The psyche behind manipulation is complex and deep-rooted. But the crux of it is that individuals who cannot express their needs assertively take this indirect route to get their way. The manipulators could be family or friends, and they might even care for you, but their own limitations cause them to resort to manipulation. Whatever the reason, no one enjoys being manipulated. So how can you shield yourself from it?

Learning to spot a manipulator

“Can I have two minutes of your time?” This is one statement that most of us have fallen prey to at some time or another, because those two minutes are always stretched longer. But this is one of the more moderate tactics employed by manipulators. To avoid falling into a manipulation trap, you need to know how to spot manipulation from a mile away. Here are some commonly used tricks by habitual manipulators.

1. Making you feel guilty

This is the easiest one to succumb to and there are many ways by which a person can induce guilt in the victim. Some things that they may say are, “How can you do this to someone who loves you so dearly?” Or “This is what I get in return for all the love I have showered on you?” Or even “Do as you wish but consider the pain you are causing the other person.” Ironically, this is used commonly in close relationships like those between parents and children, spouses, siblings or relatives. Playing the victim, shedding crocodile tears, appearing sad and morose are also subtle ways of the same game.

2. Making assumptions for you

The manipulator may make statements where he or she assumes your intentions or choices to justify their emotions or actions—“I thought you would like my suggestion” or “I know you will never say no to me.” Here, the person can put you in a spot where if you are not assertive enough, you end up saying yes when you actually want to say no. Sometimes these statements also come in the garb of false flattery—“No one can bake a cake better than you, so please make one for my party,” or “I can trust only you to take care of my pup when I’m gone.” It’s easy to get drawn into the maze of compliments that the manipulator spins; but once the momentary high is over, you are left feeling exploited and taken for granted.

Manipulators depict a different side of themselves to different people, depending on the situation

3. Displaying passive aggressiveness

Here, the person doesn’t want to do what you want them to do or disagrees with what you are saying. However, instead of being vocal about it, they mislead you into doing the action. For instance, you ask your son to pick up the house-supplies but his response is, “But you just told me that I should study and not waste time doing other things.” After you go out and buy the provisions, you return only to find your son playing video games.

4. Faking concern or ignorance

Have you ever told someone to not do something or not bring up a certain topic publicly with you and they do just that? Well, occasionally this might be a genuine memory lapse, but if it happens often enough, it is high time you realise that you are being hoodwinked.

And if you confront these people at a later time, true to their nature they will be evasive in their dealings—“There is no point discussing this now because I hardly remember anything of what I said on that day.” They may also fake empathy for your problem but it is only to use it to manipulate you further. Watch out for statements like, “With everything you have to deal with, you are too confused to think straight. Let me decide for you.”

Another trait of manipulators you might notice is that they depict a different side of themselves to different people, depending on the situation.

people tolerate manipulators because they fear the outcome. But if you want to stop getting exploited, you have to stand up for yourself

Dealing with a manipulator

If the person manipulating you is a colleague or someone who is not close to you, the easiest way out is to avoid talking to them as much as possible, set boundaries or even cut ties.

But being aware of who is manipulating you and how is not enough. If you are not able to take productive action, you will end up feeling even more helpless than before. You have to work on yourself and not allow anyone to take you for granted. By now you know that manipulators thrive on the weaknesses of their victims—they have discovered your weak spots and enjoy pushing your buttons.

If the person manipulating you is a loved one, you may feel guilty for not satisfying their wish. If you doubt a person’s intentions, openly ask exploratory questions and see how genuine their answers appear to you. If you find evasive explanations, accusations or counter arguments, you have to prepare yourself to tackle them effectively without shame or guilt. Many people tolerate manipulators because they fear the outcome. But if you want to stop getting exploited, you have to be prepared to face the consequences of standing up for yourself. It may make you insecure initially, but in the long run it will greatly boost your self-respect.

Once you learn to spot who is manipulating you and how, prepare in advance what you will say to them the next time they try to corner you. You may even need to mentally rehearse arguments to counter their reactions, so do that!

Asserting yourself fearlessly takes work and only you can do that for yourself. You have to learn to say “No” assertively and tactfully. But at times you might have to say it brutally too.

Finally, listen to yourself. When you listen to your gut, spotting and dealing with manipulators will become easy.

The post Warning! You are being manipulated appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.

A few definitions

Guilt: is often the result of blame.
Self-responsibility: is owning up to what I am doing, and creating for myself. Everything, after all is an inside job.
Manipulation: is game designed to get others to change so you don’t have to.

Ben Wong & Jock McKeen, in The NEW Manual for Life, differentiate between guilt and shame. They write that guilt is always about transgressing an externally applied norm. Shame, however, is related to the feeling one gets when one realises he or she has not been “all that they could be” in a situation.

When my dad finally said NO to my mom

A week ago, Darbella and I were out for dinner with a new friend, and the conversation came around somehow to parents and parenting. I told a couple of stories about my mom, who, along with having a ton of great attributes, was an expert at “doing guilt.” Part of her shtick came from a profound sense of entitlement. Until the day she died, she assumed that she was so “important” that what she wanted should take precedence over the life choices of anyone else. “How can they treat me like this?” was her shorthand for, “Don’t they know who I am?” Growing up and watching mom do the “guilt thing” to get her way steeled me against the wiles of the guilt trap. I still remember a call I got from my mom, back when she and dad were in their 70’s. The whole point of the call, mom being in tears throughout, was to let me know that dad had finally said “no” to her. “I can’t believe it! I never thought I’d live so long! He said, ‘no!’” I replied, “Good! I’ve been saying ‘no’ to you since I was 17. Glad he caught on!” Silence. Then, she changed the subject. Now, of course, if the things suggested by “guilt button pushers” didn’t, at some level, make sense, they’d have no effect on us. But the logic isn’t what’s important. This differs from a request, which goes, “Here is my preference. What do you choose?” With a request, the “requester” is OK with hearing “no,” as their self-image isn’t tied up in what someone else decides.

The woman who was a guilt machine

One woman I know is a “guilt machine.” She almost never comes up for air. She has a picture of how her kids and the men in her life “ought to” be. She seems afraid to state her message aloud; it’s always couched in terms of books, studies, and “logic.” But were she to speak her truth, it would sound like: “I am in charge here. I know who you are, and how you should behave. Your opinion doesn’t matter. If you love me, you will always defer to me and my wishes.” Fortunately, most of the people in her life are learning to deal with her as I learned to deal with my mom: love her, understand her games, laugh, and gently and repeatedly say, “That you want me to be a certain way is interesting. I choose to be the way that works for me. Whether you choose to hurt yourself over that or not is your choice.”

The problem with guilt and blame

My dad was good at dealing with reality — good at dealing with what was right in front of him — good at disengaging from guilt or blame.

But that doesn’t mean he didn’t have life and death challenges

Back in the late 70’s, he was working at Radio Shack, and the store got robbed. Dad would have been in his 60’s at the time. The robbers tied him up with speaker wire, threw him to the floor, and stole his wallet and engagement ring. Then they sat on his back and clicked a gun next to his ear, and threatened to kill him. They left after 15 minutes, and a customer found dad trussed up several minutes later. Initially, dad was really pissed off at every person of the racial group of the people who had robbed him. He railed against “them,” and started using racial epithets. I listened and encouraged him to dump. After 3 months he bought me a cup of coffee and said, (actually, this is the Wayne-speak version of what he said…) “Wow. That was weird. I almost became a racist over the actions of two guys. I could have spent the rest of my life blaming and hating. Close call, eh?”

We are all guilty of pushing guilt buttons

Interestingly, many moons later, that dad attempted to push my “guilt button.” After my mom died in 2000, [as mom returns, in another story] we sent her body off, as per her Living Will, to the University of Toronto Medical School. The doctors-in-training might work on a body for as long as three years. Dad chose not to hear that information. 18 months later, they finished up, cremated her remains, and left me a message that “the family” either needed to pick up the ashes, or tell them to bury them. I told dad, and he just nodded. I told him again. More nodding. A few months passed, and dad began to ask about her ashes. I repeated what I’d told him: her ashes were at a cemetery in Toronto, and had been for some time, awaiting instructions. From him. Dad [who didn’t want to decide] said, “This is your mother. What are you going to do about her ashes? A good son would care about his mother and fix this.” I replied, “It’s not my mother. It’s her ashes. And the decision about the disposal is yours.”

Guilt, interestingly, is always linked to someone not wanting to take responsibility

He tried to pass the buck a couple more times, always using the “A good son, or a good daughter-in-law, would…” We resisted being “guilted” into deciding, and kept inviting him to choose another way. Finally, after a month or so, he got real, and said, “I just can’t decide, and I would like it if you would decide for me.” We agreed, and picked up the ashes. I suggested a place that she loved where the ashes could be scattered. He smiled. “She’d like that. She loved that place.” For me, the difference is in the sentiment. Dad initially tried to play on my emotions. “She’s your mother, and you’re being disrespectful,” was the ploy. The message was that there is a certain way I was to act, based upon some invented societal norm. My message, in return, was to notice, aloud, that dad was trying to use guilt to pass the buck, thus avoiding a difficult decision he didn’t want to make. It took a month, but then dad asked me to deal with it, as opposed to trying to manipulate me into taking over by pushing the “guilt button.”

I long ago learned that giving in to guilt, no matter how it is couched, creates the expectation that you’re going to give in to guilt the next time. Better to be clear and firm, and invite others into self-responsibility.

Unfortunately, emotional blackmail is rampant in our society

Saying, “I’m emotionally upset and having difficulty deciding. Please offer your opinion,” is different from, “If you were a decent person, you’d stop being a jerk and bail me out.” The first is a self-responsible asking for help. The second is trying to manipulate through guilt.

Here’s a last, short example. I saw a couple some years back. I asked them why they had come in. Silence. I asked again. The woman sighed, and said, “I got caught cheating on my husband.” For the rest of the session, she sat in silence. When pressed, she’d reply, “I don’t know why I did it. Everything was wonderful. He needs to move on, and not be angry.” She was stonewalling. She was deeply in manipulation mode, and didn’t want to deal with her choices. Her message was, “Can’t you see how bad I feel? Now drop it, and move on, and let’s get this thing back to the way it was. And if you really love me, you’ll assure me that you trust me.” Rather than be self-responsible and deal with her actions, she focussed on her husband. This was because she indeed felt guilty… over being caught, and wanted to change the subject.

Guilt is an interesting thing. It’s always linked to someone not wanting to take responsibility – to someone trying to use emotions to get someone else to fix their messes. Think about your experiences with guilt. Do you use guilt and manipulation to get your way? Are you victimizing yourself when others use guilt with you? The way out is simple.

Self-responsibility, once again.

As always.

The post Sorry! My guilt button has been disconnected appeared first on Complete Wellbeing.