By Tope Adewuya

I count it as a great privilege to be able to share with great people on this forum.

Proverbs 11:14 – “… in the multitude of counsellors there is safety”. We all gain from the experiences shared and we learn daily.

INTRODUCTION:

The topic we are looking at today is:

“How to Identify & deal with manipulation (control tendency) in a relationship”

We will look at this under the following headings:

1. Manipulation: What it is
2. Forms of Manipulation
3. Identifying Manipulations in a relationship
4. Is Manipulation a sin?
5. Dealing with Manipulative Tendencies

Manipulation: What it is?

The Cambridge dictionary defines manipulation as the act of “controlling someone or something to your own advantage, often unfairly or dishonestly”.

In summary, the key features for manipulation to exist are as follows:

1. ……Act of controlling another
2. …….To your own advantage
3. ….. Often with dishonesty

Forms of Manipulation:

For me, I will broadly categorize manipulation into 5 forms:

1. Deliberate – this is where the perpetrator/promoter deliberately set out to take advantage of the other party/receiver for a known gain e.g to exact revenge. For example a partner that knows that the electric iron is faulty and giving electrical shocks but wants the other party to feel some pain.
2. Indeliberate – sometimes, some, possibly due to ingrained selfish tendencies, tends to become highly manipulative. So you see a partner that wore a particular clothe and wants the other party to wears something close or matching telling him/her that this particular cloth fits him/her best and will bring out all the best qualities in him/her. This is purely lying. Best to just say I will love we wear these clothes and leave the other party to agree or disagree.
3. Subtle – subtle form of manipulation could be deliberate/indeliberate but usually comes in a non-obvious way. For example you want to eat pizza but starts mentioning and dropping the word pizza in your conversations and then later saying – oh, why have I been mentioning pizza all morning self?, na wa oh!. The other party will get the hint and while you made it out to be harmless he goes out of his way to go get you pizza as a surprise. I understand we may say this is a fun thing but its a coloured form of manipulation. Am i saying we should not have fun in our relationship?, – No but do not romance lying to reinforce fun in a relationship. Let it be clear (immediately) that you meant it as fun. Or people complaining of a fake headache so they can get millions of calls and attention. Attention craving is not sin but lying about your health to get it is perfumed sin.
4. Non-Subtle form – this is open, usually deliberate form of manipulation. Practically pure blackmail. You know your partner does not like crying, in fact he runs away from Nollywood scene where people are crying so having known his weakness, at every little time you are wrong, rather than admit your fault you start crying so the man loses all desire to correct you and ends up being the one apologizing and feeling bad.
5. Supernatural manipulation – this is mostly demonic and involves forces beyond the physical to change the actions of another.

According to Zawn Villines (2019) in an article posted on GoodTherapy.org manipulation was categorized into about 12 forms which I will make excerpts from here for education purpose:

1. Using intense emotional connection to control another person’s behavior. E.g the manipulator may overwhelm his/her victim with loving gestures to make the victim lower his/her guard and /or make the victim feel indebted.
2. Playing on a person’s insecurities. E.g making a partner feel no-one else can ever possibly love them (may involve some body shaming).

3. Lying and denial. Manipulators may bombard their victims with lies. When they’re caught, they may deny the lie or cover it up with another falsehood.

4. Hyperbole and generalization. This is knowing that vague accusations are very often to dispute and goalposts can be readily shifted.

5. Changing the subject. In an argument about one person’s behavior, the individual may deflect attention from themselves by attacking their critic.

6. Moving the goalposts. The manipulator constantly shifts the criteria one must meet in order to satisfy them.

7. Using fear to control another person. For instance, a person may use threats of violence or physically intimidating body language.

8. Using social inequities to control another person.

9. Passive-aggression. This includes strategies such as guilt-tripping, giving backhanded compliments, and more. It is a way of voicing displeasure or anger without directly expressing the emotion.

10. Giving a person the silent treatment. There is usually a normal need for self-time in a relationship but when it emanates from the position of trying to hurt your partner/pay her/him back – bro/sis you are a manipulator.

11. Gaslighting. Causing the victim to doubt his/her own understanding of reality. For example, an abusive person might deny that the abuse happened, telling the victim there’s something wrong with their memory.

12. Recruiting others to help with manipulation. For example, an abusive parent might ask family members to remind a child how much the parent has sacrificed for the child. The social pressure may convince the child to stop complaining about abusive behavior.

Next part of today’s session is – Identifying manipulation.

From the various examples we have shared above, this part should be clearly easy and can be summarized in a few points.

1. Relating in fear and not love:

Relationship built on love has mutual respect and not fear. Once a partner is afraid of the other partner, watch it – there is manipulation at play somewhere. I should respect and love you, not fear you. My love and respect for you will make me not to do anything to hurt you but if hearing your voice evokes fear and self doubt in me there is something wrong. This is not a licence for carelessness. If there is true love, mistakenly hurting the other will naturally generate deep regret but not fear. A child of God is assured of the love of God but that is not a license to commit sin. He however knows that should he mistakenly sinned, he can approach his heavenly Father not that the father is weak but in the knowledge of the love of the Father. Same scenario is the relationship between partners.

2. Repeatedly being asked to prove you care:

When your partner repeatedly asks you to prove you care or love him/her, manipulation is involved and the relationship is shaky. Of course you must not take it for granted that your partner knows but being asked to prove it is a subtle way of controlling the victim. So Mr A tells Ms B that if you love me you will go with me to the place, if you love me you won’t ask me this question, if you love me you will stop laughing, etc are all aimed at manipulating the other partner.

3. Feeling blackmailed, guilt-trip, betrayed:

Have you ever been put into a difficult position by someone you care about who is using the knowledge of knowing you care about him/her against you?. That is a way of identified manipulation. Love should not make you feel bad, pressured, create anxiety or feel blackmailed. Love truly can make you do funny things but should not create anxiety, worry, fear or feeling of worthlessness. All these negatives stems from manipulation & abuse.

Having looked at the forms of manipulation, let us now go to the fourth part of today’s review: Is manipulation sin?

Manipulation is a Sin:

The first example of manipulation in the Bible was when the devil deceived Eve to eat the forbidden fruit.

Genesis 3:1-6

1. Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
2. And the woman said unto the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden:
3. But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
4. And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
5. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
6. And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

Let us go back for a moment to the key points of the definition of Manipulation, recall that the key features for manipulation to exist are as follows:

1. Act of controlling another
2. To your own advantage
3. Often with dishonesty

Now, can you see these 3 key features of manipulation in Genesis 3:1-6?

1. Controlling another – devil wants to control Eve
2. Own advantage – of course it was not out of love for man but to crash God’s plan for man!
3. With dishonesty – was lying involved or not? – devil lied!

Also recall that the Bible said clearly that devil is the father of lies in John 8:44 which states: “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.”

Proverbs 12:22 caps it all with this statement:

“Lying lips are abomination to the LORD: but they that deal truly are his delight.”

We can see from these few passages that manipulation is lying which emanates from the devil which is an abomination to our heavenly Father.

Now, at this point some may be like but where will be the fun in our relationship if we don’t spice it up with some pranks? – my point is – what you call a prank is perfumed sin (I am being civil here by putting perfumed in front not to condemn those of us that enjoy doing this).

I am not against pulling the legs of your partner (as it is called) but you should immediately clear all doubts by declaring the next second that you are just pulling his/her leg and your real motive was that you will really love some attention and not that you are not feeling well or that pizza kept dropping from your mouth, rather you crave having pizza or want to go shopping not that truly all your clothes do not fit anymore.

A lie is a lie whether subtle or not and notice the opening verse of Genesis 3 said something about the subtlety of the devil through the snake which tells you how dangerous that can be.

Let us now proceed to our 5th and final part of this session – How to deal with manipulative tendencies:

We must understand that as human beings, the tendency to be manipulative is rather inborn, just like the tendency to sin.

It is not peculiar to any gender.

The fact that you are born again does not mean that you cannot commit sin again as such thinking that being born again means that you cannot be manipulative is being in a dream world.

A mischievous person once defined Lying as a ready help in time of need. Indeed we lie/manipulate to meet our own needs.

So what can we do to cut away from this wrong tendency? There are a few things I feel we should do to strengthen our relationship and not be manipulative:

1. Recognize that manipulation is simply wrong, a sin, an abomination to God and view it as such. Justifying and making excuse for such behaviors will not help.
2. A manipulator wants others to give while he/she takes. Recognize that a relationship is giving 100% at all times. Not 50-50%, not 60-40% but 100% at all times. If partner A gives 100% and partner B gives also 100% then we have a Christ- like relationship as Jesus also gave all for his church.
3. Understand that manipulation is hurtful. Recall the folklore story of the Boy that cried wolf. He derived fun from raising false alarms which were unsettling to the villagers and eventually paid heavily for it after his manipulative tendencies were discovered. You stand a high risk of losing the trust of your loved one(s) when your manipulations are revealed and trust me nothing hidden under the sun that will not be revealed.
4. Relationships are all about communication. Communicate, communicate, and communicate. This is where the male gender seems to be coming up short. We tend not to communicate well and thereby expecting our partner to be super-heroines that can read minds. Only God has the ability to read the mind of another person. Sir (and ma), please – communicate. Don’t assume, don’t give room for wrong thoughts!
5. As an extension of above – please never assume in a relationship! You don’t know what the other person is going through. This is where the female gender seems to be at more fault!. The man has not called as such you assumed he doesn’t love you and as such started planning evil and how to embarrass him in your mind!. He said something to you that came off wrongly and didn’t apologize but you did not realize that being a poor communicator, he might not have said it properly (you can say the same thing in different ways and it will bounce off in different ways) or his mind was not really there (still poor communication).

Notice that I have earlier said men should communicate more, women should please assume less! I am not making excuses for any gender here and as a man I can tell us that most times the root of manipulation (in a genuine relationship) are little things that should not have been allowed to fester at all.

Recall what the Bible said about little foxes in Song of Solomon 2:15 Amplified Bible edition:

“Catch the foxes for us, The little foxes that spoil and ruin the vineyards [of love], While our vineyards are in blossom.”

The Amplified Bible says these little foxes spoil/ruin the vineyard of love! That simply tells you that manipulation is the foundation for the betrayal of trust and can ruin the partnership/relationship. I have been using partner/partnership more as I understand that this is a forum for singles so I expect most not to be married yet.

If there is one thing you should guard jealously and fiercely in a relationship it is TRUST. Never allow an act of betrayal of trust. It wrecks the foundation upon which relationships/marriage rests and what else can do that but acts that seem to portray selfishness/self-centeredness as this simply means you do not love the other party as much as you profess/claim.

6. Be real. You will notice that a real person will communicate well, acknowledge his/her faults and be accountable. Let accountability reign supreme in you. Own up to your faults. Pride/ego makes us manipulative as we want to blame others for our faults thereby sowing the wrong seeds/laying the wrong foundations.

Lastly, don’t enjoy manipulative tendencies. We have seen that as humans the tendency to be manipulative/to sin is there. Just as you approach obvious sins like fornication/adultery with disdain, have the same attitude to manipulative tendencies. Once you start enjoying manipulating others you have a dulled conscience which means what God hates does not look bad to you anymore and it becomes more difficult for the Holy Spirit to work with you.

Thank you very much for your time dear all. Once again, I am very grateful for the opportunity to share this with the group and appreciate Pastor for this privilege. Thank you sir.

This lecture was originally delivered by Mr. Tope Adewuya on the 3pG School For The Singles WhatsApp group page on Friday, 23^rd September 2022.