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October 16, 2019,
There are many clubs that we would love to be a member of and place their names on our resumes.
The more elite, the better.
The more exclusive, even better.
The harder to get in to, sublime.
One club that many of us have been a part of and possibly in the middle of right now, as we write and you read, is one that we would never put on a resume and except for rare circumstances, do not want to speak of it to others about.
Except to help prevent them and others from joining this non-exclusive club.
It is not something to be proud of and yet so many of us have been a private member, often with one on one customer service and most hopefully short-term.
It is the club of those who been deceived.
That is one of our life stories we really don’t want to talk about. Why?
Can we be direct?
At least in our case, because it makes us feel stupid. We know other people who would have never fallen in the same trap that we have.
We will start with a personal story of someone we knew in our circle who we’ll call Beth, a younger woman, who was very close friends with Pauline.
Or so she thought.
In our opinion, having a much older friend right from the beginning places you at a disadvantage if they are a quietly treacherous person.
Why?
Because they have way too much experience on you.
Beth came from a troubled well-off family where her parents clearly loved her more cooperative sister more, even paying for her sister’s college education and not Beth’s.
Beth would eventually pay for own her college education.
This, along with other antagonistic behavior from her parents, who felt in part because of their wealth that most should be obedient to them, led to Beth to eventually being clinically diagnosed with low self-esteem.
What is one of the signs of low self-esteem according the therapist’s actual report on Beth?
An eagerness to please. In their friendships they are willing to give 80 percent and receive 20 percent in return and are happy with it.
They’ll do anything to have a real friend.
In Beth’s case what was another sign?
A penchant for remaining loyal to those who, from the outside looking in, don’t seem to deserve it.
As an example, did you realize that loyalty to a bank, insurance company or even hotel for example can be a sign of low self-esteem, especially when you receive more attractive discount offers from other companies that you turn down because you are loyal to the company you want to build a relationship with.
Why?
People with higher self-esteem do not need such reciprocal reassurances that you are in a relationship with the hope that organization will treat you special.
What Beth would eventually find out is that most companies, like the ones described above, are only loyal to you as long as you are and have what they need. The moment that they don’t need you, as they do with their own employees, they will drop you.
How long you’ve been with them is irrelevant.
In Beth’s case when she lost her job, she tried applying for a job with some of the companies that she had this supposed long-term relationship with. How did she fare with at least three that she applied for, even mentioning that she had been a customer for over 20 years?
None of them hired her.
In the case of her so called close friend Pauline, the older mentor would eventually contribute to her temporary financial ruin by placing Beth in mortgage loans that gave her a higher commission while Beth would pay a steep price for staying in those loans.
Pauline even had the gall to place Beth in two loans on one property to secure two commissions. That would be a 30 year disaster for Beth. What saved her from that debacle is that another employee with integrity in Pauline’s office caught the deception and tactfully approached Beth, and without accusing Pauline of anything, explained to Beth why one loan would be much better for her.
When Beth brought this to Pauline’s attention, she feigned that she was unaware of the treachery and simply sighed, “Oh, you’re right”.
Some of us always felt that Pauline was a sneaky to despicable person yet even when we brought this to Beth’s attention, she refused to believe it.
Later after Beth had a financial collapse, lost all of her so-called friends, including Pauline, who one in our circle described as a “vampire”, she privately related to us some of the early warning signs that Pauline was a questionable friend.
Interesting. Deep down inside, Beth knew it all along.
The two women were part of a religious organization where one of the leaders wanted to meet with Beth.
He was a person Beth thought was a politician and wanted “yes people” in his circle.
Beth didn’t like him.
He needed something from Beth in the way of fulfilling a persuasion package for others. To ask Beth to meet him even in an ethical setting was not wise because Beth would refuse to show up.
So guess what he did?
He influenced Pauline to get Beth to show up.
Pauline was clever and deceptive enough to encourage Beth to meet with the leader by explaining to her that the meeting was about subject A.
Once Beth arrived, sat down and listened to the leader, it was actually about subject B.
After the meeting was over and Beth and Pauline drove home together, a then very young Beth wondered why Pauline would do that but shrugged it off.
She should not have.
Our suggestion?
The key to evaluating that you are in a relationship where you may eventually be deceived is not to ignore your intuition or first warning sign.
For example, in our business here at Femcompetitor Magazine, due to the success we are now slowly starting to achieve, we receive countless offers from bloggers who want to feature their link or article on our site to attract some of our readers.
Our policy is very clear. We only consider articles that are 1,000 plus words or more.
The person from the other end is usually very nice and very complimentary.
We’ve found that super nice compliments are always a red flag.
They will eventually send us an article that is not 1,000 words but expect us to accept it anyway?
Our response?
Get rid of them. Pronto. Why?
They seem to think that you are willing to accept less than what you asked for?
What would you do? Try and work with them? Email them back expressing that if they insert one more paragraph that things will be fine?
That’s really nice of you.
Probably not wise though.
People tend not to change. If a person is behaving in a deceptive way with something small, what will they do later when they have a greater opportunity in front of them?
Severe ties with them. Immediately.
In Beth’s case, the very first time that her older friend Pauline deceived her with the charismatic male leader, she should have remained acquaintances but in terms of being a close friend, distance herself.
Beth should have also asked herself why Pauline behaved that way.
“People who are deceptive themselves have a really good ear for deception. They know when somebody’s telling the truth or not, and so one of the ways around that is to always be telling the truth – or some version of it.”… Ron Livingston
She would have surmised that Pauline behaved that way because she wanted to be in good favor with the leader, who in their religious world, was very powerful.
Pauline placed her need to be seen in a favorable light above the need of Beth’s desire to not help a man that she did not like achieve his goals.
Personal experience is a very powerful teacher.
None of us want to be long-term members in the victim of deception club.
Make people or organizations step by step earn your trust and loyalty.
At the first sign that something is wrong, it is probably not wise to make excuses for them.
If they are who they are supposed to be, on their own, they will try and earn your trust again.
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https://www.brainyquote.com/topics/deception
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