I’m fascinated by human behaviour and believed this book could help me better understand people in general, not just psychopaths.

You will likely grasp the concepts presented here quickly if you are familiar with works like “Lemon Leadership” or “The 5 Love Languages,” the attachment styles theory, all of which use categorisation to help readers better understand one another.

This book is about psychopaths. According to the book, they’re more frequent than we realise.

There are some examples of how people manipulate each other and how we are fooled into being manipulated by others.

Thomas Erikson uses the colours red, yellow, blue, and green to present four types of individuals right off the get in his book. Your immediate self-awareness allows you to place yourself neatly in one [or possibly two] of the categories. After that, the book is about how to recognise and cope with your own and others’ mental health issues. Rather, what piques my attention is learning how to cope with the mental illness of others I care about.

The main lesson for me from the book is that it provided me with clues on how to spot psychopaths, how psychopaths operate and how to handle them or avoid them.

If you take the time to get to know yourself and the intricacies of your personality, you will be able to see the manipulative behaviors of even the most skilled psychopaths and successfully resist their attempts to disrupt your life.

This book is a chance for you to realise that not everyone has your best interests in mind and to learn how to respectfully and truthfully maintain healthy relationship boundaries while being aware that manipulative people do exist.

Rating

7/10

It was sometimes interesting, but I felt like I was being sold something as a reader. I do find that I am curious more about what other people are thinking.

It’s worth reading to think on who you are, how you connect with others, and how to set and keep limits.

This book is funny, interesting, and full of useful information that can help you deal with the most expert manipulators and spot the psychopaths in your life. in the nick of time!

Favourite Quotes

• “Psychopaths believe that their splendid qualities give them the right to live off of others. They never pay the bills if they can get someone else to do it. They often have debts and owe taxes because little details like income tax and bill due dates bore them. They never offer to pay at the restaurant [they will always forget their wallets], and they are happy to borrow money from family and friends without ever paying it back. If they are called out, they simply blame somebody else.”
• “As they say: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.”
• “Don’t use too much logic – people usually respond more to emotions.”
• “A psychopath believes everything of yours is theirs and everything of theirs is theirs.”
• “When the recipient has filtered the message though their frame of reference, prejudices, and experiences, what remains is what they understand. Regardless of what you actually meant.”
• “You have most probably run into this person: an exciting human being who is incredibly charismatic, nice, charming and helpful. Who always has a compliment up his/her’s sleeve. And who will be guaranteed to make you feel good. You will believe what you’re told, even when it sounds fake – since it feels good. But what might seem too good to be true will most definitely be so…”
• “Psychopaths often have numerous short-lived sexual interactions. Their charm attracts many people, so they are never short of a partner. And permanent infidelity keeps things interesting, while at the same time it is exciting for them to deceive their partner. How much can the psychopath get away with.”