I've recently been learning how to stand up for myself and say my thoughts, opinions, wants and feelings or whatever. Before, I was always passive. Allowing people to tell me what to do and not letting me choose. Being rude to me and just sitting there like a dummy. Allowing them to say whatever they want to say. Maybe even do whatever they want to do. I tell myself I was stupid because there are lots of people out there who aren't passive or were never passive. Always assertive. And, they probably think of passivity as stupidity. I would and do. Like even when people take advantage of others, there saying in there minds that the person they took advantage of is stupid. Somebody who's never said no to unreasonable requests or just things in general that they didn't feel like doing, is stupid because there allowing others to control them. I was like that and i'm just steping out of it. I'm not saying anyone on here is stupid in general, but it's my opinion that passivity is stupidity. I call myself stupid and stuff. My younger sister is so lucky because she was never passive. I wish I could have always controlled my life. But it was never like that I could count so many situations of which I've been taken advantage of by others. Or just sat there silent. Anyway I'm going to be getting councelling for it in 2 days. I'm 24 and sad since I grew up that way, not knowing. Plus I got a book and a folder I put together on assertiveness. But when I think back to the past it hurts. I've been learning though about eye contact and all that body language stuff. When I was waiting at the bus stop a couple days ago, this woman came to wait beside me and asked me how long have I been waiting as the bus was taking a while. I notice that whenever I wasn't looking at her, she's be looking at me but when I looked at her she'd turn away. It's like she didn't want to make eye contact with me. My b/f does that sometimes too and other people. Does this have anything to do with being assertive?