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Emotional Blackmail & Emotional Freedom
End Manipulation and Compliance © Martyn Carruthers

Click HERE to make an appointment!

I wrote this as a guide for people who are entangled in the difficult relationships and painful emotions often called emotional blackmail. We help people untangle their lives and find emotional freedom.

Do people speak badly of you?

Emotional blackmail is abuse. Like other forms of abuse, it seems to be motivated by a desire to manipulate or control, often by people who claim good intentions. Some victims of emotional abuse may perceive their abuse as normal, although all forms of emotional abuse have heavy consequences. We help people understand emotional abuse, protect themselves from emotional blackmail and ... recognize when they are abusing others.

People who abuse others may be unable to enjoy a healthy family!

Emotional blackmail includes excessive demands, punishment for normal behavior, unwanted displays of attachment (love) and withholding affection or care. The damage caused by this emotional abuse often manifests as dysfunctional relationship habits and suffering. We help people to gain emotional freedom and develop emotional maturity.

Like covert emotional incest, emotional blackmail often indicates dependence by people obsessed with power. Most often, the real victims of this abuse are children. If you have had enough of this, let's work together to end the craziness and regain freedom and dignity! Let's start with your family.

Mother's Boys . Father-Daughter Bonds . Parental Alienation

Where are you Now?

I composed a simple table of partnership behavior in 2003, then realized that these behaviors also apply to many other relationships, such as relationships with friends, relatives, family, neighbors etc.

Healthy Relationship Relationship in Crisis
People show appreciation and gratitude to each other One or both are often dissociated, irritated, depressed or critical
People respond to most verbal and nonverbal communications One or both ignore, avoid or shorten most communications
People review events in their history They rarely review their relationship history
People greet after time apart and ask about each other's activities and other news They rarely interact when together, without even silent intimacy
People enjoy meeting each other's needs for passion, intimacy and commitment One or both often ignore or even criticize the other's goals and needs
People discuss goals and dreams, finding shared values and creating shared meanings. They rarely discuss goals, values or dreams
People share meals and chores together They often cook, eat or do chores alone
People often go out together They generally prefer to go out alone
People create projects which require committed cooperation One or both often avoid, ignore or give small attention to shared projects
People wish to enjoy sharing relationship happiness One or both want to separate but cannot because of guilt, fear or constraints
They respect most of each other's choices and decisions, and politely discuss differences One or both show contempt for the other's decisions and make angry demands
People want happiness together One or both prefer happiness alone

What is Emotional Blackmail?

Emotional blackmail are attempts to influence or control by manipulating emotions. Emotional blackmail often follows a cycle of Demands - Resistance - Pressure - Threats - Compliance - Repetition.

  • You feel dominated - your life feels controlled
  • You feel intimidated by unreasonable demands
  • You are attacked with words, laughter or threats
  • You feel manipulated by guilt, fear or compassion

Most emotional blackmailers want power. Blackmailers are often anxious and insecure - they may believe that they can relieve their frustrations by controlling other people, especially during a crisis such as separation or divorce, loss of a job, illness or retirement. It seems that many blackmailers were overprotected and did not develop confidence in their own abilities.

Preventing or ending emotional blackmail requires active participation, although some people may feel that they cannot resist a blackmailer's pressure. We can help motivated adults who :

  • want peace at all costs
  • fear the blackmailer's anger
  • need the blackmailer's approval
  • endlessly doubt or criticize themselves
  • blame themselves for other people's emotions

Consequences of Emotional Blackmail on Children

Emotional blackmail, extended criticism or contempt can have severe consequences, especially for children. Victims often become silent, watchful, shy, preoccupied, uneasy and lonely. They may later respond with aggression and anger to people who attempt to be friendly. Such children may be diagnosed as having attachment disorders. They can no longer recognize kindness.

Adults who fixate on their parents may be unable to maintain healthy partnerships

We help people find solutions. Some signs are:

  • people feel inadequate
  • people feel inferior or unappealing
  • people avoid interpersonal contacts
  • people fear criticism, disapproval or rejection
  • people feel upset about ANY critical evaluation

Abusive Victims

Abusers often justify their emotional blackmail with fear - abusers are often afraid to lose something important (material or immaterial) that their victims provide. This includes the loss of a home, access to money, the loss of credibility, the loss of a partner, sexual intimacy and the loss of parenting opportunities, etc. Most people who resort to emotional blackmail fear losing some sort of power.

To gain coercion, compliance and dominance, abusers may:

  1. Act like victims
  2. Make angry threats
  3. Install limiting beliefs
  4. Block the victim's goals
  5. Disguise abuse as humor
  6. Withhold essential information
  7. Forget promises or agreements
  8. Contradict their victim's perspectives
  9. Invalidate their victim's reality and perceptions
  10. Trivialize their victims thoughts and achievements

Abusers can come from any background - most seem to learn to abuse by watching their parents. Some abusers are helping professionals such as doctors, therapists and healers. (See therapist-client codependence). We can help people resolve most forms of abuse.

Common Emotional Blackmail

  • Goals (You must help me fulfill my important goals)
  • Guilt (I sacrificed my life for you ... so you must do whatever I tell you.)
  • Dependent / Codependent (I cannot cope without you so you must do as I say.)
  • Shared psychosis (We are united against the world / You are my one and only true love)
  • Punish (You must follow my principles, beliefs, religion or instructions - or I will punish you)

Victim Paradox

We note that victims often have more power than victimizers. A resourceful person, by acting resourceless, can manipulate entire families, teams or communities. Members of a family, team or community may not know who are real victims. Squeaking wheels often get more grease.

A common symptom associated with abuse and emotional blackmail is chronic anger. A person (usually a child or a junior member of an organization) may identify with a victim and express intense and chronic anger to the victimizer, often explosively and inappropriately. This anger may be extended and projected (transferred) onto people who remind the victim-identified person of the victimizer.

Emotional Freedom

Emotional blackmail is manipulation - and the blackmailers (often relatives) may threaten to punish you for resisting their control. Emotional blackmailers often know your vulnerabilities and your secrets, and they use this knowledge to gain your compliance. We help motivated adults deal with many unpleasant consequences of emotional blackmail and find emotional freedom.

Click HERE to make an appointment!

Plagiarism is theft. Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 2003-2010 All rights reserved


Training Centers
Hawaii

England 
Europe

 
SOLUTIONS for Emotional and Relationship Problems

Hawaii, USA: Dragonfly, PO Box 675, Honaunau, Hawaii, 96726 USA
London: YogaAnanda
46 Albert Road North, Reigate, Surrey RH2 9EL, UK
Europe
: Centar Angel, Trnsko 13A, 10020 Zagreb, Croatia

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Good Questions

Good Answers

Training

1. Where are you now? Assess relationship bonds and entanglements Systems 1
2. What are your life goals?  Identify your life goals ... and what blocks you Systems 2
3. How to reach your goals?  Use your conscious and unconscious resources Systems 3
4. What stops you?  Dissolve abuse and trauma to rebuild motivation Systems 4
5. What else stops you? Change your limiting beliefs to end dependence Systems 5
6. What else stops you? Resolve identity loss to recover qualities and skills Systems 6
7. What else stops you? Heal mentor damage and find quality mentorship Systems 7
8. What about your partnership? Build happy partnership (or separate peacefully) Systems 8
9. What about your children? We coach parents to resolve family problems Systems 9
10. What about your success? We coach team leaders and teams ... together Systems 10
11. What about your community? We coach community leaders and communities Systems 11
12. What about complex goals? Specialty coaching & training for unusual goals Specialty

Plagiarism is theft. Copyright © Martyn Carruthers 1996-2010 All rights reserved. Soulwork Systemic Coaching was primarily developed by Martyn Carruthers. We help people define and achieve goals, resolve emotional blocks and improve relationships. This information is for general knowledge only. Consult a physician about medical conditions and before changing any medical treatment. Don't steal ... ask Martyn for permission to post or publish his work.