The point of the series on narcissism is to help me. However, I don’t want to be helped at the expense of other people and their progress in dealing with their issues. So if after reading these posts, you find yourself going in the direction of “I haven’t experienced anything as hard-core, so what do I have to complain about?”, please stop. I don’t want you to go in this direction. This is counterproductive and sad.
Remember, the only measure of parenting success is the happiness of a grown child. Are you ecstatically happy in your personal and professional life? Are you unfamiliar with feelings of constant guilt and anxiety? Do you never experience chronic fatigue, apathy, inexplicable sadness? If so, then congratulations, your parents did an amazing job, I’m happy for you.
However, if you constantly feel that things are not working out for you, if you are unhappy in the major areas of human existence, if you are constantly exhausted even after having tons of rest, if you engage in addictive compensatory behaviors (smoking, drinking, gaming, gambling, high-risk behaviors, overeating, cutting, etc.), if you experience anxiety on a regular level, then it’s time to grow up and realize that this is not normal. Somebody fucked up really bad for you to be in this place. Of course, this doesn’t mean that somebody in your family had to be a narcissist. There is a million and one ways of messing up a person that don’t have anything to do with narcissism.
Things will only start getting better when you recognize that living in misery is not normal. Happiness is the only normal state of human existence. After acknowledging this, you will be able to start walking away from misery.
And for those who have narcissists in their lives, remember: narcissism is a personality disorder. It has nothing to do with you. It doesn’t in any way depend on what you do or don’t do. The narcissist is this way because of his or her own narcissistic trauma that predates your existence. Every day, a narcissist makes a choice to keep victimizing people instead of getting better. This is not about you. You are not to blame. You can’t help a narcissist because she or he is not asking for help. The narcissist is having a blast while you cringe in misery. The only person here in need of help is you.
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This point, that they are having a blast, is really important. It is SO easy to believe they are in pain, and people will tell you to realize this and be kind; it is also so tempting to try to relieve their pain so that they will stop torturing you. But really, they are having a blast — !!!
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They are and they are not in pain, because by creating pain in others, they numb themselves. How does that happen? Apparently it is via the production of adrenaline. So long as they can get that flowing, they do not need to think about themselves and their pain is temporarily alleviated. But when that high runs low again, they need to seek another fix. I imagine there is a certain amount of pain involved in this lifestyle, then, especially as it becomes harder to get the hormonal or psychological high.
In the end it seems they are in pain, but that this is was a lifestyle choice. They had a problem with their life and the world and they could have chosen to talk it through with others or to read books and try to figure it out, but instead they chose to medicate themselves with other people’s emotions. They became grabby instead of thoughtful and deep.
And this is why education is so important as an antidote to narcissism, because if one can really figure out what is wrong with you, you do not need to become the equivalent of a psychological highway robber. And, additionally, this is surely why educators are constantly attacked by narcissists, because they cannot backtrack on their chosen solution to pain. But the educators keep reminding them that there’s another way.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPLmzTNK53M
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I just loved the last paragraph of this comment. Beautiful. Thanks musteryou. 🙂
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“They are and they are not in pain, because by creating pain in others, they numb themselves. How does that happen? Apparently it is via the production of adrenaline. So long as they can get that flowing, they do not need to think about themselves and their pain is temporarily alleviated. But when that high runs low again, they need to seek another fix. I imagine there is a certain amount of pain involved in this lifestyle, then, especially as it becomes harder to get the hormonal or psychological high.
In the end it seems they are in pain, but that this is was a lifestyle choice. They had a problem with their life and the world and they could have chosen to talk it through with others or to read books and try to figure it out, but instead they chose to medicate themselves with other people’s emotions. They became grabby instead of thoughtful and deep.”
– THIS IS ABSOLUTELY THE BEST COMMENT EVER. I think I need to memorize this.
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“In the end it seems they are in pain, but that this is was a lifestyle choice. They had a problem with their life and the world and they could have chosen to talk it through with others or to read books and try to figure it out, but instead they chose to medicate themselves with other people’s emotions. ”
– I think that the most crucial thing is that this is, indeed, a choice. Narcissists might look like they are suffering or be genuinely suffering. But they chose to feed on other people’s blood and tears. This was their choice. They keep choosing this life every day. Even right now, each one of them could make a different choice. But even today, they woke up and made a choice to keep torturing people. Keep torturing you.
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“This point, that they are having a blast, is really important. It is SO easy to believe they are in pain, and people will tell you to realize this and be kind; it is also so tempting to try to relieve their pain so that they will stop torturing you.”
– This could never be repeated enough. Because you are right, the temptation to relieve their pain is huge. Here is how it works: as a child I was not allowed to feel a full range of human emotions. Sadness was not acceptable. But there were so many causes for sadness! So I projected my sadness, my pain, my suffering onto my parents because they were the only ones allowed to have these emotions. And even now when I imagine them sad and suffering, this is simply a projection of my own sadness and suffering.
The pain you are trying to relieve is not somebody else’s. It’s yours. But you don’t really believe that you deserve alleviation of pain. So you project it onto somebody else. This is your only way to take the pain outside of yourself and lessen it.
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In my case, I believe my father, anyway, was genuinely suffering from sadness and pain. I always try to bring up the point that there is such a thing as suffering from history. I don’t mean monumental or “historic” suffering by actually directly derived from history (as well as the personal choices and other stuff relating to personality disorders that we can add to this baggage).
In this sense there was definitely a lot of suffering going on there that could be appreciated. If you had to hit the ground running, without time to mourn you loss of country and place, you are going to end up as some pretty screwed up dude.
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“Happiness is the only normal state of human existence.” I was with you up until that point. What does ‘normal’ mean here, exactly? I’m not even sure human existence has a ‘normal state’ at all, aside from being a patchwork of the states we can actually usefully describe. As in, the normal state for a human existence is all and whatever the state of that human is, misery or happiness included.
Now, I might well be happier if I believed that happiness is normal and to be expected (and I’d like to be happier), but I can’t believe things so that they would cause things, I can only believe things when I find them true.
Finally, there’s an extra barrier of resistance in that most of the damage that was done to me, or indeed that I did to myself, was out of desire to make me or myself ‘normal’ or ‘happy’. At this point, I am much happier being sad than trying to be happy. Even some moments of misery can feel pretty great, unique at least, though otherwise it is, of course, hard to bear.
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““Happiness is the only normal state of human existence.” I was with you up until that point”
I think it depends on how you define ‘happiness’. If you define it positively (the presence of optimism, joy, whatever) then you hit a trap: if you’re happy all the time you’re never really happy. If you define it negatively ‘the absence of (severe) pain’ you’re on more solid ground. The normal default state of humans is not necessarily joy but it’s also not pain.
I think some degree of emotional changes over the course of the day, week, month or whatever are perfectly normal and not a danger sign. Constant feelings of restlessness, pain and/or feeling trapped definitely need to be dealt with.
Maybe a better word is “contentment’ as the normal state with occasional surges into joy and lags into sadness.
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“If you define it negatively ‘the absence of (severe) pain’ you’re on more solid ground. ”
– No, no, we deserve more, we can have more, and we will have more. This is precisely where the problems begin. People think, “I’m not experiencing excruciating pain, so I must be OK.” But life can offer so much more.
“The normal default state of humans is not necessarily joy but it’s also not pain.”
– I insist that the normal default state is ecstasy.
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““Happiness is the only normal state of human existence.” I was with you up until that point. What does ‘normal’ mean here, exactly?”
– I will rephrase. Acute and profound happiness is what we should be experiencing at least 80% of the time.
“Finally, there’s an extra barrier of resistance in that most of the damage that was done to me, or indeed that I did to myself, was out of desire to make me or myself ‘normal’ or ‘happy’. At this point, I am much happier being sad than trying to be happy.”
– Your right to your own emotions was stolen from you. Now you are in recovery and doing the crucial work of allowing yourself to experience a full range of feelings. That’s perfectly fine and you are definitely on the right path.
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You say you like Eric Berne, but what you need is Claude Steiner …
This is especially true about the “gallows transaction” — you might see certain influences differently if you realise what’s actually meant when they blithely smile at your misery.
“Your agony must endure forever …”
Actually, that’s Neil Kinnock, but I never liked Labour, new or old …
Find a copy of “Scripts People Live” and see how it extends the “Games People Play” model considerably. I believe the information about “counter-scripting” is what you’re looking for when it comes to understanding how multiple parallel games are configured by people in everyday settings, in addition to avoiding games you don’t want to play.
I’ll know you’ve taken some of this on board when you start referring to various porcine influences that are frequently referred to in the book. 🙂
Also … have you read Max Barry’s “Lexicon”?
[mumbles four nonsense words quietly, then steals a copy of your book] 🙂
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“Also … have you read Max Barry’s “Lexicon”?”
– Here is my review of it: https://clarissasblog.com/2013/05/10/max-barrys-lexicon-a-review/ Tell me if you agree. 🙂
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“Guilt and anxiety.” I can’t comment on Narcissism, because haven’t studied it enough and given it sufficient thought. I do know a lot about guilt and anxiety.
Guilt and anxiety are, if not pervasive in human life, at least commonplace. I can’t be objective about guilt and anxiety because it’s such a part of me. Subjectively, guilt and anxiety are so widespread that it’s difficult for me to concede that they are not “normal” conditions.
I’m sure that much guilt and anxiety comes from parents and teachers. At least in my case, a great deal of guilt and anxiety comes from religious upbringing. I’m not sure if religious “indoctrination” is the right word, but that’s the word that springs to mind.
“Happiness is the normal” state? Hard for me to accept, but I’d like to believe it’s true.
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