I explained in Part One about how the mind of a Lesser Narcissist functions with regard to his or her interactions with the various appliances in the fuel matrix. Part Two introduced the behaviour of the Lower Mid Range Narcissist.
It is necessary to provide you with preliminary observations again. This is crucial in the task of reducing your obscuring Emotional Thinking and heightening your application of Logical Thinking.
I often read comments along the lines of
“I am ensnared by a narcissist and he knows exactly what he is doing, he is calculating it all and is determined to destroy me.”
I have no doubt that such belief is honestly held, but it is usually incorrectly held.
Why is that?
- It is only Greater Narcissists that are aware and operate in a calculated manner. Greater Narcissists are very rare indeed and therefore as a matter of statistics, if you have been ensnared by a narcissist, it is highly likely to be a Lesser or Mid-Range Narcissist.
- Mid Range Narcissists can appear to operate in a calculated manner owing to higher cognitive function. This is called “Instinctive Planning” which I will explain further in relation to this subject.
- The effect of emotional thinking. Yes, as you know emotional thinking obscures the use of logic and it does this repeatedly and in thousands of different ways. One of those ways is to cause you to think that the narcissist has planned and is operating in a calculated fashion because this will cause you to obsess more over what the narcissist is doing, talk more about what the narcissist is doing, try harder to contact the narcissist in order to halt this supposed calculated campaign against you and of course what are you doing if you do one or more of those things? You are engaging and feeding your inherent addiction to the narcissist. Accordingly, your emotional thinking absolutely wants you doing it and will make you ignore logic and honestly believe the narcissist is acting in a calculated fashion.
- The projection of your world view. Obviously you look at the world from your standpoint and because of this you think that anybody who engages in such behaviours as the ones you are experiencing must have planned them, because if you acted this way, you would know what you are doing and you would have planned them. This entirely understandable viewpoint of yours means that you cannot help but regard the behaviour as pre-meditated and calculated. You, as an empath victim do not manipulate through instinct. You have no need to do so, you are not designed that way and in fact if you ever (in the unusual event) try to manipulate somebody you tend to fail at it because you are just not made to do it and you are not practised at behaving that way. We on the other hand are designed to manipulate and for those who are not as evolved as the Greater Narcissist it is done through instinct. You impose your worldview on our behaviour, that is not high-handed of you at all, but it is incorrect.
Thus, these factors result in you erroneously reaching the conclusion that the narcissist is operating through calculation towards you.
How then do narcissists operate and what is their state of knowledge. Firstly, you ought to read these articles (or revisit them)
Do Narcissists Know What They Are Doing? The Lesser
Do Narcissists Know What They Are Doing? The Mid Ranger
We must have control at all times over environments and that means the people within those environments and of course that includes you. The Lesser and Mid Range Narcissists do not realise this is what they require, this is known at an unconscious level. The Greater knows that control is needed and also has vastly superior abilities to achieve that.
To assist you with the comparison between the schools of narcissist, I shall use a similar scenario to that described in Part One of Calculation and the Narcissist
The narcissist is a Middle Mid Range Narcissist. This means that he does not know what he is, he will never know what he is and cannot change.
The Middle Mid Range Narcissist (“MMRN”) usually has a higher cognitive function than the Lesser Narcissist (but not always – it is only one factor in the determination of school and sub school ) The MMRN occasionally may give the appearance of awareness or insight but that is actually part of the manipulation.
Let’s proceed with the example.
The MMRN has experienced a Hoover Trigger. The Hoover Execution Criteria have been met, primarily because the victim is the Former IPPS (thus potent fuel), has provided large amounts of fuel when there have been previous hoovers, the MMRN knows where the victim lives and it is a short drive from where he lives. The victim has not entered a new relationship. There is no restraining order against the MMRN. He and the victim are in the process of a divorce. The MMRN has a Shelf IPSS. The MMRN has received correspondence from his lawyer whereby his latest offer to the victim within the context of the divorce proceedings has been rejected. The letter was to the point and this has wounded the narcissist. He needs to exert control over the victim. Accordingly, he drives over to the home of the victim seeking to exert control over her.
At the point of reading the rejection the narcissism (if it could speak) would state as follows:
This letter threatens my control. This is unacceptable. Control must be asserted immediately. (This is the Unconscious Response)
The narcissists fury is ignited by the wounding nature of the letter. He does not think
“I do not have control, I must go and get the ex under control.”
What he does think is :-
“Why is she being so unreasonable? All I want to do is move on but she is being horrible. She was horrible to me when we were married and now she is on this crusade to try and make my life a complete misery. I just do not understand what I have done to deserve this, I tried my best during the marriage but there was just no pleasing her. You would think she would want to move on, like me, but oh no, she has to do this. My lawyer said my offer was a reasonable one so I just cannot grasp why she has to be like this. I am sick of her doing this to me, I deserve better. I need to sort this out.”
The narcissism needs to assert control and wants to do so by receiving fuel from the victim to end the wounding and also by causing the narcissist to engage in a direct, physical fashion. The narcissism causes the narcissist to see this situation, through his Narcissistic Perspective as unfair and wrong and therefore compels him to go to the victim´s house. The narcissist through this Narcissistic Perspective sees the victim as the problem. His Sense of Entitlement (which he is unaware of because his narcissism blinds him to it) demands that he preserves his financial position and that he also gets an explanation as to why she is being so awful to him. His Lack of Accountability (which he is unaware of because his narcissism blinds him to it) tells him that he is not responsible for providing her with a particular level of support and these narcissistic traits (and others desires) work together to make the narcissist do something to assert control.
The narcissism is thinking
We need control. Go and see her and use Apparent Reason, Pleading and Pity Plays in order to assert control. We will use his Cold Fury (as he is Mid Range).
Note he does not think :-
“How can I get her to do what I want? I know, I will go and see her and plead with her so that will con her into giving me what I want and accepting my financial proposal in the divorce. I will turn on the waterworks and that will make her feel sorry for me by explaining how I am strapped for cash, yes, she will feel sorry for me, change her mind and then I get my way.”
His response is instinctive driven by his narcissism which wants him to assert control and also to gain fuel to repair the wound caused by the content of the letter from the lawyer.
Driven by this instinctive response, the narcissist gets in his car, drives across to where the victim lives, marches up the pathway and he knocks at the door but the victim does not answer the door. The victim maintains no contact by not opening the door to tell the narcissist to reason with him to leave her alone. The victim does not shout through the letter box telling the narcissist to “Foxtrot Oscar”, the victim does not gesticulate through the window for the narcissist to go away or open the window and pour water down on the waiting narcissist. No matter how tempting those responses might be, the victim must not execute them because that is engagement which means
- Fuel Provision
- Potential adverse consequence , and
- Heightened Emotional Thinking
aka The Devil’s Pitchfork : The Three Bad Outcomes of Engaging With A Narcissist
Previously the Victim would engage through pleading, shouting and even threatening. All of which is Challenge Fuel and only encouraged the narcissist to keep asserting control and indeed lowered the Hoover Bar to prompt further hoovers.
Accordingly, the victim´s failure to respond amounts to wounding. The victim is the Former IPPS and therefore is at the top of the fuel hierarchy. This failure to respond is “in person” and therefore the result of this is massive wounding for the narcissist. This is on top of the wounding which has already occurred because of the rejection of the narcissist´s offer.
The narcissism is stating, if it had a voice
“Situation critical. Existing wounding not repaired. Extensive wounding now caused. Fuel level plummeting. Immediate action required. Commence Apparent Reason and if that does not work implement Pleading and Pity Plays.
The narcissist does not think :-
“I am struggling to gain control here, what shall I do to make sure I get it?”
Accordingly, the MMRN gets on his knees and pushes open the letter box and calls through it :-
“Helloooo, are you there? Its Tom. I got the letter from your lawyer and I think there is some misunderstanding, I wonder if you would be kind enough to open the door and have a reasonable conversation with me to try and sort this out? (Apparent Reason) I haven’t come here to cause any trouble for you (Facade Maintenance) (Angel With A Dirty Face) but I just don’t understand why we cannot sort this out like two adults. I know we both want to move on and it is very sad what has happened and that our marriage did not work out but we both know why that it is, but there is no point going over old ground but we do need to sort this out. Can we have a conversation please?”
Note that the MMRN is rather wordy. The absence of a Lesser Traits means he is less direct. The absence of Greater traits mean he is less polished and charming. He will think he has charm (Mid Range Delusion) but it is either lacking or minimal. He seriously believes that he is a reasonable person, hence he instinctively starts with this manipulation of trying to be reasonable. He does not think “I will try and reason with her because that is the best way of achieving the outcome.” He just regards himself as entirely reasonable, she is unreasonable and he starts to talk firmly believing that his reasonable approach (not seeing that actually his offer was unreasonable and was understandably rejected) will succeed.
The Victim does not answer the voice coming through the letter box. She has heard this all before. She is not fearful but is bored of the same comments which she has heard over and over again from Captain Reasonable. She surfs narcsite.com looking for Angel Assistance to make a donation to ensure other people do not have to put up with this tiresome behaviour from their narcissists.
Since there has been no response from the victim, the narcissism is now thinking
“Situation remains critical and is deteriorating. Wounding remains unaddressed. Fuel levels dropping. Apparent Reason has failed, switch to Pleading and Pity Plays with immediate effect.”
The MMRN does not think.
“Whoops a daisy, that did not work. Ho hum, well I suppose I will plead with her now and if I need to I will squeeze out some tears, that will have her like putty in my hand.”
Driven by the self-defence mechanism of his narcissism which still needs control causes him to switch to pleading, accordingly, the narcissist then says
“Please will you accept the offer, it is the best I can offer. I am begging you to see sense here and put this to bed. It is not doing either of us any good having this hanging over us. Can you hear me? I know you are listening. You were always a good listener but I need you to stop this, yes? Come on Sarah please open the door and talk to me about this and if you won’t do that at least do the decent thing and reconsider and call your lawyer to accept the offer. It is a decent offer and especially after what you did to me. (Note that in order to assert control Blameshifting begins). It was you that went off with that guy from work and all I ever did was try to make it work between us. I was working my backside off to provide for us and pay for this house, this house which I have to say you have got to stay in whilst I have had to move into something close to a bedsit, which is hardly fair is it. (The Pity Play has started and again this has been an instinctive shift to this form of manipulation. The narcissist has not consciously decided to do it. Note also that previously he stated he was “not going to go over old ground” but he has just done that and within moments of making such an assurance. He will not have noticed that he has done this. If this happened to be brought to his attention then this would be Challenge Fuel and would be met by The Narcissist´s Twin Lines of Defence (1) Denial “I never said that” and then (2) Blameshifting/Deflection “Well I wasn’t going to bring it up but YOU gave me no choice because you are being so spiteful.)
The Victim is unconcerned by the pitiful pleas. She does not feel threatened and therefore has not called the police. The MMRN is causing such a scene so that the neighbours are involved. The MMRN is uncertain whether his words are being listened to, therefore
No police means no fuel from Tertiary Sources
No neighbours means no fuel from Tertiary Sources
Uncertainty as to whether the Former IPPS is even listening means no Thought Fuel.
If the narcissism had a voice it would now be saying
“Situation remains critical and no prospects of situation being remedied by remaining in situ. Existing wounding still unaddressed. Fuel levels depleting and now dangerously low. Abort. Repeat – abort.”
The narcissism recognises that remaining here is just going to worsen the situation. Control cannot be asserted and there is no fuel. It is time to cause the narcissist to withdraw. The narcissism states
“Issue Dismissive Flounce to assert control and seek fuel elsewhere.”
The narcissist does not think
“Hmm that was a disaster. I know, I will show her by storming off in a huff and I will go and talk to someone else to get fuel that way.”
He thinks
“She is such a horrible horrible woman. I do not know what I ever saw in her but I am not staying her to be made a fool of. At least I know I have been tried to be fair which is more than be said for her.”
Accordingly, the narcissist shouts,
“Suit yourself. As usual you do what you want you selfish bitch. See you in court then!”
He gets off his knees and strops away to his car.
This retreat is his way of asserting control over the victim by claiming victory (by being reasonable) and then HE deciding to walk away.
The narcissism states
“Control now asserted through Dismissive Flounce. Existing wounding remains unaddressed. Fuel levels dangerously low. Fuel must be obtained as a matter of priority. Seek secondary sources and use Pity Play to manipulate provision of fuel.”
The narcissist duly takes out his phone and calls his mother,
“Mum, its Tom…I sound upset? I am (voice breaks) it is Sarah she is being a total cow to me again. I am coming over, I will be there in fifteen minutes, that is if she hasn’t made the Traffic God curse me as well. See you soon.”
Mum´s soothing tones down the phone and words of sympathy provide some fuel and begins to ease the fuel issue and heal the wounding which has occurred. As he drives across to see his mother, his narcissism still seeking immediate fuel has Tom call his best friend on hands-free to tell his tale of woe at the hands of Sarah and this supportive NISS friend provides some fuel through the conversation to aid in the healing of the wounds caused by the Former IPPS and to cause fuel levels to climb.
Once again the behaviour of the narcissist, this time Middle Mid Ranger has entirely been governed by instinct.
The Victim, misled by Emotional Thinking may well believe that the narcissist has purposefully trotted over and deployed pleading and the pity play as a cynical attempt to get her to change her mind and accept his proposal. This is incorrect. It may be the obvious outcome to her owing to her lack of understanding of narcissists and the impact of her obscuring ET, but his behaviour has not been planned, he has not sat down and thought about how best to cause her to change her mind and instead has acted entirely through instinct driven by the commands and needs of his narcissism.