Why You Believed His Lies: The Psychology of Manipulation and Abuse | Ep 010

Somebody can look you dead in the eye, say everything that you've been dying to hear, and they can still be lying to you. The science behind deception in abusive relationships reveals how manipulators weaponize psychology to systematically break down their victims. This is the podcast they don’t want you listening to.

This week, I'm joined by Dr. Abbie Maroño, a behavioral expert with a PhD in psychology who trains the Secret Service and FBI on deception, body language, and influence. 

We explore the disturbing world of psychological manipulation and how abusers use sophisticated tactics to deceive their victims. Dr. Abbey breaks down the neuroscience behind why we fall for manipulation, explaining how it's not about intelligence but about being human in a world where predators understand psychology. We discuss how abusers systematically strip away your sense of self to gain control, the difference between everyday cognitive dissonance and traumatic cognitive dissonance, and why "love bombing" and intermittent reinforcement create biological addiction. 

Dr. Abbie reveals how false vulnerability is weaponized to fast-track intimacy and trust, why we rationalize abusive behavior, and the concerning trend of men's dating coaches teaching these same manipulation tactics. She emphasizes that manipulators don't need to be "book smart" - they learn through experience and lack of empathy, exploiting the brain's shortcuts to appear trustworthy. We also dive into her experience training law enforcement and the shocking lack of trauma-informed training in the criminal justice system, highlighting why taking time in relationships is crucial for spotting deception.

Connect with Dr. Abbie on Instagram here: @doctorabbieofficial 

Ger her book, The Upper Hand

Transcript

00:00:00:03 - 00:00:08:17
Music

00:00:08:19 - 00:00:18:12
Lisa Sonni
This is real talk with Lisa Sonni, Relationships Uncensored, the podcast. They don't want you listening to.

00:00:18:14 - 00:00:41:06
Lisa Sonni
Somebody can look you dead in the eye. Say everything that you've been dying to hear. And they can still be lying to you, right? He knew what to say. He knew when to cry. He knew when to say I love you. When to act broken completely, and when to say you're the only person who gets me. And so I want to talk about the way that some abusive men really can just deceive you.

00:00:41:11 - 00:00:56:23
Lisa Sonni
And there's there's a whole science behind this. So I want to introduce, and my guest. Doctor Abbie, a behavioral expert, and I'm so excited to talk to you about deception, betrayal and lies. So I would love if you could just kind of introduce yourself and let the audience know who you are.

00:00:57:04 - 00:01:29:03
Dr. Abbie
So it's a pleasure to be here. I'm Doctor Abbie. I have a PhD in psychology focused and behavioral analysis. I am an author. I have one book focused on influence and persuasion called The Upper Hand, and one book focused on trauma recovery and self-regulation, which is called Work in Progress. I my background is in academia. I was a full time professor when I was 23, and so I moved into the private sector, moved to America, and now do I do things like training the Secret Service, training the FBI, and elicitation, body language and influence?

00:01:29:03 - 00:01:53:08
Lisa Sonni
That is wildly impressive. I absolutely love, you know, training. This is I really think, especially with respect to law enforcement, this is so necessary to understand this. I see so many victims feel failed by the system. And I think there's probably a whole separate topic on the law and what their training is and what they know versus the police, even versus the legal system itself.

00:01:53:08 - 00:02:22:09
Dr. Abbie
Yeah. I recently just came back from a keynote I did in Maryland, and Michigan, the Michigan one was I was training detectives and responders of sexual assault to improve the sexual assault response and the criminal justice system and it's really shocking to see the lack of in-depth training that these officers have. And it's not their fault. They're amazing officers, but the funding isn't really there to provide them the training that they need.

00:02:22:11 - 00:02:38:18
Dr. Abbie
So most of them don't have trauma training to begin with, which in itself is an issue. And then the interviewing training that I have, which is so essential to get the information they need to then make the decisions that they need to get the right people put behind bars, and to help victims in the way that they should.

00:02:38:20 - 00:03:06:11
Dr. Abbie
They don't really have that in-depth psychological training of how to conduct correct interviews with influence principles and human decision making. And often what they do get is do X and you'll get result Y, rather than understanding how people actually think. Because do X get y doesn't really help because people are very complicated. So I promise you, any technique that I teach you won’t be effective for everybody for so many reasons,

00:03:06:14 - 00:03:30:12
Dr. Abbie
because people are different and contexts are different, and behaviors don't happen in a vacuum. So when you teach, just do these simple things and you think there work across all these different contexts, it just doesn't work that way. But they're not getting that deeper psychological training. So when I did the training, it was so wonderful to see how knowledge hungry these officers are because they want it.

00:03:30:12 - 00:03:38:18
Dr. Abbie
They want to be able to help victims as much as they can. But it is just sad. The the lack of training that is often provided.

00:03:38:22 - 00:03:57:20
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, it's heartbreaking because I always feel like one of the biggest misses, and certainly this was my experience in using law enforcement to help me out of my own abusive relationship was, you know, it felt often I admit I wasn't directly told this, although I've heard this from others, but that feeling of like, you picked the person or why did you go back?

00:03:57:20 - 00:04:18:10
Lisa Sonni
Why did you stay so long? Why didn't you see this? And I felt really judged by that. And in hindsight, I realize how much this was actually connected to deception. Yeah. And then also, I was in a trauma band, so I was not seeing reality clearly. I couldn't really advocate for myself in the way that I know now that I needed to.

00:04:18:15 - 00:04:27:03
Lisa Sonni
And I know that training would have helped the officers help me more. And I'd love to believe that they wanted to help me. Yeah, fundamentally, yeah.

00:04:27:05 - 00:04:49:21
Dr. Abbie
And it can be confusing from the outside to be like, why didn't they just leave? Because it's really easy to say, well, I would have done, but that's because you're using your prefrontal cortex, which is what critical decision making happens. And when we really think through our decisions, when emotions are running really high, like when we are the one in those situations, we often don't use our prefrontal cortex,

00:04:49:21 - 00:05:15:15
Dr. Abbie
we use our amygdala, and our emotions take over our brain. We know that when we're high in emotions, we don't always make the best decision. So it's easy to sit there and say, well, I wouldn't have done that, and why would you do that? It's much easier to do that than actually sit back and take photos with perspective. And what we see with victims and what I see a lot is this loss of identity.

00:05:15:15 - 00:05:34:20
Dr. Abbie
So when you're deciding whether an act aligns with who you are, which is what we do, we we go through the world and we say, do I want to do this? Do I not want to do this? And we say, is this representative of who I am? And that's how we make our decisions. We see the insula light up, which is why we we very much self-reflect

00:05:34:23 - 00:05:54:20
Dr. Abbie
and what happens in abusive relationships. Often they start really wonderful. They start great. But the abuser wants you to not know who you are. Because if you have a really strong sense of self, when I ask you to do something, you can reflect on yourself and say, no, that doesn't align with who I am, what I want. That's not good for me

00:05:54:20 - 00:06:17:13
Dr. Abbie
and you can push back. If you don't have a strong sense of self, you don't really have that strong sense of boundary, and it's much easier to kind of give in to demands. What they want to do is strip you of that sense of self and give you a new one. So they'll start being really loving and really wonderful, and then they'll slowly beat down parts of your identity.

00:06:17:16 - 00:06:35:03
Dr. Abbie
So things you really like about yourself that start to kind of criticize those things and then start to kind of take those things away from you. That's why they isolate you a lot of the time. So you don't have that friend reinforcement or the family reinforcement. They start to pick slowly at parts of your identity. So you have a loss of self.

00:06:35:03 - 00:06:56:02
Dr. Abbie
And we see this in people who are in abusive relationships when they're thinking, you know, if you say, who are you? You see less activation in the insula. They don't have as much self-reflective ability. And when you start to take away those things of who you are, and then I feed in information of who I want you to be, and this is actually what's best for you.

00:06:56:05 - 00:07:20:21
Dr. Abbie
I drip, drip, drip, drip, drip, feed that into you. And it's actually the same approach that we see with terrorists who are looking to radicalize individuals. It's the very same, method of taking away their sense of self and feeding in a new one. It's just I want to take away your sense of self and feed in this new one of someone who I want you to be. Someone who is submissive, someone who is weak, someone who will do whatever I say and take it.

00:07:20:21 - 00:07:46:20
Dr. Abbie
And once I'm in that state, when someone is like, oh, well, I wouldn't ever do that because you have a grounded sense of self because it hasn't been taken from you. So when you're deciding, would I do that? You're in that critical thinking mode and your brain is functioning at its normal capacity. Your interior lit up. But when someone has been slowly picked apart over time and they've lost that sense of self, for them to say, no, this doesn't allow me to, I am.

00:07:46:20 - 00:07:49:06
Dr. Abbie
It is extremely difficult.

00:07:49:07 - 00:08:06:10
Lisa Sonni
I think we all think we'd like to have done better. Yeah. You know, I can admit I was the person also who said I would never let a man treat me that way. But the thing is that it's like people know this, and also they don't seem to know this, that, as you pointed out, they're not horrible on the first date. Yeah.

00:08:06:10 - 00:08:28:16
Lisa Sonni
And for crystal clarity, it's not the second date either. Right. It's this sort of process of building trust and dependency, building feelings and connection, albeit false. And then yeah, it's a subtle shift. Even then, it's not just like the light switch changes. It's a little bit of gaslighting, a little bit of coercion, a little bit of name calling, and it sort of starts.

00:08:28:18 - 00:08:42:20
Lisa Sonni
And then one day for so many people, you realize you feel like you're living a lie. And I think even when you recognize that sometimes you have the cognitive dissonance of like, I know this is true, but is it? Yeah, they're they're good and bad at the same time.

00:08:42:20 - 00:09:07:02
Dr. Abbie
Yeah. And it's not just deception from the other person. We are all very self deceptive. We lie to ourselves all the time, whether consciously or unconsciously, and we self deceive because we want to stay. The brain resists truths that threaten attachment. So once you're attached to someone, once you feel like this is your person, whether it's, anxious attachment, avoidant attachment.

00:09:07:02 - 00:09:27:18
Dr. Abbie
But once you are attached, once emotionally invested, we unconsciously edit reality to reduce discomfort. And this is a process, like I said, cool cognitive dissonance, but it's cognitive dissonance reduction. We feel this. This is my person. But they're doing these things and we want to get rid of this. You know they love me, but how could they love me doing this?

00:09:27:18 - 00:09:47:08
Dr. Abbie
We want to get rid of this. Dissonance is discomfort. So we like to ourselves. And then we add to this that dopamine spikes from it's an intermittent reinforcement. So unpredictable rewards when they're really really kind sometimes. So you get used to that. And then that breadcrumbs of giving you a little bit here and then a little bit here.

00:09:47:11 - 00:10:09:20
Dr. Abbie
Because you start to prioritize the hope and you prioritize it over truth. So it's not necessarily that you failed to see the truth is that you really want it, the story of who they are to be true, because your nervous system becomes attached to it, and you get that high in that low and it becomes very, very addictive both psychologically and biologically.

00:10:10:01 - 00:10:29:21
Lisa Sonni
I wish people could see that, you know, because it always what I hear so often is, why did you stay? And it's it feels like a choice. And I, you know, I've, I've read about this. Sure. We have free will. It doesn't feel like free will when you're in it because you are so confused. Yeah. And recently I read traumatic cognitive Dissonance by Doctor Peter Solano.

00:10:29:21 - 00:10:52:01
Lisa Sonni
Just sort of even deepening it isn't sort of your, I guess, what he calls everyday dissonance. This is based on betrayal and trauma. This is someone who is actively doing this to you, intentionally trying to manipulate and lie and deceive. Yeah. How do you think that these abusers really know how to do this? Like, why? Why are they so good at it?

00:10:52:01 - 00:10:57:01
Lisa Sonni
I hear a lot of people say, do they have a script? How do they learn to be so deceptive?

00:10:57:05 - 00:11:19:11
Dr. Abbie
Well, a lot of people are naturally very manipulative. And I mean, people can read courses, of course, but when you go in with a negative intention, you can kind of run your own little tests of, if I poke here, what happens if I poke here, what happens? And human beings and naturally very trusting and we are social species

00:11:19:11 - 00:11:50:08
Dr. Abbie
and as much as we are skeptical, sometimes it is in our nature to be trusting. So manipulators will utilize that. And it doesn't take long. If you go out into the world and say, I'm going to have bad intentions and I'm going to get things from people, what you realize is it's actually quite easy and it's quite easy to get what you want from people if you use harmful means. Because we are an emotional species, we are very fear driven and as complex as we are.

00:11:50:10 - 00:12:15:23
Dr. Abbie
If you understand the psychology, it is people are predictably complex and predictably irrational. If you have the intention to be manipulative and to go out and hurt people is actually quite an easy thing to do. What is hard is resisting the urge to hurt people and go out and be kind and not reactive to other people, and not intend to get things from people.

00:12:15:23 - 00:12:34:12
Dr. Abbie
Because although we are social species, we also are very selfish by nature. We want to feel pleasure, and if that pleasure comes at the expense of someone else, we have that internal conversation of is it worth it? And it is much harder to take the short road and not hurt people on the way. So how do they become manipulative?

00:12:34:12 - 00:12:59:17
Dr. Abbie
One they can read books. I understand the basic psychology and to anyone that will get what they want at the expense of someone else's pain and purposely cause harm. They are a weak individual. They're typically very smart individuals, but weak individuals because they take the easy route to get what they want. And if you do that again, like I said, it doesn't take long to realize that we're very trusting by nature.

00:12:59:21 - 00:13:23:08
Dr. Abbie
And then they test out how you can weaponize trust signals. So we know that the brain uses heuristics, meaning that because we have such a complex brain, takes up 20% of our energy, yet weighs 2% of our body mass, it it is a very, very energy hungry organ. So we take shortcuts in thinking to try and make the world easier to interact with.

00:13:23:11 - 00:13:50:13
Dr. Abbie
We know that we're a biased species. We know that we make these flaws in decision making. So if you understand the psychology, it doesn't take long to realize I can weaponize this. So the brain relies on heuristics and take shortcuts. Well, if I appear loving, if I appear honest, if I appear the I'm being vulnerable and the use of them showing vulnerability is a very effective, manipulative tactic.

00:13:50:17 - 00:14:11:13
Dr. Abbie
So if I show you all these things, I know that your brain will likely pick those up, as this, say, a safe person. This is a loving person, this is a kind person. And then I can bring you into that perception of myself. And then I can utilize grooming tactics like love bombing. I make you feel wonderful. I give you gifts and attention and flattery.

00:14:11:18 - 00:14:41:00
Dr. Abbie
So I create artificial intimacy. And what that does to the brain is it will slide it with dopamine and oxytocin and it makes a manipulator feel indispensable very, very quickly. So what felt like chemistry and connection was often a deliberate activation of psychological shortcuts. So these manipulators, they learn that they can engineer their behavior to win your trust.

00:14:41:00 - 00:15:01:09
Lisa Sonni
Right. So you said that some of them are very smart agree, some are. I have many clients who are like, no, he can't be doing it on purpose because he's not smart enough. And I've sort of been interested in this topic because I almost I want to question the word smart. What does that mean? Is this instinctual?

00:15:01:14 - 00:15:16:01
Lisa Sonni
Because even reading books not to discount some people, but they're not reading books, where do they really learn? This is some of this instinct or just sort of testing out throughout their lives on what works and what doesn't work and just kind of naturally getting better at it. Yeah.

00:15:16:02 - 00:15:41:11
Dr. Abbie
So that idea of like, oh, they couldn't have done it because they're not that smart is quite a subjective statement, because when we say smart, often we think of book smart. So someone who is an academic like myself would be considered book smart. So if you say, oh, that's a smart person, we can look at their qualifications. Well, someone who doesn't have those qualifications but has a lot of emotional intelligence, depending on how you define smart, could be smarter.

00:15:41:13 - 00:16:10:01
Dr. Abbie
So it really depends on how you define it. If you define it as well, they don't have a degree, they don't have this or they're not intelligent. We're falling into the trap of kind of IQ, which is very specific knowledge. So when I say smart, what I mean is they have the appropriate skill set in order to manipulate, which means understanding how my behavior affects your feelings, affects your thinking, and affects your behavior subsequently.

00:16:10:04 - 00:16:30:03
Dr. Abbie
So that could be because they read a lot of books on psychology. So they're very smart in that intellectual sense. In the academic sense. And that's a really great place to be whether you want to do good or bad. But having that knowledge is very key. But they could also be smart in experience wise or, you know, I've done this before and it works.

00:16:30:03 - 00:16:52:12
Dr. Abbie
They've learned and they've picked up those tricks. They could naturally be very instinctive. And they can also, having a lack of empathy can allow you to do the things that you need to do to get what you want without the barriers that the everyday person will come across, because say, I want something from you, but I know in order to get that thing, it could cause you harm.

00:16:52:12 - 00:17:10:17
Dr. Abbie
My empathy is going to stop that. It's going to be a barrier because I don't want to hurt you, even if I have the knowledge that if I do this, I can get what I want. Now, someone who is very manipulative, they have that same knowledge of, if I do this, I can get what they want, get what I want, but they don't have that empathy barrier.

00:17:10:19 - 00:17:16:19
Dr. Abbie
So for them, they use the skill set that other people could use, but they don't.

00:17:17:00 - 00:17:18:11
Lisa Sonni
So because of empathy. Yes. Yeah.

00:17:19:03 - 00:17:47:03
Dr. Abbie
So it can be because they've learned it through past relationships. It can be instinctive of I've done this and people just respond well. And some people are just naturally very charismatic. And through that they learn how people respond to them, and it reinforces that skill set. And then some people do the reading. And what I do find is people who are generally more intellectual, and that doesn't mean they're going out there, you know, running businesses, but they they do take the time to understand human thinking.

00:17:47:06 - 00:18:13:05
Dr. Abbie
They are very dangerous, very, very dangerous because I teach my influence and persuasion framework. And I train this to Secret Service. I train it to say to organizations and businesses in order to try and do good. But of course, that same skill set could be used for bad and you can encourage the use. So good. But understanding how people think in the wrong hands can be a very dangerous tool.

00:18:13:08 - 00:18:33:12
Dr. Abbie
So it's a very hard thing to control because there's so much knowledge out there, you know, there's so much out there. If you have bad intentions, you can utilize and there was a saying about because I worked for an information security company and often people say, oh, if you fall for these scams, it's because of your stupid. And actually it's because you're human, right?

00:18:33:12 - 00:18:33:23
Lisa Sonni
Right.

00:18:34:01 - 00:18:55:01
Dr. Abbie
We all fall for it. We all. And there is a scam there for everyone because we are all flawed. We are all emotional. That's just how we are built. That's how we evolve. And to say, oh, I would never what it means is maybe that exact approach wouldn't work on you. But if someone learns about you, they learn about your history.

00:18:55:04 - 00:19:13:12
Dr. Abbie
They learn about what you like, what you dislike, your personality, what your triggers are. If they took the time to learn that about you, they'll take a different approach than they took with that other person. So maybe you wouldn't fall for that. Beautiful for that. And that's often what abusers do. And they look for people who are really craving love.

00:19:13:16 - 00:19:36:10
Dr. Abbie
And that's why I'm from the side of saying, you see people who have been through a lot, they're the ones they get targeted because they want love and they know that, okay, if I come in really quickly and love bomb and pretend I'm going to be safe, it's so human to desire safety as want love. And if you've been through hell, someone's offering you some safety.

00:19:36:10 - 00:20:10:03
Dr. Abbie
Everything in your nervous system wants that. And if you then come in with that and then slowly drip, feed them back into that negative place, it's really hard to resist that because they cling to this idea of, this is safety for me now. And it is like I said, it's easy as a manipulator to see if someone is responding positively to you. And if you are love bombing and you start to see that growth in a, in, attention and attachment, what they tend to now do is they'll learn about you.

00:20:10:03 - 00:20:17:03
Dr. Abbie
And if you just want love, it's really hard not to overshare. This is something that many of us do. Many of us overshare.

00:20:17:06 - 00:20:17:17
Lisa Sonni
Oh yeah,

00:20:17:21 - 00:20:43:16
Dr. Abbie
and we do it very early on. And if you overshare early on, what you're actually doing is giving the other person information about you that information that could potentially harm you because you're giving them information about your past and your triggers. So now, if they have maladaptive intent and manipulative intent, they can utilize that of, okay, well, how do I adapt my approach to appeal to the things that this person wants?

00:20:43:16 - 00:21:06:11
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, I, I've described it a lot as bespoke abuse. Right. It's very customized. I think what works on me won't work on you. And so if we dated the same person it would look a bit different. They give you what you want. Yeah, I know early on when I think back to when I first started dating my own abuser, he would ask a lot of questions. Yeah, and I wasn't oversharing.

00:21:06:11 - 00:21:29:20
Lisa Sonni
And he did something that is so interesting because you talked about that sort of the vulnerability that we think of as safety. He shared things with me. Yes. That led me to share things back. And as it turns out, what he shared with me wasn't real. So it was like manufactured vulnerability so for me, as a person who wasn't willing to overshare, he overcame that.

00:21:30:00 - 00:21:54:16
Dr. Abbie
Yeah. And this is when I say that the tactics can be used for good and bad, because this is called mutual self-disclosure, where it's not one person sharing and one person receiving. It's sharing, sharing, sharing, sharing. It's mutual. And that's the, intensity or the emotionality increases as it will increase on the other side. So you kind of bring each other into this increased vulnerability.

00:21:54:18 - 00:22:11:12
Dr. Abbie
And I use this as a method when I teach investigators of how to get your interviewee to give you information, because that's what we want, and that's also what we want in relationships, too. If you have positive intent, you want that information so you can understand how to help them so you can understand who they are and how to be with them.

00:22:11:17 - 00:22:37:11
Dr. Abbie
But in the wrong hands, this false vulnerability is very effective. So when someone shares what appears to be emotional pain or something very vulnerable, your mirror neurons activate. And this is called emotional contagion. So you start to feel what they express, even if their pain isn't real. The brain doesn't know that. And oxytocin is released during moments of vulnerability or physical closeness,

00:22:37:14 - 00:23:08:03
Dr. Abbie
and it promotes bonding and reduced suspicion and manipulated is weaponizes by telling sob stories or crying or disclosing traumas early in their relationship. And as you said, it creates a reciprocity norm almost. So you feel like you need to open up in return. So it creates a cycle of intimacy. So if you've ever been consumed by how quickly you trust someone, it's because your body responds to these signals designed to shortcut your defenses.

00:23:08:08 - 00:23:33:03
Dr. Abbie
Again, going back to the fact that we're all biased, the brain will shortcut your defenses if given these kind of signals, whether they're true or not. So it's a really, really hard thing to combat because like I said, it has the positive and the negative. Yeah, the main thing is time. And this is a really hard reality. It sounds so simple, you know, don't give everything too quickly. Don't get invested too quickly.

00:23:33:09 - 00:23:53:14
Dr. Abbie
And it's such a simple piece of advice, but it's so hard to do because again, we all crave connection. We want it. And the early stages of dating are uncomfortable because as soon as you start to get attached to someone, what are they doing? Who are they with? Is there any competition? Why don't they like me? Do they want to be with me?

00:23:53:14 - 00:24:18:06
Dr. Abbie
And you? You naturally want to guard your person. You don't want anyone else to have them. You don't want to think about them with anyone else. You want that security. We as humans love control. We love to know where we stand. So those early stages in the relationship, it's really tempting to want to give a lot and to want to like, okay, this is my person and make that person unavailable to other people.

00:24:18:08 - 00:24:39:07
Dr. Abbie
So we increase intimacy. We use these tactics of, you know, here's all my information. Let me get yours. We create this bond very quickly because we want to feel secure that I'm there's and they're mine. And that's so natural. It is so natural because that do they want me. Do they want someone else that competition on Saturdays.

00:24:39:07 - 00:25:15:09
Dr. Abbie
How uncomfortable. But we have to learn to be comfortable with that discomfort because it's hard in stages. Yeah. And the thing is too, it's very easy, like you said, to, lie to create a false persona. It is very easy to do so for a short amount of time. It's hard to keep it up over time. It's not impossible, but it is hard because things start to slip. Because consistency over time, that's where things start to unravel. And there are other signs we can look for over time that we do tend to miss because we have the bond. But the cues start to come out over time.

00:25:15:12 - 00:25:27:16
Dr. Abbie
But if we have bonded so quickly, we're now kind of setting ourselves up to purposely deceive ourselves because we don't want to lose this strong bond that we feel.

00:25:27:18 - 00:25:49:00
Lisa Sonni
So we kind of lie to ourselves. Yeah. Which I think that's the okay, it's bad, but it's not abuse. Yeah, we, we, we start to sort of rationalize, you know, we talk a lot about this cognitive dissonance. And I think that people miss the fact that we're kind of experiencing it within ourselves for example, I'm too smart to be or I would never be in an abusive relationship.

00:25:49:00 - 00:26:18:13
Lisa Sonni
Therefore this must not be abuse. It has to be something else. Yeah. Or maybe they didn't mean to lie. Or maybe they didn't know they were lying. Or I think he believes his own lies. You hear all of this around that concept? You know, it's interesting actually, Joe Navarro, who I know, you know, former FBI agent for those that don't, he said that one of the biggest misses that people who are victimized by people like this have with their biggest miss is that you don't know that there are people out there that will just hurt you because they can.

00:26:18:17 - 00:26:40:22
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, because they're opportunistic and predatory or exploitative. Manipulative. It's who they are. So to think, well, this person loves me. They wouldn't do that. You're missing the fact that they might do that, not that we want to obviously shift to the other side and think everybody's out to get us. But just the acceptance that people like this exist is hard to accept when you love the person, and.

00:26:40:22 - 00:27:14:09
Dr. Abbie
It's because we judge everybody by our and standard. And of course we do. We look at the lens through ourselves. So our behaviors, our belief systems, our morals, our values are the most prevalent because we judge every interaction by them. They are so core to who we are and stepping out of our own thinking. It's really hard if you're a highly religious person trying to adopt the thinking of someone from another religion, trying to adopt their religion for a day, doesn't that feel so almost repulsive to you?

00:27:14:14 - 00:27:39:04
Dr. Abbie
Because saying religion, something that's very core to who you are? To try and step out of that and imagine yourself in someone else's for the day feels uncomfortable because you think, well, how could they believe that? Because it's so core foundational to who you are. If you're someone who is very atheist to imagine viewing the world as someone from a specific religion is also just as uncomfortable because it goes against your core values.

00:27:39:07 - 00:28:02:03
Dr. Abbie
And it's a very similar thing when you're trying to judge how could they treat someone like this? Our empathy and our moral compass is so central to who we are, so stepping out of it and imagining the world from their lens. It's a very hard thing to do. Again, it's not impossible. We can do it. But it takes a lot of effort, and it actually takes a lot of practice to be able to have that.

00:28:02:03 - 00:28:27:01
Dr. Abbie
And it's called Theory of Mind, really, but it's like a really heightened theory of mind to view the world from someone else's perspective, you know, not just thinking about their thinking, which is what Theory of Mind is, but to really view the world from that perspective as hard. So when someone does this, you think, how could they? There's got to be another reason, because I would never

00:28:27:02 - 00:28:48:07
Dr. Abbie
and I was recently, taken advantage of professionally in a way that hurt me so much to the core. And I couldn't understand it. And I tried to sit back because I one of my rules that I live by is don't let anyone get you out of character. And I was starting to think, almost like I want to make them pay for the way that they hurt me.

00:28:48:07 - 00:29:00:13
Dr. Abbie
And then I'm like, that's not what I do. So let me step back and have a think about why they do that. And I remember I was speaking to a friend of mine and I was like, they did it for this. You know, maybe if I was in a position I would have done the same. And then I'm like, but I never would.

00:29:00:17 - 00:29:24:21
Dr. Abbie
And he said, no, you would never do that. And it's just like, this can see fusion of but I would never do that. And I don't get how you could, because it's so hard to imagine the world from our own thinking. And that is a lesson we all need to take of. Just because you don't understand how someone could do that doesn't mean they they wouldn't never put anything past anyone.

00:29:24:21 - 00:29:25:13
Dr. Abbie
Yeah.

00:29:25:15 - 00:29:35:10
Lisa Sonni
The disbelief. Yes. Such a roadblock for people like I just I can't get there. The amount of people that say to me, I just can't get there. I can't get to a place where I can accept that this was on purpose. And

00:29:35:10 - 00:29:50:19
Dr. Abbie
that is that is perfectly okay. And actually, if you can't get yourself into that thinking, good for you. Because that strength of character, for what you need to keep in mind is you don't need to understand that thinking to understand that they think differently.

00:29:50:21 - 00:30:09:10
Lisa Sonni
So true. It's we actually spend a lot of time trying to think about why people do what they do. And I mean, certainly I mean, my experience is in this sort of domestic violence and abusive relationships realm. And I see it and I felt it like I can't get how this person could do that. I can't change how I feel.

00:30:09:10 - 00:30:15:15
Lisa Sonni
I can't, you know, it has to be trauma. The amount of times I have thought to myself, it's got to be that his mom was

00:30:15:15 - 00:30:17:20
Dr. Abbie
mean to him. It's got to be me, right?

00:30:18:00 - 00:30:42:20
Lisa Sonni
And that's in it. It keeps you. That's the trap is that you now feel such empathy, such compassion, and responsible for this person, that they hurt you. And you're like, not literally, of course, but metaphorically. It gives me more. Yeah, I'll take more. I'll love you through this. Yeah. Meanwhile, you are being deceived intentionally. Every time you try to leave, they'll make all these false promises and they don't feel bad about it.

00:30:42:23 - 00:31:01:07
Lisa Sonni
There's actually, a self-aware narcissist. His screen name is Mental Healness, Lee hammock. He once said that they will say whatever they need to say in the moment. Yeah. And to his point, he was like, I don't know, sometimes I meant it, but if I don't mean it five minutes later, I didn't lie. I changed my mind. Yeah, that's that's his thinking.

00:31:01:13 - 00:31:14:11
Lisa Sonni
And I was like, it's so easy how they can just shift and rationalize to themselves that they're not lying. And I want to point out that's not an example of them believing their own lies. It's rationalizing that they were never lying to begin with. Know which is worse, I think.

00:31:14:11 - 00:31:40:09
Dr. Abbie
And we love to rationalize other people's behaviors, too, because we love cognitive closure. Now, cognitive closure is why did it happen? Why did this happen to me? We love that closure. We think we need closure to heal. And you hear all the time about getting closure because not having it is so deeply uncomfortable. So when we don't understand someone's behavior, we go, well, it could have been this, or it could have been this, or it could have been this.

00:31:40:12 - 00:32:02:06
Dr. Abbie
We rationalize, we make excuses, we try and get that closure for them, and then we can create that sympathy. And actually what we need to do is step back and say, you know what, it's okay that I don't know why. And the closure is the pain. I feel the closure is what's happened to my life. The closure is my lack of self esteem.

00:32:02:08 - 00:32:21:05
Dr. Abbie
I don't need to understand why they did what they did because in seeking answers, often all we're doing is perpetuating the cycle. Often we don't really care about the answers. Are we using that as a self-deception of, “'m just trying to get closure. I'm just trying to understand.” And actually, it's because you don't want to leave the person.

00:32:21:08 - 00:32:48:11
Dr. Abbie
And often what we see, too, is they diminish our self esteem. They tear apart our self view, our self-perception. So one of the saddest things I hear, but so common, is what if I never find love? What if I'm never loved again? Because your self view is so small and so belittled that it's like if this person leaves me and usually they're telling you things like, if you if I leave, you'll never find someone like me.

00:32:48:14 - 00:33:02:14
Dr. Abbie
I was in a, a very toxic relationship many years ago, and he would actively remind me that if I ever left him, I'd never find someone as good as him. And then when you leave, what you realize is, actually, I don't want to find anyone like you.

00:33:02:18 - 00:33:28:13
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. Thank goodness I felt that, too. Like you'll never find anyone like me again. And I'm like, thank goodness now. But at the time, it was like, what if that's true? Some people also talk about what if I never find that feeling again? That type of love. And to me, I know this is majorly oversimplified, but you don't want that kind of sweeping, romantic feeling that you just can't even explain that you're like, lost in love.

00:33:28:13 - 00:33:31:20
Lisa Sonni
Yeah, that's not the goal. Let me think. Security is,

00:33:31:20 - 00:33:50:11
Dr. Abbie
like grown up to believe that it is. And I'm a huge romantic at heart, and I think I have a tattoo on my leg that is a lady with a heart for a head, and I kind of have that to remind myself of those feelings, that my heart is a hopeless romantic, but my brain knows better. And even when you know better, I'm still human.

00:33:50:11 - 00:34:16:20
Dr. Abbie
My emotions will still take over my brain. And it's kind of that reminder to me of those feeling things that feel amazing because it's dopamine and reward. And actually, what happens to when we have that up? Down is we have both the stress hormone cortisol making our nervous system go overactive, and we have dopamine. So we have a really intense stress response going up and down, as well as pleasure going up and down.

00:34:16:22 - 00:34:37:11
Dr. Abbie
And it's hooked like a drug. Our body craves it like a drug. But this feeling of why do I just feel like I need this person, I love them, it's overwhelming. They are everything to me. My body craves and my mind craves and everything. That overwhelming feeling is kind of what we led to believe of the one true love.

00:34:37:11 - 00:35:04:10
Dr. Abbie
And you know what we see in Disney movies and that feeling is is a very dangerous feeling. It is not stable. It is not a stable relationship. Doesn't mean that if you have that feeling, it's necessarily bad. It can be wonderful if the relationship is healthy, but it can trigger us. Yes, and that's the problem. You have to be aware that your emotions lie to you because our emotions feel like they tell the truth,

00:35:04:12 - 00:35:12:08
Dr. Abbie
but this person feels like the one. And you can't just kind of explain why, because biologically you're addicted to them. Right?

00:35:12:11 - 00:35:14:16
Lisa Sonni
Yeah. And I say trauma bonds mimic.

00:35:14:20 - 00:35:15:05
Dr. Abbie
Yes.

00:35:15:05 - 00:35:16:08
Lisa Sonni
They do not. Lie.

00:35:16:08 - 00:35:16:22
Dr. Abbie
Absolutely.

00:35:16:22 - 00:35:37:09
Lisa Sonni
It's based on hope and fear and betrayal, but hope and fear. And it feels like love and it's so confusing to sort of associate pain with attachment and safety. Somehow you feel like this is the only person that could ever make you feel better, even though they're the ones that you're seeking to feel better from. Yes, it's the most confusing thing in the world.

00:35:37:14 - 00:35:58:06
Lisa Sonni
But I see this trend over the last few years of men's dating coaches and teaching a lot of the tactics that I feel like you're talking about and frankly, probably teaching the police and law enforcement. Do you have a take on the teaching, manipulation, teaching negging teaching this? who are these men? I don't mean their names, but what kind of people are they, do you think?

00:35:58:11 - 00:36:33:02
Dr. Abbie
Well, my take is that it is truly disgusting. I teach the same tactics. And if I decided, you know what? I don't care about people anymore. I can make a lot of money. I can make a lot of money because they work. They work really well. And if your goal is to get what you want from people, don't care about the consequences to them, those tactics, they work amazingly. And the kind of people that teach them, very ego driven because it makes me look really good to get what I want,

00:36:33:02 - 00:36:53:10
Dr. Abbie
makes me look really good for everybody to say yes to me for me to have all these girls and this money and these cars. And it's the same tactic you can use in business to make a lot of money. And that's why you, you often see people who are very highly manipulative are also great in business because it's the same tactics.

00:36:53:10 - 00:37:09:18
Dr. Abbie
If I want to make a sale and get you to buy, what I'm selling is very similar tactics, then if I want you to believe what I'm saying about where I was last night, or I want to make you feel really good about yourself so that you become attached to me, says all about that understanding human decision making.

00:37:09:22 - 00:37:40:01
Dr. Abbie
So you do see them kind of get these accolades, and then it also adds to their image, oh, look how successful I am. Look how great. And that's how much everybody wants me. Look how much everybody wants to be around me. And it makes them more appealing. So they kind of build this armor of things of why I'm the big dog. And, you know, you see, like the alpha and, you know, maybe they play on what we crave, which is safety and protection and love and belonging and vulnerability.

00:37:40:01 - 00:37:58:20
Dr. Abbie
They can play on all those things and often they're very highly successful people. They have a lot of money because they have access to resources that can help them along the way. And they know that resources, if someone has money, they can provide you safety. That's a really appealing thing because it makes you feel like, okay, well, I have some protection here.

00:37:58:23 - 00:38:23:16
Dr. Abbie
So utilize all these things. I don't ever promote the use of tactics to harm people because it is a very short term strategy. If you want healthy, long term relationships and work for the long term, not in the same way, right? So those strategies I teach them for interviewing, but I teach them slightly differently. So, you know, you play on emotions, I play on trust.

00:38:23:16 - 00:38:45:00
Dr. Abbie
But your intention isn't to harm them. It's to understand, you know, and eventually do the right thing. And it's to build cooperation and it's to utilize kind of pro-social engineering, making them want to give you information, making them want to do the right thing rather than making them feel so scared. They feel like they have no other choice than to do so.

00:38:45:04 - 00:39:04:00
Dr. Abbie
And that's the negative use of them. They make you feel like instead of you want to help, you have do you have to do this, that you're so fear driven and that is a really, really horrible place to be when you're on the other side of it. And when you interact with a narcissist for a long enough time, it doesn't ever feel good.

00:39:04:02 - 00:39:26:21
Dr. Abbie
You don't very feel a little bit. It feels great at the beginning when they're validating you. But give it a couple months and you don't feel good, but you feel attached and you can see people fade away. Yes. And they play on that. And I, they need that. I think that teaching it to harm people should be kind of crime.

00:39:27:00 - 00:39:45:07
Lisa Sonni
I think a lot of things should be a crime that aren't a crime. But I actually agree with that. I it baffles me that there are accounts that stay up and you look at guys like fresh and fit. I'm glad they got demonetized. Yeah all honesty but it's not enough you know, because you just move. Platforms are still out there, still a podcast somewhere, I'm sure.

00:39:45:12 - 00:39:56:18
Lisa Sonni
But it's it's infuriating that this is just fine. Like, hey, if you fall for it, that's your problem. It says something much bigger, which is probably a whole separate topic of about society and how we just don't care that this happens.

00:39:56:18 - 00:40:14:07
Dr. Abbie
It is a hard thing to control though, because although we have safeguarding, we also have free speech and it is a very difficult thing to say, okay, you can say this, but you can only say it this way, right? And it's a very hard thing to manage because of those reasons. And then, okay, well how do we say their intention was one thing?

00:40:14:07 - 00:40:25:23
Dr. Abbie
Because if they say do it to harm people, very clear intention, but that's. Not their. Safety. Yeah, they very rarely say use this to create psychological harm in another person. They fluff

00:40:25:23 - 00:40:30:05
Lisa Sonni
it out. Oh it's to get her. Yeah. Which to win. No, she's just trying to few.

00:40:30:05 - 00:40:55:11
Dr. Abbie
And it's great. Yeah I have a great relationship. They fluff it out but it's to to monitor that and criminalize it is a very very difficult thing to do. So the best way we can protect people is teaching them psychology and teaching them more than anything, self esteem. Yes, because if you have strong self esteem, if you have a strong sense of self, you already have barriers up.

00:40:55:11 - 00:41:17:09
Dr. Abbie
So when someone tries to bring them down, you have that red flag of this doesn't feel like me, I don't want this for myself. So instead of I mean, although I would love to say we could criminalize teaching that it's just I it's impossible wish. But it's such an impossible mission for right now. So what we can do is give women the tools to understand and their own thinking.

00:41:17:09 - 00:41:42:08
Dr. Abbie
And that's really what we should be pushing and mean, should be pushing for both as much as we can. But again, realistically helping women grow their self-esteem and self-awareness. And that's much more attainable. Exactly. Way more attainable. And having these conversations because there's so much shame. People feel shame. Her saying fall for it, but saying I fell for it helps other people understand how not to fall for it.

00:41:42:10 - 00:41:58:12
Lisa Sonni
Fundamentally, you know, I think that's what drove me to talk about my own experience online was there were a trust me, there were many people in the comment sections, men and women that were like I would never admit what you're admitting. I would never admit that I was lied to. But for me, like that, shame isn't mine.

00:41:58:12 - 00:42:17:21
Lisa Sonni
That's his shame. Now, do I think he's a good enough person to feel shame? No, I think he feels no shame. But I'm not going to feel the shame of having been lied to when I'm a human. And it is a very human thing to believe somebody who says that they love you and almost always behaves as if they love you, and then you're.

00:42:18:02 - 00:42:38:22
Lisa Sonni
I realize the sort of scale of the intermittent reinforcement changes over time, and some people don't get much kindness at all, but it's different for everyone. But we get attached. It's too late by the time you realize. And so I don't feel stupid, I really don't. I know that I did, but I genuinely don't feel stupid for what happened to me anymore.

00:42:38:22 - 00:43:05:03
Lisa Sonni
And I want women to feel that as well, because liars are everywhere. Men's dating coaches are now teaching kids, right, but people know it from media and movies and books and all kinds of things. It's everywhere. So your advice of just sort of slow down, take time, know that these kind of people exist, know that there are people who are very deceptive that matters. Yeah. And just kind of take a breath and really feel what you need to feel.

00:43:05:03 - 00:43:11:15
Lisa Sonni
Slow down so that you can even take a moment to recognize that you feel uncomfortable with something. Completely

00:43:11:15 - 00:43:31:17
Dr. Abbie
and if we remove that shame, it will be so helpful to have these conversations, because a lot of the time when we're telling our friends, we hide things. I have been guilty of this. We all have. You're telling your friends things about your partner, and they've done and said that you don't tell them everything, and it's because you know that either.

00:43:31:17 - 00:43:54:12
Dr. Abbie
It's the shame you don't want to say because of how it reflects on you, or because what they'll say about it. And you don't want to have to do the hard thing and walk away as soon as you get that feeling of not wanting to tell people something, that is when you have to fight every instinct to push it down and tell them, because that I want to hide it. That is shame driven, that is self-deception driven, that is denial driven.

00:43:54:12 - 00:44:21:16
Dr. Abbie
Everything in your body is saying, don't tell them. Don't tell them because you want to cling to this idea of love. When you have that feeling, that is when you need to tell them. When you don't want to. You have to because in that is usually the key of why you need to leave. But to do that, we need to have these conversations because shame is so, so deep and it is such a barrier to these conversations.

00:44:21:20 - 00:44:47:11
Dr. Abbie
And like you said, when people say, I would never tell that, I'd be too embarrassed. That's your problem. But that's more unhealed because actually I'm okay to live in my embarrassment. So when I published my first book, Work in Progress, there are things in that book that make me so embarrassed because I had so much shame to work through the things I had done, and I'm teaching people to work through your shame and be honest with yourself and honest with others,

00:44:47:16 - 00:45:01:17
Dr. Abbie
and then with things I hadn't put in there that I was like, oh God, but if I'm honest, I have to put them in and I didn't want people to know them about me. I don't want people to know them about me, but I purposely put them in there because I'm like, I have to practice what I preach.

00:45:01:22 - 00:45:22:01
Dr. Abbie
And although I don't feel shame for them, I feel embarrassed because they don't represent who I am as a person. They don't represent my life now, the person I want to be, the person that I am. But I did those things. They were me. So now when people say they've read my book, I feel embarrassed and I feel it immediately. Oh yeah, I know something

00:45:22:02 - 00:45:51:02
Dr. Abbie
about. Don't bring it out, but I don't feel shame. And that's also the hard reality that we need to have of. We can't escape what we've done, but we can escape how we feel about it. We can change how we feel about it. And that is being open and talking about it. And we have we need to have these conversations so that other people feel that door open to say, well, I kind of did the same thing or I feel this way and those strangers shaming you on the internet, they're the ones with the most shame.

00:45:51:02 - 00:46:10:17
Dr. Abbie
They're the ones that are unhealed, and they're the ones that just want to cause other people pain because they don't feel good about their own life. And think about it, too. Have you ever met someone that is really, really happy and genuinely wonderful that tries to make other people feel bad about their lives? Oh no. That's something that people do when they don't feel good about their life.

00:46:10:17 - 00:46:26:19
Dr. Abbie
So when you have someone say that instead of reflecting on you, just saying, I feel sorry for you, that must be such an uncomfortable way to live, to be so uncomfortable with your own emotions. You won't admit to your own shame. And when you reflect it like that, those negative comments, you remove that shame of yourself.

00:46:27:00 - 00:46:41:23
Lisa Sonni
Yes, I totally agree. I know, I mean, I haven't written, I've written books, but workbooks and journals, but I haven't written a book like I Tell All or admitting things I've done that have made a lot of videos on it, and I've told a lot of stories about things that I've done and things that I've tolerated or put up with.

00:46:42:04 - 00:46:58:23
Lisa Sonni
Like I once asked my abusers mistress to let me have him. I don't know if there's anything in my life that I would ever be, even in the future. More embarrassed by than that is. I have no words. I can't even see. I can't even look at myself in the mirror. It made so much sense at the time. Yeah. Oh

00:46:58:23 - 00:47:30:18
Lisa Sonni
my God. And that's embarrassing. And I say, I've said that story a couple of times online, and every time I say it, I'm like, I really want to say that. But yeah. That's how how much someone who is deceiving you, yeah, can really destroy you. That is how much you can change. Yeah. And I was a person who was known for being very assertive at work professionally, very successful, made great money, senior executive. And it didn't make sense to anybody who knew me that I would be that at home, that I would, that it's so.

00:47:30:21 - 00:47:40:22
Lisa Sonni
But that's how much this destroys you. So for those that think it could never be me, then that cocky attitude might lead you exactly where you don't want to go. Exactly. It can happen to anyone.

00:47:40:22 - 00:48:10:04
Dr. Abbie
And when we have that loss of self-perception and we go through phases where we do lose ourselves, but often we have a mast on the outside of I'm still this really grounded, strong person, even though we don't feel it. So we keep that persona up like a mask, and inside we feel lost. And that's when we don't have that sense of self to connect with, of you do things that aren't you, that don't correlate with what you would do now because you have lost yourself that to other people.

00:48:10:05 - 00:48:24:11
Dr. Abbie
She's still fine. She's strong, she's nice because you're wearing that mask. It's okay to go through those periods when you lose yourself and then looking back, you're like, how did I ever do that? Because you weren't really connected with who you are now. That's okay.

00:48:24:14 - 00:48:32:19
Lisa Sonni
That's it. You can learn, you can grow, you can change. I mean, I think we're two examples of people who've put that to those chapters of our lives behind us.

00:48:32:22 - 00:48:50:15
Dr. Abbie
But also it's it's okay to realize, too, that in the future I'm probably going to do things that I look back on again and go on. Maybe I'm doing something now that my growth later on will go. I wish I never did that. That's okay. That's why I call my book Work in Progress. Because there's never a point where you're done.

00:48:50:18 - 00:49:05:13
Dr. Abbie
There's never a point where you're perfect, but always growing and changing. And with that comes a little embarrassment. The things you do as you grow into a different version of yourself, that's fine. That's really, really healthy. And that is nothing to be ashamed of.

00:49:05:15 - 00:49:18:13
Lisa Sonni
I love that. Thank you so much for being on the podcast. I really appreciate it. I'm going to link everything where people can reach you and watch your content, get your books in the caption and in the description. But thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate it.

00:49:18:15 - 00:49:20:19
Dr. Abbie
Thank you so much for having me.

00:49:20:21 - 00:49:30:08
Lisa Sonni
If this episode gave you clarity. Share it with someone who needs it. Thanks for being here and for being honest with yourself. And remember, you're stronger than before.

00:49:30:10 - 00:49:34:13
Music
Stronger than before.