The Narcissist’s Prime Aims

I have three Prime Aims.

All of our kind has three Prime Aims.

Our dark and menacing behaviours (even when dressed up as the illusory golden period) are focused on the attainment of these three Prime Aims. They are all that matter. Everything else is dust. We are driven to secure these Prime Aims. They are hard-wired into us, they are sub-conscious requirements in most of our kind and amongst the Greater of our brethren we are aware of the necessity of attaining these three things to ensure that not only do we survive but we also thrive. Everything we do, say and concern ourselves with revolves around achieving these three aims. Nothing else matters.

Do we love you? No. We do not know what that truly is but we will use love to secure our Prime Aims. We will desecrate it through our twisted facsimile of what we understand love to be and use it secure our aims.

Do we want to do good for the disadvantaged around us? No. Yet, if such behaviour will ultimately benefit us through the establishment of a facade which can then be used to further our quest for these Prime Aims then we will become a trustee of that charity or organise a fund raiser for the Orphanage For Unwanted Monobrowed Children.

Do we want to be friends with you because we find your collection of unopened Star Wars figures fascinating. No. We do so because knowing someone with the best collection on the East Coast means that it works in favour of us in terms of attaining the Prime Aims.

Nothing we do is about you. It is all about securing our aims. Admittedly, there will be occasions where we are in alignment and our march with our dark troops by our side to the attainment of the Prime Aims means that you and others benefit. That is pure serendipity and we do not care whether the outcome is good or bad for you, so long as we achieve what we need.

The sooner you grasp and understand that we are focused on securing these Prime Aims and nothing else matters to us, the faster you will be able to formulate your own way to avoid being caught up in their attainment. The Prime Aims and their attainment is the only goal we are interested in and everything else is swept up in the need to achieve them. Children. Job. Home. Wife. Father. Daughter. Friend. Interests. Socialising. Conversations. Money. Status. Manipulation. Connections. Infidelity. Misery. Cruelty. Seduction. Possessions. These and so much more are mere conduits, enablers, bridges to the securing of the Prime Aims.

Never underestimate or fail to recognise the single-mindedness by which our machine like efficiency closes on this goal. You are there to ensure we achieve it. Our faceless Lieutenants and lurking Coterie are there to ensure we achieve it. The secondary and tertiary sources, the facade, the crows, the butterflies, the seduction, the devaluation and the disengagement. The hoovers, oft and repeated or seemingly absent, yet appearing years later are all part of the inextricably linked matrix to achieve the Prime Aims.

So, what are they?

Those of you who have read much of my work will already know what they are, but it is necessary to identify and underline them.

1. Fuel

The chief Prime Aim. The most important one and the overriding objective of our engagements with everybody that we come into contact with. Fuel is the emotional response provided by you and everybody else, caused by us. It may be indirect, for instance someone smiling at us as we walk by, it may be direct because we have provoked you into crying by calling you names.

Fuel is both positive and negative. It flows from all appliances. It varies in potency dependent on the Fuel Index (see the book Fuel for an expansive explanation of this central factor of what drives our kind) and in terms of its quantity and frequency. Fuel powers us. It quells the anguish and the anxiety, it settles us, it edifies us, it makes us powerful and it causes us to feel impregnable, omnipotent and god-like.

It is our drug. We want it and we need it and it must be provided each and every day and we take it from those that we have established in our fuel network. From lover to lollipop lady, everybody and I mean everybody we interact with is a fuel appliance. The words you use, the tone attached to them, the inflection in your voice, the gestures you make, the things you do, the expression on your face, the sounds you make – all of these provide us with fuel and it has to be caused by us.

If you are crying over the death of your mother, that is not fuel for us. It is fuel for your mother (albeit she didn’t need it when alive and certainly has no use for it now she is cold in the ground). Those tears are wasted and this infuriates us. Thus we will say something hurtful about your pathetic weeping so that you then cry because of what we have said. Your emotional response then is down to us and we gain fuel.

Fuel is the single most important thing to us. No fuel and we weaken and ultimately enter a Fuel Crisis.

2. Character Traits

We have built a construct. This construct is like a frame and through the gathering of fuel we are able to then power its maintenance and further development. This construct imprisons The Creature. This construct allows us to show the world what we want to see and thus gain more fuel and the cycle repeats.

Everyone we interact with has the potential to furnish us with character traits which we lift and apply to the construct to make it better, stronger, more attractive and more secure. Each piece of fuel is the paste which enables us to place the shards, segments, patches, pieces and elements of character traits onto the construct and keep them there.

If you wish to understand this in greater detail, read my book Fury.

Your interest in insects, a friend’s sporting achievements, a child’s academic prowess, information from a tertiary source about the best restaurant in Barcelona’s gothic quarter, the humorous anecdotes told by a speaker at an awards dinner, the tales told by a grandparent, the intelligence gathered by a colleague and so on, all of those things become character traits which we will take for ourselves and pass off as our own. We want them and need them from those we interact with. Some have nothing to provide and thus they are less important appliances, but others have many and thus your coruscating, dazzling traits when you are a primary source to us become fundamental as part of the Prime Aims.

3. Residual Benefits

Are you well-off? Have a good house? A car? Access to a particular club? Tickets for sought after games? A famous friend? Excellent carer? Brilliant cook? Social magnet? DIY capable? Good income? Respected community member?

We are entitled and we do not recognise boundaries. Your resources are our resources and the more of those that exist and in different forms, the greater the advantage you possess because of these residual benefits.

These vary dependent on the nature of the narcissist who has ensnared you. We may be financially superior and have a large house, but you are well-thought of by people and have an extensive social circle, political connections and the like, thus we want them.

We may have a physical health problem and therefore the fact that you are a nurse practitioner and exceptionally caring results in those residual benefits becoming the foremost ones.

We may have no job and a rampant cocaine habit, so your well-appointed residence and burgeoning bank account are appealing residual benefits to us.

The list of residual benefits is not exhaustive and they will vary from narcissist to narcissist, but they form a further essential part of this triumvirate.

Thus fuel, character traits and residual benefits are the Prime Aims. All appliances are expected to fulfil their obligation to provide us with each element of the Prime Aims, although it is naturally of greater importance concerning the primary source having such applicability.

Always keep in your mind the relevance of these Prime Aims because this will aid your understanding why certain things are said and done by our kind.