Are You Being Gaslit?
Spot the Signs
By Sandy C. Newbigging
Gaslighting is a term that’s getting more exposure recently, but what is it, and how can you tell if you are ever being gaslit? Gaslighting is a form of mental and emotional manipulation that undermines the validity of a person’s thoughts, feelings, and perceptions of reality. It usually causes confusion and uncertainty, loss of confidence and autonomy, and often leads to inner angst and anxiety. In a vicious cycle, it can also create more dependency on the perpetrator – as it impairs our ability to trust our own judgment and thus discern well.
The term ‘Gaslighting’ is derived from a 1944 psychological thriller called Gaslight. In the movie, a husband uses mind games and manipulations to convince his wife that she is insane, so he can gain power of attorney and steal from her. During the film, the husband dims and brightens a gaslight, and when his wife notices, he says it is only her imagination. Hence, the term gaslighting is used when a person becomes disorientated or distressed because they are being made to doubt themselves – usually for the gaslighter’s own benefit.
How do you know if you are being gaslit?
You may suffer from self-doubt, chronic confusion and anxiety. The confusion comes from constantly being told that your thoughts, feelings, intuitions, senses, or perceptions are in some way ‘wrong’ or ‘inaccurate’. Whereas the anxiety usually arises from a history of having your version of reality invalidated; making it hard to trust yourself and feel safe.
Gaslighting makes us feel psychologically impaired or misguided, and incapable of knowing what we are truly thinking, feeling or seeing. It is disempowering, weakens our sense-of-self and our capacity to know our needs, maintain healthy boundaries, make decisions that are right for us, and function optimally as a self-sufficient and sovereign human being.
Common gaslighting phrases include: I never said that, I didn’t do that, don’t be so dramatic, you always take things the wrong way, you’re too sensitive or too emotional, you’re overreacting, you’re imagining things, or you’re remembering it wrong.
Always being told that you are ‘too emotional’, for example, can make you believe that you are somehow wrong to be feeling what you’re feeling. Being unable to trust our feelings impairs our discernment i.e. our ability to ‘judge well’, as we use our emotions to guide us.
Or let’s say you’ve been hurt by something someone said or did. When trying to talk to the person about it, instead of your feelings and version of reality being acknowledged, respected and responded to, you are shut down and accused of ‘overreacting’, ‘being too sensitive’ or ‘making a mountain out of a molehill’. This kind of deflection, which is designed to make you doubt yourself and release the ‘gaslighter’ of any and all wrong-doing or responsibility, is the opposite of what you need. Rather, a healthier response would be for the person to seek to understand how they hurt you, and ideally, apologise.
Gaslighting is harmful because we all need to be seen, heard and understood, in order to feel safe and trust ourselves and others. Gaslighting, on the other hand, corrodes our inner safety and trust, which is why it causes trauma, stress, confusion and limits our ability to ‘judge well’ and live secure, sovereign and successful lives.
Although there may be times when you are in fact remembering something wrong, when being gaslit, you will also be accused of ‘always’ remembering things wrongly, being forgetful, or having a terrible memory. Or some other kind of undermining comment that makes you chronically doubt your thoughts, feelings or memories in a more general way.
Get the difference? Gaslighting isn’t just someone disagreeing with you, or if someone ever uses any of the above phrases when talking to you. Sometimes, we are taking things way too personally, and it’s helpful for a friend to tell us! However, gaslighting is when the other person disagrees, deflects and follows-up with some kind of demeaning comment that causes us to doubt ourselves on a regular basis.
What can you do if you are being gaslit?
Know that you have the right for your thoughts, feelings and perceptions to be respected and responded to. Know that your viewpoint and opinions are valid, even if someone else thinks they aren’t, or even if on occasion you end up being ‘wrong’. Be vigilant for any undermining comments that could cause you to chronically doubt yourself. Healthy relationships consist of honesty, safety, trust, respect, and the ability to speak freely. By guarding yourself against gaslighting, you can illuminate more calm, clarity, confidence within yourself.
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