Awareness: Combatting Psyops and Emotional Manipulation

I read a headline that stated anxiety has been on the rise. A staggering 20% of adults have an anxiety diagnosis while 50% report having high levels of anxiety symptoms. In my conversations, it seems to be on the rise. Personally-speaking, anxiety shows up as fear. Despite my training and despite my experiences, it took me forever to figure that out.

Why am I talking about anxiety and fear?

Consider the types of advertisements we see. There’s an element of fear frequently attached to them.

“Your car is going to break.”

“Your house is going to break.”

“You’re going to break.”

“You’re broke.”

Obviously, there’s an element of truth in some of these things as well. This fear is used to motivate us to take action. This or that thing will prepare us or fix whatever it is. Then, we can be comfortable again. We can be at ease. We won’t have to be afraid or be anxious.

But, it may not be just with ads we see, is it?

It could be with news. It could be with politics. It could be with social media. It could be with division between people.

So, one question for consideration is this: Are we a part of a psyop?

First, a psyop is often a nonphysical militaristic mental manipulation. Chase Hughes talks about F.A.T.E. (or Focus, Authority, Tribe, and Emotion). The way this basically works is there is an area of focus that grabs our attention and often triggers fear. Often, this comes from someone we trust, respect, or know (even a celebrity). Naturally, we want to be on the right side, so we choose our tribe. Finally, our emotions are high and reach a point when we want to do something about it. We need to act.

If you really think about it, spam is like this. At work, we go through training that shows how cyber threats typically happen. “Hey, you better act now so you can avoid this discomfort!” While many of us can hit the brakes when it comes to spam, we are often susceptible to being manipulated in other ways.

This post, by the way, isn’t about inciting fear. This is about awareness. If the more of us become aware and watch for these gentle manipulations, tugs, and pulls in our psyche from media, political figures, and celebrities, maybe we can stop being so divided and find the common ground that really exists in us all.

After all, it’s a heckuva lot easier to find something when we look for it.

Let’s take a look together, shall we?

#psyop #manipulation #military #politics #division #hate #mental #toughness #unity #love #Jesus #God