 Hey, Psych2Goers, welcome back to another video. This video is inspired by Moe Ray's comment, so here it is. Have you experienced emotional manipulation, or would like to protect yourself from it? Well, everyone can be emotionally manipulative towards others, even if they don't intend to be. However, true manipulators perform each action deliberately and do so on a constant basis. Manipulation is when an individual controls another person's emotions, behavior, and thought processes in order to satisfy a personal need. If you feel like someone is actively exploiting you or influencing you in a harmful way, here are seven examples of emotional manipulation to be aware of. Number one, guilt tripping. Has someone ever tried to make you feel like the guilty one during an argument? I never thought you would do this. I've always trusted you, or you want me to pay for this meal? Emotional manipulators use guilt trips to voice their thoughts in a passive aggressive way. They do so in order to avoid direct confrontation, which can be awkward and uncomfortable. If your actions don't align with their goals, they may try to make you feel guilty. In response, you may start to overthink their statements and eventually blame yourself for everything. Number two, taking advantage of your insecurities. Have you ever seen beauty advertisements that display a model's flawless skin with words like eternal youth or smooth as butter under the image? Although advertisements nowadays promote inclusivity and try to embrace flaws, it's not uncommon for companies to indirectly utilize people's insecurities to promote their products. The same goes for interpersonal relationships. People may refer to others' body image, appearance, or habits hoping that the other person will improve themselves. However, some may do this with malicious intent to make you feel bad about yourself so that they can gain more confidence. Number three, always changing the criteria. Someone might constantly shift the criteria of what they want in order to manipulate the other person. For example, your friend may be upset about your behavior and ask you to be more caring of others. Once you observe your mistakes and make efforts to fix them, your friend still remains unhappy about the way you speak and asks you to change that as well. In essence, you may never achieve their desired requests. In this case, remember to strive to do your best to put effort into your friendship without letting them walk all over you. Number four, twisting reality. When conversing with someone else, you may have exaggerated or emphasized certain facts over others, which is completely normal. What emotional manipulators do, however, is completely twist facts in order to confuse you, gain sympathy, or achieve other goals. Many times, they do so to make themselves seem vulnerable. For instance, they may rant over how someone mistreated them when in reality there was only a simple miscommunication. Although it's hard to detect when they're lying, try to observe their body language and tone when they recite these so-called facts. Number five, diminishing your issues. Everyone's experiences in life are different, and so are the problems that each person encounters. When someone tries to invalidate your experience by saying things like, you think that's a problem? Well, how about my time with this? Or be grateful for your issues. They're nothing compared to mine. Take note of what their intentions are. They might be influencing your emotions, making you feel bad for sharing your problem when in reality, everyone's experiences should be respected. Number six, gaslighting. This is a type of emotional abuse whereby a person tries to make another doubt their perception of reality. This person might make the victim question if their memories were accurate or even if their train of thought was valid. For example, when you recite an emotional story about how your beloved pet passed away, an acquaintance might interrupt you and tell you that the event is small and that you shouldn't feel as sad as you are. The truth is only you know what you're experiencing and your emotions are all valid. And number seven, overly complimenting. On the other end of the spectrum, some people will try to sugarcoat everything they say. Sweet talkers will try to influence you by excessively praising and complimenting what you do, say or even think. Initially, you might feel flattered and it's fine to enjoy those initial boosts of happiness. However, you may want to watch out if this person praises you too much. In a way, you may subconsciously lower yourself to fence and blindly trust this person who could try to emotionally manipulate you later on down the road. So have you experienced any of these examples? Manipulators can make you second-guess yourself and make you feel like your emotions aren't valid or real. However, after this video, hopefully you'll have a better understanding of the intentions behind those people and can better protect yourself from them. Of course, not everyone has the intention of controlling your emotions. It's a matter of how often they do it and if those actions are done deliberately. If you or anyone you know has experienced emotional manipulation for a long time, please don't hesitate to seek help from a licensed professional. Remember that this video is meant to be educational and is not intended to diagnose or treat any condition or situation. Did you find this video helpful? Tell us in the comments below. Please like and share it with friends that might find value in this video too. Make sure to subscribe to Psych2Go and hit the notification bell for more content. All the references used are added in the description box below. Thanks for watching and we'll see you next time.