← The Overwhelmed Brain
The Overwhelmed Brain
The games our loved ones play
00:38:22
"Go ahead, have a great time! Wait, are you leaving without me? What about my needs? No, I mean go ahead and have fun. I'll be good! Hey, don't feel bad about leaving me alone, I'll be fine. Oh, you don't feel bad? Why are you leaving me alone? How...
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These are my personal opinions. Always seek a professional when you're making choices about your mental health and well being. I like this question. I got a question in the Facebook group. If you're not on the Facebook group, head over there, the Overwhelmed Brain Empowerment group. It would be great to see you there. And when the questions aren't answered in the group by other members, I like to go on the air and answer them here because sometimes the questions are difficult and so I like to address the difficult ones when I see them and not everyone knows the direction to take and I'm just going to give you my feedback on this and maybe you have some other feedback that you can share in the group if you're in there. But here's the question and I'll give you my take Person wrote I wanted to go a local performer Saturday night. My husband didn't want to go so far, so I called my friend. Now he said he thought it was a little strange and far for me to see a person I haven't seen in years talking about the performer. And I told him I can just buy T shirts and merch and stuff and just not go. But he says stuff like this often and it's typically after I've already committed to going or want to go bad enough that I go without him. So maybe I'm just supposed to not go anywhere if he doesn't have an interest in going. Like I'm strange for even wanting to go. Some intended sarcasm there. I told him I can just cancel. And he said that I already asked my friend, so maybe I should just go. I feel like I'm selfish in my marriage for wanting to do stuff. I asked him first if he wanted to go with me and he didn't want to. I wanted to go badly, but now I feel stupid and I just want to cancel. I'm also sad that I feel this way and I feel like if I go that I'll be worried about what he is thinking all night. We continue to have the same type of issues for years in our marriage and neither one of us really change. Yeah, that sounds like a challenge. Thanks for sharing that. In the group, somebody did respond and they had a good response, actually. They said this is a control tactic to make sure that you don't go. And they're probably 100% right. This is a control tactic. In fact, that is my response too. He is controlling you. And this is my opinion. But I see this in people who are insecure in themselves and often have a fear of abandonment or a fear of rejection, or they're jealous or possessive when they have some sort of insecurity in themselves. They will set you up in a way to make you make a decision that they want you to make but make you think you made it. So what it sounds like he's done or he does is he sets you up to be the bad guy so that he will not be responsible for you going or not going. He doesn't want to be responsible for you not going, even though his intention is to make you stay. So he sets you up to be the bad guy. And all that means is if you say, well, fine, I won't go, he can just put his hands up and say, hey, well, that's your decision. That's not my decision. That's your decision. I was just saying it seems pretty far for you to travel to see someone that you haven't seen in many, many years. Again, talking about the performer. And so that's your choice, yet that's planting a seed. The seed is planted so that there is some guilt in making a choice for yourself. So this person now has this seed planted by their partner, by their husband, and they are in a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. And no matter what you decide, you will be the bad guy. How do you deal with something like this? This is again my opinion, but this sounds like a setup. And you are set up to fail so that he gets his way and you are made to give in to his insecurity and you're made to do what he wants to do, ultimately, because I guarantee you, if you were doing something that he wanted you to do, there would be no seeds planted. And you would not be made to feel sad or upset or guilty or whatever you feel. So I want you to consider anything you do in the future, any decision that you make in the future, that if he doesn't want you to do it, whether it's because of his insecurity or he's trying to manipulate you, which doesn't seem like he's doing it consciously, he might be doing it unconsciously. Because this sounds like something that is very well built into him, like it's been there for a long time. Doesn't mean it's not conscious. But I've seen this often where someone will do behaviors that are very unconscious, meaning they don't realize they're doing them, but it leads to the outcome that they want to have. So whether he's conscious or not, there is a way to deal with this, or at least prepare for it when it happens, which is my suggestion to you. My suggestion to you is to prepare for this by asking yourself, will this be a problem for him? So you ask yourself, will this be a problem for him? And then you can ask, how will this be a problem for him? And what will he do? Because it's a problem for him. That's your preparation. That's how you prime yourself to deal with this setup. Because you don't want this setup. You don't want this to backfire on you, which it sounds like. Things like this and other challenges that go on in your relationship seem to do. They seem to backfire on you often, making you the bad guy. Like you said, this happens often in your relationship, and it's been going on for years, and it's not changing. So you've heard me say this before. Probably. If you've been listening a while. If nothing's changing, one person has to change in order for change to exist to take place. And if they're not changing, that means you have to change. And in order to make that change, you have to do something different. Up till now, you've probably been doing the status quo, which means he expects you to respond in a certain way. He expects you to make decisions in a certain way. He expects you to act or react in a certain way to his conscious or unconscious manipulations. So if he is doing something to get his way, and you are responding in a way that fulfills his desire, his outcome, the outcome he wants Then he will continue to do that until he changes or you change. So in order to see change, one of you has to change. And if the other person isn't going to change, you have to do it. What does change look like for you? For this to change, you have to change either your response or the setup. Meaning he set you up to fail, so why not turn it back on him? Not to set him up to fail, but to put the onus of responsibility for what happens next on him. And what I mean by that is that you are going to prepare for the next thing because you asked those questions. Is this going to be a problem for him and how is it going to be a problem and what will he do? You prepare by visualizing and thinking ahead about what he's going to say and what he's going to do so that you can nip those in the bud and handle those objections. That's how I look at it. It's like a salesperson's technique. You handle objections before they occur. 4 example. This is the part you want to hear. For example, Hey, I want to go to this thing. Do you want to go with me? He says, ah, that doesn't. Not really. I don't really want to go to that. Just like this event that you're talking about here. No, I don't really want to go with that. Okay, I'll call my friend. But before I do, here's the priming part. The preparation, the turning it back on him before I do. Are you going to change your mind later and want to come? Because if that's the case, I don't want to call her and change my plans again. So let me ask you, are you sure 100% that you don't want to go? And he should say, well, yeah, you know, whatever he's going to say. But what you're looking for is a definitive response. If he says, oh, I don't know if I'm going to change my mind, then I would say, then I'm not going to plan it until you know for sure. This is something that I would do. Because if I was dealing with this, I want to hear his definitive response, his absolute yes or no. No, I won't change my mind later. Great. Let's just say he says that. You can say, great, then I'll call my friend. No big deal. You have a good time at home knowing that. And this is. You might have to repeat it knowing that you're set and you are sure, then I don't have to worry about it later because sometimes we get into miscommunication. You know, you can bring this up. Sometimes we'll have a misunderstanding and you will change your mind later. And I don't want that misunderstanding to take place. And then you can use the reason is that your friend is now involved. Now that I'm going to call my friend, I don't want that misunderstanding because I'm going with my friend and I don't want to change my plans on my friend. And now what you want to look for after you say that is after the absolute yes or no. After you say, okay, then great. Now that I know you're not going to change plans and this is what you want, I'm going to call my friend and we're going to arrange to go together. Now that you've said that you want to look for congruence. Congruence is when their body language and their voice inflection and the words that they use match and are in alignment with the direction that they said they were going. For example, there's a difference between saying, no, I don't want to go. You guys have fun. That's pretty darn congruent. That's somebody being in total alignment, at least at the outset. That's what it appears. It sounds like if he said that, no, I'm totally okay, you guys go, I'm not going to change my mind because I have something else planned and I'm looking forward to it. Great. Total alignment. Everything sounds good, everything feels good. The body language is there, the voice inflections there, as opposed to, no, I don't think I'll change my mind. No, you guys go, it'll be okay. I'll find something to do that. There's some doubt in there. You can hear it. You can hear the doubt. No, no, I'll be fine. I'll figure it out. There's some incongruence in there. And you have to be conscientious of this. You have to look for it and listen for it. Look at the body language, listen to the inflection, and sense the alignment or misalignment. You can do this easily if you are paying attention. But if you're caught up in your own stuff, like, oh, geez, I'm worried what he'll say, and I just want to get through this moment. Then you'll be in your own head instead of outside of your head. Being observant, you need to be. I mean, you're still inside your head, but you're being observant of the outside world. So when he is in alignment or not, you can catch it. You can say, you don't sound 100% sure. So if you're not 100% sure, then I'm not going to make that plan. Then he goes, no, no, no, no. Go ahead and make the plan. It'll be fine. I'll be okay. And then you can say, okay, so you're 100% sure you're going to be okay. Because again, we've had misunderstandings in the past, and I don't want to be the bad guy, and I don't want to make bad guy. I just want to be clear. I just want to be clear before I do anything. So this is how you set someone up, so that they take responsibility for their decision, for their commitment, instead of you just taking it on and hoping that it doesn't happen again. Because that's what it almost sounds like you're saying. And I got. I have very little to go on here, of course, but it almost sounds like you're saying this happens all the time, which tells me you're not setting yourself up for success and setting up the outcome for success, because the outcome has gone badly before. What I suspect is that he does not like to take responsibility for what happens and likes to make you take responsibility for what happens, even though it might be what he planned on doing. He maybe planned on you staying home because he has some sort of insecurity. And that's just a guess on my part, but that's what I'm going to assume, because in a healthy relationship, if my wife, for example, I think we have a very good healthy relationship and we argue, too. That's part of a healthy relationship, in my opinion. But if she said, hey, there's a plant sale coming up, I want to go to it, do you want to go with me? I would say no. I might say yes. If, you know, I might ask her, do you want me to go with you? And she'll say, of course, I would love to have you there, but you don't have to. And then I'd say, great, I don't want to go. Because I think I said this last week. I'm not the plant guy. I'm not fond of looking at plants. I love plants, but I'm not fond of looking at them, shopping for them and all that. But she loves it, and I support that. And what I would say is, I don't want to go. Why don't you call your friend? And then she would say, great, I will. And later on, I'm not going to say, oh well, you know, gee, I would like to go. You know, I'm not going to make her feel bad. I mean, in our relationship it would be a normal thing for me to say, I've changed my mind, I would like to go. But it's not necessarily meant to make her feel bad or change her plans because if she was planning on going with her friend and they only had two seats in their car, I would say, I'll meet you there. But that comes from a healthy place. There's no insecurity. And I'm not really thinking about how I can turn that around to make her feel bad. My goal is to make sure she feels good doing what she wants to do. That should be the goal of anyone in a romantic relationship or a friendship or family. You'd want the other person to feel good. And when they don't feel good, you don't want them to stay in that bad feeling. You want to help them. You want to lift them up if you can. If they want want you to. If they don't want you to, then you leave them alone. But if they would appreciate that and welcome it, that's what you do. You know, lately I've got this pinched nerve that I've been dealing with and I think today's sponsor, OSHO Mag, is actually helping to balance the scales for me. 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Visit ashwamag.com that's a S-W-A M a G.com and use the code BRAIN at checkout for 20% off your first order plus free shipping. Try Oshwa Mag risk free with this exclusive listener offer. So I see a relationship challenge like this one this person described, and the first thing I think of is he's setting you up to fail to be the bad guy so that you take responsibility for doing exactly what he wants you to do. But you should also feel bad about it so that you think that you made that decision on your own and that you made the decision not to go, so that if there's an argument later about it, he can say, I didn't tell you not to go. I didn't say you couldn't go. I just mentioned this thing. And you're the one who made that decision. But he planted the seed. And those seeds are planted intentionally, typically. I mean, again, I have a small slice of your life from this post, but I've seen this way too often. And you said it happens over and over again in your relationship. And we can plant these seeds in other people. I know this because I used to do this. I don't do it anymore because I found out it was very toxic and it was very unhealthy. And people will end up distancing themselves from you when you do this. Just like this person who wrote that post probably feels like they are distancing from their husband. And so, I mean, emotionally speaking, because that'll happen. The more you feel bad because of an interaction with the person that you're supposed to feel good with, the more you will emotionally distance yourself from them and the more you will eventually hide stuff from them. I imagine there's probably some white lies in this relationship or bigger ones. That's a total guess. I might be wrong about that. But I can't imagine a relationship like this going forward normally with healthy, honest communication, when every time you do that, you end up leaving the conversation feeling bad. You end up leaving many conversations feeling bad and responsible and guilty. So there's a manipulation going on here, like this other person who wrote. And the goal is to eliminate the manipulation by setting up the outcome as a win win. And here's the thing. The person who manipulates the person who's planting the seed doesn't want to be on the responsible side. They want you to feel like you are responsible for what happened, but they set you up to make you feel that way. And so what we need to do is handle those future manipulations or handle those objections. The manipulations are the objections I'm talking about. Just like the salesperson will handle objections by saying, I notice you're looking at this car over here, but you're probably worried about the gas mileage that's handling an objection before it comes. That's why it's important to know what's going to happen in the future. And don't get caught up in your own stuff so. So that you can handle it while you're still thinking straight. Because what happens is we stop thinking straight when we get involved in our own worries and concerns and fears. And if we're in that space, we're in that emotional space. It's something I learned in NLP a long time ago called downtime. It's like we're down in our own stuff as opposed to uptime as being out of our own stuff stuff, and up on top of that stuff so that we're not affected by it. If that stuff is below us, where we're observant of the outside world, then we can make decisions easier. They're not always easier, but at least we're not in our own stuff when we make those decisions. So it helps to be in what I like to use called uptime so that we can set up the outcome as a win win. Now, what does a win win look like? Someone who takes responsibility for their own decisions is a win. He may not think so in this case. He may think, well, I don't want to take responsibility for my own decision. I want to make that person, my spouse, responsible for my decision. So this is what I'm going to do instead of. But the person who wrote that post doesn't want to be in that position. And in order to get out of that position, you want to set you both up to win. And what that looks like is you ask those questions again so that you can prepare for what's going to happen. And then you address the objections or the parentheses manipulations by essentially bringing up what can and will happen so that he can address those events, those future events, before they happen. And you can say, you know, we've had misunderstandings in the past and I don't want that to happen again. So this is why I'm addressing it. And you can do it with love. I just don't want us to argue and get into that. I really want us to just make this perfectly clear for both of us so there's no misunderstanding. And then you address what you believe will happen that way. It's on the table that way. If he does bring it up later, if he does bring it up as part of that seed he wants to plant or part of that manipulation to make you feel bad, then he will feel self conscious bringing it up. And that's the goal. You want someone to take responsibility for their decisions and what they've said, and take responsibility for their behaviors, their actions, and also feel self conscious if they suddenly switch gears and change their mind. Because someone who feels self conscious about something is a winner. They are. If they feel self conscious about bringing something up that you've already brought up as a point of contention or a point of misunderstanding, that usually happens. Then them bringing it up forces them to take responsibility for it. And that could look like somebody saying, you know, I really do want to go, but now that your friend is going, I don't want to be a third wheel. So there's that little seed of guilt again. But at least at this point, you've already had a conversation about it. They know it, they've agreed to the terms technically, and now they are changing their mind, which of course is allowed, but they have no choice but to take responsibility. It's a forced taking responsibility for them, meaning they know what the conditions are prior to changing their mind. They're allowed to change their mind, of course, but prior to changing their mind, they know that by saying something now that is different than the original agreed upon conditions that what is happening is on them and not on you. And it doesn't make it wrong, it doesn't make it bad. It just means they are now forced to take responsibility for changing their mind as opposed to looking at you and making you feel bad for them. Now saying something like, oh, I thought you were going to have another place for me to it because you had already addressed it ahead of time. This is why handling objections, handling future manipulations, future deceptions, future lies in any or all of the above categories, meaning controlling or coercive behaviors. When you're able to visualize what's going to happen and you can address what you believe will happen, then in order for them to slip something under the radar and make you feel bad, they have to get past the protective barriers, technically the safeguards against the control and manipulative behaviors. Not that you're telling them that's what these are. But in order for them to now try to make you feel bad, they have to get past those barriers, which puts the onus of responsibility back on them. So now they're not necessarily the bad guy, they're just taking responsibility. That's the whole point. Because manipulative, controlling, coercive people do not want to take Responsibility. They want the spotlight to be on you. They want you to take responsibility for whatever they want to happen. And some of them want you to feel bad when they don't get what they want. And they want you to think that you are not giving them what they want. And they want you to feel bad for that so that you are more likely to give them what they want, so that you are more likely to give in. It's like a power maneuver. They want power over you. And if you lose your power, then they can continue to control you in the way that works for them. And as long as you feel like you'll be powerless with them, then they'll always get what they want. And if they always get what they want, you'll always be unhappy. If you're always unhappy, what's the point? What are you doing there if you're always unhappy? This is an opportunity to turn things around. And maybe by you changing your response, your predicting what will happen and addressing those objections or manipulations or deceptions or controlling behaviors ahead of time, that maybe, just maybe, they won't do the behaviors. That's the goal, that's the eventual goal, is that it would be great if they just stopped doing those behaviors. Yes, I agree. But if they won't because they don't want to change, then preparing for what's going to happen and bringing up what usually happens, or at least what you believe they'll do or they'll say, that can give you a chance to get through this a bit unscathed. What sometimes happens, unfortunately, is that they find other ways to make you feel bad so that they can keep their power over you. When that happens, I want you to take that as more data from which you can work, meaning you know that XYZ will happen. But now this new thing happened. Now you can add that to your preparation repertoire and prepare for what happens next. Now, there is another way to handle this. The other way to handle this is something that I would probably do in my relationship. In fact, I've done this. Not that I'm dealing with any manipulative behaviors from my wife, but sometimes there will be a conversation and let's just say, let's just put myself in this example. Hey, honey, I'm going to go to this thing. You want to go? She says, not really. Why don't you. Whatever, just do it yourself. Or I'll say, okay, I'm going to call my friend and we're going to go together. And she said, okay, that's great. And then later on she says, oh, really, you're going? Why are you going so far? I mean, really, you're going to go? Why even go at all? You know, she says something to start making me think about it, like feel bad about going. Even though I've made plans with my friend. I would probably, this is me. I would probably say you said you didn't want to go and so I made plans based on that. So if you're changing your mind now, I want to let you know that I've already made a promise to my friend here. I would love for you to go, but I already made a promise to my friend, so I'm going to go. And then she might say, yeah, I really do want to go, or no, you guys just go, have fun. Then I would say, thanks so much. Now it's hard because, you know, in a relationship you do feel kind of bad when your partner wants to go somewhere or whatever and you've already made plans. But there has to be an understanding that things are going to happen after the fact and you've already made plans, you've already made your promises, your commitments, and that's just how it is. You had your chance. So this can happen in a relationship too. Not that you want to make them feel bad and maybe you do want them to come, but I apply this to relationships that have had continual problems. If it's a one off here and there, that's different. But if this is something that happens over and over again, and my wife was always making me feel bad for making plans, I would say, hey, look, you gotta just tell me what you want. You can't be wishy washy about this stuff. Just tell me what you want and I'm happy to make plans with you. But if you say you're not going, I'm going to make plans to go. And you, you're just going to have to accept that that's how it is because you made that decision. Now of course I'm leaving a lot out here. I'm leaving out the conversation that we would have and of course there'd be some feelings about it and we would have a conversation on it. But my wife and I have a good relationship, we have a healthy relationship where this kind of stuff doesn't happen. But if this kind of stuff did happen over and over again, then I would be more prone to say tough because we've talked about this. You said you didn't want to go and you do this to me, you know, often. And I don't want to have to worry or feel bad when you change your mind after we've made this plan. And again, I'm leaving out a lot here, and it's not like I would ever talk to my wife like that. But also, again, if this were happening over and over again, there will be a stopping point. There will be a hand that goes up and say, stop. You do this every time. I can't make plans like this. When you change your mind and try to make me feel guilty. I can't have you trying to make me feel guilty every time. So what can we do about this? This is our next conversation. What can we do about this? This is what happens. I make a plan, you change your mind, I feel guilty. And here we are, over and over again. That's number three. You just might have to address it, nip it in the bud like that, put it on the table and say, this happens over and over again. What can we do so that we can avoid this in the future? That's my final thought on this. I wish you the best with this. Thanks so much for posting that, and I hope something in here or somebody in the group helps you with that question as well. And good luck. Stay strong and don't give up your power. That's what happens when we feel bad for trying to please someone who can't be pleased. And they continue to make us feel bad for the decisions they're making. So we give up our power by feeling bad and letting them get the outcomes they want all the time. And we should be with people that lift us up and support us in our happiness and support the decisions we make. And that reminds me, somebody wrote, I think it was a Spotify review. They said, wait a minute, wait a minute. This is regarding last week's episode. They said you said you were supposed to support someone's political decision. Like talking, talking about your partner. That's what love is. You're supposed to support their political choice. I said, no, no, no, no, no, no. That came out wrong. What I meant was you should support their freedom to choose whomever or whoever they want as a political candidate. You don't have to like their candidate. You can even hate their candidate. But to support their freedom to choose instead of giving them a hard time for who they choose. That's what I meant on last week's episode, just in case you're listening and you heard the same thing. That's what I meant. Because there are people that I love that have made the wrong choice. My opinion, they've made the wrong choice for my country and I don't agree with them and I still love them. So that's what I meant. I support their freedom to choose because that's what the process is all about, the voting process. So I hope this wraps things up. Probably not, but thanks for listening to another episode of the Overwhelmed Brain. I appreciate you, I am grateful for you and I am grateful to the patrons that give to this show every month. Thank you patrons. I am honored and humbled every time you offer anything out of your pocket to me. It just still surprises, surprises me to this day, after 11 years of doing this. Thank you patrons and thank you to those who donate. And I appreciate all of you. And if you value this show and you want to give back like these patrons do, head over to MoreToB.com and there are options to do that over there. And for a show on how to navigate even more difficult relationships than what I talked about today, listen to my other podcast called Love and abuse over@loveandabuse.com and over there I also sell a relationship assessment workbook called the Mean Workbook. And you'll find that if you go over there and that will help you, it might help this person who wrote today that will help you assess what the specific behaviors are that are causing you to feel bad after every interaction. That's over@loveandabuse.com and if you are the person that's been being difficult, you are the difficult one in the relationship and you know it and you want to change it. Head over to healedbeing.com and there is a comprehensive program that I run over there. I've got an online group and everything that I address every question that comes in directly. So if you want to change any behaviors inside yourself and make your relationship as great as it could be, head over to here healedbeing.com and with that, always keep your mind open because that's how you make the best decisions. Be firm in your decisions and actions so that you can create the life you want. Always take steps to grow and evolve. You are powerful beyond measure. And above all, and this is something I absolutely know to be true about you, you are, are amazing. Sam Ra.