I Second That Emotion
The emotional spectrum afforded to my kind is limited. The bulk of the positive emotions that you experience have either been stripped away or moulded into one all-pervasive sensation and that is of power. Whereas you might experience joy, elation, happiness and delight, we feel power. That surging sensation which courses through us as a consequence of the receipt of fuel, be it positive or negative. Secure a promotion? I feel powerful. My football team wins? I feel powerful. I seduce a new victim? I feel powerful. I experience amusement, indeed, I have an excellent sense of humour but if I make you laugh through my sense of humour I feel a sense of power once again.
I do not feel sadness. I have, for the sake of gathering fuel, sat through numerous films which are described as tear-jerkers and entertained myself as I have alternated between watching the film and the reaction of the person, invariably an intimate partner, as their expression alters to one of compassion, sympathy and then the tears to begin to flow. I have watched the same film yet I feel nothing. I recognise that the scenes played out by the relevant actors are ones which would be labelled as moving, sad and upsetting, but I feel nothing. When I shift my gaze to the sobbing intimate partner besides me, I begin to feel something. I feel contempt for the weakness exhibited by becoming upset. Not only the fact that these tears flow at all but because they have been generated by acting. How readily people fall prey to what is acting, but I am thankful for that, because if they did not, my existence would be far more difficult. I experience a degree of amusement, because someone is moved by something which is not even real. At least when the tears fall because a pet has been run over in the street, or because a relative has exhaled their last breath on this earth, there is a genuine event which causes grief. Yet, it is always in others. You could flash a montage of images, snippets of footage which encapsulate what people would regard as tear-inducing responses, be they grief or joy and I would remain unmoved. It means nothing to me. The capacity to feel sadness, grief, woe and misery have been removed. I knew them once. I can vaguely remember, or at least I think I can remember, being sad. I do not know what the feeling is but I recall the image from the depths of my memory.
I do not know guilt. Remorse is a stranger to me. I feel no regret nor penitence. Compassion has never been available to me. As for empathy, I do not feel that either. I am, because of my heightened abilities and intelligence, able to understand how people must feel. I have spent many years watching and observing the way that people react to certain situations. I understand when happiness is expressed, I know when regret should be exhibited, I recognise when sadness should make an appearance but I do not feel any of them. If I see you in pain, I know I should demonstrate a concerned expression for you and ask how you are. That is the accepted societal expectation. During my seduction of you, I will indeed adopt that mask of concern and compassion in order to con you into thinking that I am a caring and warm person. I can don the mask which places my facial expression in the correct places. I am able to adopt the appropriate tone of voice and place my hands on you in the gentle manner which is associated with expressing concern for somebody yet despite all these learned expressions, words and gestures I feel no concern for you. I do not feel sorry for you, I do not share your pain, I am not worried about you. I know however that if I am to bind you to me and to extract fuel from you, through your expression of thanks and your gratitude for my apparent care of you, I am obligated to place the mask of compassion on. Of course, as such time as your devaluation commences, I see no need for the pretence and indeed my lack of compassion provides its own reward as your pain is increased by my dismissive attitude, refusal to help and contemptuous sneer.
The Lesser of our kind often do not even know what mask should be adopted and during the seduction stage rather than clumsily grope for an appropriate mask, they will prefer to vacate themselves from the situation, conjuring up some excuse as to why they cannot stay and help. The Mid-Range and the Greater of our kind understand that certain responses are preferred by you and therefore the masks will be brought forth and worn, but only in order to achieve what we want. If the situation dictates that our interests are better served without donning a mask, then that is what will happen.
People often make the mistake of assuming that we are totally devoid of emotion. That is wrong. Yes, there are many emotions, as I have explained above, which we do not possess, but we are not empty of all emotion. I know only too well the emotions of hate, malice, frustration, annoyance, irritation, envy, fury and jealousy. Why am I afforded these emotions and not others? In my discussions with the good doctors and my own consideration of these matters it is evident that in my evolution to what I am, it is necessary for me to have these emotions because they are the catalyst for causing me to behave in the way that I do so I will drive forward, that I will be brilliant, charming and seductive, that I will be outrageous, grandiose, belligerent and destructive, because ultimately all of those things must exist in order to compel me to gather the precious fuel.
If I did not become jealous of those in my social circle praising a friend, I would not feel compelled to draw the spotlight of attention on to me by upstaging that person, telling a glorious anecdote or causing a scene. If I was not jealous I would not take those steps and thus I would be denied fuel.
If I was not envious of my neighbour’s new sports car, I would not be driven to throw battery acid over it during the night and then watch from the window his horrified reaction on seeing the damage the next day. Again, I would gain no fuel.
If I felt no hatred towards you for failing me, I would feel no need to keep doling out the various prejudicial and abusive manipulations. Thus you would not be hurt, upset or frightened and I would gain no fuel.
If I felt no malice towards the world and its treatment of me, I would not be compelled to seduce people to provide me with that shield from the world and its outrageous injustices.
It is these negative emotions, the Dark Motivators, which cause me to always be driving forward. The absence of The Hindrances – remorse, guilt, empathy, regret etc. – means that I am not stopped or slowed in my ever onward march. I am not distracted from the sole and necessary task of gathering fuel.
This approach does not mean that my life is less fuel. I am still able to appreciate much that is beautiful, engaging, fascinating and scintillating in this world. I can appreciate the grandeur of centuries old architecture. I can appreciate the magnificence of a musical composition. I can appreciate the athletic prowess of a sprinter to win a gold medal at the Olympics. I can appreciate the taste of excellent cuisine. I can do this because of my higher function above others of my kind who have little or no interest in such spectacular elements of the world. Whereas you will enjoy the piece of music in that moment, I am using the experience of that piece of music to further my aims.
- I may tell you how brilliant a song is because I know that you will be pleased with me for telling you this and thus you will smile, appreciate me and give me fuel;
- I may use the experience of having heard the philharmonic orchestra play Scheherazade in order to boast about it to other people and draw fuel from their admiring and/or jealous responses;
- I may use the experience of knowing all of Depeche Mode’s music to be appealing to a target because she likes that music too, or just to demonstrate that I have a detailed interest in a particular band so that I am of greater interest to her;
- I may use the experience of having heard a particular song in concert to trump your tale about having heard a different one played in order to assert my superiority over you and draw a reaction from you and others.
You experience certain emotions when engaging in certain experiences. I experience a sense of power in that moment or if I do not, I store the experience to use it feel powerful when it is allied with something else, usually an appliance.
My kind mimic emotions because we are unable to feel so many of them. Thus we will second the emotions that we have seen you exhibit and make it seem as if we feel them. I know many of your emotions; I do not feel them. We second your emotions because we are reliant on your emotions to exist. It is something of a paradox that we have never cultivated certain emotions and/or we have been stripped of them in order to make us lean, effective and efficient, yet we also must receive those emotions from you in order to sustain us. We do not want to see your joy directed towards us for something we have said and done because we will then feel joy, but rather for the power that is unleashed as a consequence of your joy providing us with positive fuel. I am filled with hatred, jealousy, envy, fury and malice but that does not mean there is no room to accept your hatred towards me, indeed I welcome it. As a consequence of my manipulation of you, I want you to stand there screaming your hatred at me until your voice is hoarse and your eyes stand out from your face. The fuel I gain from such an intense expression of negative emotion is immense. Once again I appropriate your emotion and use it for my own purposes. Whether I take it in order to allow me to mimic and copy it, to make me appear more acceptable to other people or whether I seize your emotion as fuel in order to power me and allow my existence to continue, I will always find a use for your emotional output. I put to good use your emotions. I am the ultimate recycler.
42 thoughts on “I Second That Emotion”
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‘I feel contempt for the weakness exhibited by becoming upset. Not only the fact that these tears flow at all but because they have been generated by acting’. . .
I disagree that it is weak to become upset, however feelings are generated is irrelevant.
To feel the full spectrum of emotion: joy, happiness, fear, grief and more. To feel, to live them, to strive, to overcome..to endure whatever it may be..however it is generated.. things seen will activate emotion.
All things that are felt, however generated, is humanity.
Good things bring pleasure, bad things we endure.
Endurance is strength.
Not all emotions stop people in their tracks, hold people back, as suggested elsewhere, it isn’t all positive emotion that holds everybody back.. far from it and quite the reverse is often true.
Anger and hate may drive some.
The opposite of it that is true of others.
Humans are many things.. being upset and crying is not a sign of weakness. Feeling pain is not weak.. tapping into how others feel albeit be it from an act it’s just that in itself.. it is tapping in and feeling it.
Feeling all things is a strength.
Applying that strength from endurance in all aspects of life, from entertainment to things more serious, is part of life.
A person who cries at the end of a moving film does not crumble into a failure of a human being. Far from it.
It shows their humanity.
I haven’t seen many people being carried out of the cinema or the front room in life because they’re a weak human specimen of a cry baby.
Contempt is contempt and will be shown regardless of whatever excuse is given.
Contempt usually comes from jealousy.
But being able to cry and sharing the emotions of others with genuine compassion and empathy comes from strength not weakness…
And I reiterate “however generated” the emotions are.
Very hypocritical to cast aspersions on somebody’s tears not being good enough unless they are generated from “real grief”.
Another good example of typical narcissism: everybody else has to be real – except the narcissists.
No offence. Just facts.
🛡
I agree with what you say. It’s like watching a horror movie and jumping and getting scared. We all know it’s not a real boogie man coming for you, no shit, but that’s why we see the movies we do, horror, comedy, drama, etc. to bring out the certain emotions we want to feel. To not feel these emotions, one would be ignorant as to the entire concept of cinema and art all together.To say you’re better or more advanced than someone without narcissism because you lack all these emotions and lack the ability to feel and understand the entire scope of life, is like telling an author of a best seller, you’re better than he is, because you can’t read.That might make sense if you’re maybe,mentally ill, in the real world, we know that is obviously ludicrous. Hence, why you need to steal these emotions away from us, because you want and need them to help you feel somewhat normal, because deep down you know you’re missing a huge chunk of what it is to feel truly alive.
My N cried twice in the 5 years we were together. Once was when his uncle passed, it seemed forced and awkward. Another time was when he failed the nursing exam. This time seemed genuine. Would this have been sincere emotion HG?
The second time was crying for himself but was a manipulation also to engender sympathy and compassion.
I saw tears in my narc’s eyes once in the 16 years, I thought that was love😢 It was after I had brocken up with him for about a year and in that year he was living with someone else. So he came after me and declared his love to me, I was young, imature and inexperienced I thought that must be love and I took him back. It will never happen again though because I don’t even want to see his face ever again.
Speaking of emotion…
I WANT WINDSTORM 2 BACK!!!!!!!!!!
(Hoping the exclamation marks will lure her in if shes reading).
I mean’t you are left with no family and friends 😩
For so many years I never understood how someone could be so cold when someone is hurting even when that hurt was caused by them. For so many years I struggled comprehending how someone could just stand there with no emotion at all and watch you cry and watch you take those pills to comit suicide so that you can just end the pain because you can’t bear it anymore you just want or are looking for an escape. Again thank you HG, though it’s hard coming to terms with the truth and the road to recovery is very steep because your whole life was a lie and the narcissist makes sure that you are left with no family and family basically zero support.
You are welcome.
Nonto, those are difficult issues to tackle. I am dealing with many of the same emotions. This is a great place to learn and heal.
Hi Jasmine at least we are here hey, there’s hope for us. I know someone who lost her life because of the same abuse, she couldn’t escape the horror but we were brave enough to take that first stem. This sickness is truly demonic though, I believe these people are just possessed by an evil entity coz everything about them and what they do is pure evil. But it’s better to just forget and press on because they do not want to be helped.
Nonto
Not your whole life. You are here and with life ahead of you that can be peaceful and rewarding. The road to recovery may be steep, but here you have the information and the friendship of others that makes it not impassable.
Yes NarcAngel you are right, I meant the first part of my life even though it feels like my whole life. This guy was my first, I never knew anything before him and that’s why it took 16 long excruciating years to figure out what was happening and escape. I am so grateful and lucky to have come out of this and found this site and now I look forward to my new life, the rest of my life and I intend to make it worthwhile, real and meaningful. I intend to find true and genuine love, I have to experience it I just have to but for now I need to rid myself of all that has happened to me and cleanse my mind from it.
Thank you NarcAngel for words of encouragement
Nonto,
Only if you need my advice (otherwise you may ignore it): take good care of you and heal from all “toxins” narc left in your life and (it may seem a little “cynical, but it’s only reality) be careful to keep “legs on the ground” (stay realistic) for “true and genuine love” is not equivalent to movie’s love or golden period in narc’s “love”; true love is about true companionship, understanding and walking through life and come together out wiser than before. What I’m trying to point out is that you must protect yourself from narcs from now on. Don’t ever lower your guard, from my past experience I tell you we all tend to repeat experiences we didn’t learn from.
Best wishes!
Somewhere over the rainbow 🌈 I appreciate your advice so much and I take it wholeheartedly. Thank you for such words of wisdom and encouragement, I will be careful that’s why I’m not rushing to find love rather I will wait for it to find me because I’m focused on my inner healing right now. I understand what you are saying about real love and I appreciate your words and will keep them with me for eternity.
Again thank you and you also take good care of yourself hey😊
I feel similar Nonto- I’m not sure if reading here necessarily helps me heal. I have been ruminating now for two weeks. but I got triggered by seeing the name of the new supply in front of my face. And then again by someone telling me about pictures that are posted on Facebook with my exnarc and her new girlfriend . I had been progressing well with positive affirmations and feeling empowered and happy but then I got refocused again on her shit. Pardon my French. How are you working on your healing? I am up for hearing about what works for different people. I know I have to probably just work on disciplining my mind and not allowing it to go to those thoughts. maybe I need to read read HG‘s book “Exorcism “. Ugh ✌️ peace
The last time I watched Spaceballs I was in tears. Damn you, HG.
Keep firing assholes!
Because it was so low budget?
I forgot that John Candy was in Spaceballs; he was one of your kind Narc Angel: Canadian.
Indeed.
Mimicry was something I sensed right away. it is what ultimately lead me to conclude I must leave. Because there was no feeling of human bonding in my heart. It was going through the motions but everything fell flat. That’s where the somatic uses their sex to dazzle you and make you forget. Mine was always telling me how much I need to look lik mine was always telling me how much I enjoy it and how could I’ve Been in a very happily content but pretty sexless relationship. I would always say well there’s more to life than sex-and i have to feel bonded with someone to really want to have sex with them ongoing. That is a fatal flaw of the narcissist but if no one has ever experienced that bonding feeling with another human they won’t miss it. But I would assume most empathetic people definitely feel that feeling. At first I thought it was just her odd way of expressing herself. But then I started asking her if she had been abused as a child. And set upon trying to figure it out. That’s probably when my devalue started ha ha- 😞
Kathleen, hi. I think many of us understand the mimicry right from the start, but we don’t want to believe it -or we, honestly, can’t get it. All these years I am trying to really understand what HG says about his feelings-I can relate to most things he writes about himself, some of his traits are mine too, but the fact he feels no sadness or happiness , well, I am unable to grasp that.
Sometimes I think it is a matter of definitions. The way narcissists define happiness or joy and the way we do. Anyway, being with them is a lose- lose situation.
The narcissist I was with cried 2x in 12 years. One time, my mother had died. I was at her bedside saying goodbye and he had tears in his eyes. The second time was when his son who is grown visited and he expressed how proud he was of him, and what a wonderful son he had. He had pride and he was sobbing and I believe it was due to regrets. In all other aspects he displayed a lesser to mid-range character of narcissism. Is this possible?
Not from regret, no.
Hi Paula I don’t think your guy is a narcissist, they have no emotion whatsoever, so if he showed some kind of emotion even if that emotion is regret, that’s a normal person. My ex husband would not even console me when I lost a loved one sometimes he would just disappear and not even come to the funeral. Sometimes he would use gatherings like that to buy people’s eyes like on the day of my brother’s funeral he came a delivered a new car a Range Rocer Evogue that he came to surprise me with, I don’t know what to say or do all eyes were on me everybody wished to be me and you can just imagine how my family felt about this guy they were melting, they’d never seen anything like that before, everyone was praising him and my family telling me that I should never come back home no matter what this man may do. Now thanks to HG I now know and understand that all of that was never about me but about him so that he can get everyone to love him. Right now my family doesn’t speak to me because they think I’m crazy for the things I’m telling them this man has been doing to me, sadly they still love him and think he’s Prince Charming, so I’m crazy while he carries on with his life like nothing happened I’m left here having to pick up the pieces of my life alone because he made sure that I don’t have anyone
Some narcissists can feign regret and remorse if it suits their purposes. HG has even managed to summon a drop of precipitation when he felt it was to his advantage (with the good doctors). I experienced tear-filled eyes from a narcissist, and where one might think it was tenderness, I identified it likely as suppressed rage and got away quick. In a separate incident, my Step-Narc (Lesser) tried to squeeze out a tear at his mothers funeral which resulted in him just making faces like he was about to take a dump and was really quite comical and quite ridiculous.
When I attended my mother’s funeral, with whom I had cut ties years ago because of my abusive step father, he was there reciting a poem.It was the same poem he had “dedicated” to an ex girlfriend of his when she left him. Totally disrespectful, I thought. I felt like hitting him. I have now realised he was the first narc in my life and the one that started it all. But even then, being 25 and completely unaware of cluster b, personality disorders etc., I could tell he had no feelings of compassion, I could tell the poem was just a show. Same with my last narc. His “compassion” (whenever it was needed) was fake, it was so damn obvious to me right from the beginning. However, my “fuel” then came from the fact that he tried to fake it. His effort to persuade me flattered me (!) I thought it was a sign that he cared. Ya, I know, totally idiotic.
I like how you put that – “i was flattered he tried to convince me” –
I felt the same-very early on. Anything I got from the narc or just observing her interacting-it all came across to me as fake. My heart /intuition knew- yet I stayed and tried to figure it out. Never again.
So when I leapt up from cowering in a fetal position, shoved against his chest and then screamed at him, an inch from his face.. he was loving that??
That was fuel and you were feeding him. Dependent on what you screamed it would either have been Pure Fuel or Challenge Fuel and yes, that is what he wanted and needed.
May I ask what outward signs are there that a narcissist just got fueled?
You may ask.
Ahh.. That explains why he kept insisting I challenged him. I thought it was in reference to another interaction.. but it never fit. This makes more sense. Thank you! Thank you!
Little by little..
Brian
Two of my lesser females looked liked they were having an orgasm when they got fuelled. Their eyes would roll up and their mouths dropped opened and a look of “pleasure” suffused their faces. I didn’t know what the fuck was happening at the time, now I know it was fuel.
Jasmine,
I am so often surprised that it’s not only the narcs that seem to do things from a playbook, but it seems “victims” react in similar ways, too.
When i read your description of your explosion, I clearly recall doing similar. I was curled in a fetal position on the floor with him just kind of slapping me, side to side. I kicked him in the gut, and as he fell to the floor yelling “you hurt me!”, now I stood over him yelling “You’r GD right! If you ever hit me again, I’ll beat you to a bloody pulp, and kick your ass out to the gutter!”. I left for about an hour. When I came back, he acted very high on energy, very happy, acted like nothing had gone on. Then he left the house with a cheerful “see ya later!”
Must have been excellent fuel. I’m sure the “You hurt me” was to add guilt to the rage.
Frustrating and crazy making!
As an aside, whenever I struck back, I stopped with one blow, but then streamed with verbal fuel.
Perse,
Definitely crazy making! I heard about it for months. it was thrown in my face. *I* became the abuser. Ha! And he used it to torment me too. Omg, he had an entire group attacking me and THREATENING me. Frikken fucked up, that really messed with my head. I was already a prior victim of domestic violence from a previous relationship. Xx Good on you, fighting back. 💞
HG
Excellent insight into those emotions that you DO feel, as you point out-many describe your kind as having none.
I am reminded of Sheldon Cooper from Big Bang feeling nothing for someone else being sick but stating that societal norms dictate that he offer them a warm beverage.
Thank you Narc Angel.
Sheldon’s response does articulate the learned response that Mid Range and Greater may deploy, as mentioned previously though Sheldon isn’t a narcissist (before someone suggests that is what you are stating – I know you are not.)
You get me lol.
I’m the only one!
I believe the character your are referring to Sheldon Cooper most likely falls (if we must label) Aspergers, high functioning Autism with OCD aspects— not psychopathic tendencies.
I love this. A few peices of the puzzle for sure.