On being non-confrontational.

I'm a total wimp. Its hard for me to stand up for myself, and I tend, sometimes naively, to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. This however has led to me getting increasingly annoyed with people that I genuinely like. The problem with being so non-confrontational is that things tend to pile up. So my roommate forgot to do his dishes, fine, i'll pick up the slack. Oh? he didn't do them again, he's just forgetful, i'll just do them. But after a while it becomes increasingly hard to deal with this behaviour. Things build up, emotions build up, and then you end up being angry with someone when it really isn't there fault. I didn't have to do his dishes, I don't have to clean up after people, but I do, and I never say a word. I'll let loose a passive aggressive quip every now and again, but rarely will I confront the situation head on. My goal now is to be just a little more confrontational, sure people do deserve the benefit of the doubt sometimes, but other times they just need to be told of their transgressions and be made aware. I have no doubt in my mind that a little confrontation is healthy. There needs to be a dialogue between people, and unfortunately, you can't have a dialogue if you don't open up your mouth. But herein lies my problem, every time I try and say these things the words don't come out, instead there are incoherent sounds, and then a quick change of subject to something less, well, confrontational. I know I should just grow a pair and speak up on my behalf especially when I feel justified in my views. I suppose no one likes confrontation, but its a necessary aspect of the human experience and I need to work on it. But for the time being it seems i'll still have to change my roommate's cat's litter, and clean up his messes, maybe I should just link him to this blog post, but that won't help me with my problem with confrontation. I should also point out that I love my roommate and thats why I put up with these things. I'm also sure that he would be total receptive if I confronted him on any of these issues, so the problem remains mine. I just find when it comes to confrontation I have this fear that people will resent me for my views, I just don't want to step on any toes. The only problem with that is that in life, some peoples toes need to be stepped on if you want to move forward. And with that another post about 20-something-white-kid-problems comes to an end. Thanks for listening.