The Meta Message

By Ginger Johnson on July 28, 2024

Maya Angelou wrote, "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." And although I thought I understood what Maya meant, I obviously didn't, because for so long I didn't realize that my ex, Jack, felt contempt for me.

Humans are the masters of saying one thing while meaning another. "He's a little 'out there,' if you know what I mean," said with a lift of the eye brow and a subtle change in posture and tone on "out there." Only the the speaker knows for sure what he's implying by "out there." It's code.

If I am reading a spy novel and a man walks into a seedy dive of a bar and says, "I'll have a glass of sherry, please," it's pretty clear it's code for something. Fortunately in novels such cryptic communications are usually decoded sooner or later. Real life is very different.

Sometimes I can predict what other people are going to say, and I am pretty good at picking up on meta messages. I don't always understand them, or even know that's what I'm receiving, though. In conversations I might see the shape of what people are explaining even before they finish speaking. I will sometimes help a friend untangle their thoughts when they get partway through a sentence and hesitate, unable to find the next word. Also, I know the tone of voice people use when they mean the exact opposite of what they say: "I'm sorry! I didn't see you there," in a syrupy tone, or "Wow, you're so creative!"

None of that, however, prepared me for my ex, Jack, who can say, "You're not committed enough to me," or "You hate me," in the exact same tone and with the exact same body language as he would say, "I love you," or "I'll have the chicken." It was outside of my experience, and I didn't even know I was out of my depth. He lies as easily as he breathes.

Jack must have known early on in our relationship that I was clueless about this mixed message business. Looking back I can see many of his tactics. He wasn't that subtle about his manipulations, but he didn't need to be. I had given him a free pass to my inner circle, and I didn't parse his wording or his meta messages because I trusted him.

For instance, he would never say outright I was stupid for thinking something. Instead he would tell me a story about a girl who was stupid for thinking something similar–right after I'd shared my thoughts. Or he would say something with a meta message, but without the tone that would queue me to a meta message being sent. So I would think the meta message was my own thought, I'm stupid for thinking that, but I only attributed to Jack the actual words he said--"You really think these things through." If I brought it up, saying something like, "But you think that it's a dumb thought," he would backpedal immediately and assure me he thought no such thing and he'd sound completely sincere.

One of Jack's regular tricks was to leave a sentence dangling for me to finish and then if I did, he'd backpedal and say the exact opposite. Deniability was the name of the game. And deny he did. He had many other tricks in his repertoire as well. It's painful to remember.

I was so easy to trick, lie to, confuse, and manipulate. Using his contempt as a weapon in meta messages, Jack was able to change the way I was thinking. I was highly responsive and active in our conversations. He just sat there, leaving half-finished sentences or saying almost nothing and I did all the work, tearing myself down. I must have been a very entertaining toy.