Question by AZZBO (RED DAWN): I’ve become a manipulator and compulsive liar?
I’m not sure where to start. Ok, Last March i got into a relationship. It lasted 8 months until we broke up. We had a lot of arguments blah, blah, blah and she lied to me alot. She used to lie about everything which is one of the reasons I couldn’t trust her. But, anyways, a little while before broke up her Mum told me that I was manipulative and emotionally abusive which I shrugged off after someone told me that her Mum says that about everyone she doesn’t like. For a while I just laughed at such a ‘crazy’ accusation and thought nothing of it.

After a little while I was reading an article that appeared on some website I go on a lot (I can’t remember whether it was Yahoo news or Cracked.com o something else) titled “15 signs of a manipulator.” I thought I would read it just because it appeared so soon after I had been accused of being a manipulator. I was shocked. I wrote down each of the points and ticked the ones that I did. Turns out I fit 12 out of 15 signs of being a manipulator.

I later began to examine myself and realised that I was also lying a lot. I re-observed my relationship and realised that I was just as much of a liar as she was.

I tried to see where each of these problems had developed and I came to this conclusion. My mother and both of my grandparents are manipulators. I’ve noticed myself that they tend to emotionally abuse and twist the minds of people to make them feel guilty and put themselves out of the wrong. I won’t go into detail but they are severe manipulators (worse off than me) and are brilliant at guilt trips.

I believe the lying began in my younger years. I used to have no friends and was always trying to make friends, however due to my restrictedly uninteresting childhood I couldn’t. What I mean is that I was not allowed to go to parties, not allowed out with friends, went to church 3 times a week and was also made to spend 2 hours a day doing Bible study (My parents are very religiously obsessed). Obviously other kids found my lifestyle rather boring at school so I used to lie. Make up stories about where I’d been over the weekend, what I’d done, make up friends that didn’t exist, all to make myself sound more interesting so that people started to like and accept me more and didn’t think i was boring. Eventually I started to lie more and more regularly until it became a compulsion. I lie about everything (whether it be where was I on a certain night, or what I had for breakfast that morning) and Yahoo answers seems to be the only place where I’m actually honest. The thing is I lie so much nowadays that I don’t even realise I’m doing it. I know it sounds stupid but I sometimes convince myself that the lies I told are true.

Those are my theories as to how I ended up how I am.
I believe my manipulation has come from my family. I’ve been manipulated so much by them that I’ve started to think of it as the norm and my lying has just become a compulsion over time.

However how I became this way is unimportant I suppose. The fact is I want to change. I don’t want to be the person I am but I honestly don’t know how to change. Where would I start?

Best answer:

Answer by Jenna
Don’t stress about it, being manipulative and a liar isn’t necisarilly a bad thing

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