A Letter To The Narcissist – No. 82
My Dear Narcy guys,
I had and I have a lot of you in my life, so if I decided to write a letter to each of you, it would take a lot of my time and I have none. Moreover, my letters to all of you would be pretty similar, because you all have a lot in common. Yes, you all look different, you all behave differently, but I see the same type of a person, living inside of you. I want to talk about that person.
1. Emotional pain and Loneliness.
You all know what the Internal Loneliness means exactly. You are acutely aware of it. You desperately want to get rid of it, because it is unbearable. Like anyone else, you have a deep wish to be loved, accepted and cared for. You want to belong somewhere.
Moreover, considering your childhood traumas, you, more than anyone else, want all of those things, but you can’t get them, because you are afraid of intimacy, which is a key point to get them. You are afraid to give your all and be rejected after that. You know precisely, how badly you are susceptible to the Emotional pain and you know that you won’t survive it.
Having a lot of you, my dear Narcy guys, in my family history, I bear some of your genes and, because of it, I know how that Emotional pain feels also. It isn’t easy to describe it, but it definitely feels like a hell.
So, no wonder why you all have to protect yourselves from that pain, and the single possible way to do it is to live in a “shut up” manner. You don’t permit a single soul to get close to you. You don’t trust anyone. You don’t permit yourselves to be open and vulnerable. I understand it. I don’t judge you. It is your natural protective mechanism.
But.
We have a vicious cycle. Your deep desire to be loved, accepted and cared for conflicts with your protective mechanism.
My dear Narcy guys, do you realize how it is hard to love or to live with a constantly “guarded, suspicious, and hostile” person?! No? So, I tell you. It is totally exhaustive. In the end, people leave you alone because of it. I understand them. I don’t judge them. It is their natural protective mechanism.
2. Loneliness and Fantasy World.
Your internal loneliness is and feels unbearable. You want someone to be with, to share your life with, to belong to. But, you know very well that a closeness and an intimacy make you vulnerable and exposed to the Emotional pain you all can’t tolerate.
You need and want an absolutely safe person for yourselves. The person who will never leave (read betray) you. Absolutely loyal. Absolutely loving. Absolutely caring. Absolutely understanding. Absolutely kind. Absolutely…
That divine person doesn’t exist in the real life (he/she doesn’t exist in principle and some of you are painfully aware of it!), but he/she exists in your Fantasy World. You create the ideal mother, father, brother, sister, friend, partner and lover in your mind. That’s your One.
That One is your ideal half. You talk to him/her. You both laugh. You both lead an interesting life. You both do wonderful things. You make love. You are open and sincere. You feel loved and admired. You feel safe. You are free and…happy. Almost heaven.
But.
That “paradise” would be a bless to someone with a schizophrenia, but not to you. You have a very good reality check. You see a difference between your Fantasy World and your Real Life, and this is a source of your misery. You desperately want that “paradise” in your real life, because you think that it is the only possible way to be happy. Your Fantasy World, albeit very pleasant, is not enough. You want more. You want it real.
How?
To “create” your One using a real person. To get his/her real love and loyalty through a dependency. Emotional. Physical. Financial. You have to be very inventive, very convincing, very seductive. And yes, you always have to control your One, because he/she, invariably, would escape after realization that everything was a lie and an illusion.
The sings of your control are very different (depends) – mental games, flattery, bribery, intimidation, restriction, physical violence, etc… The paedophilia, rape, murder, and cannibalism are the most perverse and ultimate sings of control.
The infamous Dennis Nilsen talked for hours with the dead bodies of his victims and wrote a lot of very tender poems to them. Those dead bodies were his real and loyal “friends”. They shared his loneliness. They never betrayed him and never escaped. He didn’t have to pretend and control them. He felt safe and…happy with them.
My dear Narcy guys, I know that you aren’t paedophiles, rapists, murderers, and cannibals in your real lives. But, I know, you all have those dark fantasies from time to time. Everything is possible in your Fantasy World. You are the Kings and Queens there. You are the Gods. You are forever young, healthy and wealthy there. You can do everything you want there.
And I know how it is hard to all of you to fight with yourselves and not to cross a very thin line that divides your Fantasy World and your Real Life. You kill your various enemies in your heads and you try to be a good people in your real lives at the same time. It isn’t an easy way to live, but you all do it and, considering your lack of empathy, you do it almost perfectly. You have my respect for that.
3. Sensation-seeking, Envy and Hate.
Unfortunately, the bad Nature and the bad Nurture both contributed to your personality type development.
I don’t want to overload you with a various chemical and functional brain abnormalities’ details, but those abnormalities are real and a lot of data suggests that they can be measured and documented pretty accurately.
Among many of things, you all have a very high level of the “pleasure threshold”. It isn’t easy to make you happy, guys. You aren’t capable to extract your happiness from the simple things and stimuli (good weather, music, food, friendly talk, healthy sex, etc.).
Those stimuli can’t reach your “pleasure threshold”. They are too weak for that. You need more. Much more. Mad love. Drama. Scandal. Fight. War. Reckless driving. Alcohol. Drugs. Hard porn. Questionable adventures. Anything, that can reach your “threshold”. And not having an empathy and having a low impulse control, you guys don’t hesitate to get your immediate gratification. And it works. For a short period of time.
Without that “over-stimulation” you feel empty, bored, depressed, and generally unhappy. You know exactly when you need your next “fix”. It manifests as a nervousness, irritability, restlessness, and anxiety.
And you know exactly what would happen next, if you don’t find your “fix” as soon as possible. Your internal “monster”, “demon”, “creature”, or whatever you want to call it, would eat you alive. Do you know what is it?
It is a very interesting, but weirdly working type of a Narcy conscience. It constantly and desperately tries to save your humanity, to protect you, to warn you, to tell you how bad your deals are. It tells you that it “sees” the difference between your created and real self.
The more you do your bad deals, the bigger, stronger and more intimidating your internal “conscience-monster” becomes. You hear its ominous roar and you want to silence it. You are scared to death to hear and admit the truth and your real self.
How could you silence your “monster”? Well, you have to distract yourselves, trying to reach your high “pleasure threshold” and loose yourselves in that relieving, but unhealthy oblivion. And, pretty often, your “distractive” methods aren’t honourable at all.
So, we have another vicious cycle. Your conscience forces you to do more bad things to silence it and then punishes you for that with a more intensive force.
That’s why I always tell you: “My dear Narcy guys, try, really try not to do the bad things. Don’t feed your “monster”. You just won’t survive when the “time of truth” comes. And it will come. Invariably. Sooner or later”. But you (aside of the one of you) don’t listen. You don’t “hear” me or anyone else who tells you the same things. The denial is so sweet…
But let’s back on the track. You see the ordinary people and you see how it is easy for them to be happy. Their “pleasure threshold” is so low in comparison to yours. They can extract their happiness from anything literally! And if they are wounded, they don’t have to go to extreme to “fix” their wounds. The mere friendly hug could help them, but not you.
You know how different you are and how it is hard for you to be happy like them. To laugh like them. To relax like them. To be free from that heavy burden you have to carry on your plates…
You envy them for that. You feel inferior and you hate them for that. Their mere happy existence insults you deeply. You want to punish them for that. You want to show to all of them what that means to be you. To live like you do. To fight with yourselves like you do. To foresee the slightest possibility to be wounded and to do everything to prevent it. To be guarded constantly. To survive.
Those visceral Envy and Hate make you look and act like a pure Evil. You know deeply inside that you aren’t evil persons at all. You just want to live peacefully, like anyone else. But, in many cases, you can’t control your Envy and Hate. You can’t address those destructive forces to something benign and constructive. You hate yourselves for that and you direct those destructive forces against you. When you reach the “no return point”, you stop to value even your own life. Nothing matters anymore. You give up.
4. Lack of Empathy.
Having the Emotional pain, the absolute internal Loneliness (personal isolation) and the low “pleasure threshold”, you all try to survive in this world. And the lack of Empathy makes your life journey absolutely antisocial.
You can “read” people intellectually, but you can’t “feel” them. You don’t feel their boundaries, so you don’t know where to stop at. Moreover, those people are so nauseatingly happy, so it makes you feel inferior, envious and angry. And that means that you always (intentionally or not) have to hurt people around you.
Of course, if you can’t feel someone’s pain, you can’t feel it. Dot.
But.
You can feel your own Emotional pain. You, my dear Narcy guys, know about the pain more, than anyone else. To avoid or to stop hurting people, just project your own words and actions on yourselves… How the cheating on you feels? How the verbal or physical humiliation feels? How the rejection feels? How? You know how.
You don’t need the empathy to navigate in this world successfully. You have the Self-Projection instead. It works pretty effectively, when you want to get a control upon your destructive urges and don’t want to find yourselves in the mental hospitals and prisons…
P.S. I don’t know how to finish this letter properly. Honestly.
So, my dear Narcy guys, I just want to express my sincere respect for your really heroic attempts to live a decent and pro-social life despite of your highly conflicted Nature. And I want you to know, that if you really want to heal yourselves and have a good life, everything is possible. Good luck.
Noname
38 thoughts on “A Letter To The Narcissist – No. 82”
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Thank you, my dear girls, for your interesting opinions and kind words.
I see, that my last paragraph caused some sort of misunderstanding and carries a potential damage, so I want to clear the things up to amend that.
Yes, I told about hope in those lines. But. It was the hope for NARCS, not for their victims. The Narcs, themselves, have to know, that their condition is not so hopeless as it seems; that the scientists work hard to find the best ways to modify their problem, to make their lives more consistent, organized and easier to cope. And I see some promising results in the professional scientific literature. There is a real hope for THEM.
But.
Their hope is their hope. Not YOURS. Not, at least, in the sense to prolong your suffering, thinking you can fix them. It is NOT your job to fix anyone and everyone. You owe NOTHING to anyone. You are responsible only for your own decisions, actions, and your own life.
I see you felt my compassion toward my Narcs in my letter and, yes, it is exactly what I feel.
But.
My compassion doesn’t compromise my logic and if I see that it is not wise or it doesn’t have any sense to do something on my Narcs behalf, I, with all my purest and deepest compassion toward them, would walk away without a backward glance. And I wouldn’t have any guilt feelings after that.
It is the custom here to paint the Emotional Thinking as something bad and defective. No and one more time no. Our life would be blank, dull and gray without ET. The ET is a gift you all have to be PROUD of. And when I hear – “I wish I were the Narc without ET…” , I always think – “You don’t know what you are asking for…”.
And it is not the ET, that forces people make their wrong choices and decisions. The logic deficiency, denial, rationalization, unstable self-esteem and self-respect do that instead.
You have to have your own stable “baseline” – the firm knowledge of what and who you are, what you do or don’t want, and what is acceptable and unacceptable for you. You don’t have to expect anything from anyone. Just go and take it yourself.
Yes, you can feel the compassion, but the logic and facts tell you that it is not wise for you to intervene or participate in a certain Narc’s events, so, in that case, listen NOT to your NORMAL (not defective!) emotions, but to your NORMAL logic.
For those girls, who made a CONSCIOUS decision to stay and fix their Narcs, consider this…
If you decided to explain to your Narc what is really going on with him, it wouldn’t be like a “suddenly he knew” situation. To understand things doesn’t mean to change. Moreover, it requires the ability to work on an introspective level, which the majority of Narcs can’t reach by default.
Considering their famous immaturity, it requires A LOT of time to modify their behavior. You just can’t say to a 5-years old to go to sleep and become 20-years old tomorrow morning. It won’t happen. You have to wait 15 years for that. Are you willing to do that? Especially, if the end result is so unpredictable? Moreover, if you see the “nothing-wrong-with-me” philosophy in ACTION, there is no hope for YOU.
Dear girls, let yourselves to be emotional in a good sense of this word. Don’t suppress the very thing that makes you unique and interesting. Paint your life with various colors and take a pleasure from it. But, always know where to stop at. Respect your logic and always listen to it. Always keep your “baseline” no matter what and who you are dealing with. No exclusions. Never.
About Narcs’ “monstrous creature”…
In my letter, I described the “basic” one and ALL cluster B people have it (but few of them feel and recognize it for what it really is).
But, it is not a single one “creature” they have in their heads. They have others also. And those “additional creatures” make Narcs and their “modus operandi” unique. I even gave the funny personal names to their various “creatures”, but I’m not going to explain or reveal more. I’m going to wait for our dear Tudor’s book “Creature” release and see how he considers that very complex matter himself.
I was glad to see all of you here, my dear girls. I was glad to see that you are doing well. Also, I was glad to see that you, dear Tudor, continue your work. That’s very good.
P.S. Perse, you are very right about “Noname’s” genesis!
Noname
Wise and wonderful! You are very right about ET. It has an important place, but so does LT. we are best off when we understand when and how to use both.
I have missed your comments here on the blog. Glad to hear from you again and hope that you are going to stick around and add your wisdom and perspective.
Is this Maria Sklodowska Curie by any chance?
NarcAngel,
Thank you for your comment and thoughts. I agree with you that understanding how they work is so important and logic is key.
I’m finding that there is a way to be both logical and empathic at the same time. It takes time and continual focus to get to the point where self-awareness is strong enough to prevent the “empathy” factor from slipping back into emotional thinking. As HG says, it’s a case of “always resisting”.
After reading this letter and thinking about it, and also reading some of the comments on this letter and other narcsite articles, I am more and more inclined to believe that psychopathy and narcissism is biological and hereditary more than it is a product of childhood experiences and abuse.
In a bid to make the whole subject more understandable and acceptable and even hopeful, I believe that as more and more people in society become aware of this “disorder” the general collective beliefs in the public will lean toward a certain kind of sympathetic rationalisation that these people need to be “helped” or understood, or that their childhoods were so bad that it “changed” them for the worse. I’m not so sure that is the case and by believing these things, it is a potentially misguided form of “emotional thinking”.
I say this because I myself am also at risk of being too hopeful or trying to rationalise the things I see in order to better accept them. I am slowly thinking along these “hopeful” lines less and less.
When I think of my own mother, she had a difficult childhood and the environment she grew up in was harsh, however, she was not the only child to experience such hardships. Since her childhood, she has had a comfortable life with a very supportive husband and children and her life has not been extremely stressful or demanding. Yet, to listen to her and to be at the mercy of her manipulations, you would think she had been imprisoned in a hard labour camp until just a few years ago. Also, looking at photos of her from childhood onwards, she seemed happy and carefree as a child and there were positive aspects to her upbringing as well. Yet, she seems to take great pleasure in sadistically manipulating and using others around her and has that gleeful smirk when she thinks she has “tricked” someone. This is particularly so with her closest family members who have consistently loved and cared for her for the majority of her life. In my opinion, I’m inclined to think she is psychopathic and not only narcissistic.
Since learning about this disorder and developing better boundaries and less contact, I can see that “normal” people develop more narcissistic behaviours as a result of needing to live and maintain relationships with these people for longer periods. It is a way to survive without being totally destroyed by them. It reminds me of the line in the U2 song, Peace On Earth… “And you become a monster, so the monster will not break you”. However, these other “normal” people do not develop the narcissist’s underlying manipulativeness, pathological lying, lack of guilt, and enjoyment in seeing someone else’s pain.
Also, as this letter (and many commenters) have mentioned, the cluster B traits run in families quite a lot. I believe there is a strong hereditary aspect to them. The more I read and the more “logical” I get, the more I believe narcissists are born rather than made. This means that without some kind of medical biological intervention, they can’t and won’t change by themselves.
WiserNow
I, too, believe heredity is very important in becoming a narcissist. And they do often run very strongly in families and also come from non-abusive families. However, I also know that early intervention and training as children has a great impact on how little narcs grow up and how abusive they become. It doesn’t require medical intervention to alter their life path if you start from birth.
Windstorm,
I agree with you to an extent. Childhood experiences and the emotional validation, permissiveness, restrictions and security a child grows up with during the time their brains are forming and are most vulnerable is extremely important. I believe these environmental and care-giving influences can alter the actual neuropathways and chemical and hormonal aspects in the brain before it’s fully developed.
Just as there is a cognitive scale among narcissists that makes them either lesser, mid-range or greater, I think there is another type of scale, if you like, that makes them more “extreme” or “sadistic” or prone to be malignant. It’s just a theory that I have in my own mind and I could be wrong, but please let me explain.
The narcissists that become serial killers or do weird and crazy things that we read about in the news are extreme. There are many, many other narcissists who live seemingly normal and respectable lives and never appear in the news.
I believe the extent of aggressiveness, the seriousness of the perversions or fetishes, and the prevalence of malignancies are influenced by the formative experiences of childhood and whether or not abuse was present, and also the amount and type of abuse that was present. The amount and type of secure care-giving and positive emotional validation will also affect this scale of malignancy that I’m thinking of.
The underlying biological susceptibility is already there though. Imagine that a narcissist is born with a pile of logs (logs = narcissistic traits) sitting in their brain that may or may not catch fire. If the conditions are such that a match is lit and thrown onto the logs (a lit match = adverse conditions), the logs will start to burn and it’s the logs that will fuel the fire. If there are many matches thrown consistently, the fire will get bigger (size of fire = scale of malignancy).
A normal person does not have those logs in their brain. If a match is thrown, it may burn for a while, but the fire will go out at some point because there are no logs to sustain the fire. I hope that makes sense.
This is just a rough theory. I think it’s not that clear cut and the scale of malignancy doesn’t necessarily mean there was an equal, directly relational scale of abuse.
I agree with you that a narcissist’s life path can be altered if you start from birth, however, I think it would take focused and persistent attention from a caregiver who knew how to be both emotionally validating as well as carefully restrictive in a safe and secure environment.
In today’s world, I’m not so sure it’s that easy for all parents to know what kind of child they’re dealing with, and be this closely and patiently involved with their children, while also providing them with safety and material security. I think it’s possible, but I also think the reality unfortunately falls short of the ideal in the majority of situations in the stressful lifestyles and lack of awareness many people have. Not to mention that a lot of these parents may be narcissistic themselves.
Thank you for your comment Windstorm. To me, it’s a very interesting line of thinking and I appreciate your ideas and thoughts very much. I am continually learning and adjusting my views from being on this blog and reading your comments along with everyone else’s.
WiserNow, I’m totally with you on this. I am almost sure it is biological and I think narcissists are born highly sensitive. “Too sensitive” to be able to cope with reality. In order to survive everything they have to deal with in this world, they take on this defence mechanism.
I am really in to this at the moment, because I think my eldest son may be a narcissist too. Since I have two sons, I can compare. I raised them both mostly by myself, their N- father did not take part in their upbringing, he used to be abroad a lot for business or just absent(-minded).
Of course, like any parent, I have done things wrong, but I have always told them and shown them I love them unconditionally.
Both my sons act completely different. I know there is a world out there besides the safety of home and they could have experienced horrific things without me knowing about it.
Now that I have time to speak with my sons alone (without N-ex), I try to talk to them during dinner about their lives and childhood, how they have experienced it, to find out if there perhaps is a trauma.
Still I am almost convinced there is a biological difference and I try to find information on internet. Is it genetic? Why did I feel so extremely nervous (physically) during my first pregnancy?
Is my son highly sensitive (empathic) like me or higly sensitive (narcissistic) like his father?
What do I do? Does what I do make a difference anyway? It did not with his father! How can I help my son?
You know, all those questions… What, why, how,..
(And please… not another narc…)
WiserNow,
“Since learning about this disorder and developing better boundaries and less contact, I can see that “normal” people develop more narcissistic behaviours as a result of needing to live and maintain relationships with these people for longer periods. It is a way to survive without being totally destroyed by them.”
Absolutely so!!
“This means that without some kind of medical biological intervention, they can’t and won’t change by themselves.”
And that’s where the problem lies. N’s don’t want to change, they don’t see the need to change. Their self defence mechanism works so effectively. You are the problem, not them. That’s how they see it.
N-ex rather divorced me than get help. Going to a psychotherapist would be ‘pure horror’ (that’s what he let me know on Whatsapp).
And that’s on my mind all of the time. What could be sooo horrific to tell a therapist? Was he perhaps sexually abused and can’t talk about it? Is it the deep down tucked away feelings of guilt for causing his ex to commit suicide? Is it about giving away controll?
I learn so much on this blog, but I also gain so many more questions.
Don’t be hopefull WiserNow, I truly think there is no hope. There may be a little cognitive adjustment, but you never get to the core of a narc.
Blank,
Thank you for your comment. Yes, there so many questions and so much of what is known can’t be definitely proven. If only it were as easy to determine answers to these psychological questions as it is to take an x-ray to determine if someone has a broken bone.
I’m sorry this is something that’s affecting your life so much. I know how difficult it is and how mysterious and detrimental it can be. When it affects your close family and loved ones, it’s a dark cloud you can’t get rid of completely.
Best wishes with both of your sons. After reading your comment, I get the feeling you are trying to look into the past to see what were the “causes” and if in fact there were any. It sounds like you are a “truth-seeker” and you want to find out why and how so that you can “justify” the causes and maybe try to fix whatever the “problems” are.
Please don’t allow this to harm your own emotional health or waste your life trying to solve the puzzles. Just know the signs and how to protect yourself against them.
WiserNow, thank you for your kind response. Best wishes to you too. xx
Wisernow
I’m still of the opinion that it is a combination of both, but I agree that they cannot be helped, so the focus needs to be more on the understanding of how they work so that we can better adjust to them being in society (but especially not in our beds) to extract the best from interactions with them and to better protect ourselves.
“And you become a monster so the monster will not break you”
I believe there is truth to that. I did employ some of Stepnarcs techniques to be able to deal with him and protect myself-I just did not adopt all and become him. It is also what I meant in my letter to HG when I said:
“If you would become her-you would not suffer you, yes?”
I’m glad to read that your experience of having developed better boundaries and having less contact is aiding with logic, as I feel that is truly the key for everyone.
HG. I would really like your take on this letter if you are So inclined
Thank you
My observations will be provided in time.
Food for thought!
Sometimes I am convinced I am the Narcissist…
I wanted the:-
“The person who will never leave (read betray) you. Absolutely loyal. Absolutely loving. Absolutely caring. Absolutely understanding. Absolutely kind. Absolutely…”
I was that to him, was my nature, until I had to stand up to him. Still was but wanted him to see what was happening was unfair.
Now it is all over and I have seen him with someone else he says and seems happy. That hurts.
I have completely lost my joy, I loved simple things the Autumnal leaves on the ground. There was a choir on the television, I cried watching them as they seemed so happy and I cannot seem to get that back.
Is the deep hurt / wound I feel, me feeling sorry for myself. Is that Narcissistic the poor me? I don’t know.
I think I am a co-dependant love devotee. Always just wanted the one and to be the one. Life isn’t that simple, I always thought that part could be.
Thank you x
Noname,
Very understanding of the reality and very compassionate.
When I was reading your letter I felt sympathy for the narcissist.
Oddly, I felt like I was a child when picturing myself in their place.
It is a lot to process and took a few minutes to read.
Thanks for writing it.
Perse
Awesome!
So well written Noname. Thank you.
wow. This person really gets it.
Excellent description of the emotions and thoughts that end up propelling the narcissist’s abusive behaviours. It gives us a peek inside the minds of people we can barely begin to comprehend. HG, your work will be very useful for years to come. Looks like you have created the immortality you spoke of earlier.
That is the idea, Donna.
Dear Noname,
Thank you very much for this great letter! It was a pleasure to read. I actually read it twice because it’s very detailed and I wanted to take in all your deep perceptions and really understand them. I enjoyed it just as much the second time around. You are very insightful. I also think you are truly empathic in a very reflective and non-judgemental way. I learned a lot from your insights.
I never really thought about the narcissist’s “pleasure threshold” before, but it makes sense and I have seen it myself. Your description of this, together with the different emotions and behaviours, makes me see that all the different emotional and reactive aspects tie in with each other and work together to create a “whole”.
A non-narcissistic person can see and feel the joy and marvel at the beauty of simple things – a cute animal, a beautiful landscape, a sunny day, etc – but these things don’t seem to “impress” on the narcissist in the same way.
Putting aside all of the anti-social, manipulative and self-serving aspects, you would think that these external and “neutral” things of beauty or wonder would still have the same impact on another human’s eyes and sensibility. But in the narcissist’s case, they generally don’t. Their brains process it differently. It’s very interesting.
Also, the spiral and loop of feeling pain, doing something narcissistic to relieve the pain, but then feeling pain again from the actions taken is very well explained in your letter. It is a loop only they can stop, however, their disorder prevents them from stopping it. They can’t “meet” their creature or learn to love their creature, because they don’t have enough capacity to love and hope and believe that they will survive.
Thank you again for your very insightful, grounded and perceptive letter. I enjoyed it very much.
Holy wow. I think I need to read this more. Print it. First of all there is no rage. None. The empathic quality of this is astonishing. I am curious to see other comments. And read it five more times.
Saw that this had been posted on FB (I follow there too but do not comment).
One of those comments stated, words to the effect…. ‘Don’t like this so much,; she’s giving the Ns to much leeway.’
In my own, humble opinion; I don’t think she is. She has recognised specific traits in Ns and rather than take the ET viewpoint, she is taking the rational one whilst still maintaining her boundaries. We do differ on one point though.
What she is seeing is something in them which I also see. That there is a small and very frightened little child inside who is desperately</em. trying hard to be heard. If we are Es, then we must also possess affective empathy. I see it all the time and most especially in the ones who are more highly evolved surprisingly.
So, let's take HG example of mirroring and why it will never work. OK, agreed. But what about the times when they are not seeking to impress you by talking about a common (supposed) interest? The delight, the passion that they are able to display as they explain, very carefully why this kitchen knife is better than that one or why this train is better than the one over there. Or an opinion on history or indeed anything? It mustn't be forgotten that we are Empaths. We can and do 'read' this and if we are weaponised, for a little time, we are able to put aside our differences and just 'be'.
So I turn this inwards and I ask myself (after the moment), how did I feel? I feel happy that they have found joy in something and then, we 'feed'. Or rather, Es would call it rejoicing in others' happiness, however transient.
From my point of view, this calls into a major emotional state which is rarely touched on. It does crop up though on here from time to time. That is compassion. To me, compassion is a place one 'sits'. It is not Emotional Thinking. One can have great compassion but still not engage, maintain boundaries, watch from a far etc. Compassion will not always propel an E into action. I believe we can feel that state and simultaneously acknowledge that to engage is not in our best interests.
Let's face it. When we read on here about the rage, the hurt and the pain caused by a N or Ns; that is also an emotional reaction driven by emotional thinking. Totally and utterly justified, I might add. It is still ET though. When you've had your whole life ripped apart, raped, assaulted, defrauded, ghosted and all the rest, why wouldn't you feel a towering anger?
I'm far from a saint myself but I do reserve a special place for those that have seriously maimed me. The rage transmuted from hot to cold but it is still there. I do hold compassion for those two people at some level but it is seriously tempered with the fact that IF our paths should ever cross…
Where I and the author of the letter differ is right at the very end; no they will not change and again, in my opinion this is emotional thinking.
Ahh the great Madame Curie. Fantastic picture, HG.
Noname, please give yourself a name (even if it’s fake), you are worth it.
Love your letter. Wish it could work, the self projection, but narcs are so NOT in touch with their real emotions anymore, their defense system works too effectively.
Their vision: They do not have a problem. You have a problem. Not that they care though.
xx
Blank,
Just saying, but your “name” is evocative of ” not wishing to be noticed” to me, as is noname’s. Not that my name is any great shakes, as it was chosen emotionally. I have seen posters name(s) change over time, a great example being our lovely Bubbles, who seemed to really blossom with her name change. But, we will accept content over moniker to show us their thoughts & feelings. This letter is a great example.
I do agree that the last line of her letter does show ET, but overall I think she has pegged it.
Now, I look forward to HG’s commentary on our letters and wondering what he thought of this one, especially.
I know mine was venom spewing, but not to the degree of disdain that others have so eloquently expressed in their letters.
Hi Perse,
I didn’t mean to criticize Noname, I just thought ‘noname’ sounds a bit like ‘a nobody’ and I hope she does not give herself this name because her self esteem has disappeared, due to having to cope with all these narcs in her life.
It’s funny you say my name is evocative of not wishing to be noticed also. I didn’t know Blank could have such a meaning in English. When I recall the time I came to this blog I think I just felt blank, like in empy, like in I don’t know anything.That’s what I meant with Blank.
You think I should change my nick Perse? Any suggestions? 🙂
HG’s commentary on the letters? I doubt if he has time for it.
Venom spewing will be forgiven Perse and understood by many, I guess it all depends on the time of writing the letter. Some victims are still full of hate, others are in a ‘forgiving mood’.
xx
Oh my god! This is so beautiful ! It is so truthful yet compassionate. Hate is never justified or smart irrespective of one being a narcissist or an empath. I strongly agree with this article especially the last part. Not having empathy is not the issue. If you can feel your own pain then that is having an understanding of how it feels to others. Psychopaths do not feel pain, fear or guilt at all and its genetic. Sociopaths and Narcissists do feel those things at least for themselves. That is a game changer and it means, if they are truly dedicated they can help themselves. Also the interpretation of the creature being their own conscience – wow! If they are self aware and try to work against the tide then they truly are the superior beings they want to be. It would be both commendable and good for them.
Dear HG , the pic of the dark shadow of a man in a suit on your YouTube videos ,is that actually you .If it is you nice shoulders ,
Im just curious .
Yours Kiki
It is, thank you.
They are nice, aren’t they?
No Name, such a powerful letter. I admire you for being able to write it.
Wow I took a quiet moment to really digest this……
“Your internal loneliness is and feels unbearable. You want someone to be with, to share your life with, to belong to. But, you know very well that a closeness and an intimacy make you vulnerable and exposed to the Emotional pain you all can’t tolerate.
You need and want an absolutely safe person for yourselves. The person who will never leave (read betray) you. Absolutely loyal. Absolutely loving. Absolutely caring. Absolutely understanding. Absolutely kind. Absolutely…
That divine person doesn’t exist in the real life (he/she doesn’t exist in principle and some of you are painfully aware of it!), but he/she exists in your Fantasy World. You create the ideal mother, father, brother, sister, friend, partner and lover in your mind. That’s your One.”
That’s what my nex wanted, I could feel his loneliness and I tried so hard to show him through love, adoration, actions and words. I gave him my loyalty, my heart, my soul, my devotion, my body and all I wanted to do was heal his past hurts and show him happiness, show him that he is loveable and worthy and amazing and gifted. I wanted him to learn with me and together we could get over our past abuses and terrible childhoods. But he’s trapped in his own hell, I understand that now.
I often wonder what facing those demons would do. But as this letter highlights, they are brave and bruised and have been terribly abused, I wish they could let it go. What is the worst that could happen? I hear so often it would destroy them, but it would destroy the beast – the beast that needs feeding and to be contained. How chained are they? Captive in their own worlds unable to feel or allow themselves a smidgeon of vulnerability or to lose control. I understand why HG or my nex lock themselves in a tower with drawbridges and moats filled with spikes – hot boiling oil barrels ready to be poured over anyone who manages to approach the gates to depravity and debauchery. But instead of keeping people out – getting them from knowing the real person deeply vulnerable inside – they actually protect the beast. The beast is not them. The real them is the child who was forced to be strong and to find a way to survive and cope.
Thought provoking letter, thank you for sharing anonymous.
I suspect the beast is the excruciating, overwhelming, and horrifying, deep existential loneliness. Ns and Co-deps alike feel it, their little love tanks a dark unfilled void. Those whose job descriptions were to fill their offsprings’ love tanks were themselves parented by love-deficient individuals.
We so very much want to make it all alright for our Ns that we love. It’s painful to us that we can’t do that, or make any dent in their difficulties, or reach any degree of understanding with them. It’s painful mostly that they can’t really feel or experience, much less value, our love.
I’m glad to read about MRI evidence in a narc brain. I can believe that you are human after all, although there are times when you seem to gleefully be possessed by evil.
Projection is obviously no substitute for empathy, or we wouldn’t be having any problems, and we’re having huge problems. Brain cells can regrow, including in the empathy area of the brain, and there’ll likely be some cure in the future- at least for empathy. But what about now? I need to coexist.
Go when you know is just leaving the monster to other innocent people. That’s not very empathic. And sometimes it’s not feasible anyway. I’m not wrapped up emotionally over him, which actually means I might unintentionally wound him easily because I’m not under his spell anymore. So I need to know, do I treat him kind of like a grown up child, I guess? We overlook things with children because they haven’t learned things yet, and same with a narc. I know his game or traits, so I just play along like he’s a child, and nicely put my foot down when he crosses a boundary. Is this right? I mean I’m wise to him, he can’t help being how he is. Overlook bad behavior sometimes, don’t take it personally, always let him feel superior, throw him a real compliment, play along like you do with a child without patronizing but with real understanding of the cause. He will feel good and so will I. Is that right?
My narc is the boss. I’ve known him so long, been through so much.
From what I’m researching, narcissism can cause chemical imbalances and emotional brain damage to their victims too. In fact that’s how the bondage happens between us.
Wow. Your letter really resonates with me. Enjoyed your analysis very much!