Object to the act, not the motive

Sometimes the slip needs more than a question. It needs an objection. The interruptions have to stop. The forgotten date hurt and you want it not to happen again. The email tone is getting to you and you'd like it changed. The habit's version of this is to object to the motive. "You don't take me seriously in meetings." "You never think about anyone but yourself." "You treat me like an assistant." Each of those is a charge stated as a fact, and each will be denied, because from the inside none of them is true, and now you're arguing about their character instead of the thing that happened.

Object to the act instead. The act is checkable, the motive isn't. "I've been talked over three times this week and I'd like to finish my points." "My birthday matters to me and I'd like you to put it in your phone." "Could you add a line at the top of the figures emails, they read quite sharp." There's no verdict in any of those. There's nothing to deny. The person can only say yes, or ask what you mean, or explain, and all three move things on.

This is also where the fear from chapter 11 gets answered in practice. You're not being a doormat. You're making a specific request about a specific act, out loud, on the day. That's more assertive than a month of silent verdicts, not less. And it works better, because a request about an act can be met, while a verdict about a motive can only be resented.

Keep the innocent cause in the sentence if you can. "I don't think you mean to, but I keep getting cut off, and I'd like to finish." It isn't weakness. It's accuracy, because you don't know they mean to, and saying so makes the request easy to accept. People will change an act they didn't know they were doing far more readily than they'll accept a motive they know they don't have. Give them the act. Keep the motive to yourself, where it belongs, filed under guesses.