If someone keeps using guilt, pressure, or manipulation to get their way, it’s time to stop letting them make your choices for you and start being more assertive with them. So, Let’s Talk About Mental Health!

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Episode Overview:

Feeling manipulated by someone? Manipulation can include guilt trips, pressure, emotional manipulation, controlling behaviour, and sometimes gaslighting, but the common thread is the same: someone is trying to pull you away from your own needs, wants, and choices.

In this episode of the Let’s Talk About Mental Health podcast, I’m talking about how to deal with manipulation: what manipulative behaviour is, and how to approach emotional manipulation in a more assertive way, especially when manipulation tactics make it hard to navigate a difficult relationship. If you’re dealing with manipulative people, toxic relationships, or unhealthy relationships, or if you’re trying to understand the signs of manipulation before you get pulled in too far, this episode is for you. I’ll explore why guilt and manipulation can affect your self-esteem and mental health so deeply, why manipulative dynamics often get worse when you start setting boundaries, and how to say no without over-explaining, apologising, or letting someone else’s pressure make your choices for you. You’ll learn how to recognise manipulation earlier, respond with more self-respect, and practice assertiveness in a way that protects your peace without turning you into someone cold or cruel. 

👉 Ready to recognise manipulation and respond more assertively? Then let’s talk!

💡 TL;DR: If guilt trips, gaslighting, or manipulative behaviour keep pushing you into saying yes when you really mean no, this episode will help you spot manipulation earlier and respond with more self-respect. 🙂

New here? Hi! Let’s Talk About Mental Health is your weekly dose of practical mental health advice for real life. I’m Jeremy Godwin (hello! 👋) and I keep things simple, honest, and doable so you can feel more in control of your life and your mental wellbeing. If you’re not already a free subscriber, sign up below to have episodes and transcripts land in your inbox every Sunday:

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Episode Transcript:

How to deal with manipulation

How many times have you been manipulated into saying yes when you really meant no?

And how many more times are you going to let other people make your choices for you?

If you often feel guilty, pressured, or like it’s easier to just give in, then you may be dealing with manipulation… which can have a huge impact on your mental health, because manipulation pulls you away from your own wants and needs. And so, this episode is about recognising manipulation and responding to it assertively.

So, let’s talk about… how to deal with manipulation.

Hello! I’m Jeremy Godwin and this is the Let’s Talk About Mental Health podcast, full of practical advice for better mental health.

If you often find yourself in situations where you feel like someone’s cornered you, or pushed you into doing something they want you to do, then there’s a good chance you’re not simply just “being too nice” or trying to keep the peace or whatever; you may be dealing with manipulation. And identifying that really matters, because manipulation pulls you away from what you actually think, feel, and want, and it teaches you to prioritise someone else’s comfort over your own self-respect… which, you know, isn’t exactly great for your self-worth.

Manipulation can be surprisingly tough to recognise when you’re on the receiving end of it, because it doesn’t always look dramatic or obvious like it does in soap operas or in B-grade movies. A lot of the time it just feels like pressure. It feels like guilt. It feels like obligation, or like someone’s reaction has now suddenly become your responsibility. Which it’s not, by the way… because we’re all responsible for our own emotional reactions… but more on that later.

Now, the thing is that if you’re someone who cares about other people, or who wants to do the right thing, or who tends to keep the peace, then that kind of pressure can end up working on you very effectively. The problem is though that once manipulation becomes normal in a relationship, you can start losing touch with what you actually feel comfortable with. You stop making clear choices for yourself, and instead you start trying to manage other people’s emotions, or expectations, or their consequences. That can wear down your confidence, your energy, and your sense of self over time.

So in this episode, I want to take a really good, long, hard look at what manipulation actually is, what it does to you, and what it feels like when you’re being manipulated, why it affects your mental health so much, and how to respond more assertively without continuously getting dragged into unhealthy dynamics. So the first thing that we need to do is to get really clear on what manipulation actually is and what it looks like. So, let’s talk about…

What is manipulation?

So I think the most straightforward way to understand manipulation is this: it’s when someone tries to get you to do what they want by applying pressure instead of being honest, and direct, and respectful. So instead of asking you clearly for what they want and then accepting your answer and your decision and treating you like an equal, they tend to employ tactics that are aimed at getting you to give into them or to see things their way. They might push, twist, pressure, guilt, soak, withdraw, blame, or create consequences that make it harder for you to say no. So the issue is not just that someone wants something from you; that’s totally normal in relationships.

The issue here is how they go about it, and whether or not they’re trying to influence you fairly or control you unfairly. And when you’re on the receiving end of that kind of unfair manipulation, it can feel very confusing. You might feel guilty even when you’ve done nothing wrong. You might feel responsible for someone else’s mood, or their disappointment, or their anger. You might find yourself rehearsing conversations in your head, or dreading messages from a certain person, or saying yes before you’ve even considered what you actually want and need. It can feel like there’s never a choice in front of you, because every option comes with enough emotional strings attached to create a string factory.

Now… what a lot of us often tend to misunderstand about manipulation is that we think it only counts if it’s obvious, or malicious, or dramatic… but a lot of manipulation is much quieter than that. Sometimes it’s subtle; it looks like guilt tripping. Sometimes it looks like obligation dressed up as love, or it sounds like, “Oh, after everything I’ve done for you…” or, “If you cared, you’d do this…” or, “Well, I guess I just won’t ask again.”

And sometimes the person doing it may not even fully realise just how manipulative they’re being, because this is the unhealthy way that they’ve learned over time to get their needs met. So it’s not always conscious or intentional behaviour. But regardless of whether or not it’s conscious, the impact on you is still very real. It’s still manipulative.

And I think that’s the deeper clarification that matters most here: manipulation is not just about controlling your behaviour; it’s about disrupting your independence, your sense of agency, your right to make your own choices in life. And so… it disrupts your connection to yourself. It pulls your attention away from your own values, needs, and limits, and it pushes it onto managing someone else’s demands and reactions. That’s why it can leave you feeling so unsettled and so emotionally drained. And the longer it goes on for, the more harmful it can be to your mental health.

So let’s discuss why, as well as why it’s something that you need to take very seriously, and let’s talk about…

Why manipulation harms your mental health

So one of the main reasons manipulation affects your mental health so deeply is that it keeps putting you in situations where your inner reality and your outer behaviour don’t match. You feel uncomfortable, pressured, resentful, or uneasy, but you go along with things anyway… because it seems just much easier than having to deal with the fallout of pushing back. And when that happens repeatedly, it starts to chip away at your self trust. You stop believing in yourself. You stop believing that your discomfort means something important. And instead you start treating your own limits like they’re negotiable, while everyone else’s feelings become urgent and a much higher priority than yours.

And that’s the blunt truth here. If someone can only get what they want by making you feel guilty, afraid, responsible, or trapped, then that’s not healthy relationship behaviour…. and yet often we let it continue. There are lots of reasons why we do that. It might be normal in your friendships, or in your family, or your past. Or it might just be familiar, because it’s what you’re used to. But ‘ normal’ and ‘familiar’ does not automatically mean healthy.

And emotionally, what makes this stuff so difficult is that manipulation often hooks into the part of you that wants to be good, and fair, and caring, and connected. So it can leave you feeling like your reaction is the problem, when actually the deeper issue is the pressure being placed on you in the first place. That’s what I really want to underline here: the problem is not that you find it hard to say no; the problem is that someone is making your ‘no’ feel unsafe or selfish or costly.

Over time, that can create anxiety, resentment, shame, self-doubt, and emotional exhaustion. You can start second guessing yourself constantly. You can find yourself dreading contact with certain people, or overthinking every interaction… before, during, and after. Or you can find yourself just feeling guilty for wanting space. And if manipulation has been part of your life for a long time, especially in your family relationships, then it can start to feel so familiar that you don’t even recognise it for what it is anymore; it just feels like “how things are,” or “how they are,” or even “what I have to do to keep the peace.”

And that’s exactly why we’re talking about this topic. Because a lot of people are trying to protect their peace and build healthier relationships, but you cannot really do that if you’re still being pulled around by guilt, and pressure, and obligation. If you want more self-respect, more honesty, and more balance in your relationships, then you need to be able to spot manipulation and respond to it differently.

Now let’s talk about what sits underneath all of this, right? Because manipulation creates internal pressure that makes betraying yourself and your needs feel easier than discomfort. Giving in to their demands may bring you some short-term relief because the guilt eases off, or the tension settles down for a moment or two… but every time that happens, you are reinforcing the pattern. The other person learns that putting pressure on you works, and you learn to override yourself in order to get temporary peace of mind. The trouble is that temporary peace of mind brought through self abandonment always comes with a cost. If peace requires self betrayal, it isn’t really peace.

And so we’re going to talk about how to approach manipulation in a much healthier and more assertive way right after this quick break.

[AD BREAK]

And welcome back! Now let’s get into the ‘how to’ part of this episode, and let’s talk about…

How to stop being manipulated

Alright, so this is where we talk through practical advice for what to actually do when you find yourself dealing with manipulation. I’m going to share things that you should focus on now, as well as some things to work on longer term. You’ll find the transcript on my website at ltamh.com/ episodes and it’s linked in the episode description as well. OK, first…

Slow the moment down.

Manipulation works best when it gets you to react instead of responding thoughtfully; so in other words, when you don’t have time to think about the choice that you’re going to make. When you’re emotionally activated, it can sometimes take up to 10 seconds for your logical mind to kick in fully… so any choice that you make before that is basically being driven by pure emotion. And when you’re being manipulated, you’re probably going to be dealing with feelings like guilt or fear or panic… and they are not exactly emotions that are ideal for making considered choices.

So, do what the Spice Girls recommended and stop right now, thank you very much. If someone is pressing you, or guilting you, or trying to corner you into a decision or answer, do not rush to respond. Instead, give yourself some thinking space. That might involve saying something like, “I need to think about that,” or, “I’m not making a decision right now,” or even, “Let me come back to you later.” Even taking that small pause matters because it breaks the automatic pattern of just reacting to pressure by complying to their demands. Now, if you only take one thing from this episode and put it into practice this week, please let it be that: stop answering under pressure. OK, next…

Put a name to it.

In other words, start naming what’s happening… even if it’s only to yourself at first. So instead of thinking, “Oh, why am I being so difficult?” or “Maybe I’m overreacting here,” try saying to yourself, “I’m feeling pressured right now.” Or, “This feels like guilt, not a fair request.” Now that really matters, because once you can name the dynamic you’re going to be much less likely to get swallowed up by it. Over time, as you build your confidence, you can also start naming that to the person; same thing, you could simply say to them, “I’m feeling pressured right now,” or “This feels like guilt, not a fair request.” All of that is going to help you… but at the very least, it’s about getting really clear on things because clarity protects you; confusion is where manipulation tends to thrive. Next…

Stop overexplaining.

This is a huge one… because a lot of people who get pulled into manipulative dynamics think that if they could just explain themselves well enough or calmly enough or kindly enough, then the other person will finally understand and they’ll back off. Good luck with that! Because if someone is committed to getting their own way, more explanation often doesn’t work; it just gives them more material to push against, more reasons to argue with, more details to hook into for their own agenda. Sometimes the healthiest response is short, sharp, clear, and repetitive: “No, that does not work for me.” “I’m not available.” “I’ve made my decision.” You do not need to write the extended remix version of your boundary as though it’s the 12 inch version of Pump Up the Jam from 1989. Shorter and sharper is often stronger. Next…

Separate discomfort from danger.

And this is another big one, because so many of us let ourselves stay stuck in manipulative dynamics because the idea of other people feeling upset feels unbearable to deal with. But someone being disappointed, annoyed, frustrated, or even angry, does not automatically mean that you’ve done the wrong thing. It may simply mean that they’re not getting what they want. And that is a very different thing.

This is one of the biggest shifts that helps you to be more assertive, learning that other people are allowed to have feelings about your boundaries without their feelings becoming your responsibility to fix. As long as you’re clear and respectful and courteous, they’re your boundaries. Now, sitting with the discomfort of that can be… well, uncomfortable… but learning how to sit with discomfort and then work beyond it will completely change the way that you approach life. I covered discomfort in Episode 239 if you’d like to learn how to do that, and it’s linked in the description. Next…

Look at the pattern.

And by that I mean to look at the overall relationship pattern, not just the individual moment. So ask yourself, is this a one-off situation or is this how this person regularly gets their way? Do I often leave interactions with them feeling guilty, drained, confused, or cornered? Do I feel free to say no? Or does saying no almost always come with a price? Those questions will help you to move from “Maybe I’m imagining it…” towards a much clearer view of what is actually happening, right? So that you can then respond accordingly. Patterns are something that I talked about in Episode 303, as well as healthier relationships in Episode 266, so you’ll probably find both of those helpful; they’re also linked below. OK, next…

Respond differently.

Now, here’s a challenge for you; it’s a constructive one, but it’s a challenge nonetheless: if you keep making yourself uncomfortable so that other people can stay comfortable, then you’re helping to maintain the very dynamic that’s hurting you. Now… I say that to you with kindness, even though I am being deliberately blunt here, because I know that this stuff can be really deeply conditioned and that it’s not easy to shift.

But the fact is that nothing changes if nothing changes. And if you want things to change, then you need to change things. If you keep accepting this kind of behaviour, nothing will change. If someone has learned over time that guilt or pressure or emotional consequences are a really effective way to control you and your choices, then the pattern usually is not going to stop until you respond differently.

So what does responding differently actually look like? Well, it means being calm, clear, and consistent. Not aggressive. Not cruel. Not dramatic. Not disrespectful. Just fair and assertive. It means saying what is true, holding the line, and not getting pulled into defending your right to have boundaries. For example, you could say: “I understand you’re disappointed, but my answer is still no,” or, “I’ve made my choice, and I’m not discussing this any further,” or simply, “That doesn’t work for me.” Or if it’s family you’re dealing with, you could say, “I know we’re related, but that doesn’t mean you get to make this choice for me.”

Look, assertiveness can feel uncomfortable… but assertiveness is not being rude; it’s respectful honesty. And in unhealthy dynamics, respectful honesty can feel very confronting precisely because the relationship may have been built around you not using it… so you need to be prepared for that. Which actually does lead to my next point…

Expect pushback.

Because when you challenge the status quo, the way things are, that can be quite confronting for people… especially for people who have a vested interest in things not changing or who are resistant to change. Pushback is often inevitable when you’re changing the dynamics, and unfortunately it’s where a lot of people stumble when they’re trying to stop someone from manipulating them.

So you might start responding differently, doing better, being more assertive, setting healthy boundaries and sticking to them… and then you get pushback and you panic because the other person reacts more strongly and it seems like everything is actually now getting worse. But often what’s happening is that the manipulation is no longer working as easily, so the other person turns it up to 11: more guilt, more pressure, more blame, more playing the victim. But that doesn’t mean that your boundary was wrong. It doesn’t mean that you’re doing anything wrong. What it most likely means is that your boundary is being tested. If you’ve been respectful about how you’ve gone about it, then yeah… your boundary is being tested.

This is where your self-respect really matters, because protecting your peace isn’t just about setting a boundary once; it’s about reinforcing it and holding it when someone tries to make you doubt it. And as I’ve said, as long as you’re being fair and respectful you have every right to set boundaries for yourself. Be reasonable about it, obviously, but if you don’t want to do something you don’t have to do it.

Now look, if you tend to struggle with boundaries and people pleasing check out Episode 322 for more on that; that is a very big conversation, so I’m not going to get into that in this episode. It’s linked in the description as well, just like all the other ones I’ve recommended! OK, next…

Stop sacrificing your needs.

And by that I mean to stop feeding the urge to rescue the relationship at your own expense. Not every relationship can be made healthy by you behaving more clearly. Sometimes the most honest thing that you can learn is that the relationship only functions when you’re being compliant, or when you’re guilty, or easy to control. Recognising that is painful… but it’s also illuminating, right? Healthy relationships require mutual respect… and they cannot be built by one person having all the emotional flexibility while the other person keeps using pressure to get their own way. That’s an imbalanced power dynamic, and it’s unfair. Next…

Build your self trust, one choice at a time.

Every time you pause instead of reacting, every time you say no without giving a five page essay about why, every time you let someone be disappointed without rushing in to fix things, you’re teaching yourself that your needs matter, that your limits matter, that your peace matters. And that’s how healthier relationship patterns begin: not in one giant dramatic moment or blow up, but in your repeated and grounded acts of self-respect.

Conclusion

So here’s what I want you to take away from this episode. Manipulation isn’t just about someone else trying to get their way. It’s about what happens when pressure pulls you away from your own needs and wants… and if you need and want healthier relationships and better self-esteem and more peace of mind, then you have to start recognising that guilt, obligation, and pressure are not the same thing as love, respect, or fairness.

So here’s a question for you to reflect on: where in your life are you still making yourself uncomfortable just to keep somebody else comfortable?

Because when you boil it all down, protecting your peace sometimes means being willing to disappoint people who benefited from you having weaker boundaries.

There’s nothing so dangerous for manipulators as people who choose to think for themselves.

Meg Greenfield

Let me repeat that:

There’s nothing so dangerous for manipulators as people who choose to think for themselves.

Alright, that’s it for this week. If you found this helpful, please share it with someone who might need to hear it and leave a rating or review on your favourite podcast platform because it helps more people discover the show and the advice that I share. And if you’d also like to support my work, you can find out more about my Patreon at ltamh.com. It’s linked in the description below.

Thank you very much for joining me today. Look after yourself and make a conscious effort to share positivity and kindness out into the world… because you get back what you put out. Take care and talk to you next time!

Join me next week when I talk about existing versus living, and check out my episode on dealing with difficult people next; it’s linked in the description. I release new episodes every Sunday, so follow or subscribe to never miss an episode.

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Let’s Talk About Mental Health.
Making Mental Health Simple.

Let’s Talk About Mental Health. © 2026 Jeremy Godwin.

The information provided in this episode is for general awareness on the topic and does not constitute advice. You should consult a doctor and/or mental health professional if you’re struggling with your mental health and wellbeing. You’ll find additional information on the Resources page of this website.