Struggles with deception, gets caught in slips (9)
I believe the answer is:
conflicts
'slips' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both acts as well as being plural nouns.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I don't see?
'struggles with deception gets caught' is the wordplay.
'struggles' becomes 'flits' (I can't explain this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'with' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other).
'deception' becomes 'con' (I've seen this before).
'gets' indicates putting letters inside (gets can mean captures or absorbs).
'caught' becomes 'c' (cricket abbreviation).
'flits' after 'con' is 'conflits'.
'conflits' going around 'c' is 'CONFLICTS'.
'in' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for conflicts that I've seen is " Discords, contentions, wars".)