Knowing the Narcissist : I Am Empty. I Show You What You Want To See
There is a vast emptiness inside of me.
Whatever was meant to be there is not there and instead this chasm remains, an expansive void that is dark, deep and perpetual. I remain ahead of this void because it wants to consume me and in so doing consign me to oblivion. This relentless black hole wants to devour me, breaking down all that I have achieved and crushing them into nothingness, a final insult against me as I disappear without trace. A terrible matter to contemplate that as this extinction is aimed at me is the prospect of never having mattered, never having existed and never having made a mark on the world. To be erased in an instant, obliterated and deleted.
I am fearless in all that I do, save that is this void, this nothing which is the architect of one total fear. It is against this constant fate that I drive forward. You see, hurled into this void is The Creature and he is scrabbling to escape it so that with dreadful suicidal intent he can wrap his sinewy arms about me, his yellowed and sharpened teeth plunging into my neck, his venom paralysing me as he gurgles and giggles, hauling me backwards off the precipice and into the void, the pair of us plummeting into oblivion.
That must not happen.
In order to keep him deep, deep down in the void it is necessary to imprison him and keep his vile and seditious whispers silenced. This means filling the void. Imagine he lurks at its very deepest point. He wishes to keep the void as it is. Vast and empty, since by doing so he will be able to then clamber out and grab me, dragging me down back into the void. He needs the void to be just that. He needs emptiness so he can reach out of it unhindered. He needs the void to be just that. He needs emptiness so he can destroy me through its unrelenting absence of anything.
I cannot have emptiness.
This void must be filled and it is filled with fuel. Each piece of fuel places a layer within the void and behind each layer The Creature becomes imprisoned. Oh he will wail and protest but as those layers become thicker and more numerous his wretched cat calls become muffled and then silenced. He cannot break through these layers, he cannot reach out and burst through the constructed layers to sabotage my existence. Each layer differs in depth, strength and duration in accordance with the type of fuel that I am able to gather and place within the void, fashioning my construct.
The smile from a stranger is a thin and ephemeral sliver. The admiration from a newly acquired primary source is a dense and durable slab that protects me and makes the construct strong. Piece by piece, layer by layer, each segment of fuel, positive and negative, reinforces the construct, fills the void and keep The Creature at bay.
One cannot rest for these pieces dissipate and melt away through time. The Creature picks at them, claws at them, raking through them. Your treacherous criticism punches massive great holes in them allowing the mocking howls of The Creature to echo to me. See now why we hate criticism so vehemently?
Fuel fills the void. Fuel creates the construct.
The fastest way to gather fuel is to show you what you want to see for then you will pour forth with your love, your delight, your admiration and your appreciation. Marvellous, edifying and filling is your fuel. If I show you the very thing that you want to see, namely yourself, you will give me this fuel more readily, with such potency, often and in huge amounts. I have not time to build something of substance for you to fall in love with, to admire and desire. I must create it with due expedience and what better way than to use that which already exists, namely you. Thus, I show you yourself through my mirror and you fall for that image believing it to be me, believing it to be my essence and substance.
You do not realise that you are seeking yourself and indeed you do not see yourself when I mirror you back at yourself. You are conned by my fakery into thinking that it is my substance that you see and it dazzles and enchants you. I care not. So long as you are providing me with that fuel, I will hold up that mirror to you and let you fall in love with yourself. It is an artifice, a fabrication and fakery but it is necessary.
I give you what you want. It is not real but it seems so real to you and thus your responses are in fact real. The delicious fuel flows and I want you to pour it into me, filling me up, creating a barrier of salvation between me and the Creature as you are chief architect in the plans to frustrate and defeat his attempt to dethrone me.
This is why when you are installed as primary source and your wonderful fuel flows you truly are everything that matters to us.
You are our salvation and if holding a mirror up to achieve this salvation is what must be done, then it will be done.
3 thoughts on “Knowing the Narcissist : I Am Empty. I Show You What You Want To See”
Vent Your Spleen! (Please see the Rules in Formal Info)
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HG, your words paint a picture of an existence shaped by an insatiable void—one that demands constant feeding, yet never seems full. I hear the fear, the relentless drive, the necessity to build walls of “fuel” to keep The Creature at bay. But what strikes me most is the paradox—this void is never satisfied, and the effort to contain it is never-ending.
You say, “I cannot have emptiness.” But have you ever considered that true freedom isn’t found in filling the void, but in allowing yourself to confront it—not as an enemy, but as a part of yourself that needs healing rather than suppression? What if The Creature isn’t your downfall, but the very part of you crying out to be seen, understood, and ultimately redeemed?
Self-awareness is the first step—you recognize the void, the need for fuel, and the fabricated mirror. But what lies beyond that? Are you willing to feel, to process, to heal? You ask us to see ourselves in your mirror, but when you look in that same reflection, do you see yourself—or only the mask?
Forgiveness, both of self and of others, is the only true path to emotional freedom. It’s not about fairness—because no, life is not fair. But freedom is found in surrender, not control. You build a construct of fuel to protect yourself, yet still, you remain imprisoned within it.
Scripture speaks of a different kind of filling—one that lasts.
• John 4:14 – “But whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
What you seek cannot come from others—it must come from within, from the One who truly satisfies. No amount of external validation, admiration, or even criticism will quiet the emptiness. Only God can fill the void permanently, not with fleeting fuel, but with truth, peace, and healing.
You do not need to keep running. You are not beyond redemption. The Creature is not your greatest enemy—fear is. And fear is defeated in perfect love.
• 1 John 4:18 – “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.”
The question is—will you allow yourself to step beyond the construct, beyond the fear, and into something real? Because until you do, the void will always remain.
Dear Ted,
Your comment is so sad to read 😞
What happened that made you crueler and a SOB?
Narcissistic Abuse has destroyed my empathy. I am a crueler person now and a SOB because of narcissistic abuse.
“Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster… for when you gaze long into the abyss. The abyss gazes also into you.” — Friedrich Nietzsche
“Abash the devil stood and felt how awful goodness is.” — Paradise Lost.