If you find yourself constantly being blamed for everything going wrong, it’s time to question whether you’re being manipulated into believing what may be a deflection. In this episode, I tackle the sometimes tricky dynamics of responsibility and blame.
Let me tell you about a dynamic I’ve seen destroy relationships, one I’ve even participated in myself. It’s what I call the mirror effect, and it’s one of the most insidious forms of emotional manipulation because it masquerades as self-awareness and personal growth.
Here’s how it works: one person in the relationship holds up a mirror to the other person, constantly pointing out their flaws, their mistakes, their shortcomings. “Look at yourself,” they say. “Can’t you see what you’re doing? You need to work on yourself. You need to change.”
And the person looking in that mirror starts to believe that everything wrong in the relationship is their fault. They become consumed with self-improvement, with fixing themselves, with being better.
But the thing about the person holding the mirror is that they only face it in one direction. They never turn it around to look at themselves. They never examine their own behavior, their own patterns, their own contribution to the problems in the relationship. Instead, they’ve found the perfect deflection technique. And as long as the person they are making look in the mirror stays focused on their own flaws, they will never have to address their own (by design).
I know this dynamic intimately because I’ve been on both sides of it. In my marriage, I was the one doing harmful behaviors. I was judgmental, critical, and emotionally abusive. I caused most, actually all, of the problems in that relationship. Everything would probably have been fine if I hadn’t done the things I did. But at the time, I couldn’t see it. I was so focused on what I perceived as my wife’s issues that I completely missed my own dysfunctions and toxic behaviors.
It wasn’t until after the divorce, when I had to face myself without anyone else to blame, that I finally understood what I’d been doing. That separation was actually a gift. With her out of the picture, I had no one to judge except myself. I had no one to give the silent treatment to except myself. I had to face my past and everything I had done, all the people I had hurt. That forced reflection changed everything.
The Roots of Deflection
So where does this pattern come from? Why do some people become so skilled at deflecting responsibility onto others while avoiding any self-examination?
In my experience, it usually stems from deep insecurities and low self-worth. When you don’t feel good about yourself, when you’re carrying shame or fear or unresolved pain, looking in the mirror is terrifying. It’s much easier to focus on someone else’s flaws than to confront your own. It’s a protection mechanism, a way to avoid the discomfort of self-reflection.
A lot of this goes back to childhood. The coping mechanisms we develop as kids to survive difficult situations often become the dysfunctional patterns we carry into adult relationships. I grew up in an alcoholic home, and I learned early on to stuff down my emotions. If I showed fear or sadness or anger, there were consequences. So I learned to repress everything, to keep it all inside.
That coping mechanism protected me as a child, but it destroyed my adult relationships. When you stuff everything down, it doesn’t just disappear. It comes out later in destructive ways. Passive-aggressive behavior, lashing out, anger issues, and emotional abuse. These are the results of unprocessed emotions and unhealed wounds.
I remember as a kid feeling neglected, even though my family wasn’t overtly abusive in many ways. My parents were dealing with their own issues, particularly my stepfather’s alcoholism, and I often felt invisible. Those feelings of not being important, of not mattering, created a wound that I carried into every relationship I had as an adult.
When you grow up feeling like you don’t matter, you develop strategies to get attention, to feel important, to feel worthy. Sometimes those strategies are healthy. Often, they’re not.
In my case, I became controlling and critical in my relationships. I used judgment and emotional manipulation to feel powerful, to feel like I mattered. But I was really just acting out my childhood wounds on the people I loved.
The Wake-Up Call
The pivotal moment for me came after my divorce. I was devastated, of course. I thought marriage was supposed to last “forever,” and when it ended, I felt like a complete failure. But upon reflection, I realized it needed to happen. If I wanted to evolve, if I wanted to become wiser and learn what I needed to know to get closer to happiness and fulfillment, I had to experience that challenge.
I had to take responsibility for my actions. Not just acknowledge them, but really own them. I had to stop blaming my ex-wife, stop making excuses, stop deflecting. I had to look at my behavior honestly and ask myself some hard questions:
Why did I act that way?
What was I afraid of?
What wounds was I trying to protect?
This is where the mirror effect becomes so damaging. When one person in a relationship is constantly deflecting blame onto the other, the person being blamed starts to believe they’re the problem. They become hyper-focused on fixing themselves while the actual source of dysfunction goes unaddressed.
I’ve worked with people who have spent years in therapy, read countless self-help books, and tried every strategy they could find to improve themselves and save their relationship. Meanwhile, their partner did nothing. No self-reflection, no therapy, no acknowledgment of their own behavior. And when the relationship still didn’t improve, the partner who had been doing all the work felt like an even bigger failure.
That’s the insidious nature of this dynamic. When the person holding the mirror convinces their partner that if they just worked harder on themselves, if they just changed more, if they just became better, then everything would be fine, it’s a lie. One cannot fix a relationship problem by themselves. Both people need to look in the mirror to see what they are contributing or taking away from the relationship.
This doesn’t mean the victim of abusive behaviors is at all to blame. In fact, a victim of this kind of behavior is always looking in the mirror. They are always trying to show up better and do the right thing. But if they are the only ones looking, the relationship cannot grow and heal.
Truth as the Foundation
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned is that honesty, even when it’s uncomfortable, is essential for healthy relationships. If a relationship can’t withstand truth, it probably wasn’t built on a solid foundation to begin with.
I remember when I started dating my wife. I had just decided to stop dating altogether because I needed to work on myself. I was tired of trying to impress people, tired of pretending to be someone I wasn’t. I wanted to be authentic, even if that meant being alone.
The day I decided to get off the dating sites, she sent me a message. And instead of trying to impress her or present myself as available, I was completely honest. I told her I wasn’t looking to date, that I was choosing to be single to figure myself out. I expected her to disappear, but instead, she said it was refreshing to hear someone be so honest.
We stayed friends for many months, writing every day, with no romantic expectations. I was comfortable being myself because I wasn’t trying to win her over. I shared everything, the good and the bad, because I had nothing to lose. That honesty became the foundation of our relationship. We’ve been together since 2014, and that transparency we established from the beginning has made all the difference.
When you’re honest about who you are, what you want, and what you’re struggling with, you give the other person a chance to know the real you. And if they can’t accept the real you, then the relationship isn’t right anyway.
When both people show up authentically, when both people are willing to be vulnerable and honest, that’s when real connection happens.
The problem with the mirror effect is that it prevents this kind of honesty. The person holding the mirror is hiding behind it, presenting a false image of themselves while scrutinizing every flaw in their partner. There’s no authenticity, no vulnerability, no real connection. Just manipulation and control.
So, How Do You Break This Pattern?
Whether you’re the one holding the mirror or the one constantly looking into it, how do you create healthier relationship dynamics?
First, you have to recognize the pattern. If you find yourself constantly focused on your partner’s flaws while rarely examining your own behavior, that’s a red flag. If you’re always the one apologizing, always the one working on yourself, always the one trying to change while your partner does nothing, that’s also a red flag.
Second, if you are doing behaviors that hurt the other person, you have to be willing to turn the mirror around.
This is terrifying, I know. Looking at your own dysfunction, your own wounds, your own harmful behaviors is incredibly uncomfortable. But it’s necessary. You can’t heal what you won’t acknowledge.
When I finally looked at my own behavior after my divorce, I was horrified. I saw all the ways I had been judgmental, critical, controlling, and emotionally abusive. I saw how my childhood wounds had shaped my adult relationships. I saw how my fear of abandonment and rejection had driven me to manipulate and control the people I loved.
That self-awareness was painful, but it was also liberating. Once I could see my patterns clearly, I could start to change them. I could work on healing the wounds that drove those behaviors. I could learn healthier ways to cope with my emotions and communicate my needs.
Third, you have to take responsibility for your actions. Not just acknowledge them, but really own them. This means no more deflecting, no more blaming, no more making excuses. When you hurt someone, you acknowledge it. When you make a mistake, you own it. When you have work to do on yourself, you do it.
I’ve learned that people who care about you, people who love you, want you to be happy. They want you to honor yourself and your needs. When you express a boundary or share something that’s bothering you, a healthy partner will listen. They’ll care about how you feel. They’ll want to understand and support you.
But if you express a boundary and the other person gets defensive, if they turn it around on you, if they make you feel guilty for having needs, that tells you something important about the relationship. That tells you they’re more interested in maintaining control than in your well-being.
The Path Forward
Breaking dysfunctional patterns isn’t easy. It requires courage, honesty, and a willingness to face uncomfortable truths about yourself and your relationships. But it’s worth it.
I think about the person I was in my previous marriage compared to who I am now. I’m not perfect. I still have work to do. But I’m no longer that judgmental, critical person who used emotional manipulation to feel powerful. I’ve learned to communicate honestly, to take responsibility for my emotions, and to honor both my own needs and my partner’s autonomy.
The key is recognizing that personal growth isn’t about fixing yourself to please someone else. It’s about becoming the person you want to be, healing your wounds, and showing up authentically in your relationships. And sometimes, that means recognizing when a relationship isn’t healthy and having the courage to walk away.
If you’re in a relationship where you’re constantly being told to look in the mirror while your partner refuses to examine their own behavior, that’s not a partnership. That’s a power dynamic designed to keep you focused on your flaws while they avoid accountability for theirs.
Real growth happens when both people are willing to look in the mirror:
When both people take responsibility for their actions.
When both people are committed to honesty, even when it’s uncomfortable.
When both people support each other’s growth instead of using it as a weapon.
I’ve been on both sides of the mirror effect. I’ve been the one deflecting blame, and I’ve been the one accepting blame that wasn’t mine to carry. Neither position leads to healthy relationships or genuine happiness. What does lead to both is the courage to be honest with yourself, to take responsibility for your actions, and to demand the same from the people in your life.
The mirror should face both ways. If it doesn’t, you’re not in a relationship built on mutual respect and growth. You’re in a dynamic designed to keep one person in power and the other in a constant state of self-doubt and self-improvement that never quite seems to be enough.
You deserve better than that. You deserve a relationship where both people are willing to do the work, where both people take responsibility, and where both people show up honestly and authentically. Don’t settle for less just because you’re afraid of being alone or because you’ve been convinced that you’re the problem.
Sometimes, the most loving thing you can do for yourself is to stop looking in that one-way mirror someone is holding to you, and start looking at the big picture. When you do, you might find that the person holding the mirror has actually been hiding behind it all along, choosing to deflect instead of reflect.
