John Perry

Comm 2110 Interpersonal Communications

April 23, 2017
My Personal Change Final Report
Overview
This paper will outline my personal change project and review strategies and efforts that I
applied in order to bring about the desired change. The goal of my project was to learn to be
more assertive with my communication methods. I had noticed that I would rather accommodate
to someone else than stand up for what I believed if I felt that there would be a chance of a
conflict. In order to improve this ineffective method of communication I found several strategies
that would help me to learn how to express myself in an assertive manor. Some of these
strategies included: watching word choice, describing my feelings clearly, developing honest
relationships, and using eye contact. During this project, I learned how this skill can help me
save time and energy as well as save relationships. Since implementing these strategies I feel like
my relationships are more inviting and honest. Although there are some great perks to this skill I
am still in the process of bettering myself and it. I still maintain the goal to continue these steps
and try to continue this improvement process.

Unwanted Communication Pattern

I have the bad habit of not expressing myself. I will do whatever I can to avoid a conflict and
that includes not expressing myself. This I something that I want to change about myself. It is a
very bad communication skill and has often got me into places that I didnt want to be and be
doing things that are normally against my character and morals. Things like this will happen
because I would rather be passive about how I feel in the situation. A more assertive pattern of
expressing myself would help me to avoid these unwanted situations while maintaining honesty
in my relationships.
Here are two examples:
One situation happened last year. My sister had a friend whose name was Erica. She had
just gone through a bad divorce and was living with my sister. I would often see her when
I went to go visit my sister and her family. Erica had started to grow a liking to me and
wanted to invite me out to different events. At the beginning, it was just fun and innocent
and I didnt mind it at all. She would invite me to go see concerts and see different land
marks. Overtime though it started to get more and more intense while she got more
attached. We started frequently being together where she would get really close and act as
if we were a couple. However, I didnt think of her in any other way than just a friend. I
didnt express these feelings until it was too late and she was already invested. It had
been almost the whole year of doing this before I got to saying something, and when I
didnt I was so inexperienced that I sit down and tell her again a second time. Even after
 those talks she still seemed really invested. I realized this situation could have been
avoided if I had been honest about my feelings with her from the beginning. If I would
have done this it would have saved me a lot of time and discomfort. It would have also
saved her from really getting her feelings hurt.
Another situation that demonstrates this dysfunctional communication habit occurred
when one of my friends got in a fight with his relatives. He got into a dispute with his
aunt and uncle with whom he was living with. He ended up wanting to stay at my
apartment while this dispute occurred with him and his family. I, being unable to express
myself, gave in and let him stay on the couch. He ended up staying there for a few weeks
even after the tensions cooled down with his family. I was unable to confront him about
the inconvenience it was to have him staying in the living room. My roommate
eventually confronted him about it and was able to resolve the issue. Things would have
been easier if I had just been forward with him from the beginning. It would have saved
me a lot of time and food, plus it would have encouraged him to mend things with his
aunt and uncle sooner.
In both of these situations I could have saved myself a lot of time and energy had I just been
willing to express myself and my opinions clearly. Unfortunately, because of the nature of this
communication flaw I usually end up unhappy with myself and the situation. In the first
situation, I not only hurt myself and wasted my time I also wasted Ericas time and hurt her as
well. In the second situation, I enabled someone to take advantage of me because I wouldnt
express my concerns.

Strategies
I had been wanting to change this characteristic about myself for a while. So, when I was
presented this opportunity I was excited to implement some strategies that would help me to
overcome this behavior. Through some research, I found a few strategies that I decided to use to
help me with this goal. In all there are about eight strategies that I went over to help me achieve
this goal.

Express Assertiveness. (Beebe, 2008 p. 56)

For this strategy, I decided to look at this as a broad approach for this goal. I wanted to be
assertive and express myself accordingly. If I could remember to be assertive in my
communication it would help me to express how things would affect me without just letting them
pass by me passively.
Affinity Seeking Strategies. (p. 337)
I studied what I could say to people that would allow me to be expressive without coming across
as a jerk or impersonal. I did this by asking people how they would approach a certain situation
and I would document their answers.
Other Oriented. (p. 2)
I would develop an Other Oriented personality. This way I would be able to see things from not
only my perspective but theirs as well. This will let me know how I can be expressive without
being dismissive.
Eye Contact (p. 13)
The first strategy that I planned to use that would help me to be assertive is to make sure I have
good eye contact with the person that I am talking with.
Develop honest relations for support. (p. 49)
I planned to start out new and developing relationships with an assertive personality. This would
give me the practice I needed with being assertive as well as start new relationships already with
this characteristic.
Word Choice (p. 162)
I would make a conscious effort to use words that wouldnt come across as offensive or
dismissive.
Describe my feelings (p. 174)
I decided I would focus on using I language instead of you language for a positive way of
expressing myself.
Understand my Breadth (p. 273)
When asked my opinion I will take some time to really think about how I feel before I express it.
This would help me be less impulsive on what I say.

Through the application of these strategies I will be able to express my thoughts and
feelings assertively and in a way that will be understood. It will also be done in a way that will
hopefully not be seen in a negative manor. In order to help me with the application of these
strategies I would focus on one or two of them at a time.

Constraints
I ran into a few constraints during the application of some of these strategies. One thing
that I first ran into was that not all people are alike. What might be appropriate to say to one
person would not be appropriate for someone else. This didnt come as a complete surprise to me
though, it just meant that things would have to be tailored to who I was talking to. After thinking
about it, it made sense. We dont talk the same way to everyone we know. I talk differently to my
grandma than I do with a friend.
 The second constraint that I noticed was the fact that I had already developed this habit
with the current relationships that I had. When I started to introduce this change into these
already existing relationships people would think that I was upset or at my limit. I would have to
explain that this was a characteristic that I wanted to change about myself and that they shouldnt
be concerned about it. After this metacommunication things would go smoother and I would
have the support from my friends and family.
The last constraint that I noticed was that I had a habit of just being passive. It would take
active thought to make sure that I was assertive. This meant that I would have to be able to
approach a conversation with the thought of being assertive even if I never had to use it in the
conversation. That took some time to get accustom to and is still a little challenging.

Implementation
When I started to try and change this communication behavior I realized that I was not
only fighting myself to change but as well as the constraints that I outlined above. They all
seemed to be working against me at the same time. There was never a solution that would work
with all of them to help me. I decided to listen to how the person talks and see if I could talk to
them and be assertive in a way that they wouldnt think was offensive but would be clear for
them to understand. With the second constraint, I would metacomunicate with the person to help
them understand why I was doing what I was doing. With the last-mentioned constraint, I would
start out with smaller conversation and I would try and use them to help me better get in the habit
of being assertive.
One of the main goals for this change is to help me communicate effectively with my
friends and family. I am always worried about what they are going to think and say. I do not want
to do anything to disappoint them and damage the relationship and so I noticed I would just do
whatever they wanted. Since starting this out I noticed that some of the relationships got a little
strained to start with but it got better and the relationships are still at the same understanding that
they were at before.
I was really able to develop this positive change through the implementation of the
previously mentioned strategies. In order to help me with the implications of them I started out
doing only one or two at a time with each interaction that I would have. There was a few times in
which the strategy that I would chose to work on did not fit well with the interaction but I took it
as a learning opportunity as to when not to use that particular strategy. One example of this was
when I was trying to work on understanding my breadth when the friend I was talking to took the
pause as me being dismissive and he walked away from the conversation right then thinking I
was ignoring him.
Through some other mistakes, I learned about the importance of some of the other
strategies in other scenarios. While trying to express my opinion to my roommate I was focusing
on understanding my breadth and eye contact. I was focusing on those two strategies that I didnt
think about using I/Me vocabulary. I mistakenly used accusative wording and despite my
efforts in the other areas it ended in a fight between my roommate and myself.
 Though there were some negative times, there were also some very positive experiences
that happened because of the implementation of these strategies. I decided to focus on starting a
new relationship with the idea of being clear and assertive with the person. I decided to try this
with a girl that sat next to me in one of my classes, her name was Jocelyn. This brought about
may positive results. The first thing that came from this was that I was able to see how honest
and open the relationship seemed to be even from the beginning stated of the relationship. I was
also able to take this experience and use it as practice. I was able to see which words to use as
well as how to approach different situations. Another good thing that happened because of this
was that I was able to make a new friend.

Results
As I implemented these strategies I was able to experience a lot of positive consequences
that came as a result. I feel that I have become better at being assertive, especially if you
compare how I was before starting this project. I hope I can continue to get better at expressing
myself accordingly. I have been able to have positive and honest relationships without fear of
judgment. There were some negative experiences while working on this project but that came
from inexperience and the more I practice this skill I should be able to reduce those negative
experiences by learning to express myself clearly. I have been able to enjoy my relationships on
a deeper level. I am unable to see where I would be had I not started to put forth effort to change
this habit, but I am sure if I had not I would not have spent a lot more time and energy on things
that I did not want to do. I have learned a lot about how it has affected my life the more I look at
this behavior and I see it in past.

Recommendations
I definitely plan to continue to work on this skill and I hope that one day it will become a
part of who I am and I wont have to even give it a second thought. The success I have
experienced so far is a great motivation to keep working. I plan to continue to implement these
strategies in my relations with my friends and family, as well as learn to develop friendships with
this attribute from the beginning.
One strategy that I think would be good to imply in the future is to learn to purpose
counter offers. For instance, if someone proposes an idea me to do that I dont necessarily agree
with I would be able to offer them an alternate idea that would work out well for everyone
involved. I think this would take some practice though and I should work on learning to express
how I really feel first to make this step more efficient though. It can be practiced and
implemented not though in collaboration with the other strategies proposed.

Work Cited
Beebe, Beebe, & Redmond. (2014). Interpersonal Communication: Relating to Others. 7th Ed.
Boston: Pearson Education/ Allyn & Bacon.