that may turn into conflicts, because you think that turning a discussion into a problem will make you look embarrassing or ugly.

Therefore, you must learn negotiation skills, specifically learning to continue the discussion to communicate what you want without getting excited or rushing to end the discussion and give up what you want to say.

For this to happen, there are three key skills that you can train yourself in at home in order to develop your debating abilities:

  • Define your order accurately

You must know exactly what you want.

When you are confident of your conviction, desire, or need, you will stand up for it, and you will not find a way out or a way out to justify for yourself to abandon the discussion about it.

From here learn to say what you want to discuss about with three or five clear and specific words (I want to replace this piece, please) without saying broad, general, random and redundant words, as hesitation and lack of clarity reduce the chances of others responding to your requests or desires, It also makes you vulnerable to accusation and exploitation under the pretext that you don't know what you want in the first place.

  • Create a virtual situation and practice with your brother

This step is done by asking your best friend or brother to have a virtual discussion with you about a business issue.

In this case, you have to challenge yourself, ask your friend or brother with whom you are training to put counter-arguments for you, in order to learn the quick wit to evoke immediate responses when your points are met with criticism and rejection.

It is not enough to practice negotiating in your mind, but you must learn it by confronting someone other than yourself (such as saying to your brother I want to ask you to return a pen that you just took from me, and resisting the arguments I put for you in a blunt way, so that I learn to debate for a long time).

  • Equipped with multiple arguments and different possibilities (what do I do when my first argument fails?)

This step depends on learning to go beyond one-step thinking, as the first argument of a consensual person often fails, he thinks only one step, such as: I have to ask him to close the window because I'm cold.

And when he does this and fails to fulfill his request, he does not find other options for confrontation because he is a consensual person and fears excessive urgency and fears getting involved in a dispute.

So one must have more than one justification and way to enforce his request (eg: I will ask him to close the window, or I will ask the office manager to close the window rather than the person sitting next to it).

  • Third: Learn to say "no" when you feel you have to

Harmonic people tolerate beyond their abilities because they are afraid to answer “no” so as not to hurt the feelings of others and not get involved with them in a disagreement or controversy in front of the rest of the people around them. To destroy their own health and personal interests to gain the admiration of others.

The important thing here is to balance the demands made from them and their current capabilities in terms of time, skill, money, psychological and physical readiness, and so on.

  • Fourth: Learn the techniques of assertive communication.

It may seem like a simple idea, but it is effective. Believe it or not, a large part of the problems of compatibility may be linguistic or communicative.

More specifically, consociationalists may overcome their kindness problems by replacing their daily answers with other answers.5 They are communicative and language exercises that teach you how to replace answers that subject you to subjugation with assertive, (say and don't say) answers.

At the end of this article, in the "Tools that will help you" section, you will find two tables that show you some of these exercises.

  • Fifth: Draw healthy boundaries

In his book "All the waters are the color of drowning", Emil Cioran says: No one can protect his solitude if he does not know how to be hateful with people6.

This may be a harsh statement, but it's the beginning of an important rule of thumb about setting healthy boundaries.

Healthy boundaries are those where you keep your distance from others in a way that ensures you are safe to say what you really want without suffering serious consequences.

The problem lies when professional or occupational relationships are mixed with family relationships, and family relationships with job relationships, as well as when we make the boss at work a father.

Yes, this may be useful for some time, but it will return to infiltrate your privacy and waste your time and desires in many times, so drawing boundaries always preserves relationships more than it spoils them, unlike what is expected.

Tools that will help you

  • Table (1): Practice assertive response techniques

A table showing you how to answer questions that try to take advantage of your politeness and kindness.

Practice the schedule well, and entrust yourself every week with one of the points (such as intrusion), and try to notice every question that tries to exploit you, and use the optimal answer as suggested by the psychologist 6, and then watch how much you improve in communication, and how much you get rid of the burdens of questions that try to embarrass you or take advantage of you.

  • Table (2): Practice assertive communication techniques

As previously mentioned, the exploitation of your kindness by others depends primarily on the way you communicate, as through our loose answers we create open windows for others to break in, because in the end others interact with the answers you give them.

The following is a table that shows you the most important pleasant communication mistakes, which, by changing them to assertive communication methods, will draw healthy boundaries with others in a way that achieves what you want and achieves for others what they want in a mutually satisfactory manner.

Memorize the table below7, and each week try to practice replacing one field of wrong communication with assertive communication, and so on until you have done the rest of the table.

  • Book: The Power of Positive Rejection - William Urey

It often happens that our answer is “no” to many of the tasks that are asked of us, but we are afraid to answer “no” for fear of the feelings of others, or for fear of their power and oppression, or for fear of losing their satisfaction with us or losing the gains that our good relationship with them gives us .

But how can you say “no” in a lively and positive way, without the other feeling attacked or rejected, and without the situation or the request becoming a point of conflict and disagreement?

The anthropologist and researcher in the field of negotiation and understanding presents his book "The Power of Positive Rejection", where he explains in detail how answering "no" by refusal can be a way to develop our relationships with others, and a way to preserve our own health and personal will.

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Sources

  • The power of positive rejection.

    William Urey.

    Jarir Bookstore (2009)

  • Develop Your Assertiveness.

    Sue Bishop.

  • Asserting yourself: A practical guide for positive change.

    Bower, SA, & Bower, G. H