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Q: Why does bullying create a deep psychological & emotional stress and why can some advice make things worse!
A: Bullying works through ‘projection’ a subconscious action where a person unknowingly discharges their own fear, shame or intimidation onto someone else.
Bullying advice!
When advice that is given, ignores this inner dynamic and focuses only on the surface behaviour of the bully it can increase pressure on the person being bullied rather than reduce the harm being caused to them.
Remember this – regarding all domineering bullies, whether it be in the workplace or from school or in your memory from the distant past when or if you were bullied. A bully is not creating something new in the person they target. They are ‘projecting’ the very fear, humiliation and intimidation they already carry inside themselves. To put this simply, they are carrying and living with the ‘effect’ of the thing they are creating or attempting to create in the person they are picking on. Most bullies or intimidators do not realise this, as they are being driven by this subconscious inner need to discharge their harm or damage onto others.
What they push outward is an unconscious internal state they cannot sit with or face, as its too painful or edgy.
When the other person (the person that is being bullied) reacts with distress, confusion or collapse, the bully feels a sense of relief, satisfaction or fulfilment. That reaction is the discharge landing exactly where it was aimed. The satisfaction comes from seeing their own inner weight being lifted and transferred, discharged or offloaded and that can be a verbal or psychical offload onto the other person.
When someone, the person being picked on ‘doesn’t react’ in the usual sense, what they then often communicate (somatically, not verbally) is: withdrawal, submission or dissociation to the bully.
To a certain kind of bully, that is not neutral, it’s provocative. It confirms asymmetry.
This type of bully isn’t just seeking a reaction more like they are seeking hierarchical confirmation.
And hierarchy is not negotiated through words as it’s negotiated through presence, appearance under threat.
When the person being bullied, stands their ground or gets back up off the floor, so to speak – changes everything!
What disrupts ‘DRAMATICALLY’ the bully mid flow is not retaliation per se, but non-collapse, non-submission, non-acquiesce or non-compliance with the bully and their power display.
When a person is knocked down, gets up without pleading, posturing or appeasing and remains present in their body or mind (they have-not shown an effect to the bully) the bully is forced into an unexpected internal state, which is:
‘I cannot control YOUR internal world’.
That’s becomes powerfully destabilizing there and then for that bully.
At this point, the bully is no longer regulating you, the person being bullied, they’re starting to feel themselves again, their inner conflicts etc. And what they then feel is often, guarded anxiety, impotence or shame they were outsourcing, looking for someone to discharge this onto.
The bully will often mask this theatrically if there’s an audience, which there often is. But the private maths inside their head changes.
Two key mechanisms are at work!
Somatic credibility
Bullies are exquisitely attuned to your mind and body signals, the signals you give out when they approach you: Breath activity or rate, muscle tone, eye behavior, pacing – energy shifts, body language etc.
Standing your ground after impact signals: indicating ‘this doesn’t end me.’ or ‘Your leverage, strength is limited.’
That’s not a bravado or trembling courage. That’s an arising and appearing strength or stand my ground truth emerging.
Affect contagion reversal
Up to that point, the bully is exporting their internal state.
When you don’t carry it for them or receive it or react to it, even after pain like a shove to the ground, a kick or punch on the nose or mockery, it starts to rebound on the bully.
They don’t back off because they feel empathy.
They back off because proximity to you now produces their own dysregulation and somewhat fear or unease arises in the bully.
Why well-meaning the advice fails people who try to give it!
Most public advice assumes: verbal bullying, low-stakes environments and regulation-seeking aggressors but it does not account for: strong or dominance-driven individuals (bullies), identity-stabilizing aggression or those for whom backing down equals some psychic collapse.
Telling someone to ‘just ignore it’ in those cases can be actively dangerous and again although well meaning.
On the word ‘victim’ which is often used.
‘Victim’ terminology freezes a person in the moment of harm.
Many people who later become deeply grounded adults learned, painfully how to stay intact while under pressure. This is called early, forced mastery in the face of dominance or power.
Bullying is always talked about as a behaviour problem or a discipline issue but in my view that misses something important. In many cases bullying is not just about power or control in that moment but it is always about projection.
A person who bullies is carrying intimidation, humiliation or fear inside themselves and instead of facing it, they discharge it onto someone else weaker that they know they can hurt. The effect they create in the other person is the same effect they are trying to escape within themselves.
Are you getting this?
It is some easy to see and read! This is crucial because a lot of professional advice or advisers ignore this inner dynamic or malarky of the bullies internal thinking, feelings and needs.
It focuses on surface behaviour only and rules, consequences reporting systems and zero tolerance policies all have their place but they can also make things worse for the person being bullied if they do not address what is really happening.
When the inner process of the bully is overlooked, the response can unintentionally increase the pressure on the ‘victim’ and sometimes escalate the bullying itself.
When someone bullies another person, they are often mirroring their own unresolved experience that they carry. If they create fear, it is usually because fear already lives in them BUT is hidden and pushed away or even forgotten.
BUT the bully’s subconscious mind brings it back to the surface, in the form of a need or drive or urge that must be discharged onto another person!
And specifically for this reason the bully is magnetically attracted to what they perceive is another weak or weaker person, so weak that they resent and loathe that person for appearing to be what they are, which is weak or feeling weak even if the bully is powerful, muscular and strong they are in various ways damaged the same way as they are creating in the other person and they don’t even know it.
For those who can read it, a bully is advertising their fears, insecurities and inadequacies. If most bullies knew why they do what they are doing, and not just because they think they enjoy it, but actually know the mechanism that is driving their behaviour, then they might get in touch with the pain the rage or the anger that they carry inside them. Unless it’s dealt with it will never go away and in many cases, it turns sickness and physical ill health in later life. Yes, it does!
If they humiliate someone, it is often because they carry deep shame. If they intimidate it is usually because they feel small, powerless or threatened inside.
The bullying behaviour is a way of offloading that internal state onto another human being. For a brief moment the bully feels relief or power and the other person carries their weight.
This does not excuse bullying. This psychology explains it better. Understanding this distinction is essential if advice is going to help rather than harm.
If you are a person that is being bullied or has been bullied, it really is important to know that most of it if not all of it was a discharge from the bully from their past and you just happened to be an easy passing target for them and not the cause. And in most cases, it was always them and never you!
For the person being bullied this dynamic can be deeply confusing. They think and feel something is wrong or off with them. They may internalise the fear, shame or humiliation as if it belongs to them. Over time this can damage confidence self-trust and emotional safety. One of the most important things anyone can be told when they are being bullied is this simple truth. What is being projected onto you does not originate in you.
That does not mean the impact is imaginary. The nervous system responds to intimidation whether it is justified or not. Your body reacts and the emotional wounds are real and hurt like hell. But recognising that the source is external, theirs – can prevent you, the victim from carrying the bully’s unresolved inner state as their own identity.
For parents this understanding changes how support is offered. Instead of only asking what their child did or how they should react, it becomes important to help the child stay grounded in who they are. Parents can gently reinforce that the bullying behaviour says more about the other person than about their child. This does not mean encouraging passivity or silence. It means helping the child respond from stability rather than fear to understand it.
Advice can be harmful!
One reason professional advice can be harmful is that it sometimes places too much responsibility on the person being bullied to manage the situation too perfectly. Phrases like ignore it, rise above it or be assertive can sound reasonable but they can also imply failure when the bullying continues. This adds a second layer of harm to the person being bullied.
A more balanced approach recognises limits. No one can regulate another person’s unresolved inner or nervous state. What can be done is to reduce exposure, increase support and respond in ways that do not amplify fear or shame. Sometimes this means removing the victim from the situation when possible. Sometimes it means firm intervention by those with authority or sometimes it means external help.
It is also important to recognise that confronting a bully directly does not always work. If the bully is discharging their internal state they may escalate when challenged. This is the reason text book/blanket advice doesn’t not work. Each situation needs to be assessed with care and realism rather than idealism.
At a deeper level bullying thrives where systems tolerate emotional discharge rather than them addressing it. Schools’ workplaces and families that value appearance over honesty allows bullying to persist quietly. Creating environments where emotions can be acknowledged without punishment reduces the need for projection in the first place.
Learning how to defend yourself on the streets using self defence skills. It’s not for everybody but wherever possible, learn how to defend yourself!
This article is human written!
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