How to handle toxic people and their traps
Toxic people
How to handle toxic people and their traps? The most common people ask their counselors, teachers, parents, and leaders. Yet very little is known about the subject.
Most of you even don’t know what these toxic people are and how to identify them. This post will tell you about them and their traps and how to handle them and avoid pitfalls.
Toxic people are those people who suck your soul out and make you feel bad about yourself to feel good about themselves. These are people who are the real nightmares for those who are not toxic themselves.
How to Identify them
Identifying toxic people is not easy because they manage themselves so intelligently that sometimes you wonder why the hell you are living with such psycho or sociopaths next doors.
This list is lengthy, but I will mention just a few that literally and metaphorically sucks your soul if you didn’t do what it takes to handle them with emotional and social intelligence.
Here we go in order of intensity and a ladder to the next level:
The Narcissists
You may know or don’t know about these centers of attention creatures in constant search for admiration, selfishness, and victims of their torture if not physically, then psychologically.
The Paranoids
The real nightmare for anyone close either physically, emotionally, or socially; they don’t trust anyone. In reality, the paranoids don’t trust themselves either; doing anything for them is like banging your head with the wall.
You can’t win their trust no matter you kill yourself for them; they will not trust you because they don’t know themselves first. So, any sacrifice is in any form is useless for these people to get their attention or support, love, or anything else you want in return.
The Antisocial
The narcissists and paranoids, along with apaths, if not handled, they show their real face behind the mask of antisocial behavior.
Be it a Nero or Maselena, the emperor or queen of the Roman Empire, Gengez of the Mongolian empire, Hitler the German Empire, General Daire of Britain empire, Bush of the American Empire, Albaghdadi of ISIS, they all just the notorious manifestations of these antisocial behaviors men and women.
However, with the same spirit and souls, they are present in every nation and every country. They have no guilt or shame, sorrow, or regret for their victims. They can blow up factories with fire, kill people with suicide bombing, torture, rape, and slaughter just for fun.
The Apaths
Maybe I am the first person who has coined this term. Because online dictionaries and grammar checking software doesn’t recognize this term, if this is the case, then let me define this too; I call apath or collectively apaths to those individuals who have silenced their conscience about social apathy.
They feel nothing about other individuals; they are numb to other concerns, issues, and problems. They are living stones, in my opinion, because they don’t show anything about anyone except themselves.
They call everything in their universal motto; ”it’s not my problem.” They don’t take responsibility for their social apathy or psychological aloofness. They consider anyone as a threat that comes in their way to satisfy their sinister and nasty wishes.
They have all the characteristics of the Narcissists, paranoids, and antisocials. They have this added flavor of apathy in them, too, making them more destructive and dangerous among previous types of toxic people.
Although there is nothing mentioned in Psychology textbooks worldwide about apaths, psychopaths and sociopaths are common themes of toxic people in popular psychology, self-help literature, entertainment, and mass communication platforms.
In my opinion, apaths can be classified further into two categories: psychopaths and sociopaths.
The psychopaths
The psychopaths are those with emotional and psychological apathy towards others in secret, hidden, mysterious, and covertly manner; you can call these people slightly lean towards introversion in nature.
All serial killers, rapists, slaughterers, and suicide bombers are in this category of apaths. They have all the characteristics of all the above toxic people.
The sociopaths
These are the opposites of psychopaths. They are those people with social apathy towards others in an overt, open, judgemental, objectionable manner. You can call them extrovert.
Most politicians, religious leaders, gangsters, and governmental agencies and their public outlets can be classified in this category; they have all the above toxic people’s characteristics.
The Mr/s perfect
These people know that they can fool all the world all the time. They think that they can implement the one world order, one language, culture, consumer, power, and empire. All the dictators, tyrants, emperors, kings, state representatives, ministers, presidents, and revolutionary leaders fit in these categories.
They represent the rare case for these toxic people; that’s why one wisest resistance leader told his followers that friendship or relationship with the government is a ride on the wild beast.
You don’t know when they will change their minds. They are apaths, but they have worked to stay themselves up the ladder in toxicity and destructiveness. They have the power to destroy nations, races, or entire populations of states.
These are certain types of toxic people; if you find anything or any behavior resembling these, you should seek help and try to change your ways before it is too late to recover emotionally, psychologically, and socially.
Now it’s time to think about their traps and start to avoid them.
Their traps and how to avoid them
The list here is too lengthy, but I try to cover only those who are the most common and which have the potential to destroy your inner peace.
Guilt
The most powerful yet the most destructive weapon in the hands of toxic people is guilt. They will convince you that you and your past are the roots of all evils.
And needless to say that neither you can destroy yourself either physically, psychologically, and socially nor can you change your past.
History is a great teacher; it teaches us about the traps of toxic people either applying this individually to individuals or applying it to masses.
The guilt force you to abandon your past physically by compensating with immature changes to your physical appearances. You unconsciously try to copy the toxic people to look like them, talk, eat, sleep, and enjoy them.
This doesn’t work in a broader context because you can be a copycat and living original life simultaneously, either individually or collectively, as a nation.
How to avoid this trap?
Remember, always your past and history. What you are today just because of your past and history. Never let anyone decide to change it or interpret it, not align with your values and social expectations and reality.
Your past is precious because it makes you, you. You can look up to anyone in their eyes because of your past. You have heroes, villains, tremendous and worst people in your history to look to.
Your language and culture are of value because it makes your social unit. You love and hate in your appropriate cultural ways. You eat, drink, and sing in your language and cultural frameworks so, you must invest time and energy to seek and understand everything.
If you know your history, lessons you learned, and the future dreams and inspirations, no one, including these toxic people, can steal your happiness by guilt or any other trap you will read next.
Shame
When they try again and again and fail to trap you in guilt, they flip the coin, and now they try shaming you personally as a person and society as a society or member of society as a whole. They want you to bend your knees and kneel to them and accept their superiority.
They can expose your inner and private life in public. They can bully you in your workplace, cyberbully, you on online platforms in social media too. They need you to beg them for mercy.
How to avoid this trap?
Don’t play in their mind games; instead, devise your ground and play with your own game rules. Never give them the satisfaction to see you in misery. Stand still, with neck high, head up and looking into the eyes of those in human people and fight back with legal actions.
National and international legal systems. Never think that you are alone; countless people love, care, and support you, so tap into your out of your comfort zone and see the magic happening for you and others.
Never use the same tactics of toxic people because you chose not to be like them. Silence in the face of violence and illegal and unethical individuals, groups, and governments is a crime against humanity.
Take courage with you, fight back, and don’t terrify by the blurring effects of psychological shocks and traumas. Remember, this time shall pass. You are not the first one, and you will not be the last one either. Be a role model and live your life without shame imposed on you by toxic people.
Emotional blackmailing
When they try and fail to use the guilt and shame card against you, they now use the multifacet approach of emotional blackmailing.
They use your emotions against you. They try to misuse your fears, dreams, passions, profession, professionals, and legal or social systems to blackmail you.
They can use your family and friends to suffer you physically, emotionally, socially, financially, and psychologically.
How to avoid this trap?
Don’t lose hope. Stay connected with your emotions, and never share it with those who can use it against you. Trust only the trustworthy. Tell only those about your fears and dreams who share with you theirs first.
Disclosure with the untrustful is given a weapon to your enemy to destroy you. Avoid it at all costs. The toxic people are always in search of secrets of your weaknesses and fears and doubts.
Seek help from professional counselors; they can help you in this regard and consult legal and law and order systems and local, national, or international bodies who can help you to recover your damages.
Happiness highjack
Whenever you are happy, you will find these people trying to highjack you with comment, criticism, gossips, backbiting, or taking actions to snatch it from your hands. I am speaking about, both individually and socially.
How to avoid this trap?
Never give anyone permission to destroy your happiness. Never comment back, never try to play their game with their rules. Just stay happy, and your joy will punish them more than any other action.
Smile theft
Whenever you are smiling, their first question will be, why are you smiling. When you tell them a reason, they will start criticizing it, and you will stop laughing.
How to avoid this trap?
Remember what the great French writer Voltaire said. I am happy because it is good for my health. So, it is suitable for your health to keep smiling in every situation. It can make miracles happen.
Soul sucking
I have taken this term from The Harry Potter book of J K Rowlings, where a wizard would suck souls of ghosts. I used this for a purpose, have you ever seen a person who enters a room or in a social gathering, and everyone keeps their mouth shut just for fear of being disgraced.
I am talking about this person. They surround themselves with all the negativity, and it disturbs all the balance of friendly and positive energy levels in the room or the gatherings.
How to avoid this trap?
You have two choices, chose anyone wisely first leave the place immediately or stand with your positive energy while supporting all others, which can be a target. Stay safe with your supporting members of the group, and don’t start an argument, but if it starts to finish it with your own rules.
Gold digging
The gold-diggers are everywhere; they find everywhere gold only. For them, friendships, relationships, and companionship are just bookish concepts. They are just friends with benefits; they will use hit and run strategy. The moment they find gold, you will not see them by your side.
How to avoid this trap?
Never allow them to dig gold out of your resources. Keep everything safe, your wealth statements, resources, income channels, and business secrets. Never brag about your money.
These people only target those where they find gold. While keeping your gold metaphorically safe, you are kicking them out of your sight and mind.
Never invest your money and time in those who don’t do so in return.
Energy drainers
They are the real nightmares if you find one run with a marathon speed. They can destroy everything if you permit them to come into your life. They dilute everything you are up to; their emotional outbursts, blood, sweat, and tears are just a trap.
They want to play a victim game with you. They will complain about everything and everybody. It doesn’t matter what you want to say or do to them; that will be not enough. At the time, they will be control freaks, and at times they will take the role of totally dependent.
How to avoid this trap?
The moment you identify the energy drainer, your sensor of sensitivity is activated. To stay yourself safe, you must seek others’ support to detach from these toxic people.
Don’t be their doctor, nurse, counselor, friend, spouse, partner, or colleague. Let them find other people for their mind games. You are responsible for yourself first, then other people.
Conclusion
This was all about the toxic people and how you can avoid their traps. What do you think about them and their traps? Let me know in the comments below.
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