That Doesn’t Matter

Our sense of entitlement, lack of consideration and our failure to recognise and respect boundaries means that we are important and you are not. Our need is an emergency. Your needs are secondary. Our requirements are fundamental. Your wants are irrelevant. If we want something it must be done and you must drop everything else, cancel your plans and ensure we are provided for and catered to otherwise all hell breaks loose. Fail to do something we want and when we want (even if we haven’t told you what it is) is regarded by us a criticism and our fury is ignited. We may impose a cold furious silent treatment or lambast you with our heated fury but either way we are important and you are not. We show no appreciation of your situation, no consideration of your position and scant regard for what you might need or have to contend with. It is predictable all about us. Any situation, any time and any moment we will trample all over what you are doing in order to get what we want done. Whatever you may have organised, planned or whatever you are doing is minutiae and utterly inconsequential to the massively important event, occurrence or happening that we have decreed. Expect interruptions, abrasive treatment and a complete lack of manners and consideration. This mind-set that what you are doing is not important appears often and repeated and is symptomatic of so many of our narcissistic traits. Here are twenty instances you may recognise where what you are doing is not important right now.

1. Talking over you.
2. Changing channel on the television when you are clearly watching something.
3. Switching off music that you are listening to.
4. Playing music loudly when you are relaxing.
5. Thrusting a newspaper under your nose when you are reading a book and saying “look at this”
6. Talking to you when you are on the telephone.
7. Calling you at work and raising a trivial matter and demanding that you do something about it.
8. Asking you to pass something that is in reach when you are doing some other task.
9. Saying la la la when you are trying to explain something.
10. Making you late because we needed you to straighten our tie several times first.
11. Calling you indoors from an outdoors task just to point out something on the television which is irrelevant.
12. Calling you and asking where something is when it is easy to find.
13. Calling you when you are socialising and demanding that you return home to deal with an emergency – such as the blinds are stuck or we have run out of peanut butter
14. Demanding you prepare our evening meal when you are trying to get ready to go out.
15. Feigning a greater illness when you are unwell.
16. Waking you up to tell you something pointless.
17. Ringing the landline from our mobile (withholding the number) and insisting you answer when you are trying to eat and then hanging up.
18. Demanding to be picked up or given a lift irrespective of what you might be doing.
19. Using items you need to complete a task.
20. Thrusting a tablet under your nose as you are trying to do something and telling you to “watch this” only to see a video of a man falling down some stairs.

It does not matter how trivial, ridiculous or childish the behaviour is as long as it disrupts you and thrusts your attention onto us, even if it is to react in a negative way, we will always behave in such a way.