There’s a particular kind of pain that comes from realizing someone close to you has been undermining your success. Maybe it’s a colleague who forgot to include you in an important email chain, or a friend who subtly discouraged you from pursuing an opportunity, or a partner who seemed strangely critical right before your big presentation. In the moment, these actions might seem random or even well-intentioned. But when you step back and see the pattern, something darker emerges.
At the heart of many of these behaviors lies a fundamental human anxiety: the fear of not being needed. When people feel insecure about their value or place in the world, they often unconsciously seek to create situations where others depend on them. It’s a survival instinct dressed up in social clothing. If you need me, the logic goes, you won’t leave me. If I’m essential to your functioning, I’m safe.
The problem arises when you happen to be nearby and thriving. Your success, your competence, your independence becomes a threat to someone else’s sense of security. And so, without necessarily even recognizing what they’re doing, they begin to create the need they so desperately want to fill.This sabotage rarely looks dramatic. It’s not usually the villain twirling their mustache and plotting your downfall. Instead, it’s the death by a thousand cuts. It’s the person who asks if you’re sure you’re ready for that promotion, planting seeds of doubt at precisely the wrong moment. It’s the parent who keeps “forgetting” to tell you about family events, keeping you slightly off-balance and dependent on them for information. It’s the friend who always has a reason why your new relationship won’t work out, positioning themselves as the only reliable constant in your life.
The insidious nature of this dynamic is that it often comes wrapped in concern. “I’m just looking out for you,” they’ll say. “I’m trying to protect you from disappointment.” And they might even believe it. The human mind is remarkably skilled at justifying its actions, especially when those actions serve a deeper psychological need. What feels like helpful advice to them is actually a way of ensuring you remain in a position where you need their guidance, their support, their presence.
Consider the manager who never quite gives their talented employee all the information they need to succeed independently. Every project requires checking back in, every decision needs approval, every achievement is subtly diminished with a “well, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” The employee’s growth is stunted, yes, but more importantly to the insecure manager, the employee remains dependent. The manager remains needed, relevant, indispensable.
Or think about the romantic partner who becomes increasingly critical as their significant other gains confidence or success. Suddenly there are more complaints, more observations about flaws, more reminders of past failures. The successful partner begins to doubt themselves, to feel that perhaps they’re not as capable as they thought, that perhaps they need this relationship more than they realized. Mission accomplished for the insecure partner, though at a terrible cost to both people involved.
The tragedy of this pattern is that it’s self-defeating. The very actions taken to ensure being needed often push people away. Nobody wants to remain in a relationship, professional or personal, where they feel their growth is being quietly opposed. And yet, the insecure person often can’t see this outcome coming. They’re too focused on the immediate anxiety of potentially not being needed to recognize that sabotage creates resentment, not loyalty.
What makes this dynamic particularly challenging is that calling it out can feel cruel. After all, you’re essentially telling someone that their deep-seated insecurity is causing them to harm you. That’s not a comfortable conversation to have, especially when the person in question might be genuinely unaware of their patterns. They may react with defensiveness, hurt, or denial. They may accuse you of being ungrateful or unsupportive. The cognitive dissonance of being told you’re undermining someone while believing you’re helping them can be overwhelming.
Breaking free from this dynamic requires recognizing it for what it is. When someone consistently seems to benefit from your struggles or appears uncomfortable with your successes, it’s worth examining the pattern. When help comes with subtle strings attached, when support always seems to keep you slightly dependent rather than truly independent, alarm bells should ring.
For those on the receiving end of such sabotage, the path forward often involves setting boundaries and sometimes creating distance. You can’t force someone else to deal with their insecurity, and you can’t sacrifice your own growth to make them feel needed. It’s possible to be compassionate about their struggles while still protecting yourself from the consequences.
For those who recognize these tendencies in themselves, the work is harder but more rewarding. It requires sitting with the uncomfortable feeling that you might not be needed, that people might choose you rather than require you. It means building genuine value and connection rather than manufactured dependency. It means trusting that you’re enough without making others feel like less.
The deepest irony is that people who feel secure enough to support others’ success without sabotage are actually the ones who become truly needed. Not because they’ve engineered dependency, but because their presence genuinely makes life better. They’re chosen repeatedly, not because others have no choice, but because being around someone who celebrates your wins rather than subtly undermines them is a rare and precious thing.
In the end, being needed and being valued are not the same thing. One can be manufactured through sabotage and insecurity. The other must be earned through genuine support and secure connection. The question each of us must answer is which one we’re willing to settle for, both in what we offer others and in what we accept for ourselves.
