Persuasiveness

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Throughout my life I seem to have always been close to heavily persuasive people. Primary examples are parents, and church folks.

There's no doubt I can make my own choices in life but these people's persuasiveness tends to be too heavy to refuse. All that the persuasiveness has led me into is distress and trauma. Indeed it is a distress in itself, so much it seems better to go along with the people.

I was thinking today of why I suffer so much trauma, it's very often because I've been persuaded into things that on my own accord I perfectly well had the foresight to avoid. A prime example is home ownership, which I have coped very poorly with as experience has shown I was pushed into it before I was ready as living circumstances tend to have been distressing.

It struck me that maybe it's not all my own weakness or lack of foresight, more that the persuasiveness of others is really heavy, and just in itself ends up breaking me.

Is anyone else surrounded by heavily persuasive people, or seem to be surrounded by them, and how has experience taught you to negotiate it?

I can be that way at times. I also consider myself to be quite persuasive.

I wish I was persuasive. Nobody listens to my arguments, even though I back them up with facts and they just use opinions, if not insults.

Noone can persuade you to do something you don't want to do if you don't let them. I'm the opposite as soonn as I feel someone is trying to persuade me to do something I get very resistant, I'll argue for long enough that I can make my own mind up on wether I want to do it, if I find I actually do I'll act like they've persuaded me and I'm grateful for it just to go with the flow and play the game (which makes them happy) but if I don't want to do it I wont and it's lead to me putting my foot down in the past and pissing people off but who cares? Someone has to be in that situation and it's either you or them.

I never used to be like this tho, used to be just like you. Only thing that changed was I decided not to be a doormat any more and excercise my free will at all times. One thing I had to learn tho was not to burn bridges, always leave your options open as long as you can so if for example I'd refused to go somewhere I could if I wanted change my mind and accept at the last moment.

Being surrounded by heavily persuasive people probably means you appear as though you need to be directed. Yes there are persuasive people out there looking to make you do things you don;t want to but most aren't like that without a reason.

The home ownership thing for example has a very good reason behind it - everyone should, if they can afford it, try and get on the housing ladder the younger the better. That's simple economics. I'm presuming it was a member of your family that was persuading you to do that and they will have done so for your benefit. If it was a flatmate persuading you to do it then it was for their own or both of your benefit.