Becoming more assertive

[beatitude]

If someone wants to stay at your place because they want to do something else, then it's their job to get there and figure it out. You're doing the nice thing by giving them a couch to crash on, some food to eat, and a shower. And you certainly don't have to make a three hour round trip to help them find your house - if they're an adult they can put on their big kid pantaloons and figure out how to read a map or use GPS.

The situation seemed like it might be a little more complicated at first. I live in a Palestinian community, and she's a student from America. A few people come here with wild ideas about Palestinians being dangerous to life and limb. I don't like these attitudes (they're an insult to my neighbours, who are the loveliest people you could hope to meet; and this is a community, not a safari park where the wild things are) but people can't always be reasoned out of these notions. So I would always offer to escort someone to my house the first time if they seemed nervous about coming alone, partly as a way to show them that I'm not actually surrounded by sabre-toothed tigers and that people here are pretty regular standard people just as you'd find anywhere else. But now I've found that she's visited Palestinian communities before, so in her case it can't be fear, it's just plain rudeness.

Thank you for all the advice, everyone. Recently I was talking to a professor who is helping me to develop my presentation skills for an academic conference that I'm a bit nervous about, as I am only a PhD student and there will be some big-name speakers there from all over the world, and something she said struck me deeply. "Don't worry about other people and what they are going to say or how they are going to react to you. Just focus on what you have to say, what you considered so important that you decided to write this paper and fly to a different country to share it. Only you can say it. Speak with integrity." I realised that this applies to my wider life as well as to my academic life, and I started putting it into practice last night by talking to a close friend (not the friend described in my original post) about why recent events between us have hurt me a lot. At first I suppressed my unhappiness and my reasons for it, not wanting to worry him, as I know this happened out of thoughtlessness rather than malice. I thought it would be unkind to make an issue of it when he didn't mean to hurt me and possibly didn't even understand how it was affecting me. But then I realised that no, close friends should be able to share things that matter - it's not about blame and guilt but just about being honest over what you need. I prayed before I did it and I think managed to speak lovingly and without blame, while still making it clear that I need some more sensitivity and understanding in future. I have a way to go with this, but hopefully I will get better all the time.

Edited April 19, 2015 by beatitude