Emotional abuse can undermine your confidence and make you feel victim, but remember that someone else’s comments do not define your worth. So, in this post, I’m going to share 101 emotional abuse when someone puts you down quotes to remind you of your power and guide you towards self-love and resilience.
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Emotional Abuse When Someone Puts You Down Quotes
1. “Don’t let negative and toxic people rent space in your head. Raise the rent and kick them out.” — Robert Tew
2. “Revenge is surviving, getting out, and being a better person than you were, and breaking the cycle.” — Kristy Green
3. “People inspire you, or they drain you - pick them wisely.” — Hans F. Hansen
4. “Poisonous relationships can alter our perception. You can spend many years thinking you’re worthless… but you’re not worthless; you’re unappreciated.” — Steve Maraboli
5. “Beware of those who are bitter, for they will never allow you to enjoy your fruit.” — Suzy Kassem
6. “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” — Maya Angelou
7. “If you believe that feeling bad or worrying long enough will change a past or future event, then you are residing on another planet with a different reality system.” — Wayne Dyer
8. “The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse.” — Edmund Burke
9. “That’s the nature of a controlling personality. They always feel like they’re right.” — Harriet Braiker
10. “The only person that deserves a special place in your life is someone that never made you feel like you were an option in theirs.” — Shannon L. Alder
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11. “A healthy relationship doesn’t drag you down. It inspires you to be better.” — Mandy Hale
12. “Some scars don’t hurt. Some scars are numb. Some scars rid you of the capacity to feel anything ever again.” — Joyce Rachelle
13. “Emotional abuse poisons a relationship and infuses it with hostility, contempt, and hatred.” — Beverly Engel
14. “The scars you can’t see are the hardest to heal.” — Astrid Alauda
15. “Over time, anger can build up on the part of both abuser and victim, and emotional abuse can turn into physical violence.” — Beverly Engel
16. “Verbal abuse is still abuse. It’s abuse in the form of words. Don’t assume that a few hurtful words won’t cost them their life. Words hurt.” — Unknown
17. “Overcoming abuse doesn’t just happen, It takes positive steps every day. Let today be the day you start to move forward.” — Assunta Harris
18. “The disrespect and hatred each partner begins to feel leads to more and more emotional abuse and to each partner justifying inappropriate, even destructive, behavior.” — Beverly Engel
19. “You never fully recover from the pain; you learn how to cope with it.” — Natasha Preston
20. “No matter how much a couple once loved each other, once emotional abuse becomes a consistent aspect of the relationship, that love is overshadowed by fear, anger, guilt, and shame.” — Beverly Engel
21. “Abuse grows from attitudes and values, not feelings. The roots are ownership, the trunk is entitlement, and the branches are control.” — Lundy Bancroft
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22. “Remember. Whoever is trying to bring you down is already below you.” — Ziad K. Abdelnour
23. “Staying in an unhealthy relationship that robs you of peace of mind, is not being loyal. It is choosing to hurt yourself mentally, emotionally and sometimes, physically.” — Kemi Sogunie
24. “To not have your suffering recognized is an almost unbearable form of violence.” — Andrei Lankov
25. “I can’t control your behavior; nor do I want that burden… but I will not apologize for refusing to be disrespected, to be lied to, or to be mistreated. I have standards; step up or step out.” — Steve Maraboli
26. “It is not the bruises on the body that hurt. It is the wounds of the heart and the scars on the mind.” — Aisha Mirza
27. “We do learn so much about ourselves in our experiences. But also, know that it shouldn’t have happened. This was not a lesson you needed to learn.” — Jordan Pickell
28. “To deny someone’s feelings or experiences it to literally deny their reality.” — Danu Morrigan
29. “Poisonous relationships can alter our perception. You can spend many years thinking you’re worthless, but you’re not worthless, you’re underappreciated.” — Steve Maraboli
30. “No one deserves to be treated like trash, especially not by the person you love.” — Unknown
31. “No matter how hard you work to bring yourself up, there’s someone out there working just as hard, to put you down.” — Dr. Dre
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32. “Lies don’t end relationships — the truth does.” — Shannon L. Alder
33. “There are people who break you down by just being them. They need not do anything. Dissociate.” — Malebo Sephodi
34. “Abuse changes your life. Fight back and change the life of your abusers by breaking your silence on abuse!” — Patty Rase Hopson
35. “Be alert! Some people have problems. Don’t let them be your problem and don’t ever allow their problems to infect you through their words and actions! Stay happy!” — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah
36. “All the people who knock me down, only inspire me to do better.” — Selena Gomez
37. “You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.” — Margaret Thatcher
38. “Strong people don’t put others down. They lift them up.” — Michael P. Watson
39. “Scar tissue is stronger than regular tissue. Realize the strength.” — Henry Rollins
40. “Putting people down does not make you a powerful and a strong person. It makes you a bully, a coward and eventually alone in life.” — Tess Calomino
41. “Never look back unless you are planning to go that way.” — Henry David Thoreau
42. “Part of the healing process is sharing with other people who care.” — Jerry Cantrell
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43. “Your time is way too valuable to be wasting on people that can’t accept who you are.” — Turcois Ominek
44. “Healing doesn’t mean the damage never existed. It means the damage no longer controls our lives.” — Akshay Dubey
45. “I am unable to connect with negativity and toxic people today. Please check back at a later time.” — Germany Kent
46. “I’m still coping with my trauma, but coping by trying to find different ways to heal it rather than hide it.” — Clemantine Wamariya
47. “Relationships are like glass. Sometimes it’s better to leave them broken than to hurt yourself by putting them back together.” — Inglath Cooper
48. “The only people who get upset about you setting boundaries are the ones benefiting from you having none.” — Unknown
49. “He or she may begin to believe that there is something wrong with them or even fear they are losing their mind. They have become so beaten down emotionally that they blame themselves for the abuse.” — Beverly Engel
50. “Sometimes it’s better to end something and try to start something new than imprison yourself in hoping for the impossible.” — Karen Salmansohn
51. “Emotional abuse is the least understood form of abuse.” — Beverly Engel
52. “Childhood should be carefree, playing in the sun; not living a nightmare in the darkness of the soul.” — Dave Pelzer
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53. “Living with an emotional abuser means that you’re living in a constant state of stress.” — Dr. Anne Brown
54. “The only keeper of your happiness is you. Stop giving people power to control your smile, your worth, and your attitude.” — Mandy Hale
55. “People will let you down… Welcome to life. People will also lift you up, save you, love you, embrace, teach you, and guide you… Welcome to life!” — Elle Febbo
56. “We all experienced people putting us down and people saying we couldn’t do it. We overcame it.” — Leigh-Anne Pinnock
57. “You survived the abuse, you’re going to survive the recovery.” — Mariska Hargitay
58. “Emotional abuse is just as bad as physical abuse. Worse! You can heal broken bones; you can’t heal a broken mind.” — Dia Reeves
59. “Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.” — Mark Twain
60. “When people criticize me, instead of putting my head down, it gives me energy to do even more.” — Zlatan Ibrahimovic
61. “Self-respect means knowing that you are worth more than the poor treatment of others.” — Unknown
62. “Abuse if you slight it, will gradually die away; but if you show yourself irritated, you will be thought to have deserved it.” — Publius Cornelius Tacitus
63. “Your social awkwardness does not define your value. Stop trying to be so nice to everyone.” — Ray Alexander
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64. “Emotional abuse poisons a relationship and infuses it with hostility, contempt, and hatred.” — Beverly Engel
65. “If you want to know where to find your contribution to the world, look at your wounds. When you learn how to heal them, teach others.” — Emily Maroutian
66. “Family is supposed to be our safe haven. Very often, it’s the place where we find the deepest heartache.” — Iyanla Vanzant
67. “When it comes to abuse, you believe there’s no way out. There is always help. There is always a way out.” — Rev. Donna Mulvey
68. “Trust yourself. You’ve survived a lot, and you’ll survive whatever is coming.” — Robert Tew
69. “The more that we choose not to talk about domestic violence, the more we shy away from the issue, the more we lose.” — Russell Wilson
70. “You are allowed to terminate toxic relationships. You are allowed to walk away from people who hurt you. You are allowed to be angry selfish and unapologetic. You don’t owe anyone an explanation for taking care of yourself.” — Unknown
71. “You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.” — Maya Angelou
72. “You don’t have to defend or explain your decisions to anyone. It’s your life. Live it without apologies.” — Mandy Hale
73. “The results of any traumatic experience, such as abuse, can only be resolved by experiencing, articulating, and judging every facet of the original experience within a process of careful therapeutic disclosure.” — Alice Miller
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74. “Each time a woman stands up for herself without knowing it possibly, without claiming it, she stands up for all women.” — Maya Angelou
75. “If you allow people to make more withdrawals than deposits in your life, you will be out of balance and in the negative. Know when to close the account.” — Christine Williams
76. “Emotional abuse kills. The abuse might not be physical but being constantly wounded emotionally eventually wears out the heart and the body.” — Folaranmi
77. “The only real control we have is over ourselves.” — Anne Nwakama
78. “There are far too many silent sufferers. Not because they don’t yearn to reach out, but because they’ve tried and found no one who cares.” — Richelle E. Goodrich
79. “An abusive relationship should be easy to identify though often one of the most difficult to end.” — Desmond Tutu
80. “As in all abusive relationships, the abused mistakenly assumes the kindest version of the abuser is the real one.” — Chris Holm
81. “Sometimes your heart needs more time to accept what your mind already knows.” — Unknown
82. “Boundaries aren’t about keeping people out; they are about keeping the right people in.” — Unknown
83. “The only way a relationship will last is if you see your relationship as a place that you go to give and not a place that you go to take.” — Tony Robbins
84. “Hate speech is not free speech. It’s verbal and emotional abuse.” — Dr. Dashanne Strokes
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85. “Be prepared, people are going to judge every little thing about you.” — Charlena E. Jackson
86. “Sometimes you have to let people down in order to get on, particularly in showbusiness.” — Dusty Springfield
87. “Be gentle with your past selves for doing what they had to do to get through it.” — Jordan Pickell
88. “Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it’s having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome.” — Brene Brown
89. “Do what you feel in your heart to be right - for you’ll be criticized anyway.” — Eleanor Roosevelt
90. “If you walked away from a toxic, negative, abusive, one-sided, dead-end low vibrational relationship or friendship — you won.” — Lalah Delia
91. “You don’t have to hold yourself, hostage, to who you used to be.” — Oprah Winfrey
92. “When you react, you are giving away your power. When you respond, you are staying in control of yourself.” — Bob Proctor
93. “Don’t ever let someone tell you the value you don’t have, in order to be in someone’s life. That is often the value they feel you have, not that person.” — Shannon L. Alder
94. “No one can break me down. I know my worth and it’s a beautiful thing.” — Iggy Azalea
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95. “Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts. Don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.” — Mary Schmich
96. “Overcoming abuse doesn’t just happen, It takes positive steps everyday. Let today be the day you start to move forward.” — Assunta Harris
97. “Don’t let someone who doesn’t know your value tell you how much you’re worth.” — Unknown
98. “Never forget that walking away from something unhealthy is brave even if you stumble a little on your way out the door.” — Mandy Hale
99. “You can love them, forgive them, want good things for them…but still move on without them.” — Mandy Hale
100. “Toxic people will pollute everything around them. Don’t hesitate. Fumigate.” — Mandy Hale
101. “If you’re brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a new hello.” — Paulo Coelho
Final Thoughts:
After reading this 101 emotional abuse when someone puts you down quotes, which ones stand out to you? Which ones will you keep available to help in your own healing?
Whatever the cycle of abuse looked like for you, and however many iterations you endured before breaking free, you are not to blame. No one outside your relationship (or your heart) can truly understand how it was for you.
So, be gentle, live your life happily, and be kind to yourself my friend!
Thanks for Reading!
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