Dr. Lena Agree logo featuring her name and title as a licensed psychologist, emphasizing professional psychological services.Dr. Lena Agree, JD, PsyD – Licensed Psychologist and Associates

How to Set Boundaries for Assertiveness and Self-Respect

Woman drawing a red line in the sand on a beach, symbolizing the importance of setting personal boundaries and assertiveness.

Strategies for Assertiveness and Self-Respect: How to Build Confidence and Set Healthy Boundaries

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Assertiveness means naming your needs, limits, and values clearly and respectfully. Self-respect is the inner sense of worth that makes those limits stick. This guide gives practical, evidence-informed strategies to strengthen assertive communication, protect your emotional energy with clear boundaries, and grow lasting self-esteem through everyday habits and targeted cognitive tools. If you find yourself people-pleasing, carrying chronic guilt, or struggling with fuzzy limits at work or in relationships, the steps below translate insight into behavior with scripts, step-by-step boundary work, and short practice drills. You’ll find definitions, core communication skills, examples for couples and professional settings, and clinical context linking attachment and mentalization to assertiveness. The guide also clarifies when coaching or therapy is most helpful and how focused,…

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Heart shape torn in half on a black background, symbolizing emotional distress and mental health challenges.

Do You Have Toxic Parents?

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Most people describe their childhood as “normal.”  We tend to normalize our own childhood because it’s the only one we had, and we truly want to have a loving relationship with our parents. However, that wish can be so powerful that it clouds our memory and our vision, making it difficult to see our parents clearly and objectively. So, if you are an adult who is depressed or anxious, how do you know if your relationship with your parents has something to do with it? You may or may not have negative memories of your parents from childhood. But how can you tell if your current relationship with them is healthy or “normal”? How would you know if your desire…

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