Daily Archives: April 29, 2025
They Can’t Gaslight You If You Trust Your Gut!
Gaslighting can be a very destructive aspect of a toxic relationship. It basically refers to any form of “reality twisting” or “crazy-making” that is designed to confuse or manipulate the victim.
Gaslighting is used to gain power and control in the relationship by making the victim question their reality. The phenomenon is typically found in romantic relationships, but it can occur in all kinds of social relationships, including friendships, at work, and with neighbors.
Sometimes it’s done in an obvious way, right under the victim’s nose, but more often it’s done under the radar, and you don’t always know who’s gaslighting you, or even that you’re being gaslighted.
“Gaslighting” is a psychological term derived from the 1938 stage play Gas Light and its 1940 and 1944 film adaptations. The movie is about a husband’s attempts to systematically drive his wife crazy by repeatedly dimming the gas lights in their home, only to deny that it ever happened when the wife asks him if he also noticed it. Over time, he manipulates his wife to the point where she believes she is imagining things and loses her mind.
Gaslighting is a common manipulation technique used by dictators, con artists, abusers, sociopaths, narcissists, and cult leaders. It’s done in such a way that the victim rarely realizes how much they’ve actually been brainwashed.
At first, the victim may have the idea that they’re not imagining things, but that someone else is doing this to them. They may even have an intuition about who that person is. However, the goal of gaslighting is to get victims to doubt these rational thoughts and replace them completely with the belief that there is something wrong with them, either mentally, spiritually, emotionally, or physically. The worst part, in my opinion, is that it makes you doubt your own intuition.