Hey! My name is Hannah! I have begun a series where I provide you with responses I give in some of the fb groups I am in. As they are private groups, I don’t share what the original post says verbatim, but the general topic of discussion, I do share that for context. I’m excited to share this response with you. The topic of discussion is “Why Finding Clarity Is Challenging”. I hope this is an encouragement to you who may be going through this type of confusion and need clarity, as well as insight to those who are trying to support their friend. I would like to encourage you to consider joining fb groups to support you and find a sisterhood of likeminded women! I have a list of resources at the bottom of this page! Tap here to skip to it!!
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Original Post Is Public and Worth Watching!
Betrayal Trauma Recovery posted
06/15/2022
Yes there is a reason for his behaviors, however, understanding the source of his porn use or anger (shame, trauma, personality disorders, addiction, etc.) doesn’t make a significant difference in how those behaviors affect you. Seeking the source won’t empower you to stop it or heal from the trauma – it only keeps you in harm’s way. Instead, spend your energy on getting to safety using healthy boundaries.
“Remember, clarity isn’t an endpoint; it’s a process. With every word, you’re one step closer to shedding light on your experiences.”
Hannah Esther
Commenter (A) Response
Yes…. However. Desperately seeking clarity and validation in a chaotic situation is 100% human and normal, especially if dealing with gaslighting and flying monkeys. Just a word of caution because telling someone to stop seeking answers can come across like things they have heard while experiencing abuse or that their experience doesn’t matter. Definitely point towards safety first. But telling someone to stop seeking answers takes a lot more nuance and care before that’s going to make sense, and only makes sense after safety has been established. My two cents. ✌️
Like a sculptor shaping clay, language molds our understanding of behaviors, chiseling away the excess to reveal the clear contours of our reality.
Hannah Esther
My Response
Definitely agree. Because 2 months ago, the word abuse made my skin crawl. Shame for even thinking it, would engulf me. Fear of what people would think… if I used that word to describe anything… so I don’t, I don’t even say that word still. Such a delicate issue and the more covert and crazy making it is, the harder it is to accept that it’s even abuse to begin with. ♥️
Your two cents are appreciated by someone like me, who is still just trying to accept reality.
Additional Responses
If they respond, I will place my responses to them here.
Commenter (B): instead of the word abuse, maybe using “unsafe” in its place might help.
My Response: I love that. Doesn’t make me feel overwhelmed haha – thank you.
Commenter (A): yesss! Being able to discern the truth of your experience and start rejecting all the coping mechanisms like years of “benefit of the doubt” or accepting false guilt etc. Having language that describes the truth with terms and definitions stops the world from spinning and the ground from shifting beneath your feet. Also knowing there are others out there who have experienced the same things (again only recognized by definitions of experience) starts to reveal that your own behavior is not the cause.
also “toxic”
My Response: I completely agree! Earlier this year I felt swallowed up in shame and guilt and knowing nothing about language that describes or even that others were experiencing the same things.
I literally just thought this was normal.
After seeing Natalie Hoffmans post on Facebook, literally describe majority of what I’m experiencing. I was baffled. Went to her podcast and have been slowly rewiring my brain and beliefs as a result of her amazing way of breaking things down so gently.
One of the things I’ve realized through all this, I need gentle. I shut down with harsh. So, I feel very blessed to have found Natalie and so many others who speak the truth that’s so difficult to fathom.
Commenter (A): And is necessary. Understanding what happened is critical for restoring your life.
Why Finding Clarity Is Challenging
Finding clarity can be challenging due to the complexity of our thoughts, emotions, and external influences. Our minds are often filled with distractions, doubts, and conflicting information, making it difficult to gain a clear perspective. Additionally, personal biases, fear of uncertainty, and the fast-paced nature of modern life can further hinder the process of achieving mental clarity.
Finding clarity becomes even more challenging when emotional factors are involved, such as being unable to use the word “abuse” to describe one’s experiences. This can stem from feelings of shame, guilt, or a lack of understanding about what constitutes abuse. The struggle to articulate and come to terms with such experiences can cloud one’s ability to see the situation clearly and seek the support needed to heal and move forward.
Language is incredibly valuable in the challenge of finding clarity because it provides a structured way to describe behaviors and experiences. When individuals can accurately label and articulate their feelings and situations, it helps them make sense of their thoughts and emotions. Describing behaviors with precise language allows for a deeper understanding of what’s happening, enabling individuals to identify patterns, causes, and effects. This, in turn, empowers them to seek appropriate help, communicate with others effectively, and work towards resolution and healing.
Your journey towards clarity is a testament to your resilience. With each word you speak, you carve a path through the fog of confusion.
Hannah Esther
Language for Behavior
Let’s talk about the power of language in building strong boundaries and gaining clarity!
- Manipulative Behavior: When someone consistently tries to control or influence your decisions and emotions for their benefit, without considering your feelings or needs.
- Gaslighting: When someone distorts or denies reality to make you doubt your own perceptions, memories, and sanity.
- Passive-Aggressive Behavior: Expressing negative feelings indirectly, often through sarcasm, silent treatment, or subtle actions.
- Isolation: Deliberately cutting you off from friends, family, or other sources of support to gain control over you.
- Undermining: Consistently diminishing your achievements, opinions, or capabilities to erode your self-esteem.
- Neglect: Failing to provide emotional, physical, or psychological care and support, leading to feelings of abandonment.
- Bullying: Engaging in repetitive aggressive behavior to assert power and dominance over you, causing emotional distress.
- Intimidation: Using threats, verbal abuse, or body language to make you feel frightened and submissive.
- Exploitation: Taking advantage of your vulnerabilities or resources for personal gain, often without regard for your well-being.
- Control: Exerting excessive influence over your actions, decisions, or freedom, limiting your autonomy.
- Invalidation: Dismissing or belittling your feelings, thoughts, or experiences, causing self-doubt and confusion.
Using these specific terms can help individuals accurately communicate their experiences and feelings, which is a crucial step in gaining clarity and seeking the necessary support or resolution.
- Verbal Aggression: Engaging in hostile language, insults, or yelling that causes emotional harm and distress.
- Withholding Information: Intentionally keeping important information from you to maintain control or manipulate your decisions.
- Stonewalling: Refusing to communicate or engage in conversations, which can lead to frustration and a lack of resolution.
- Guilt-Tripping: Using guilt or manipulation to make you feel responsible for someone else’s feelings or actions.
- Conditional Love: Expressing affection only when certain conditions are met, creating insecurity and dependence.
- Silent Treatment: Ignoring you or refusing to communicate as a form of punishment or control.
- Minimization: Downplaying the seriousness of a situation or your feelings, making it difficult to validate your experiences.
- Boundary Violation: Ignoring or crossing your personal boundaries, leading to discomfort and a sense of violation.
- Projection: Assigning your own negative feelings or traits onto someone else to avoid acknowledging them in yourself.
Defining these behaviors can help individuals recognize and articulate their experiences more clearly.
- Deflection: Shifting the focus of a conversation away from the topic at hand, often to avoid taking responsibility for one’s actions.
- Selective Memory: Choosing to remember or forget certain details in a way that serves one’s narrative or intentions.
- Escalation: Intentionally intensifying conflicts or disagreements to manipulate the situation or gain control.
- False Promises: Making commitments with no intention of following through, leading to disappointment and mistrust.
- Blame-Shifting: Holding you responsible for problems or issues that are actually caused by the other person’s actions.
- Discrediting: Undermining your credibility or reputation to prevent others from taking your perspective seriously.
- Double Standards: Applying different sets of rules or expectations to different people, causing feelings of inequality and injustice.
- Love-Bombing: Overwhelming you with excessive attention, compliments, or gifts initially, only to later use these gestures for manipulation.
- Microaggressions: Subtle and often unintentional actions or comments that convey prejudice or discrimination.
- Emotional Blackmail: Threatening to withdraw love, support, or care to control your behavior or decisions.
Using these terms to describe behaviors can help individuals pinpoint specific actions that may be contributing to their lack of clarity. This awareness can empower them to assess their situation objectively, communicate effectively, and make informed decisions about seeking help, setting boundaries, or taking steps towards personal growth and resolution.
- Triangulation: Involving a third party in conflicts or discussions to manipulate perceptions or gain an advantage.
- Cycle of Abuse: Recognizing the repeating pattern of tension-building, explosion, reconciliation, and honeymoon phases in an abusive relationship.
- Victim-Blaming: Holding you responsible for the negative consequences of the other person’s behavior, shifting the blame onto you.
- Coercion: Using pressure, threats, or manipulation to force you into actions or decisions you’re uncomfortable with.
- Invalidation: Dismissing or belittling your emotions, experiences, or perspective, leading to self-doubt and confusion.
- Negotiation Tactics: Utilizing manipulation or emotional tactics during discussions to sway the outcome in one’s favor.
- Passive Compliance: Going along with requests or demands to avoid conflict or negative repercussions, even if you’re uncomfortable.
- Scapegoating: Blaming you for problems or difficulties within a group or relationship, often unfairly.
- Hostile Humor: Using sarcasm or humor to demean or ridicule you, under the guise of joking.
- Controlled Disclosure: Sharing selective information to maintain power, withholding key details to manipulate the situation.
This understanding is essential for making informed decisions about seeking help, setting boundaries, and ultimately prioritizing their well-being.
- Mental Manipulation: Using psychological tactics to influence your thoughts, beliefs, and perceptions.
- Exploitative Promises: Offering rewards, benefits, or positive outcomes to manipulate your behavior or compliance.
- Disengagement: Avoiding communication or emotional connection as a way to control the relationship or situation.
- Normalization of Harm: Downplaying or justifying harmful behavior to make it seem acceptable or typical.
- Selective Amnesia: Conveniently forgetting previous promises, commitments, or agreements.
- Emotional Withholding: Refusing to provide emotional support, affection, or validation as a means of control.
- Intentional Confusion: Deliberately creating unclear or contradictory situations to keep you off-balance.
- Conditional Approval: Granting approval, affection, or attention only when certain conditions are met.
- Dismissive Attitude: Ignoring your concerns, opinions, or emotions, causing you to feel insignificant.
- Overstepping Boundaries: Ignoring your personal limits or disregarding your consent, leading to discomfort and violation.
I pray these behavioral identifiers will provide clarity to you and empower you to address issues, set healthy boundaries, and make choices that prioritize your mental, emotional, and physical well-being.
Thank you for reading! I do hope this was insightful and encouraging! This is such a important topic to me! I’m passionate about words, language and transparency. We are beautiful creations and should be protected. God gave us the tools to do just that. With wisdom and discernment we can heed the truth and use the tools we have to arm ourselves in preparation for battle. We must first know how to define many of the invisible tactics used to harm us and our loved ones. Behaviors seem normal when you’ve become used to it. However, when you begin to see that it’s pattern is destructive and draining you of your life force, you will see it in a new light. I was unable to call many things abuse for a long time, because all that I was experiencing was all I’d ever known, it was normal for me and harmful all the same. May you find safety, to then embrace clarity and find healing. Mourn the losses and grieve the truth, take time and be gentle with yourself, it will not be a fast process, and know that you are worth every moment of healing! No matter where you are at on your journey, God loves you and is with you right where you are! ♥️
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Resources
More Resources
- Natalie Anne Hoffman with the Flying Free podcast — episode 160 “An Emotional Recovery Tool That Changes Everything” — this episode is a game changer. I listen to it often and it has changed how I think and process my thoughts. Defines where our actions begin. How no one can make us feel anything. It’s all based on the meaning we place on things. It’s powerful to take your power back that you didn’t even know was yours to begin with. It was yours all along!
- Leslie Vernick – Enriching Relationships That Matter Most — podcast episode “Is It Abuse?”
- PlusONE Parents — podcast episode “Does God Hate Divorce”
- Jen Wilkin — podcast episode “DISTRESS & DELIVERANCE: UNDERSTANDING THE HEART OF GOD IN THE MIDST OF SUFFERING WITH JEN WILKIN”
- Bare Marriage with Sheila Wray Gregoire
- Patrick Weaver Ministries
- Esther Company
- Confusion to Clarity
- The Life-Saving Divorce—Gretchen Baskerville
- Intentional Today
- Sarah McDugal – Wilderness to WILD
- Rebecca Davis—Untwisting Scriptures
- Betrayal Trauma Recovery
- Sarah K Ramsey Toxic Person Proof Podcast
- Marg Mowczko
- Psalm 82 Initiative
- Thriving Forward
- Held & Healed: Christian Women Rebuilding After Abuse by Heather Elizabeth
- Another One Free
- Amy Gannett — podcast episode “ANSWERING YOUR KIDS’ QUESTIONS ABOUT GOD WHEN YOU’VE GOT SOME OF YOUR OWN WITH AMY GANNETT”
- Lisa Appelo — podcast episode “LIFE CAN BE GOOD AGAIN: LOSS & LACK TRANSFORMED BY THE GOODNESS OF GOD WITH LISA APPELO”
- Bailey T. Hurley — podcast episode “FRIENDS LIKE FAMILY: FINDING YOUR PEOPLE & CULTIVATING COMMUNITY”
- Nate Postlethwait
- My Response Series | Why Do The Wicked Prosper
They will reap grievously what they’ve sown, and some will not repent in this life. That is a tragedy in and of itself. - My Response Series | Self-Love vs Selfishness
Self-love involves healthy boundaries and self-respect, whereas selfishness often involves disregarding others’ feelings or needs. - My Response Series | Entitled Husband & “Crazy” Wife Dynamic
“No one is perfect” – Husbands attempt to gaslight his horrible behavior as his Wife simpling being unrealistic in her expectations of him. - My Response Series | “My Ex Is Crazy”
How someone talks about someone is telling. Someone who is unwilling to meet their partner’s emotional needs or engage in constructive communication is unsafe.
The Family Treat 