How to Coach Yourself and Others Beware of Manipulation | Page 266

Flattery and other likability tricks
Manipulators want you to like them. It helps hiding the
aggressiveness of them approaching you and wanting
something from you, leading you, or requesting things of
you. Thus, you'll trust them, and let yourself be persuaded
by them. You also won't easily be rude to them in order to
stand up against manipulations.
So, they'll be nice and friendly to you, and flatter you to
be liked, or give you things. They'll tell you how clever
you are, how friendly you are, or make you other
compliments. They'll be very honest, so as to appear
trustworthy, at least about things that don't matter for
making the deal. Even psychopaths, the worst of
manipulators, usually seem very nice, while they, in fact,
don't have much of a conscience at all.
Even when you're aware of what they're doing, you may
not stand up against it, as you think that you cannot be rude to a person who treats you nicely. But the
aggression may not show obviously, if you can see it is there, why not be aggressive yourself? How
else can you stand up for yourself?
A person who wants something from you, and is flattering you, is probably doing that for that purpose.
Keep you eyes on your own objectives, and on the other person's.
Returning the favor
When a manipulator gives you a gift, he
wants to use your feeling of needing to return
the favor to have you take an action he wants.
You're usually not in a position to return a
similarly valued gift, so you'll do something
else, like buying that car, to reciprocate.
When a company offers you a free coffee,
they may do that hoping that you will feel
obligated to buy at that company to
compensate for what you accepted.
It is usually made hard for you to not accept
some gift. When someone hands you
something, it is hard not to take it. When you
refuse that coffee, you're encouraged to do
accept it. When you don't want that free beer,
they may act insulted.
To not accept a gift being handed to you, it helps to put your hands in your pockets, and keep them
there. In some situations, you could insist on paying for the gift to release the debt, or returning the
favor with another gift. You can tell that you will not return the favor, while offering to give the gift
back. When you can ask whether they expect something in return, and the answer is no, you are
relieved from any obligation to reciprocate. But you can also simply not bother: they give you
something for a manipulative reason, and without you wanting to do so, so the social rule to return the
favor doesn't apply.

265