The above saying is one that I've heard so many times in my life and have always believed was absolutely true. And upon hearing it again recently, it brought me to my question of the day which follows later in the blog. If you can fool or manipulate me one time, you've done something not many can do because I'm pretty good at reading people and their motives for what they do. However, I can't say it makes you a very good person for even trying to manipulate people and/or situations in the first place. Then, if you can do it to me again, I'm an idiot. And that, I'm not. I catch on REAL fast to people. In my past life, there were those that hated the notion that I was that in tune to my feelings about people. Mostly the people that hated that about me was because they found out in the end that I was right. It just took them a little longer to get to that end game than it did me.
When I say I could sense things pretty quickly, that didn't make me change my behavior towards the person in general. I would always be polite and helpful if I could or the opportunity arose. Where the issue came, was that I couldn't respect them for their deceitful manipulative ways, and I couldn't trust them from then on. Once trust is gone for me, it's gone and almost impossible to regain. If I love a person, I'll give them the best shot, but if they are not someone in my life, but have done something to manipulate me or a situation that I'm involved with, all bets are off. The issue then is that EVERYTHING they do in the future is suspect to me and comes with me believing they are trying to manipulate something again. I will then ALWAYS be on the watch for it so that people I do care about, don't get hurt. The "mama bear" comes out in me for all people I care about.
So, the question is where do you go when you are in a position of highly suspecting that manipulation is happening, but not in a position of speaking openly about it? How do you handle situations that are so fragile that speaking up will only be turned around on you due to the other parties manipulation tactics? It's such a curious dilemma. I try to bring my kids up to be trustful of people, but also hope that they are not so trustful that they don't realize things are happening around them. I've asked them what they would do if they overheard a conversation about someone that the just didn't believe at all... or was outright told something about someone they didn't believe. Would they question the person doing the talking? would they confront the person that was being talked about? Far too often others just overhear and ignore, or worse yet pass the story on... or maybe even worse yet believe it and have it change their minds about someone without all the real facts.
I haven't always been a big believer of confrontation, but based on my life and things that have happened in it, I'm now a big believer of confronting people. If that can help clear up an misunderstanding, then great. I think most people would say "just get rid of those doing it". But what if you can't? What if you can't for fear the retribution will just bring more manipulation? Maybe that's when you have to start believing in Karma. Either way, why can't people just be honest and upfront about their intentions. Let people know exactly what it is they are trying to get out of their manipulations and put it out on the table. It takes great character for people to be honest. I wish more people had that kind of great character.
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