By Harold H. Dawley Jr., Ph. D., Clinical Psychologist

My parents divorced early in my childhood, and, for the remainder of it, I lived with a number of different relatives and friends. I also spent some time with one parent or the other. I was fortunate in that I felt my parents did love me, along with having the emotional backing of a loving older sister plus an Aunt and Uncle who loved me as well. But the constant moving from one home to another was not good for me.

Whenever I lived with my father, my step-mother’s two sons were also in the home, and, when I lived with my Aunt and Uncle, my two male cousins were present. Whenever I got into a fight with my two step brothers, my step mother took their side. If the fights were frequent or severe enough, I would have to move elsewhere.

It was the same with my loving aunt and uncle. On several key occasions when I got into a fight with one or the other cousin, I would have to move. A pattern developed in that whenever I fought, I usually had to move. It didn’t take me long to become conditioned not to fight. Add severe acne, and I soon became a shy, introverted, and non-assertive individual.

I barely got out of high school, graduating 300 in a class of 320. Since I did not socialize and kept to myself, the school yearbook described me as “Quiet as church mouse but an outstanding member of the band.” They were correct in that I was terribly quiet and inhibited back then, but I was never a member of the band.

I joined the Marines as soon as I graduated from high school. After boot camp and advanced infantry training, I was stationed at a guard company on an island in the South Pacific. It was here that I realized something was wrong.

The tropical heat and humidity made my acne worse. Soon I was being called “the face.” Even though the name hurt me, I couldn’t say anything. I had difficult speaking up and standing up for my rights no matter how much I hated being teased about my acne. I also couldn’t say no to any request and frequently felt that I was being exploited. I thought it was just me, something was inherently wrong with me.

After my overseas tour, I returned to the states. With only two months to go before my discharge, I was placed on permanent mess duty. Again, I didn’t say anything, even though a friend in the same situation spoke up and got a different assignment. On mess duty most of my co-workers were new recruits. I was senior man at the chow hall.

I remember one day I told a new Marine to do something and he told me to “shove it." I’ll never forget the shame and humiliation as I stood there immobilized with anger and fear as I tried to figure out what to do next. Wild thoughts raced through my mind. ”I’ll curse out that SOB, I’ll put him in his place.” But I did nothing. The fear of taking any action to defend myself was too great. Finally, turning red, I walked away. I winced as I heard the new recruit laugh.

I started agonizing. ”I’m a coward, a no good coward . . . And now everybody knows I’m a coward.” For days, I kept to myself as much as I could as a dark cloud of depression spread over me.

I kept thinking about finding the new recruit and righting this terrible wrong. The more my frustration and agony grew, the more extreme my fantasies became. ”I’ll walk right up to him and knock him out.” I then went to the other extreme. ”No, I’ll be nice and tell him , ‘Let's try to get along." No matter what thought I had, it was followed by overwhelming fear -- fear so intense that the only step I could take was to avoid any action.

Finally, my anxiety, depression and despair became so great, I thought about deserting. With 60 days left on a three year tour of duty, deserting didn’t make much sense. But I didn’t know what else to do. I was at a complete loss as to how to handle situations where I needed to stand up for myself. I finally met with the base Chaplin and felt some relief at talking about my problems. Still I finished my last 60 days in the Marines in misery.

Because I fled from situations that called for me to stand up for my rights, this avoidance behavior was rewarding to me in that it reduced the fear and anxiety I always experienced at such times. The only problem was that running from situations calling for an assertive response made it harder and harder for me to assert myself on even minor issues. I became more uptight and inhibited, avoiding all situations that might call for me to stand up for myself. Soon I had difficulty looking people in the eye. I didn’t feel good about myself.

My avoidance of any confrontational situation increased, and my life became more and more restricted. By this time I was in college working towards my bachelor’s degree. I again turned to someone for help and saw a psychologist at the university counseling center. As I explained my difficulty in standing up for my rights, the counselor asked me about my childhood. What I wanted was someone to teach me how to stand up for myself. I wanted some direct “how to” advice so I could handle these debilitating situations smoothly. I stopped counseling after only a few sessions and got used to my up-tight, restricted way of living. I stayed in the background always taking the rear seat and never saying anything in class. I became a dull, bland person who never expressed an opinion.

While I was an undergraduate student, "Behavior Therapy" was just beginning. This learning-based therapy focused on the present and dealt with teaching people the skills they lacked. One day I heard about a book written by a psychologist by the name of Andrew Salter. With only a bachelor’s degree, Salter was nonetheless a licensed psychologist and well respected. He had written what many were calling the first and best book on how to be “assertive.” Curious, I obtained a copy of Salter’s Conditioned Reflex Therapy and casually glanced through it. Little did I know that my life would change so dramatically as a result of what I was to read.

Salter’s major contribution to the world of ideas is his description of the "Excitatory" and "Inhibitory Personalities," what were to be later called "Assertive" and "Non-Assertive Personalities.”

It was a cold Winter’s day in late 1967. I had finished my classes for the day and returned to the trailer I shared with another student about four miles from Southern Illinois University. Kicking off my shoes, I lay down on the sofa and started reading about the Inhibitory and Excitatory Personalities. My journey to self discovery had begun.

According to Salter, the “Inhibitory Personality finds it difficult to get up in the morning because facing the world calls for excitation (assertion). Because of the inhibition, the inhibitory personality constantly goes around with unfinished business.” Salter explains that in the past, such self-limiting inhibition had survival value for such a person, and that any opposite excitatory behavior was punished.

Salter's book goes on: “The inhibitory are like flypaper. A harsh glance, an overlooked letter, an imagined slight, stick in their minds, and the more they try to shake them off, the more firmly stuck they become.”

Wow, he’s talking about me!

My excitement grew as I read on. Salter explains that “the inhibitory fear they are taking up too much space, and breathing too much air.” He adds: “The inhibitory have developed the brake habit. They have collided with too many automobiles on the highway of life, and have learned to drive with the brakes on.” What Salter says made sense and was exactly describing my problem.

Everything Salter says, fit me perfectly. I finished Salter’s book at 3 a.m.. Buoyed with renewed self confidence, I now knew what to do. I knew how to change from being an Inhibitory Personality to an Excitatory Personality.

Waking up refreshed the next morning, I slowly began practicing what Salter recommends. I practiced “Feeling Talk” by expressing more of my true feelings as I strived for “emotional honesty.” I started to stand up for myself, gradually at first, following Salter’s advice to “contradict and attack” when people tried to put me down or exploit me.

I started using the personal pronoun “I” and began accepting compliments. I believed in what Salter recommends. Slowly but surely, I began to change.

Instead of always hiding in back, I sat in the middle of classrooms and occasionally started asking questions and making comments. I began to become active in student organizations. I joined the Sociology Club and then the Psychology Club. I became Activities Chairman for the Sociology Club and then its President. My grade point average increased, as did my social life. While I still had more than my fair share of hang ups, my life was getting better.

After college graduation, I was on to graduate school. All along I practiced becoming more assertive. I must admit that my efforts at being assertive were not always successful. It did, however, work most of the time, and it sure beat non-assertiveness.

After receiving my Ph.D., I started working at the New Orleans VA hospital. There I started teaching other non-assertive veterans how to be assertive. Four years later my former professor and I wrote Achieving Assertive Behavior: A Guide To Assertiveness. Being fairly assertive by this time, I picked up the phone and called Andrew Salter himself, asking him if he would consider writing the forward to our book. Sure enough, my hero did write a nice forward.

Several successful decades for me later, I called Andrew back to see if I could now re-publish his book since it was out of print. I was saddened to hear that Andrew had died several years earlier. His wife and children, however, agreed. I now have the pleasure and honor of publishing his self-help book and giving a personal testimonial on its effectiveness. It works. I’m living proof.

How Self-Help Books Can Help Your Sex Life

By Linda Levine, LCSW, Psychotherapist

There is a great need for self-help books, particularly in the area of sexuality. Even though there is much more information about sexuality available from books, videos, TV, and the Internet, there's still very little explicit verbal sharing between and/or among adults and their peers. And, there is rarely inter-generational sharing about sexuality between adult children and their parents. Consequently, many people wonder if what they like or don't like is normal, whether they're adequate or skilled in bed. Even if they have more sexual information than their parents did, there are often gaps in their understanding of sexuality that make it hard for them to feel confident in the bedroom and they are too fearful or ashamed to compare notes with their friends. Books like Shared Intimacies and The Intimate Male which are comprised of actual interviews with people who feel good about their intimate lives and are willing to share, in explicit language, their thoughts, feelings and solutions to problems can help fill those gaps.

Ways to used Shared Intimacies and The Intimate Male:

1) Some people buy two copies of each book and underline in magic marker the passages that have special meaning to them. And, then, they exchange books with their partner who gets to see what sections have had special meaning for them. This is a way of jumpstarting a couple's ability to talk to each other about sexuality.

2) Give the books as gifts to people who are going through different phases of the life cycle where their sexuality is affected, for example: a friend who is pregnant and might be interested in the range of sexual experiences of other pregnant women.

3) Try out solutions to specific problems that are suggested in the books.

---

Linda Levine, LCSW (Licensed Clinical Social Worker), is a psychotherapist in private practice in Washington, DC, who has over 30 years of experience working in the field of sexuality. She has a master's degree in Clinical Social Work from Catholic University and is certified by the American Academy of Certified Sex Therapists and Educators. For the past 25 years she has run short-term workshops for women on sexuality and has co-authored Shared Intimacies: Women's Sexual Experiences and The Intimate Male: Candid Discussions about Women, Sex and Relationships with Lonnie Barbach, Ph.D. She is also a certified EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing, a way to help people redo negative childhood traumas as well as life-threatening traumas) therapist who has lectured at international conferences on the integration of EMDR and ongoing psychotherapy in the area of intimacy. For the last six years, Linda Levine has been exploring a wider range of EMDR usage, such as peak performance issues in the workplace and the arts, as well as changes in people's internal intimacy scripts.