Trigger Warning: This article contains disagreement, accountability, and mild emotional discomfort. If you find these experiences triggering, please get to a safe space before reading any further.

People today seem to be triggered by literally anything.

A social media post about a controversial topic? Trigger.
Being told their ex probably isn’t a narcissist? Big trigger.
Listening to a speaker with strong opinions that don’t align with their values? Somebody designate a safe area, quick!

It’s as if anything that threatens a person’s feelings, beliefs, self-image, narrative, or coping mechanisms is being labeled a trigger.

Being challenged
Being pissed off
Being offended
Being held accountable
Apparently, even being triggered can be triggering.

Guys—stop. These are not triggers.

These are normal life experiences that shouldn’t be shaking people’s sense of safety. They should be strengthening their resilience.

That’s not resilience. It’s fragility.

When you treat everything as a trigger and expect people to tiptoe around it, you’re making yourself more fragile and more entitled. The world isn’t going to behave exactly the way you want it to all the time.

A trigger is when something in the present trips a deep, unresolved pain from the past, making you react as if the past were happening again. The reactions feel disproportionate because you’re not reacting to what’s happening now, you’re reacting to what happened then.

This could look like

Getting overly defensive or angry when someone says something mildly dismissive because you grew up in an emotionally dismissive environment.
Lashing out when someone brings up something emotionally uncomfortable that you’ve worked very hard to forget or suppress
Feeling rejected and getting clingy after a minor disagreement because you’ve got a strong fear of abandonment

The problem is that when you’re triggered, it doesn’t feel like you’re reacting to the past.

It feels like you’re reacting to what’s happening right now.

That’s why triggers are so convincing.

The anger feels justified.
The defensiveness feels justified.
The withdrawal feels justified.
The clinginess feels justified.

What makes it hard is that the feelings are real, but the intensity is coming from somewhere else. It’s impossible to untangle how much of it is coming from the past and how much is coming from the present.

Nobody stops and thinks “Ah, here come my old abandonment wounds. Before I react to right now, let me identify how much of the intensity is coming from the past, divvy it up appropriately, and then adjust my reaction to only reflect this moment.”

If our brains could do that, I wouldn’t have much to blog about.

Also, your triggers are your responsibility. You can’t expect people to tiptoe around every painful experience you’ve ever had.

I once had a friend get mad at me while I was going through a pretty painful heartbreak because listening to me was bringing up “pain from her past that she’s worked very hard for many years to suppress.”

How was I supposed to know my pain was stirring up the pain that she’s worked so hard not to feel?

People aren’t mind readers, and they can’t fix your triggers for you.

Having said that…

Don’t be an asshole.

If someone you care about is struggling with some triggers, be mindful of what they are and be patient with them while they work through it. You aren’t responsible for them, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be considerate.

The goal isn’t to avoid your triggers forever. The goal is to understand and heal them enough that they stop hijacking your reactions.

So stop believing every uncomfortable emotion is a problem. Stop treating every painful memory as trauma.

And for the love of God, stop calling everything a trigger.

Subscribe now

None of this is true, of course. But shame is a convincing liar. And it has a lot of power over how you believe you’re viewed and judged by the people around you.

The thing about shame is that it’s not really about what happened. It’s about what you think it says about you.

Maybe you lied. Maybe you hurt someone. Maybe you made a selfish decision. Maybe you stayed too long, left too soon, failed at something important, got divorced, cheated, got fired, lost a friendship, or made a choice you regret.

Whatever the mistake was, the mistake itself isn’t what haunts you. What haunts you is the story you tell yourself about it.

You lied, therefore you’re a liar.
You hurt someone, therefore you’re a shitty person.
You ran, therefore you’re a coward.
It didn’t last, therefore you’re a failure.
You got divorced, therefore you’re broken.

That’s a hell of a leap.

But that’s where shame gets its power. Not because other people might judge you, but because you’ve already judged yourself. You’re afraid if others find out and believe it, it must be true. The external judgment then validates the internal one.

Now honesty starts to feel risky. Dangerous.

Not because honesty is dangerous, but because shame has convinced you it is.

So you hide it. You avoid it. You justify it. You explain it away.

You build an image that protects you from having to face it.

Before long, you’re not just carrying the original mistake anymore. You’re also carrying the cover-up story. You build your life around protecting it, and end up losing more of yourself in the process.

You lose honesty.
You lose authenticity.
You lose integrity.

Shame convinces you that hiding is safer. But WTF does shame know? The reality is that hiding actually prevents inner peace. It keeps the internal conflict alive.

When you’re carrying shame, a surprising amount of your energy gets spent managing the situation.

Constantly hiding evidence to make sure nobody figures it out.
Quieting the internal turmoil.
Blocking out the thoughts you don’t want to believe.
Rationalizing doubts and justifying behavior.
Regularly having to convince yourself you’re doing the right thing.

It’s basically avoidance on steroids.

These are typically signs that you might be struggling to see things clearly and unknowingly protecting yourself by rewriting what happened or justifying it in some way. You construct a narrative that helps you live with it. That’s where shame thrives.

But you have to maintain that narrative. You have to keep blocking thoughts, rationalizing doubts, telling yourself you had no choice or this is for the best. Your brain may keep those things quiet most of the time so you don’t live in constant inner turmoil, but it’s always running emotional interference in the background.

It rationalizes. It justifies. It distracts.

It rewrites the past.

It’s always metaphorically looking over your shoulder. The hypervigilance alone takes a lot of cognitive resources.

Even if you aren’t consciously aware of it, this creates stress that can make you emotionally less available. The exhaustion can increase emotional burnout and feel draining. It can shorten your fuse or make you distant.

It’s exhausting.

Worst of all, this kind of avoidance eventually builds resentment. You start resenting yourself, your choices, even the very thing you were trying to protect. They begin to feel responsible for the inner turmoil you’ve had to carry,.

The problem is avoidance works. Just enough to protect you from the immediate consequences and convince you that the situation is resolved, even when it’s clearly not.

Avoidance keeps you safe from immediate consequences, but at what cost?

Here’s what else shame doesn’t tell you.

It’s like my student loans: you can defer payments all you want, but they’re still going to accrue interest.

The avoidance compounds the damage long-term, and the cost of delay becomes enormous. It feels safe at first, but avoidance actually leads to more suffering. What you end up paying might be 3x more than it was ever worth.

There’s a saying that goes:
“You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.”

It’s brilliant.

The truth will always be true. The consequences aren’t going away. And you’ll never truly find inner peace until you can be honest with yourself and face your mistakes.

Because avoidance doesn’t contain the damage, it passes it off. It impacts everyone involved and multiplies the initial damage exponentially.

It’s like an emotional hit-and-run: the hit isn’t the biggest crime anymore.

The run is.

Because the hit could have been anything: an accident, a misunderstanding, an error in judgment, something benign that backfired. It could’ve been unintentional or even done with good intentions.

But the run is always the same thing - a choice to ignore it.

That’s not to say you don’t care that you hurt them. You probably do. It probably feels more like “I don’t know what to do, I don’t want to face this, I hope it goes away.”

That’s shame talking. It tells you the best thing to do it avoid it. That it hurts worse to face them than to lose them. Maybe it tells you that they’re better off without you, or that this is just the way it has to be.

That doesn’t mean you’re being selfish, more like paralyzed. It doesn’t mean it was done with malice, either. But it does mean that the person running is reacting in a way that protects themselves while letting the other person carry the damage.

To them, it often feels like you don’t care that you hurt them, or maybe that you don’t care about them at all.

Whether that’s true or not is a blog post for another day.

Shame tells you not to think about it. It fuels denial. It traps you in a situation where you feel like every option hurts someone. Like any choice you make will cause harm. It’s a double bind where avoidance feels like the only answer.

Shame can be a real asshole.

Hurting someone you love sucks. Avoiding someone you’ve hurt or pretending you didn’t when you both know you did might be one of the most painful things you can to do to another person. But it doesn’t make you a monster.

It makes you human.

Your worst mistake is not an indictment of your character. It does not define you.

What says far more about your character is what you do once you know you’ve caused harm.

Shame wants you to believe that facing it proves you’re broken. But honesty and accountability are how integrity is rebuilt.

Hiding the truth degrades your integrity.
Coming clean, however late, restores it.

Subscribe now

The problem is that people often stop listening the moment what you’re saying makes them uncomfortable.

You tell a friend you’re unhappy and they’ll explain why you shouldn’t be. You feel dismissed.

Tell them you’re having second thoughts and they’ll be in disbelief and want to know why. Now you have to defend your feelings.

Tell someone you’re thinking about ending a relationship, and the response is a sad or shocked, “But you guys are so great together!” You wonder if they even heard what you just said.

Whether you’re trying to navigate relationship concerns or going through a breakup, people don’t ask a lot of questions. They’d rather give you answers, often in ways that kind of sound like “you’re wrong, and I know better.” Instead of feeling supported, you feel invalidated, dismissed, and patronized.

That sounds pretty shitty, doesn’t it? Well brace yourself, because I’d bet good money you do this, too. A lot more than you think.

No one wants to see their friend suffer. Breakups are painful abd messy. They can drain friends and divide social groups, force people to take sides, and create a lot of uncertainty and discomfort.

You don’t want to watch your friend be heartbroken.
You don’t want the friend group to change.
You don’t want to be responsible if the relationship ends.

So instead of engaging with what they’re actually saying, you might say things that feel comforting.

“But every relationship has problems.”
“You guys are so good together.”
“Give it time.”
”Everything happens for a reason.”

These kinds of comments feel comforting because they’re comforting you. Not your friend who is hurt and trying to navigate their feelings while you’re painting silver linings.

It’s not intentional or malicious, but the way we comfort others is often dismissive of their feelings in order to soothe our own.

Keeping the peace has also become a priority over acknowledging uncomfortable truths. Sometimes we gloss over concerns because acknowledging them feels unkind or “not our place.”

Ever watch someone be supportive and excited about a friend’s wedding, then turn around and say, “I give it 18 months”?

People do this all. the. time.

They see the concerns.
They see the incompatibilities.
They see the problems.

But most people don’t want to be responsible for making waves, breaking up a “happy” couple, or destabilizing the group. No one wants to name the painful elephant in the room. So they don’t.

If they validate concerns instead of glossing over them, they risk being seen as hurtful, negative, or unsupportive.

So they stay quiet.
Or they reassure.
Or they tell themselves it’s not their place to get involved.

If being honest has visible consequences, people prefer to stay quiet. It’s safer and more comfortable.

It gets framed as kindness.

But is it?

Today’s comfort culture would say that yes, protecting someone’s current feelings is kinder than pointing out a painful reality.

But when you ignore a friend’s concerns out of “kindness,” it can feel like you’re telling them their feelings don’t matter.

Even if you don’t mean to, you send the message that maintaining comfort is more important than understanding what your friend is going through. That they should endure privately to avoid disrupting social dynamics or making anyone else uncomfortable.

Think about that.

The things that others validate, challenge, ignore, or dismiss don’t just affect the conversation.

Social dynamics tend to reinforce the status quo, even if some individuals don’t necessarily think it’s good. No one wants to speak up.

They want to be kind.
Keep the peace.
Not get shot.

The constant validation of the current option leaves little room for any other.

People end up quietly enduring situations they don’t want because choosing differently might let others down, and they’re afraid of what it might say about who they are.

The pressure isn’t always explicit or intentional. You probably contribute to social pressure in others’ relationships more often than you realize. We all do.

Sometimes it’s simply the absence of anyone willing to engage honestly. Sometimes it’s telling yourself “it’s not my place to say something” so you can feel mature while looking the other way. (What I never understood it that if it’s not your place as their friend, then whose place is it?)

It’s rarely malicious or even intentional, but that doesn’t make it any less harmful.

This social “kindness” doesn't just keep the friend group comfortable, it can also actively hurt those in the relationship. The impact ripples out.

When a person’s relationship choices are influenced by social pressure, it can lead people to stay in situations they would otherwise leave, or leave situations they would otherwise stay in.

This means their partners or others involved lose the ability to make informed decisions about their own lives. Being “kind” instead of honest can indirectly harm everyone involved.

Avoiding difficult truths doesn’t eliminate the consequences. It just spreads them out over a longer stretch of time. Today’s comfort becomes tomorrow’s pain. And tomorrow’s pain is often far more damaging.

What leads to these situations and makes comfort culture so problematic is that it confuses hurtful with harmful.

The difference is that hurt causes pain, which is immediate, but heals. Whereas harm causes damage, which shows up much later but can take years to repair. This makes the harmful option feel significantly safer in the moment, even thought it’s not.

Ending a relationship hurts.
Hearing a difficult truth hurts.
Having an honest conversation hurts.
Blowing up your life hurts.

But none of these inherently cause harm.

Avoiding them can.

The most ironic part of this is that the hurtful thing you avoid often prevents the harm you end up doing instead. You just can’t see that until later, and by then it’s too late.

People think overlooking a painful truth is kinder than acknowledging it. They think they’re protecting their friend, preserving group dynamics, or preventing unnecessary pain. Really, they’re protecting themselves from discomfort at someone else’s expense.

Because pain is not evidence of harm, and avoiding pain is not evidence of kindness. It’s often quite the opposite.

Yet we judge behavior — including honesty — by its immediate emotional effect rather than its actual long-term consequences, and that’s where we get into trouble.

Honesty isn’t always comfortable, but the problem isn’t discomfort.
It’s what we’re willing to do to avoid it.

Nope. It’s fundamentally misleading and can cause real harm.

A lot of relationship content sounds logical.

That’s the problem.

How?

I’m so glad you asked. Let’s start with some very basic logics.

I took a logics course in college, and it was one of my favorite classes. I kept my textbook and still looks things up now and then.

I know, I’m a total nerd.

But you know how common sense isn’t as common as we think? Logic is the same - it’s not as logical as we think. It turns out it’s something we actually need to learn.

The core foundation of logic is that conclusions are made based on 1 or more pieces of information, called premises. Premises can be facts and direct observations, but they often come from common assumptions.

Let’s walk through an example from Logic 101:

Bob flirts with Sally often, therefore he must like her.

The premises are:

1. Bob flirts with Sally often
2. Flirting is an indication of attraction or romantic interest

Therefore, it’s fair to conclude that Bob likes Sally.

Agreed?
Good. (I gave you an easy one.)

The conclusion can only be true if the premises are both true and complete.

Another example:
We tend to think a lot of things are good for us because they’re natural.
The assumed premise is that natural things are better for us, and I think few people would argue with that.

Shouldn’t they though?

There are a lot of natural things that are not so good for us.

Take opium. Opium is natural, but I don’t recommend it. Unless you happen to have some narcan laying around, which is synthetic. Fruit is also natural, but too much can mess with your insulin. Speaking of insulin, synthetic insulin is often safer and more effective than natural insulin.

Nature isn’t looking so good anymore, is it?

The premise that natural things are automatically better for us is wildly inaccurate, yet most people would agree with that statement.

Let’s go back to Bob & Sally. We know flirting shows you like someone. But we also know plenty of times when it’s used for other reasons, like getting sex, even when the person has no interest in seeing the other person again.

Well I know Bob, and I can tell you he’s a bit of a player. He only flirted with Sally to get laid.

We used what seemed like obvious logic, yet we landed on the wrong conclusion.

Not such an easy one after all, was it?

You’re probably annoyed and thinking some version of

“Well, yeah, obviously that was possible, but I wasn’t thinking of that. Flirting usually means they like you.”

Yep. It often does. But not always, and you knew that. Here are some other very common possibilities:

Wanting an ego boost after a breakup
Being lonely and wanting some human interaction
Being a big flirt who flirts with everyone

There are countless other reasons, yet you took the bait.

See how easy it is to get it wrong, even when it seems so logical?

Flirting doesn’t have one possible motive, it has many. Without more context we can’t know anything. Not because the premise was wrong, but because it wasn’t the only possible explanation.

Things like culture, personal experience, and social influence tend to assign specific assumptions to certain behaviors. And even when we know other reasons, the most widely accepted assumptions get ingrained as the most obvious explanations.

Logic requires a bit of critical thinking, some curiosity, and willingness to accept that you may not know why someone did something, even when it might seem obvious.

Here are three of the most common misinterpretations we make about relationship behavior and the inaccurate or incomplete assumptions that drive them.

1. “They know exactly what they’re doing.”

Assumed premise: When someone is being manipulative, they know it. People are aware at all times of what they’re doing, why they’re doing it, and exactly what harm it causes.

Reality: Sometimes they are. Most of the time they’re not. (Be honest — neither are you)

People act from fear, shame, attachment wounds, habits, conditioning, identity protection, nervous system responses, and emotional blind spots ALL. THE. TIME.

People often have no idea what they’re actually doing and are oblivious to the harm they may be causing. And if they do have some awareness, they generally believe they have a valid reason that supports some greater good. It doesn’t excuse it, but it can explain it.

2. “If they wanted to, they would.”

Assumed premise: If you want something, you will act on it. If you don’t act on it, then you didn’t actually want it.

Reality: Wanting something doesn’t automatically mean you have the capacity to do anything about it. In dating and relationships, it’s actually really common for a person to not go for what they want.

The problem is we often confusion won’t and can’t.
Won’t suggests a choice.
Can’t suggests a limitation.

Big difference.

They may have a huge crush but not act on it out of fear of rejection.
They may want to call or text but don’t want to seem needy.
They may want to leave a relationship but fear the fallout.

Lots of things get in the way of what we want - fear, shame, time, anxiety, social pressure, other obligations, competing forces.

Maybe they want it. Maybe they don’t. Whether or not they act doesn’t necessarily tell you anything about why or why not.

This expression can be incredibly toxic and cause real harm. Please stop saying it.

3. “They don’t care.”

Assumed premise: Cold or distant behavior means they don’t care about you.

Reality: Lots of things may cause a person to act flippant or indifferent, but it doesn’t mean they are. It doesn’t mean much of anything on its own.

Look at hit-and-run behavior. They hurt you, and then they avoid you. It could be because they’re an asshole who doesn’t care.

It could also be they’re too ashamed of their behavior, they learned avoidance from their parents, they don’t know what to say or how to face you now, they think they’ve done too much damage that can’t be repaired, or they’re afraid that after what they’ve done, they’ll be rejected. You have no way to know unless they tell you.

Sometimes they don’t care.
Sometimes they actually care a lot.

Their behavior tells you what they did/didn’t do. It doesn’t tell you why.

The biggest mistake in all three of these is that they all assume you can know someone’s motives simply by observing their behavior.

But you can’t know a person’s motives without having a lot more information than just “they did a thing, and I know what that thing means.” Jumping to conclusions like that can be toxic.

When it comes to understanding relationship behavior, logic will almost always point you in the wrong direction.

Most people aren’t blind or irrational. In fact, they may arrive very cleanly at their conclusion based on the information they have. That makes it really hard to argue with. But they’re often reasoning from inaccurate assumptions they don’t realize they’re making.

If the premises are inaccurate, it doesn’t matter how well you can lay out your logic. There’s a good chance you’re still wrong.

Subscribe now

Most red flags aren’t obvious, especially in the beginning. They don’t sound the alarms or have flashing lights. And they rarely look like anything you’d find on any list of “Red Flags You Need to Know.”

Instead they show up as small moments that are easy to explain away: a comment that feels slightly off, a reaction that seems disproportionate, trust that doesn’t feel earned.

That’s where people get tripped up. The first few things that feel off are usually small. Easy to dismiss. Easy to rationalize.

You tell yourself you’re overthinking it. You make excuses, rationalize it, then forget about it and move on.

Then you do it again.
And again.
And again.

Before long you’ve managed to sweep a dozen “small things” under the rug and you haven’t even been dating for 2 months. Each one seemed minor on its own, so the pattern never fully registered.

This is why paying attention to patterns matters far more than memorizing lists of red flags. If something feels slightly off, make a mental note. Better yet, grab a pen and actually write it down.

Because patterns are easy to miss when you rely on memory. Memory is notoriously unreliable, and even when we’re certain we remember something clearly, we really don’t.

Our brains don’t store memories like a video recording; they leave gaps then use tidbits from other memories and common assumptions to restore the memory to a continuous story.

Don’t rely on your memory for this. You need accuracy. From now on when you start dating someone, keep a log. You can call it, “Dating Log.”

Our brains can also store memories in ways that make patterns difficult to catch. It’s like if you kept a dating log, but put each instance on a new page. How would you ever see the pattern? When the brain does this, it’s called fragmented memory, and it’s more common than you think.

One issue on its own might not mean anything, but you should still jot it down so you can watch for a pattern.

Because no one can make a fourth shitty comment without making a first one.

We expect red flags to be these bright, flashing red lights and blaring sirens. We expect them to be obvious. But it’s rarely obvious until you’re already in too deep and experiencing real harm. Seems a little late for ‘red flags’ at that point.

By the time a relationship is harming you, you’ve missed the warnings. Probably a lot of them.

It happens. We’ve all been there.

The key is you have to watch for patterns. And one of the clearest patterns to watch for is how someone responds when you set boundaries. And for the record, setting a boundary doesn’t have to be dramatic. A quick, “I don’t like jokes about my clumsiness” is enough.

That’s a boundary. Open up your Dating Log and write it down.

If it gets crossed again, make another note. You may start to see a pattern emerging. That may mean it’s time to reevaluate things.

Miss the pattern and you may find yourself a year into a controlling relationship that hurts more than it feels good, while you look back thinking “How did I get here?” (If you have a Dating Log, this will be a much easier question to answer.)

But the answer is typically the same: you missed the red flags.

The thing is, they’re hard to recognize. We expect red flags to show themselves and patterns to feel obvious. Memorize a list from tiktok and then watch for those exact comments and behaviors, right?

Wrong.

Human behavior isn’t black and white, especially in close relationships. People insist on being incredibly complicated. It’s super annoying, amiright?

The same words or actions can mean very different things depending on what’s happening around them, and different context creates different impact.

So what do you do?

Check in with yourself: Do I feel emotionally safe? Am I being treated with respect? Are my feelings being validated or dismissed? (FYI—feelings aren’t always true, but they are always valid.)

When you ask questions like these, you can start to distinguish what’s harmful and what’s not.

Take something simple like, “Are you sure you want dessert?” That could be a shitty comment from a controlling partner, in which case it wouldn’t feel very good. It could also be a supportive comment from a partner who knows you’ve been trying to eat healthier, in which case you’ll probably feel supported and appreciate the reminder.

Same words. Different meaning. Very different feeling.

The feeling is the part you need to pay attention. Good partners will make us feel bad once in a while, that’s life. But it should be rare and generally have some form of apology and repair soon after. When it’s common and lacks repair, that creates unhealthy dynamics that will chip away at your confidence and self-worth.

The key is to evaluate your felt experience instead of trying to understand their behavior. We get upset about how the relationship feels when things get bad enough, but we overlook what’s hurting us in the beginning.

Stop obsessing over understanding them and start paying attention to what their behavior is doing to you.

Subscribe now

(What were we thinking?)

Fast forward to now, and the frustration is real. More and more people are complaining about them, wishing they could go back to pre-historic dating when you met in bars and swapped phone numbers instead of Instagram handles.

So what gives? What makes them so bad?

First let’s talk about attraction and “chemistry.” We think of attraction in terms of looks and composure, but it’s actually much deeper than that. Our nervous systems collect so much information that we are oblivious to.

The dilation of pupils, the speed and cadence of their breathing, tiny micro expressions that the naked eye can’t recognize. Pheromones are chemical signals that trigger physiological responses in others, usually in the form of undetectable scents.

Even saliva carries dozens of informative tidbits, which is why a kiss can be really intense, or just meh.

You may not remember if they had their palms facing up or down, but your nervous system does. (Visible palms suggest safety.)

We’re talking teeny tiny cues that have teeny tiny responses, all in a teeny tiny millisecond. This is what we often think of as “vibes.”

With dating apps, you get approximately none of that data. You see a 2D photo and read a few lines of flattering text. You’re trying to determine a match with almost none of the necessary information.

It’s like wanting to love your Ikea furniture because the photos online looked good. But let’s be honest—it’s Ikea.

So what do our brains do about the missing data? They fill in the gaps to create a full picture. It’s fiction, obviously. But we don’t consciously register that.

Why is the book always better than the movie? Because you built the scenes. You imagined the people. You have a version in your head that is uniquely yours. When you read a book you have to actively engage with it and create the images yourself. The movie will look different. Not necessarily bad, just not what you expected.

We take a few photos and lines of text and imagine the whole person. We don’t necessarily idealize them, our image is often fairly average, but it’s biased to our own liking.

So the problem isn’t that the person wasn’t good enough, it’s that they didn’t match the version of who you imagined them to be.

Only we don’t know that—it’s all subconscious. None of us has any idea this is what’s happening.

When you show up, what you see is not what you expected.

It turns out the image you invented wasn’t actually real.

Shocking, I know.

When people go on dating apps, they are generally looking for a person—or so they think. Why we do things and why we think we do things are often very different. You use dating apps to date, right?

Maybe.
Sometimes.

Have you ever found someone you wanted to connect with, sent them a message, and by the time they replied, you’d lost interest? You were most likely seeking validation, not connection.

Maybe you wanted reassurance that you are attractive enough to get a response. Maybe you needed a confidence boost. Maybe you were feeling lonely when you sent it, but you’re not anymore.

And when someone messages you then ignores your reply? Feels pretty shitty, doesn’t it?

The thing is, not responding likely had nothing to do with you. They were never looking for a person, they were looking for a feeling.

Reassurance. Validation. Relief. Confidence.

The big problem here is that one person is outsourcing their sense of worth onto the app, while the other person gets hit by the fallout. Both can be damaging.

Dating apps are validation machines. People often use the apps to regulate their own loneliness, boredom, or self-doubt, without realizing someone else is on the receiving end of it.

None of it is done with malice, it’s just how the emotional physics of dating apps work. Over the course of months or years, these can have a significant impact.

Not only is it an exhausting process with terrible ROI for many people, but it can actually make you feel worse about yourself. And while it may fill a void or boost confidence briefly, they aren’t actually meeting real needs. It’s a high that doesn’t last. You go back and swipe for more.

Don’t get me wrong – some people have great dating app experiences. We’ve all heard Tinder success stories. I have friends who met on Match and have been married for 16 years strong.

Miracles can happen.

The people you swipe are real people, right?

As someone who tried hinge twice, for a few months each time, I can tell you that the sexual harassment is real. And it’s often as quick as the first message. People can become creepy creepsters when they’re typing on their phone to a photo.

The way people behave on dating apps can be appalling. And I’m sure some of those people are just appalling people. But many of them would never behave that way in person. The lack of nervous system connection and 3D interaction makes it easy to forget you’re talking to a real person with real feelings.

The internet as a whole creates an environment where people can say awful things with a complete lack of consequence.

In person, they’d have to see your face when they say a mean thing. They’d have to hear their own words out loud. They’d have to behave physically to match their words. Many people would be too embarrassed or unable to be so hurtful when they actually have to answer to it. It’s uncomfortable.

But on an app? They don’t have to speak it, they don’t have to face the person they say it to, and no one is watching. Being a bitch or asshole has never been easier.

Swiper, No Swiping!

Dating apps remove your nervous system from the conversation. The unconscious data necessary to form attraction and chemistry (ahem, biology) is absent. They meet the wrong needs. They open us up to hurtful behavior, whichever side of it you’re on.

Ten years ago, dating apps were ubiquitous and people loved them. Today, people are getting tired of trying to find love by swiping in two dimensions.

It turns out love works better in 3D.

____________________________________________________________________________________________

Want to test how well you can spot emotional manipulation? Take the quiz.

Feedback is encouraged and always appreciated, even if it’s negative!
Leave a comment below.

Subscribe now

Share

So those lists of red flags? Toss ‘em. They’re not entirely useless, but they’re pretty close. I’d actually argue they do more harm than good. If you’re on the lookout for very overt and obvious signs of EM, you’ll miss the actual abuse that’s happening.

Our overconfidence is part of what makes us an easy target. And manipulative people know it.

Ever think to yourself (or say out loud) “If my partner was abusive, I’d leave.” It seems logical, right? But do you think the people who don’t leave abusive relationships once said “If my partner was abusive, I’d stay”?

I’m going out on a limb here and guessing not. Abuse never starts as abuse. It typically starts as a great relationship, then very slowly and very gradually shifts.

And it does things to your brain that make an obvious thought, “I’d leave” into a much more complicated situation.

For my Master’s Thesis, I conducted a study where people took a quiz about EM, then received explanations of the psychological mechanisms behind the answers. Not just “XYZ is a red flag” but “here’s how and why XYZ works the way it does.” Then they took a similar quiz to see if they did better. (They did. And my results are being downloaded like crazy across the planet.)

What was most interesting—and in my opinion, most important—were the comments people made. “Why is this the first time I’m learning this?” “This finally makes sense after years of trying to figure out what was happening in my marriage.” “This is a sobering moment.”

The most moving comments were from the people who recognized abuse in their relationships based on what they learned.

Even more moving—the people who said “I had no idea I was the abuser.” Around 7% of the study participants put that in writing. That’s not a small number. People saw ways they were unknowingly using manipulative and harmful tactics on their partners—and admitted it.

That. That is why I do the work I do. No one else seems to be looking at unhealthy relationships like this. It’s a lens not even educators are looking at.

In fact, my work was once called “highly inappropriate” in a university setting, and I was prohibited from presenting there.

Luckily, the American Psychological Association disagreed, as they invited me to present it at their annual conference later that same year. It was a big relief to find my work was not actually inappropriate at all.

Anyway, I digress.

The point is, I revamped my quiz without the academic constraints that limited its power (in my opinion.) And here it is:

Emotional Manipulation Quiz

The best part? After completing the quiz, you get a link to the Answer Explainer which — get this — explains the answer. What a novel idea.

What’s more? You are not required to create a login or give me your email address to see your score or get the explainer.

So take the quiz. See how you do. Learn some things.

And if you could be so kind, leave some feedback at the end so I know what’s working and what’s not.

Good luck!

*This is a research-based knowledge quiz, not a magazine-style fluff piece. Please give yourself about 15 minutes to complete it.

Rules and ultimatums often get confused as boundaries, but they are actually very different, and this difference matters.

Rules and ultimatums are an attempt to dictate what someone else can or cannot do.
Boundaries are statements of what you will do in response to someone else’s behavior.

For example:
Rule: Stop raising your voice with me.
Ultimatum: Stop raising your voice or I’m leaving.
Boundary: If you continue to raise your voice, I’m going to leave.

The first two demand that the other person to stop yelling. It requires a specific behavior from them. The last one doesn’t ask anything of them, it instead focuses on your behavior. It’s often an “if, then” type of statement that tells them what you’ll do based on their behavior.

So if you’re waiting on their behavior to change, you haven’t set a boundary.

Ultimatums and boundaries can get a little confusing, as they seem to be communicating the same thing to accomplish the same outcome. But that’s actually not the case.

On paper, they may look the same. The difference is whose behavior you're trying to control.

If you’re communicating what you will do, then it is a boundary. It says “You can choose your behavior, I’m telling you how I’ll respond.”

If you’re trying to influence what they’ll do, it’s an ultimatum. It says “I’m using the threat of consequences to try and get my way.”

If you want to set boundaries, you have to communicate how you’ll respond, then let them decide for themselves.

But boundaries only work if you follow through. If you uphold your boundary this week but back down from it next week, it’s not a real boundary. And they are less likely to take your boundaries seriously.

Think of it like this:

A rule says “Do what I say.”
An ultimatum says “Do what I say, or else.”
A boundary says “Do whatever you want, but here’s what it will cost you.”

Subscribe now

But relationships and emotions are anything but intuitive. Your feelings are real, but they aren’t always true. And instincts are often based on a faulty autopilot.

Most of us assume we’ll recognize unhealthy dynamics when we see them. If something is wrong, it’ll feel wrong. If someone is manipulating us, we’ll know it. If a relationship is unhealthy, it’ll have problems.

Right?

Unfortunately, that’s not how any of this works.

The nervous system prioritizes survival. It doesn’t care if you’re happy—it only cares that you’re safe.

This makes the nervous system incredibly good at convincing you that confusing situations make sense, harmful dynamics are normal, you’re not good enough for someone, or genuine love is dangerous. And you will believe whatever it tells you.

Because it does not matter how smart you are.

Your nervous system is smarter.

The Public Discourse

In today’s world, we have access to all the knowledge we could ever imagine. Unfortunately, we’re also inundated with misinformation.

If it’s on the internet, it must be true, obviously.

Especially if it’s on social media. That’s where a lot of relationship “advice” circulates. Some of it is credible. Most of it is not.

The problem is people don’t know what to believe, so they often believe whatever resonates with them and dismiss what doesn’t. It becomes an echo chamber reinforcing unhealthy soundbites.

Relationship advice is often oversimplified to the point of being wrong—or even harmful. Some ideas might technically be true, but they’re horribly misrepresented or expressed as universal truths when they’re actually circumstantial.

It’s all buzzwords and clickbait.

To be honest, even a lot of the “good” content is less than helpful. So much of it emphasizes moral validation and focuses on surface level things like identifying red flags, setting boundaries, diagnosing narcissism, understanding triggers, or giving quick advice about what people “should” do.

These ideas aren’t objectively bad, but the average consumer has no clue how to figure out which relationship content to trust—or what might be missing from the conversation altogether.

To be fair, it’s pretty hard. We try to think logically, but this is a topic where traditional logic often leads to the wrong conclusions.

So What’s My Point?

People want this information—it’s in high demand.

Unfortunately, the supply sucks.

We need better content, better commentary, and better myth-busters. We need unpopular opinions and unfiltered reality. So I started a blog.

You’re welcome.

But there’s another pressing issue that almost no one talks about. The majority of unhealthy relationship content focuses almost entirely on toxic dynamics and overt abuse.

But the vast majority of unhealthy relationships are not toxic or abusive. In fact, most of them are loving relationships between two partners that genuinely care for one another.

True story.

People stay in relationships for a lot of wrong reasons. Maybe they dread single life, feel too old to start over, or are running out of time before their ovaries tell them to fuck off.

Whatever the reason, it unintentionally creates quiet dysfunction that slowly eats away at one or both partners. These dynamics also have an unusual ability to expand the harm beyond the couple, often leaving others damaged in their wake.

And virtually no one is talking about this. So I want to get that conversation started.

But Can You Trust Me?

Content creators almost all claim to be educated experts and have the best information, even when that’s wildly inaccurate. So why believe me?

Because I’m an educated expert and I have the best information.

Trust me.

All kidding aside, if you want my full credentials, you can find them here and here. But the most relevant thing I can tell you is that from 2023–2024, I conducted one of the first academic studies focused entirely on emotional manipulation and the mechanisms that drive it. And it turns out we may be looking at unhealthy relationships all wrong.

I also presented my research at the world’s largest psychological conference (APA, Denver 2025). Since then, my study has been downloaded over 1400 times across 73 countries (and growing), and has been cited in other academic publications. #braggingrights

One might say I know some things.

And I want you to know them too.

This blog will be mostly commentary and myth busting, but if you want a deeper educational experience, I also have a platform called UNRAVEL that explains relationship psychology in great detail. If you don’t know where to start, there are 5 Journeys that walk you through the full cycle of unhealthy relationships, your own patterns, and ways to support a friend.

And it’s written in clear, relatable language.

There’s no jargon there. No unnecessarily complicated language. No 7 syllable words. (Wait…Neu-ro-plas-tic-i-ty. Phew, only 6.)

One Last Thing, and This is Pretty Important

A lot of relationship content is built around blame and moral validation.

Who’s toxic.
Who’s the victim.
Who’s right.
Who’s to blame.

That’s not what I do.

My goal is to help people better understand their patterns and relationships, not to judge them. I want to reduce shame, not add to it. So I explain what’s happening, how and why it works, and the harm it can cause.

But I focus on the behavior, not what it may or may not say about the person.

There are no heroes or villains in my work.

Want to test how well you can spot emotional manipulation? Take the quiz.

Feedback is encouraged and always appreciated, even if it’s negative!
Leave a comment below.