How Do You Deal With The Stress of Ulterior Motives?

Feel used or to feel like people are being kind to you or.

Because they want you to do something and they've got ulterior motives.

It's not fun.

I'm Rick from Thriving Now. This is Kathy Bartuli from thriving now and theintimacydojo.com how do you deal with that? You know, I know we have high standards for relationships. We want people to be authentic and upfront, but not everyone lives in that place.

No, it's not a good feeling to feel used or to feel like people were being kind to you or trying to connect with you in order to get something that they needed. I'd much rather someone was genuine with me and just said, hey, I could really use this thing. Are you willing to do this thing? Versus wow, Rick, you look really good today. Did you get a haircut? And wow, you just look really good. And, oh, I really need help cleaning my car. I'll do that sometimes playfully with close friends, but I do it in such a way that it's obvious that that's what I'm doing because I don't want people to feel manipulated. I think sometimes people feel like that's the only way they can get needs met, though. Our society doesn't teach people how to be open or ask for what they want, especially because a lot of people don't know how to say no. Yeah.

And we're human animals. We often have motives. And an ulterior motive to me is like, it's a motivation that's not been disclosed yet. You can kind of feel it. You sense that they're coming from a place where something is real important to them and they're offering things. It's like, would you please scratch my back? And here's this mango. Or it's actually, here's this mango. Here's another. Here's a fig. Here's a mango. Here's some water.

And now that you meet with me.

Would you please scratch my back?

But you've already eaten them, so it's a little hard to say no.

Right. And in which case the deal isn't clear. And I one is, I invite people to look at how much of what they do is really not a yes for them, because that'll give you a sense of how much you're acting from obligation or that sense of tit for tat. Oh, this person was really nice for me. And now I'm going to have to give them their ulterior motive. If you break that chain, you'll notice that people behave differently because that kind of if it's a false niceness in order to get something from you that you're not going to want to say yes to. If you can say no, then they're not going to do that. They're much more likely to discover, wow, I can be direct with this person and it may be a yes 90% of the time, but those other 10% of the times it really doesn't matter how much sucking up I do. I'm not going to get what I want.

Yeah. And I encourage you if this is something you struggle with and I know I have a hard time if someone's kind to me and then asks for something. Go through our video, we have a video on handling disappointment. Let other people feel disappointed sometimes if you didn't agree to something and they, they were like nice to you or sincere with you and then asked for something. If you're not a yes, be okay with them being disappointed and like, oh, well, if they say but I did these things, you can say, well, I didn't realize it was in exchange for this, I need to have agreement up front. So I'm a no to your request in the future. Please let me know ahead of time if you want to trade things.

Right. Because generous hearted people, we do things out of a yes. And if you want an exchange with me, then it's important for that to be up front and remembering that we're always evolving our relationships. People adapt to who we are and they can think that they know who we are. I mean we often see that in family, right, that they think that they know who we are, but we actually different boundaries and different interpersonal capacities. Especially if you've been tapping a lot, you'll notice that that kind of yank that people used to be able to do to get you to be and do what they wanted is like they don't have any traction anymore. And that's a great thing. And so we can start with some very simple tapping on how do you feel as you imagine this person coming to you and they've got that energy and you just know they have an ulterior motive. But you do you like them being nice to you?

Yeah, it feels kind of rude if they say something nice and you're like, what do you want? Like that doesn't always.

Because then you don't get the niceness. So the energy approach is we can accept and tune to the niceness and we can even in a calm, confident way. But you know, that gut reaction may be, oh, there's an ulterior motive. Here. So as you think about someone with an ulterior motive coming to you, maybe someone you really care about, that you have a big yes for what happens in your body. Like, as I think of someone coming to me with an ulterior motive, I get a little bit of a bile feeling. My body's like, oh, there's something else going on here. It's not just this loving exchange of appreciation and service. There's something else going on here. How intense does it feel? And let's do some tapping. Take a deep breath. Feet on the floor. Wiggle your toes. Even though I can tell they've got an ulterior motive.

Even though I can tell they have an ulterior motive.

And a part of me feels sick about it.

And a part of me feels sick about it.

And I want to move away.

And I want to move away.

Maybe that's not the only way to be with this dynamic.

Maybe that's not the only way to be with this dynamic.

Even though I can tell they have an ulterior motive.

Even though I can tell they have an ulterior motive.

Thank you, Bonnie, for letting me know.

Thank you, Bodi, for letting me know.

And I'm open to relaxing and getting clarity.

And I'm open to relaxing and getting clarity.

Clarity about what's my yes.

Clarity about what's my yes.

Eyebrow. And if it's an exchange, what the exchange is for.

And if it's an exchange, what the exchange is for.

Side of the eye. It's okay to do exchanges.

It is okay to do exchanges.

It's okay to be generous.

It's okay to be generous.

I love nice people.

I love nice people.

Sweetness is sweet.

Sweet. This is sweet.

And sometimes humans have ulterior motives.

And sometimes humans have ulterior motives.

Under the arm. And I'm cleaning this up.

And I'm cleaning this up.

Particularly the obligation part.

Particularly obligation part.

Aren't they going to be surprised?

Aren't they going to be surprised?

Deep breath.

And if you have someone that has a pattern of doing this with you and they start being nice, you can receive what you feel comfortable receiving as a. This is what humans do for each other. And then if they, you know, like, oh, let me make you dinner, it's like, you know what, Mary? I would love to have you make me dinner, but in the past, you've been. You've made me dinner and then been very disappointed when I didn't want to do something for you and it exchange. So I want to be clear, is this just a Dinner or do you want something? I'd like to know ahead of time.

Yeah. And those words, if they could never come out of your mouth, keep tapping on that feeling in your body until you can practice it and say it out loud to a mirror or to a picture of Mary or a picture of Bob, whoever it is that you can't imagine. See, part of it is we can feel like we're being mean or calling the question in a way that's rude and resentful. Because you know what? We have a lot of built up rudeness and resentfulness about how they've behaved in the past. Tapping on your own or with a coach can help clear that so that when it comes out of your mouth it says, yeah, I love your dinners, Mary, You've always been really good. And is this something that you'd like to exchange for something from me or is this just an act of let's have dinner together? It's a co creation. You want to make dinner and I want to eat your dinner. Wow. Most of us have never heard that kind of dynamic. There have been unspoken exchanges that rot relationships that make us feel this kind of gross feeling so that we're not even able to enjoy dinner.

Yeah. The resentment expectation, what do I owe her now?

Kind of feeling and keeping track, like, I did this for you and you need to do this for me, and then I did this for you. Yeah. That's not our model for loving, healthy relationships. It's not a mercantile relationship. Mercantile relationships have a place. If I want something, I like to be able to say, hey, I really cannot do this on my own. If. If would you be a yes to doing this? And I would like to offer an hour of my time in service of you for something that you'd like. How does that feel to you?

Yeah, it's very different.

Thank you.

Yeah.

This type of work is so core to cultivating an emotional world that's exciting to you. If this appeals to you, but you'd like to know some next steps, you can leave your comments or email us@supportrivingnow.com and we appreciate you being a part of our circle and being the type of person that's looking for ways of crafting and co creating relationships that are really thriving.

Nice.