2. Control and Counter control
When you participate in a manipulative relationship, you unwittingly collude with the person who seeks to control you. Every time you comply, capitulate, cave in, or otherwise satisfy your manipulator’s wishes and purposes, you reinforce the toxic cycle that is compromising your self-esteem, co-opting your values, and corroding your emotional wiring.Being manipulated is a highly stressful experience.
It is unpleasant, demeaning, and disturbing. And it is harmful to your physical health, too—literally.I wrote this to make you and other victims of manipulation aware of your counter control. And I intend to empower you to use that counter control. I realize that your participation in the manipulation probably has made you feel quite powerless.
This is what the manipulator wants you to believe. However, the truth is that you hold the key to either making the manipulator successful or foiling his or her efforts.Manipulation is used because
it works. As long as you allow a manipulator to exploit and control you, he or she will continue to manipulate. However, if you make the manipulation ineffective by
changing your behavior, the manipulator will be forced to change tactics or to seek an easier target elsewhere.
You are not likely to change a manipulator by pointing out that her tactics are unfair or that you feel unhappy with the way the relationship is going. To put it bluntly, manipulators do not care about your feelings. They are out to serve one purpose: to advance their own interests and goals, frequently at your expense.
If you benefit from a manipulative relationship, it is merely accidental.You can, however, exercise counter control to change the power balance of the relationship.
When you stop rewarding manipulative tactics by ceasing to cooperate, comply, please,acquiesce, apologize, or respond to intimidation or threats, you will
unilaterally alter the nature of the manipulative relationship.
Then you can stop or at least begin to reverse the emotional havoc that the relationship has wreaked.
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