Heads up, yall. I don’t think it’s possible to stress enough how important it is to correctly perceive the nature of covert fighting if you’re going to avoid being victimized by a manipulator. And I think this best illustrated through example. Let’s just say you’ve confronted someone about not being truthful with you and therefore damaging yet again any sense of trust you’d like to have in your relationship with them. When they respond with something like: ”What am I supposed to do when you’re always exploding whenever I level with you (using the tactic of externalizing and shifting the blame)?,” and “It was just one little thing and I misspoke, okay, it’s no big deal (using the tactic of minimization)!,” and “You always make me out some kind of monster (exaggerating) when you’re no one to talk (subtly adding some ‘guilting’ and ‘shaming’),” and you perceive this behavior as defending themselves as opposed to merely fighting for position, you’re bound to lose. When the character-impaired person engages in these behaviors, they’re primarily doing 3 things simultaneously: 1. Fighting you (trying to back you into a corner and get you to back-off or back-down) for a position of advantage in your relationship. 2. Fighting to maintain an undeserved positive image. 3. Fighting against internalizing the principle they know you’d like them to accept (i.e. that trust in relationships is based on the willingness to be honest with your partner). And it’s this last reality that tells you unequivocally that the behavior you find troubling will definitely occur again. A person simply can’t fight against a principle and internalize it at the same time. It’s just not possible. Accepting the principle and making a commitment to improve would sound something like: ”You’re right, I shouldn’t have lied to you. I need to do better on that score. And I’ll prove myself worthy of your trust by doing things differently in the future.”
Posted on: Wed, 03 Sep 2014 09:43:58 +0000
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