Customer Reviews

Your Perfect Right: Assertiveness and Equality in Your Life and Relationships (Eighth Edition)

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Alberti and Emmons offer commonsense alternatives to the feelings of powerlessness that come from failing to express what we really want. Their practical solutions can be applied to family and social situations, in intimate and sexual relationships, at work, as consumers, when dealing with difficult people, and within our 21st-century realities in a multicultural, pluralistic, politically volatile world.

This is a highly motivating guide for learning how to act in your own best interests without behaving in an obnoxious Me First manner. Designed as a step-by-step AT (Assertiveness Training) program, the activities and exercises encourage proactive behavior that invites mutual openness. Benefits include getting over your anxiety in dealing with others, boosting your self-confidence, coping with anger and fear, improving decision-making skills, and reducing stress. Because the authors take a holistic-eclectic approach, blending psychological techniques with physical, spiritual, and environmental factors, they suggest you might even be able to relieve certain physical complaints that may be related to underdeveloped assertive talents.

Even the most socially timid reader will find Alberti and Emmons' focus on gradual, realistic progress an energizing method. Start with the Assertiveness Inventory, then follow the guidelines for determining how components like eye contact, body posture, gestures, facial expression, voice tone, inflection, and the thinking process itself fit into your assertiveness quotient. You'll learn to judge what really happened, how much it matters to you, what your priorities and options are, what the consequences might be, and -- most importantly -- whether assertion will make a difference. The book's appendices offer helpful Assertiveness Practice Situations and a list of references and recommendations for further reading.

Since assertiveness is an acquired skill and not an inborn trait, this can be tricky territory. It's easier (and sometimes safer) to respond politely or nonassertively -- even when that means stressing yourself out over an upsetting situation. The other extreme is to confuse assertiveness with aggressiveness. This book is not about bullying or manipulating people to get your way. It's about choosing how to respond, exercising personal rights without denying the rights of others, with the win-win result of making all your relationships more equal.

This book goes beyond the standard publications on assertiveness. It defines assertive behavior not only as an effective communication style, but as a way of being in the world. Assertive behavior allows one to be self-expressive of ideas and opinions without denying the rights of others. It also means being able to communicate feelings of warmth and love to others. The authors' step-by-step process for increasing assertiveness is invaluable in helping both men and women understand the concept of assertive behavior and practically apply it to life situations.

of all the books on my bookshelf, this is probably the one that i have recommended the most. the authors do an excellent job of motivating people to assertiveness, describing the difference between assertiveness and aggressiveness (something i repeatedly do with patients because these concepts were not well defined for them in the past), and providing a practical guide for people to improve their assertiveness. the end of the book has a helpful section on deciding when to be assertive and reviews various questions to consider at the time you are trying to decide if the current situation is a battle worth picking.

i have found that many patients feel very challenged by the notion of abrasive or offensive people scaring them into submission. this book has a chapter on dealing with difficult people that helps with this fear. the section, true to form, gives a very practical strategy for tackling even the toughest, most narcissistic individuals.

for individuals wanting to conduct assertiveness training in a group format, the book can easily be tailored to this goal. the practical, step-by-step approach makes creating weekly lessons and discussion groups quite simple.

my only complaint about the book has to do with the discussion of anger. i don't agree with some of the authors' concepts in this area. for example, they don't see anger as something that builds and could be expressed negatively and disproportionately when the straw breaks the camel's back. i believe in concepts such as anger displacement and think that one person can only take so much. also, the authors state that anger is a feeling like sadness, happiness, fear, etc. i believe, though, that anger is a cover for other emotions such as sadness, anxiety, fear, guilt, shame, etc. when i've worked with patients on anger, they are nearly always able to see this and explore what their anger is truly about. that is, while anger is a valid emotion, it also tends to be superficial. while it often gets us the reactions we want (e.g. getting others to back off, getting people to do things our way), it is motivated by other emotions in my opinion.

another great reference is smith's When I Say No, I Feel Guilty. this book focuses more on overcoming guilt and feelings of low self-worth as the primary obstacles to being assertive and self-respecting.

First and foremost, this book defines assertiveness. It doesn't get into how to be assertive in much detail. There are many other books out there for that: "People Skills", by Robert Bolton, for example.

With that said, this book does a wonderful job defining assertive behavior and when to use it. In this complex world, it's difficult to define appropriate assertiveness, but this book does shed some interesting light on the subject.

I have learned a lot from it, and I would definitely recommend it. I believe it deserves 5 stars.

While I did find this book somewhat informative and useful in developing assertiveness (I wouldn't be writing this review otherwise), I was turned off by the constant insertions of political and moral viewpoints. This book would be just as effective without the subtle rhetoric.

Additionally, this book could be heavier on the content. It uses too many references, making it seem, at times, like little more than a reader's digest of everyone else's books on the subject.

In conclusion, assertiveness is independent of political or moral viewpoints, yet this book implies that by taking an alternate viewpoint to those presented in this book would be wrong. Isn't that a subtle form of the manipulation that is discouraged in this book?

This book would be better with less politics and more original content.

This book is supposed to be about assertiveness, but there is very little helpful information for the unassertive wimps among us. Instead the book concentrates on telling us to "be nice". We are already too nice or we wouldn't need these books. A much better book is "When I Say No I Feel Guilty". It gives you some useful tools to stop people from walking on you.

This book helped me identify my aggressive behaviors that weren't beneficial and find alternative ways to be assertive. It has helped me consider others without sacrificing my needs.

This is such a great book. It was actually one of my text books in college,used in one of my HUS electives.
I gave it to a friend who I thought needed it and then bought two more copies 1 for my personal enjoyment and then a copy for a guy at church that made soup look nervous.
Great book!

It helped me get to know who I am and how to express my feelings while taking into consideration and respecting the other persons rights.

As a clinical social worker and marriage and family therapist, I have a lot of clients whose primary issue is that they want to be more assertive in their lives. They feel too passive and not in control of their destinies. They are the people who say 'yes' when they want to say 'no', agree to do something for someone else when they are already maxed out, go to a movie they don't want to see because they are afraid of suggesting a different movie that they'd prefer seeing, etc.

Of all the resources available for developing assertiveness skills, 'Your Perfect Right' is the best one I have used. I have utilized it in individual therapy and in groups. I've used it with very high functioning people and with people who have chronic mental illness. It is helpful and pragmatic for every aspect of the population.

It will benefit people who want to work with the book alone and learn assertiveness skills for their daily lives. However, for people who feel that their passivity has already crated more problems than they feel they can contend with, I recommend that they contact a therapist and use this book in conjunction with therapy.