My clients frequently present with complaints of symptoms related to depression or anxiety—often referred to in mental health circles as the “common colds” of mental illness. More often than not, I come to find out that the client’s negative mood originated—and is now being sustained—in some toxic relational environment. Perhaps damage was inflicted from a […]
Manipulators operate in a cloud of confusion. We can feel confused for one of several reasons: There is often a disturbing discrepancy between the public image the manipulator portrays and who he actually is in private. Attributes, which may be positives in public, are the same ones that have such a negative effect privately. […]
“The most effective lies,” I read recently, “are the ones containing the most actual truths.” Manipulators lie but the lies they propagate are often constructed using nothing but facts as building materials. True story. One time, I went downtown and a man with a mask knocked me out, slit my throat and took my money. […]
There’s a wonderful movie made in 1944 by the name of “Gaslight”. A young woman played by Ingrid Bergman is a newlywed and moves into the house of her murdered Aunt with her new husband, Charles Boyer. The husband is kind, charming, and generous. But this pleasant exterior is merely the mask worn by a […]