flattery

Flattery in courtship is the highest insolence, for whilst it pretends to bestow on you more than you deserve, it is watching an opportunity to take from you what you really have.

~Sarah Fielding

Every good thing said about me was true.  Looking back, I see how perfectly played it all was.  Paying lip service to my best personality traits and characteristics made me feel good about myself.  It made me feel appreciated, admired, and genuinely loved, all while I was told that no one before had ever truly loved me.  Convenient.  Familiar sounding...  Even the predictable claims of not deserving me, which I appropriately denied and discounted, hence negating my self worth.....man it was all so brilliant.  And so superficial.

The irony of the sort of flattery in Fielding's quote above is that it is strategically designed to be self-serving.  By heaping flattery onto a person - especially one whose self esteem is lacking - the recipient of flattery softens, melts, and seeks to prove that the words of the flatterer are true, if only because they want to truly believe the validity of the flattery.  And yet, it already is true!  But the recipient regards the flattery as a gift that may be fleeting, or a "high" that might dissipate, so they reinforce and amplify the qualities that have been flattered in the hopes that the flatterer will continue to value and desire them.  The flatterer reaps a harvest, easily supplied and easily taken. 

I'm making a distinction between flattery and genuine compliments or affirmation.  Also, the quote above is about flattery in courtship.  When my Mom tells me I am a giving person, it's just that simple and straightforward.  She perceives me as a giving person and wants me to know that she recognizes and celebrates that trait in me.

Maybe I'm being pessimistic or oversimplifying things, but it seems to me that, quite often, in the context of courtship, the suitor who flatters your body ultimately wants to partake of it.  The courter who flatters your generosity wants to take from you.  The wooer who flatters your strength wants to be the weak one while you run around applying band aids to all their frailties.  Perhaps the key variable is whether the flattery is merely words, or if it is reflected in actions.  Does he say you're amazing?  Or does he treat you like you're amazing?  Does she say you're attractive?  Or does she treat you like you're attractive and respect your body?

The flatterers who took more from me than they gave...they stumbled upon me at times when I was ripe for their picking.  I was hurting for one reason or another, and had also allowed too much space between myself and God.  The things I knew deep down to be true of myself were buried under other garbage and baggage.  I wasn't turning to God for my own affirmation and my self worth was compromised.  So when I heard those strategic, self-serving words of flattery, I ate it up and I opened the gates to give the things they realized I had to offer.  And boy did they take and take.  But at some point they took too much and I came to my senses.  I realized I didn't need to hear them say I was x, y, or z in order to believe it.  Furthermore, I realized that the hateful things they said about me were mostly motivated from their fear of being viewed as the frauds that they were. 

So when they say "flattery gets you everywhere," in a sense, that's true.  Or at least it can be.  But the cycle stops when the recipient of flattery observes whether the behavior of the flatterer is reflecting their words.  Anyone can call every girl they meet "beautiful", but are they treating them beautifully?  Anyone can tell you you're a great catch, but are they treating you like a great catch?  Chances are, if you're a great catch, and someone believes you're a great catch, they're not going to do anything that would make you swim away.