Emotional Strength Training for HSPs: Assertiveness PART 3

Emotional Badass

Nikki Eisenhauer

Health & Fitness, Mental Health, Education, Self-improvement

4.8 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 22 March 2026

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Part three of our assertiveness series, and we're breaking down the Goldilocks of it all. Walk through a scenario with me about difficult parents and boundaries that protect your HSP nervous system the way no one protected you growing up. When your inner child looks up thinking 'you just did what Dad never learned,' that's the bliss I didn't know this work would bring. Passivity is too little, aggression too much, passive-aggressive somehow both at once. No wonder we can't tell when we're being honest or dysfunctional. RESOURCES: WORK WITH NIKKI 1:1 30 DAYS TO PEACE COURSE PATREON COMMUNITY THE BOUNDARIES COURSE BOOK CLUB NARCISSIST ABUSE RECOVERY WORKSHOP THE FREE MORNING ROUTINE WEEKLY NEWSLETTER SIGNUP THE PATTERNSCAPES WELLNESS DECK BRAIN FM: CODE: emotionalbadass for 20% off your membership FOLLOW US: YouTube Instagram Facebook TikTok Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Assertiveness is the way to more peace, more simplicity in these relationships that can get so complex, confusing, and convoluted.
0:12.0	Passivity breeds burnout, and it attracts manipulators and abusers.
0:18.0	Aggression breeds regret and pushes healthy people away. Assertiveness breeds stability.
0:25.3	Even if and when the other person stays just as difficult as they always were, assertiveness
0:31.6	interrupts this dysfunctional cycle that we unfortunately learn to try to survive it. Assertiveness puts you back on your
0:41.1	higher purpose path. Assertiveness says, I can be compassionate without being a punching back.
0:50.1	I can help without self-erasing. I can do what is right and not to my detriment. I can help without self-erasing. I can do what is right and not to my detriment.
0:57.6	I can regulate myself without tolerating mistreatment.
1:02.2	Hello, welcome to the show.
1:05.0	This is Emotional Badass, where Moxie meets Mindful.
1:08.3	I'm your host, Nikki Eisenhower, life coach and psychotherapist. And on today's
1:13.3	episode, I am talking about emotional strength training for highly sensitive people on assertiveness.
1:21.0	This is part three of a series I hope to continue if y'all like it. If you haven't listened to part one or two,
1:30.3	please go back and listen to those. This one will be so much more impactful if you do.
1:34.9	So I want to review here that understanding these conversational ways of being,
1:42.8	these styles, these strategies, these real defense mechanisms for
1:48.3	childhood dysfunction that we take into adulthood. The simplest way to understand these is
1:55.3	understanding Goldilocks and the three bears and their porridge. Okay, so passivity is when we bring just too little.
2:05.9	It's not enough. We need more from ourselves when we're passive. Aggressive is too much. It's
2:13.5	overkill. It's going way too far. We have to pull that back and do less there.
2:20.3	Passive aggressive. Now this probably holds the most confusion because it's very nuanced.
2:26.5	The passive aggressive is somehow both too little and too much at the same time.
	...

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