Do you struggle to speak up for what’s right? Expressing yourself authentically—whether challenging injustice, setting boundaries, or voicing disagreement—requires practice and courage, but the benefits strengthen relationships, advance careers, and create positive change.
Speaking up isn’t just about overcoming personal hesitation. It’s about recognizing that honesty and assertiveness serve both yourself and others. With many expert-backed tips and pieces of advice, you can develop this essential skill across social, professional, and difficult situations.
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How to Practice Speaking Up Without Fear
There are several reasons why you may not want to speak up for what’s right: You fear hurting someone’s feelings, causing offense, or inciting anger; you aim to avoid being perceived as rude, mean, or aggressive; or you hesitate to show emotions, appear needy, or make public mistakes.
While these fears are powerful deterrents, Aziz Gazipura (author of Not Nice) argues they’re based on false beliefs about relationships. In the world of nice, if you disagree with someone or express strong volition, that person will like you less. In reality, honesty strengthens relationships. When you say what you think, you treat the other person as a capable and resilient adult, allowing both of you to be your authentic selves, regardless of whether you agree.
According to Gazipura, to speak up effectively, you must communicate assertively—express yourself clearly while also considering others’ feelings. This helps everyone talk openly, respect each other, and set clear boundaries for healthy interactions. In contrast, passive communication involves holding back your thoughts and needs, often leading to frustration and misunderstandings, and aggressive communication is forceful and disrespectful, causing conflicts and damaging relationships. Being assertive strikes a balance, fostering effective and respectful conversations.
1. Practice in a Social Setting
One place you can practice speaking up more is in social settings. When you’re hanging out with friends or out at a party with new people, practice speaking openly about yourself, your opinions, and your ideas. If you want to connect with people, you have to choose to be authentic over being nice.
Gazipura says that becoming confident in social settings often means reevaluating your rules of social interaction. For instance, you don’t need permission to join a conversation; you can simply jump in. Moreover, new conversations don’t require a specific structure; instead, aim to build connections by discussing what genuinely interests you, rather than sticking to what’s expected.
2. Practice in a Professional Setting
Next, practice speaking up at work. Regardless of what position you hold, your ability to speak up will have a profound impact on your professional success. People are often most hesitant to speak their mind at work because they’re afraid of being wrong, getting challenged, or looking stupid. However, if you don’t confront these fears, you’ll become stagnant and unable to advance professionally.
Gazipura offers a few tips to help you gain confidence speaking up in a professional setting. First, he recommends asking questions. It’s a low-stakes way to speak up that shows curiosity and engagement. Second, recognize that you have specific skills and experiences that give you a unique perspective. And third, say what you want to say with confidence. Avoid qualifiers, like “just” or “maybe,” that minimize what you’re saying.
3. Practice When It’s Uncomfortable
The hardest time to speak your mind is when it’s uncomfortable—usually when you’re mad at someone or disagree with them. But, as in your professional life, your success and quality of life depend on your ability to have difficult conversations. Disagreement is inevitable and healthy. These conversations become easier when you don’t pit yourself against the other person. Your goal isn’t to win but to connect with the other person, to listen and be heard.
Gazipura recommends the following approach for handling any conflict: Begin by identifying your emotions, such as frustration or anger. Next, clarify what changes you want. For example, if you’re unhappy with infrequent communication with a close friend, think about what you’d prefer. Then describe the issue neutrally and express curiosity, saying something like, “I’ve noticed we don’t talk very often, and I’m curious to understand why.” Actively listen as the other person shares, and summarize their response to make sure you understand. Then, explain how the situation affects you. Finally, clearly state your desired outcome, but remain open to compromise. Just because you name what you want, doesn’t mean you’ll always get it.
How to Speak Against Injustice
In Courage Is Calling, Ryan Holiday asserts that true individuals won’t let anyone prevent them from speaking the truth. There are injustices in every society and in every time period, and a courageous person will seek to expose them and rectify them. They’ll speak up against tyranny. They’re willing to be loud, difficult, and unreasonable according to society’s standards, and they keep fighting even when their reputation, their safety, or their well-being is threatened.
We can draw from the past for examples of courageous individuals. Throughout history, many artists, writers, journalists, politicians, and other everyday citizens stood up against injustice and spoke the truth, frequently at great expense to themselves. These people were often alone in their convictions at the start. They had to stand firm in their beliefs until the opinions of their society caught up with them.
| How to Fight Injustices as an Everyday Citizen As Holiday says, courageous people work to fight injustices in society. However, with all the stories of suffering and inequality we see in the news and on social media, it can feel overwhelming trying to figure out the best way to help. Here are some ideas for easy ways you can support causes you care about: • Educate yourself about the issues and the background behind the cause (how others have fought this injustice in the past).• Share and reshare content about the cause on social media. This is especially helpful for sharing valuable educational resources (as long as the information is accurate). • Donate money to organizations fighting for your cause, and put your money toward work that makes your community better (when you can).• Donate your time as a volunteer to your favorite organizations. • Attend peaceful protests speaking out against injustices in your community. • Exercise your civil rights—sign petitions, vote for propositions, and vote for candidates that align with the interests of your cause. |
Keep Going Even in the Face of Opposition
When you try to do the right thing and you’re met with opposition and danger, Holiday encourages you to keep going. Hard as it may be, being courageous means making the right choice anyway, regardless of the consequences. You may feel alone for a while, and people may think you’re strange. Still, in the end, you’ll have succeeded because you stayed true to what you know to be morally right.
For example, maybe your company is ignoring safety concerns about one of your products, and they say they’ll fire you if you tell anyone about the situation. The courageous action would be to take your concerns to a higher authority or expose the issue to the media to prevent your company’s product from causing further harm. This might affect your career and your livelihood in the short term, but you’d prevent untold levels of future suffering.
How to Speak Up for Yourself
In Professional Troublemaker, Luvvie Ajayi Jones argues that you need to tell the truth, even when it’s risky. She defines truth-telling as everything from being honest with your friend about her unflattering haircut to challenging a misguided idea in a corporate meeting to protesting injustice. Jones acknowledges that speaking the truth is risky because it could cause serious consequences like the loss of a friendship or a job.
Because telling the truth is risky, people lie a lot, from little white lies to big, damaging lies. Jones cites a University of Massachusetts study that found that most people lied at least once during a 10-minute conversation. She argues that this is because people are afraid of the truth. Deceiving ourselves and others protects us from having to deal with the hard truths of reality.
But Jones says that while telling the truth can be risky and difficult, it also has important benefits. Speaking up about challenges in a relationship can strengthen the relationship. If you’re known for telling the truth and challenging the status quo, people may be less likely to lie or try to get away with bad behavior when you’re around. They might be more likely to give their best if they know that you’re expecting it (and that you’ll challenge them if they don’t). And telling the truth about injustice or wrongdoing can result in positive change and make the world a better place.
1. Nathaniel Branden’s 4-Week Program
Nathaniel Branden (author of The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem) recommends the following four-week sentence-completion program to improve your ability to assert yourself.
Every weekday morning and evening, follow the instructions listed below. Then, each weekend, review your answers and write six to 10 answers to the following prompt: “If any of what I wrote this week is true, it might be helpful if I…”
Week 1: Create and answer four sentence stems that address what asserting yourself means to you, what would happen if you asserted yourself a little more today, what would happen if you were taught that your desires mattered, and what would happen if you behaved as they did.
Week 2: Create and answer four sentence stems that address what happens when you pay attention to or ignore your innermost desires, what would happen if you acted in accordance with your desires, and what would happen if you expressed yourself more regularly.
Week 3: Create and answer four sentence stems that address what happens when you ignore your views, what would happen if you expressed or ignored your desires, and what would happen if people knew your true, best self.
Week 4: Create and answer four sentence stems that address what would happen if you could access your true and best self, what happens when you convey your true self, what happens when you conceal your true self, and what would happen if you wanted a fuller life.
| Alternative Strategies for Asserting Yourself If you struggle to assert yourself in a specific situation, other strategies experts recommend include the following: – Use relaxation techniques like gentle breathing or meditation to alleviate any fear you may have around asserting yourself. – Practice what you’ll say beforehand by conversing with friends or writing a script. This boosts your confidence and makes your message stronger. – Temper your language so that you don’t come across as accusatory or aggressive. Use “I” statements like “I feel” instead of “you” statements like “You did this.” Similarly, saying “Part of me” instead of “I” can introduce ambivalence and make your message easier to stomach. – Be mindful of your non-verbal communication: Even if your words are calm, aggressive body language will muddy your message. In 12 Rules for Life, psychologist Jordan Peterson states that if you stand up straight, you’ll exude confidence. |
2. View Yourself as Worthy and Unique
In 4 Essential Keys to Effective Communication, Bento C. Leal III argues that you first must view yourself as worthy to learn how to express your feelings in words—you must believe that you’re a unique person who has something important to add to the world. To cultivate self-worthiness, Leal recommends engaging in practices that help you recognize your passions, talents, and abilities—the things that make you worthy and unique. For example, watch a movie that ignites your passion, create a list of your accomplishments and goals, or write down all of your unique characteristics.
3. Express Yourself Clearly and Respectfully
Once you’ve determined what you want to say to the other person, Leal recommends expressing yourself in a way that makes your thoughts, feelings, and needs easy for the other person to understand and respond to.
To do this, explain your points one at a time. Furthermore, focus the conversation on your perspective of the situation by using the “I” pronoun rather than the more critical-sounding “you.” For example, say “I feel…” rather than “you did…”. You’ll avoid making accusations and assumptions that might make the other person uncomfortable and cause them to disengage from the conversation.
Leal argues that the best way to express yourself clearly and respectfully is to follow a set formula (what he calls an “XYZ Statement”). First, explain the issue in question. Then, explain your perception of the issue. Finally, explain how the issue makes you feel. For example, “Yesterday, my boss called out the quality of my work in front of the office, and it made me think they wanted to publicly embarrass me. It made me feel really ashamed and a little angry at them.”
4. How to Set and Maintain Boundaries
Luvvie Ajayi Jones says that you need to set boundaries—limits for the type of behavior you accept in your relationships. Setting boundaries can include everything from telling people when they’re doing something that makes us uncomfortable to establishing rules for the way people interact with us online.
Setting boundaries can be scary because we don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, come across as rude or unlikable, or face rejection. Many of us have been taught to accommodate others even at the expense of our own sanity, integrity, and safety. But if we accommodate others without setting healthy boundaries, says Jones, we allow ourselves to be taken advantage of and mistreated.
Jones points out that you can’t blame someone for violating your boundary if they don’t know it exists. You need to tell them what it is. Not telling someone how you feel can make you resentful and punishing, without giving the other person a chance to fix the problem. However, if someone continues to violate a boundary that they’re well aware of, it shows that they don’t care about your needs. Jones advocates removing those people from your life.
| How to Set Boundaries and What to Do If They’re Violated In Set Boundaries, Find Peace, therapist Nedra Glover Tawwab provides the following tips for setting boundaries: Communicate your boundaries immediately after a situation in which someone made you feel uncomfortable. That way, you can prevent the situation from repeating, and you don’t have time to become resentful. Be assertive when communicating your boundaries, so people know you’re serious. Don’t explain your reasoning, as doing so only gives people an opportunity to argue with you (but note that other authors disagree with this approach, arguing instead that sharing your feelings can help build mutual understanding). Tawwab also provides guidelines for what to do if a boundary is violated: Restate your boundary. If someone frequently violates your boundaries but you need to continue to be around them (for example, in a work environment), limit your interactions with that person. If someone frequently engages in major, serious boundary violations, you may need to end your relationship with that person. Don’t blame yourself if someone violates your boundary. If you’ve told someone how you feel and they continue to disregard your feelings, that reflects more on their character than on yours. |
5. Speak Up When It’s Hard
Jones emphasizes that you shouldn’t speak up just to be difficult, but rather to correct a wrong, point out a blind spot, or improve a situation. She believes in speaking up when it’s hardest because that’s when it’s most likely to make a difference. If people tell you to be quiet or you know you’ll be going out on a limb by telling the truth, speak up.
In deciding whether to speak up on a particular issue, Jones first ensures that it’s something she really believes in. Then, she makes sure it’s something for which she can provide factual support. Finally, she doesn’t speak unless she knows she can do so with kindness and compassion.
Jones notes that sometimes we don’t speak up about personal issues in our relationships because we’re afraid of rejection. It may seem easier to keep quiet. But Jones says that if we don’t tell someone when they’ve hurt us, we’re likely to build up resentment, which can damage our relationship. Telling someone how we feel gives them the opportunity to make a change and can strengthen the relationship.
Jones advises that there are a few situations when it’s best not to speak up, such as when you’re flooded with emotion and likely to say something you’ll regret, when someone is giving you constructive criticism, and when it would be unsafe to speak up (as previously discussed).
Explore More About Speaking Up for What’s Right
To better understand the broader context of speaking up for what’s right, read Shortform’s full guides to the books referenced in this article:
