I’ve noticed I have a problem with not noticing people’s bad intentions until I’m well into an interaction or relationship, and not having good ways to respond when I do notice. Some of this may be brain, but I think much of it is habitual from things I was taught in my upbringing that don’t work well in the world.

Has anyone successfully figured this one out? I’ve done a ton of work on myself and gotten a lot wiser, but I still keep falling into the same trap of giving my good faith time and words to people who are semiblatantly trying to take advantage of me, are asking questions in bad faith, or are just generally being kinda mean or creepy to me. Once I do notice, it’s usually gotten to a point where it’s a little costlier to exit the situation than I think it would be if I had noticed right away. It still happens even when I feel cynical or don’t like/trust someone.

Any way to avoid this in the future? I guess I feel like I need a good reason to think “fuck this person.” It’s hard for me to react to it in the moment when it’s not clear to me a)what they’re doing and b)how to effectively shut it down or extricate myself.

  • kruffa@beehaw.orgEnglish
    4·
    4 months ago

    I’m really not qualified in any way to state the below, just trying to draw from my personal experience and express what I think is useful and relevant in this situation.

    English is not my first language

    Honestly I think it is more useful and helpful to focus on the second part of the equation: exiting the situation.

    Exiting situations is a tremendously useful life skill regardless of the other person(s) intentions while spotting people with bad intentions could become a burden as it might lead you down a path of mistrusting many more persons than you “need” to mistrust.

    Learning to say “no” in different and effective ways is also a way to learn to say yes and will, in my experience, let you live a life closer to what you want.

    I suspect that I’m still early on my path to communicate this effectively because I was not really listened to as a child, so my feelings and wishes where not seen as relevant to a situation.

    As for how to do it: I don’t really have anything groundbreaking to give you. But as with most things I suspect it’s just practice: start saying no! And start acknowledging how you feel or felt even if it’s too late to do anything about it as that can teach yourself to look for clues (inside yourself) in the future (maybe).

    • PotentiallyApricots@beehaw.orgOPEnglish
      2·
      4 months ago

      Thanks. Any good effective ways to exit situations that you have found work for you? I find when I start to feel uncomfortable it’s harder for me decide what to do or say specifically.

      • kruffa@beehaw.orgEnglish
        4·
        4 months ago

        I’m still quite bad at saying no and exiting situations, but I have become much better than before.

        Some things I have done and try to remember to do:

        • I practiced saying “no” to everything for a while. That was really uncomfortable!
        • Declaring that I need time to think about something (as others have said here) can be effective. Like with scams/clickbait/up-selling/etc: if the other is trying to induce urgency they most likely don’t want you to think about it rationally.
        • Segway:ing into outs with the standard phrase (and a slightly rises voice): “Oh, that reminds of…” and either change the subject completely or lying about needing to go and do something else.
        • Calling people out on their bullshit but without showing any interest in talking further about it: “That is just not true”, “This isn’t something I want to talk about”, “If you keep talking about this I will leave” and then obviously leave if necessary.