Gaslighting Is an Especially Destructive Survival Mechanism
How a defense mechanism can be used to destroy others.
Posted October 22, 2025 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma
Gaslighting has become a popular term; it is not just manipulation but an assault on the right to one's own mind. The wound is not simply confusion and control; it's the forced collapse of subjectivity. People who gaslight do so much harm to others, all in the name of saving themselves. Gaslighters tend to have a very fragile sense of themselves and their place in the world. They work hard to create inner structures but continuously find the external world to be a threat. To prevent their own collapse, they distort the thinking of others to render the perceived threat neutralized.
Psychoanalyst R. D. Laing defines ontology as existing as a real, continuous person in relation to others in the world. This requires being accepted and seen as yourself by others, a recognition that your subjectivity is valid. Gaslighting represents a collapse of this intersubjective field. It is not simply lying or manipulation but a form of psychological violence. Daniel Shaw, a therapist and cult survivor, talks about traumatic narcissism and describes this as a “relational system of subjugation” in which one person’s psychic survival requires erasing the separateness of another. The victim’s mind becomes conscripted into stabilizing the gaslighter’s fragmented self, their subjectivity reduced to a mirror for someone else’s needs.
This dynamic creates a trauma of being. When one’s perceptions are consistently denied, memories rewritten, and emotions shamed, the basic continuity of the self begins to fray. As a person loses touch with their own subjectivity, they lose their sense of being real in the world and may even start to dissociate . Thoughts and feelings become numbed or compartmentalized, the body feels distant, and time feels distorted. In Laing’s terms, the person becomes divided , existing half inside themselves and half in the imposed world of the gaslighter.
The Gaslighter's Stance
From the perspective of the person doing the gaslighting, this isn't about being evil or harmful; it's about staying safe. Gaslighters may have ontological insecurity . They do not, at their core, feel stable and continuous in the world. Due to their own childhood wounds about being unloved and unseen, they find the adult world threatening.
They create internal narratives that are fragmented, discontinuous, and derived from dissociations and amnesias of their own. The story they have about themselves may not be totally based in reality, but they cannot allow themselves to notice that. Someone else's realness is a threat because it may require them to see things differently and as they really are.
To deal with the feeling of being attacked by reality, they attack reality itself. They bring other people down into their own realm of ontological insecurity and confusion. Somehow, this does serve as a temporary band-aid; their inner narrative remains untouched, and perhaps they even feel a degree of power that lifts them further.
Interpersonal Consequences
Authentic relationships depend on mutual recognition, each partner honoring the other’s perspective without annihilating it. Love, in its healthiest form, is a dance between two realities, not a conquest. When this capacity for difference collapses, intimacy turns into a contest for control. Gaslighting replaces emotional reciprocity with dominance, turning connection into a theater of distortion.
Even love itself can become weaponized. “If you cared about me, you’d trust me.” “You’re making me feel crazy.” Affection becomes a form of submission, guilt the currency of belonging. Ironically, beneath the gaslighter’s control is a profound fear of abandonment. Yet their desperate effort to prevent loss ensures it—the more they dominate, the more they alienate. Eventually, those with stable selfhood withdraw, unwilling to live as extensions of another’s psyche.
Coping With Gaslighting
The first step in coping is understanding that this is not a disagreement over facts; it’s a battle for psychological coherence. The gaslighter’s goal is not truth, but self-preservation. Attempting to argue your reality only intensifies their defense. Instead, focus on internal grounding. Journaling, psychotherapy , and supportive conversations help rebuild confidence in your own perceptions and emotions.
Patterns matter more than moments. The remorse and tenderness that sometimes follow episodes of manipulation often serve to reset the cycle rather than end it. Pay attention to repetition. Does the dynamic change or merely pause? Observing from a distance restores clarity that the relationship itself erodes.
When deciding whether to stay or leave, gauge the other person’s reflective capacity. Can they tolerate discomfort and accept partial responsibility without dissolving into rage or shame ? If not, maintaining your integrity may mean exiting the relationship. Preserving your sanity is not abandonment; it’s fidelity to your own truth. Love that demands self-erasure is not intimacy; it’s captivity disguised as devotion.
Facebook image: Hryshchyshen Serhii/Shutterstock
Kernberg, O. F. (2016). What is personality? Journal of Personality Disorders, 30(Supplement), 145–156. DOI: 10.1521/pedi.2106.30.2.145
Kohut, H. (1971). The analysis of the self: A systematic approach to the psychoanalytic treatment of narcissistic personality disorders. International Universities Press.
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Jason Shimiaie, M.D., is an assistant clinical professor at Mount Sinai Hospital. He researches relational psychoanalysis, trauma, and dissociation.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.