Stand Up for Yourself

The headline may seem a bit trivial psychological advice; the fact is that many of us forget to stand up for ourselves. If you don’t stand up for yourself, there will not be anyone else to stand up for you. It is like ‘if you don’t love yourself first, no one else cares to’.

When to stand up for yourself?
Stand up for yourself whenever you feel the need to. Are your friends bullying you so much? It is time to put your foot down. Are you not getting what you have paid for? It is time to stand up for yourself.

Our family had a tough time dealing with some neighborhood issues. A few of our neighbors want a broad path to their homes, at our cost. Or in other words through our property, after removing three jack fruit trees, three cashew nut trees, two mango trees and several other small trees. Everyone knew it is complete injustice against us – they just know it.

And the day came when they have reached to broaden the three feet path to a seven or eight feet path, taking up extra land from our property. They were about fifty of them, mostly hired workers under the leadership of our neighbor. My younger brother put a bold foot and challenged the action of them. Ours is a civil society and not any 16th century society where muscle power ruled over everything. The next scene was police station, from where a constable came and asked them to stop working. Sure, we get the support of others and mainly from the police. Their project was lost. Though paths and walkways are necessary, I or my family didn’t feel the requirement of unjustifiable sufferings.

Others could help us, only because my brother was able to make a bold statement and stood for us.

Thus standing up for yourself involves keeping your prestige and self-respect intact without ever allowing others to take it away from you.

Many times in the past I felt it is OK to take myself not so seriously. No. That type of thought is not with me any more. If you don’t take yourself seriously, others too will not. If you make sure you have self respect and prestige, others too will agree with it.
Stand up for yourself, make voice for yourself. The first thing is to understand you have self-respect. It is not assuming or believing, but understand and know that you deserve to be treated with respect.