5 Types Of False Positive People

Man, it’s good to let some steam off. At least, from time to time. Every time you deal with aggressive or frustrated people, the energy between you is curbed. This is how it works, their actions or words are dislocating large chunks of energy that you have to process somehow. Pressure builds up. Most of the time, that pressure and aggressiveness can be recycled. But sometimes, it can’t. So you let the steam out and this is how you deal with aggressive and frustrated people.

But as I looked over the other day post and its reactions on Twitter and Facebook, something interesting stroke me. You know, aggressive people are easy to spot. They’re loud and somehow visible. They yell at you and they even become physically violent. But they’re not the only species that can hurt you. Not even remotely. In a way, they’re easier to deal with because they’re honest and easy to spot.

But there are a few types of people who are even worse than them. I call those “false positive people”. It’s coming from a programming concept, in which you create an algorithm and then start feeding it with data, but at some point, the algorithm is bypassed by a piece of data that it normally shouldn’t. That event is called “a false positive”. It looks like it’s ok, but it’s not.

False positive people are difficult to spot. They’re not yelling at you. They’re not trying to hurt you openly. At least not from the beginning. They build a sugary image used to get close to you and then, when they’re close enough, they start their own hurting game. In my experience, there are at least 5 types of false positive people.

1. The Empowerer

This is what I call “the vampire“.  Their sugary line is: ”I get out the best of people.“ And most of the time, you fall for that. Who doesn’t want to get out the best of themselves? But beyond that sugary line lies a bunch of frustration and lack of attention.

The ”empowerer” doesn’t really want to get anything out of you. What he wants is to be listened continuously and taken care of. The subtle mechanic of his game is: “You see, I get out the best of you, now you should do the same for me. Or at least thank me in some way”.

That was my very first false positive and I fought for a long time with it, almost 8-9 years. It went on an on with an imbalanced relationship until I realized that I’m the only one that can get out the best of me. At that point, the energy exchange game stopped.

2. The Surviving Victim

This is a disguised abuser. Their sugary line is: “Everybody treated me so bad, you’re the only one that understands me.”. Of course, nobody treated them bad. As a matter of fact, the “surviving victims” are getting the best treatment they can dream of. Only they never admit it.

Most of the time they’re looking around to tell their sad stories to whoever is willing to listen. The moment you start to express some mild interest, (not to mention the tiniest compassion) they’re ready to “surrender” to your powerful hands. Only they’re not really surrendering, they’re taking over your life.

That’s the second type I met and lived with for a long time. Around 5 years of endless back and forth of “everybody treated me so bad, you’re the only one that I trust. As long as you’re going to do exactly how I say to you, right?”.

3. The Cheerleader

This is a disguised manipulator. He’s the one that give pats on the back but never really care about you. Ready to take your place anytime. Talking behind your back. Bragging around with your successes. The happy-go-lucky pal that will always be ready to take your girlfriend out “to a movie”.

They don’t have a sugary line, but most likely a sugary approach. Their apparent joy and availability is in fact a facade for a very clear purpose. Once you immersed in their enthusiastic vibration, you’re going to obey to their small and almost impossible to refuse requests.

This type is very often found in business relationships. The social norm in these circles is to smile and be available. On top of this game, it’s very easy to construct a more sophisticated behavior with the only goal of obtaining influence or manipulate other people. Took me a few years to learn to isolate them from the genuinely enthusiastic business partners I had.

4. The Yesman

This is a disguised con. Their sugary line is: “You’re awesome, man, everything you do is just amazing!”. Other variations include: “You know I am your friend.” or “Whatever you say.”. Behind this line there is, of course, a simple intention to get something from you.

It wasn’t until recently that I was confronted with yesmen. Partly because I never showed myself as a powerful or resourceful person, choosing a much humbler approach. That way, I wasn’t useful, since they allegedly didn’t have anything to take from me.

But in the end, I had to have this infamous conversation myself:  “I am your friend, can you lend me some money?”, “But of course, when are you getting to pay it back?”, “In two weeks. Top.”. Never seen that money again, of course.

5. The Savior

This is a disguised dominator. Their sugary line is: “I know how to save you. Just let yourself in my power and I’ll take care of you.” Most of the time, the savior did have some psychological knowledge (acquired or instinctual). Meaning that he will prove to some point that he can be useful.

But once you take off some of your shields, he will become your worst nightmare. The most unpleasant part of a relationship with a “savior“ it’s their constant need to be in control, to watch your moves and to be sure you’re following their instructions.

I found my ”savior“ a few times, most of the time by willingly investing them with my own power, hoping that things will turn out well. It never did, of course. The problem wasn’t that they were all becoming dominating at some point, but the fact that I thought I had a problem in the first place.

***

One thing that you should be aware of, when dealing with other people, being them openly aggressive or disguised as false positive, is that they’re just tools for your destiny. They’re looking and acting in a certain way to you because you filter them in that specific way. They’re like this for you and for you only. In other words, the problem they’re pointing at is inside you.

Every man is true to himself. Deep down, everybody wants to be happy. We just choose different paths on this road. And these paths can hurt or empower other people. For some, we may come out as true and balanced individuals. But for others, we may be their empowerer, their surviving victim, their cheerleader, their yesman or their savior. Provided that they’re allowing us to perform like this for them.

So, apart from getting your distance and protect yourself from the false positive people in your life, take the time to always remember that they’re nothing but tools in your destiny.

In the end, what needs to be worked out is inside you.

How To Catch A Bee

When I was a kid, one of my favorite distractions was catching bees. Before jumping to any conclusions, let me give you a little bit of the context around this sentence.

I grew up in a communist country, in a small city near the mountains. You didn’t have much to do in a small city from Romania, especially under a communist regime. All kids had to go to the same state kindergarten because their parents didn’t have any time to spend with them. And that was because they had to be away all day to build socialism, of course.

Although a very rough place to be for a kid, with not much affection or tenderness around, (not to mention the strict discipline and the terror of not saying what you want, by fear of the political police) the communist kindergarten helped me a lot. I’m sure that my will to become self-supported immediately after high-school had a lot to do with that. Also, my ability to survive in difficult conditions must have been built up during those years. But I’m getting a little bit ahead here. Let’s get back to our bees.

Playing Around

So, under this rather gray background, any activity that stood up as being different, or at least colorful, left a very deep mark. Catching bees was one of these activities.

We used to take an empty plastic tube, the ones that were used to keep small pills of C vitamin, took out the small plastic top (the tube was closed by applying a little bit of pressure on it) did a small hole in the top and then went out hunting.

The outside playgrounds on the state kindergarten were surrounded by small bushes. I suppose the initial intention was to have a “live fence” around the playgrounds, but they were just bushes. We were slowly approaching those bushes, sensing the vibration of hundreds of small insects, slowly and gently, trying to spot a bee.

When we spotted it, we were carefully approaching from one part the top and from the other part the tube, trying to catch the bee in the middle, right into the tube.

If our moves were smooth, if we were close enough, if we were fast enough and, of course, lucky enough, every once in a while we ended up with a bee caught in our small vitamin C tube.

That moment was magic. I still remember the thrill of it. That small insect was caught only by our actions. We did this. I couldn’t find any comparison for that. I know it sounds dumb, but in our little grey universe, that dumb activity was the only way to prove our assertiveness. And, as incredible as it may sound, our capacity of enjoying life.

Releasing The Bee

We weren’t into killing insects. Hence the small hole in the tube, to keep the air flowing in. We were into catching up something difficult to catch. And potentially dangerous.

The bees were buzzing inside the tubes for a few minutes, just enough for us to show them up to our colleagues. Oh, the moments we were finding out someone did catch a bee. The sudden aggregation of a human circle around you, the joy and admiration on the childish faces, the yelling and the joy. For milliseconds each bee catcher became a local hero.

After that, the bee had to be released back into the open. Releasing the bee was a very important part of the game. You couldn’t hold a bee forever in your vitamin C tube. You just couldn’t do this, it was against the rules. You had to go out and catch a new bee every day.

There were some kids who wouldn’t obey that rule. They were carrying their bees in their vitamin C tubes each and every day. In all honesty, those kids weren’t very popular. As a matter of fact, we used to make fun of them. “Is that the 100 year old bee in your tube?”. “Still sleeping together?”. “Are you married already?” Eventually, they had to release their bees too and get back into the game.

The Adult Perspective

One day, our parents spotted this game.

“What are you doing there kids?”, they asked.

“We are catching bees”, we answered.

“Oh, I see that, but what is the benefit of this game? Are you building a house for those bees?”

“Nope, we’re just catching bees.”

“Are you killing the bees? Oh, you want to clean the fence from insects?”

“Nope, we’re just playing.”

After we went like this for like ten minutes, we realized that they just couldn’t understand the game. For them, that bee had to have a meaning. Do something with it. Use it somehow.

For us, just catching the bee and releasing it back into the open was enough.

Oh, the thrill when someone was catching a big one! The joy on our faces and then the smooth and necessary releasing of the bee back into the open. Those were magic moments. Did I say that already? Yes, I did. But that’s ok.

Today

I still catch bees these days. I still do things only for the thrill of it, without any immediate benefit. Or specific usage.

I support my friends if I can. I support other people if I can. I set up some goal and then reach it and then forget about it.

I make insane amounts of money and then release it back into the open, letting myself broke. And start again. And again.

Many of my friends don’t understand this. To be honest, I don’t really care. I may listen to their concerns, because, well, we’re friends, and that’s what friends are doing. But when it comes to that question: “So, you really don’t regret letting that bee fly away?”, I always answer “Nope, not a bit”.

Because I still have that thrill inside. I have my eagerness to pursue a new goal, I have the ability to reach it and the power to let it go after that.

Catching bees and releasing them back, as simple and dumb as it may seem, helped me not only to keep my mental health, but to act and react like any human being on this planet should.

Like a child.

7 Things About Me

Well, it seems is that time of the year. And I don’t mean Christmas, but tagging and meme games. This time is Stephen Smith from Productivity In Context, and it’s about 7 things about me. Tracking down the beginning of this meme was a little over my time but I can tell for sure that the previous link before Stephen was Phil Gerbyshak from Slacker Manager…. I don’t usually follow these games, mostly because almost all those memes are just small disguised traffic scams with little or no associated value. But this time seems it’s going to be something fun and genuine. I’m in.

Let’s see the rules of this first:

• Link to the original tagger(s), and list these rules on my blog.
• Share 7 facts about myself in the post – some random, some weird.
• Tag 7 people at the end of my post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter.

7 Things About Me

1. I am 38 years old, as of November 10th this year.
2. I work for myself for about 10 years now, being what they call an webtrepreneur. This year I’ve made my first successful exit from my web publishing company in Romania.
3. In the last 4 months I’ve been eating only raw food with dramatic positive impact on both my physical health and mental clarity.
4. While doing my military service, 19 years ago, in a city called Timisoara, I was a live witness of the Romanian Revolution, which ultimately led to the first free elections on my country after half of a century. During that exact period I didn’t sleep for 5 nights and 6 days in a row, which is supposed to have devastating effects on the brain. I somehow survived. Or so I think…
5. I’m married with Diana and we have wonderful daughter, Bianca, who is almost 3 years old. I learned a lot from Bianca, in the first and second year of her life.
6. I’m a DIY junkie, I’ve assembled almost all the furniture in our house, and organized our garden literally from the ground up.
7. During high school I’ve played basket-ball as a left wing, although I’m right-handed. Apparently, this was some sort of advantage…

Now I have to pass this on to the following bloggers:

• Steven Aitchison, follow him on Twitter
• Kris Rowlands, follow her on Twitter
• Chris Marsden, follow him on Twitter
• Andrew Mason, follow him on twitter
• Brett Kelly, follow him on twitter
• Patrick Rhone, follow him on twitter
• Pascal Venier, follow him on twitter

Those blogs are quite interesting, by the way, steal a second or two and have a great read on them!