Fear comes in many forms. It has the capacity to cause dread, anxiety and nervousness. Fear is one of the most powerful tools that exists to facilitate control over somebody. Think back to when you were a small child and the things that frightened you. Many of them have a universal applicability. How many times did you cry out to your mother and father in the night because you were frightened of the “monsters under the bed” and you were terrified that once the bedroom door was closed that something would come creeping out of the wardrobe and induce utter fear throughout you? Perhaps it was the strange shapes that formed once the light was turned off with only moonlight streaming through the crack in the curtains so that the shadow thrown across the room appeared like some old crone waiting to come and take you away and eat you. How many times were you warned as a child never to speak to strangers, never to get into a car with somebody you did not know and never to accept sweets from a stranger? Do you recall how this conjured up images of smelly old men in stained raincoats who waited to abduct you and spirit you away to be locked up who knows where? Perhaps there was that house on your walk back from school which had attracted a certain reputation. It was run-down, the garden overgrown, with bushes spilling onto the path, the windows grimy and paint peeling. You were never sure whether anybody actually lived there. Some said that a witch resided there and she waited for children passing on their own before grabbing them and stuffing them in her cellar to starve to death. Others told tales on stormy afternoons which made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, about the spirits that haunted the old house. A friend would swear that he had walked past, one wet and windy evening, just as it was going dark and he saw the face of a ghostly child staring at him from an upstairs window, the child’s spectral hands knocking against the window as if requesting help. After hearing that tale you took a different route home from school so you did not have to pass this particular house anymore. If that was not possible, you would run past, head down, shouting at the top of your voice to drown out any strange sounds that might come from the trapped ghost child, as you dared not even look towards the house. Fear often stalked your childhood and resulted in sleepless nights, nightmares and a reluctance to go to bed. Do you remember being sent to bed and staring up the stairs towards the darkness wondering what was waiting for you? How you did not want to appear scared in front of your parents (especially since they had let you stay up a while longer because you were a “big boy/girl” now). You wanted to hand those words back as you hovered at the base of the stairs, the hallway colder than the living room from which you had ventured. How many times did the noise of the house settling, resulting in strange groans and creaks convince you that somebody was waiting out of sight in a doorway, their heavy booted foot resting on the squeaky floorboard, rusty axe clutched in greasy, long-nailed fingers?  Did the sight of a clown have you running to hide in the folds of your mother’s dress, that strange leering and accentuated mouth creating panic in your tiny mind? What did that eerie clown have in mind for you?

It might have been a reluctance to paddle barefooted in the sea or a river because you could not see where you were putting your feet. You felt something brush your foot, most likely seaweed, but in your mind some razor-toothed fish was about to take a bite from your ankle or a crab was about to affix a pincer to your big toe. You turned and ran hollering from the edge of the sea back to the safety of the sandy beach. There may have been a murderer’s alleyway in your town, a badly-lit passageway between two roads which was a convenient and easy short cut during the day but a night the purported preserve of lurking knife merchants and yellow-toothed stranglers who were just waiting to pounce and take your life. You stood staring down the alleyway trying to drive the rising fear from you but it just would not go and instead you opted to walk the long way around. It took twenty extra minutes but at least you got home safely.

Fear continued to stalk your life as you grew older. You might not be worried about the bogeyman anymore but he has shapeshifted into the fear that comes with finding a lump about your body and not knowing what it is. Uncertainty about the business for whom you work has you tossing and turning at night. Wondering where the next pay check will come from has you similarly fearing for the future. Walking alone along a road at night and hearing footsteps behind you still causes your heart rate to increase. A glance over your shoulder as you cross the road to the over pavement only serves to heighten your worry as a hooded figure also crosses the road. Your step quickens as your fear increases and your mind floods with images of robbery, rape or murder. When alone in the house at night the sound of a bang from downstairs has you sat bolt upright in bed. What was that noise? Did you dream it? Was it somebody breaking in? Was it something not of this world, a poltergeist perhaps hurling a book against a wall. You cannot see what caused the noise and immediately the fear forms in the pit of your stomach, your racing mind conjuring up a score of unpleasant scenarios as you debate creeping to the top of the stairs and peering down to see if you can ascertain what it was.

Fear takes hold of you and makes your reasoning faulty. It tightens around your throat stopping you from calling out and turns your legs into stone so you are figuratively petrified and unable to escape that unseen tormentor. Fear withers you, paralyses you and you will do anything at all to escape that sensation of fear. It is pervasive, damaging and controlling.

Your greatest fears always stem from the unknown. It is that which you cannot see which causes you the greatest terror. When you cannot see something you are plunged into fear, its icy grip takes hold and you crumble. The unknown and the unseen create the fear. That is why we are so devastatingly effective in our control of you. That is why we create such numbing fear in you.

 

The hoover. A tried and trusted method of gaining fuel and exerting control over a victim once again. Whether they are benign or malign the hoover is an integral part of our repertoire. They are often part of a concerted action which is designed to break down your defences and suck you back in so we are able to exert control over you once again. Sometimes it is to con you into resuming the relationship again, sometimes it is purely to hurt you further and draw negative fuel. We may devise a particular scenario, use other people to effect the hoover by proxy and plan an effective way of establishing contact and then unleashing the hoover. For the hoover to be effective it must have two constituent parts: –

1. A method of contact;
2. A method of causing a reaction (positive or negative)

We may have devised a delightful scenario which will cause you to come running back to us oozing sympathy-based fuel but if we cannot establish contact with you it is pointless. This is why I often mention how it may seem that we have left you alone but all it is, is that we are waiting for a moment to establish contact so we can then cause the reaction. We are of course mindful that if you escaped us you have no doubt instigated no contact and that your defences remain high, you are on a state of alert and wary about what we are doing. Sometimes sheer force of the hoover and our magnetic personalities prove enough to surmount these defences but this can take time and in particular energy and as you know we prefer to conserve our energy. There is a particular hoover which I call the Seduction Shuffle. It is invariably a benign hoover and relies on you thinking we will do something and you are wrong-footed when we do not, only for us to then make our move.

The circumstances are such that we allow you to know that we are in the vicinity. This may be through somebody else. It might be by walking past where you live or work. We do not make any approach to you. We do not look towards where you might be watching us from, we do not reach out. All we do is want you to know that we are nearby and then we do nothing.

You have been expecting us to get in touch. When we first re-appear or you get news of us being nearby you will raise your defences again expecting an approach but then when it does not happen you are taken aback and confused. Why has he not tried to get in touch? He walked past your window the other day but did not even look towards you? He passed the office but acted as if he did not realise? Perhaps he is not interested in me anymore? Why would that be the case? You almost feel insulted by the fact that we are back in town and have not looked you up. You wonder what is wrong and in that usual way of yours you start to question yourself. This failure to act when we show up leaves you somewhat bewildered, possibly relieved and your defences come down. Maybe we have moved on, perhaps we are no longer interested in you although you cannot help but want to know why this is. Your curiosity is piqued and you are torn between knowing you should stay away but also wanting to find out why we have not approached you. Is it the case that we are no longer interested? Could this really be true? You need to know. Part of you wants the confirmation that it is over, part of you wants to know why you are not good enough for us to approach again and your desire to know proves difficult to control. Word reaches you from a third party that they were talking to us, but no, we did not mention you or ask about you. This troubles you although you know you should not care, but you do. Admittedly, there may be some of you who will not react to this method but they are in the minority. The desire to achieve some kind of understanding as to what happened, some kind of closure, perhaps the chance to get a few things off your chest still churns inside of you. The fact we looked well has drawn your interest again, rekindling thoughts and feelings from that first seduction, but overall you want to know why the shark is swimming nearby again but has not come hunting for you. We know these thoughts will be going through your head. We know you saw us. We know that you showed disappointment when a member of our coterie said they had spoken to us and not mentioned you. Already you have begun to provide fuel to us and we are content to wait for that delicious hoover fuel. Hoover fuel is always enjoyable, whether relief, joy, loving or upset, it all empowers us but it is especially rewarding when you come into our sphere of influence again. With defences lowered as you think that you are abler to handle our machinations and manipulations now you decide that you want to find out what we are doing back, who we are with and most of all the reason why we have not been in touch with you. The temptation proves too great and after all, one text message or a telephone conversation cannot do any harm can it? Once we see that message from you or your name appears on the mobile ‘phone screen, or we don’t recognise the number but recognise your voice when we answer we can scent even more fuel. You have made the contact and this tells us that you have opened yourself up to provide us with the sought after reaction and this waiting game has once again proven successful. We can now strike and finish the hoover.

 

You will have silently asked yourself this question many times. You will have asked it of friends and family as you recount the latest confusing bout of behaviour from us. You may even go so far as to ask us why we make everything so difficult. Your confusion stems from several places. First of all, life really ought to be a bowl of cherries and straight forward. You have a good house, two cars on the drive, you get to go on holiday, there are no real concerns about the bills, the jobs seem safe. You are not rich but you are in a fortunate position. Everybody in the family enjoys good health, you have two wonderful children and extended family are supportive and play a part in your life. You once got along famously, brilliantly, a complete match made in heaven which shows that it can be done and therefore that suggests, does it not, that this can be resurrected and returned to, if only he wanted to and tried to do it. Going beyond this you give everything to the relationship. You have not changed. You remain devoted, loving, working hard for the family unit both in the office and at home. You make our meals, you suggest days out, you attend to the laundry and the housework with little assistance in return. You know that you give more of yourself to us, emotionally and in terms of dedication to the concept of our relationship and the family and truth be told you do not begrudge doing so. You have always been a giver and you derive pleasure in seeing other people content and happy knowing that you have played a part in it. Whilst it would be lovely to receive some affection from time to time you could live without it, if you are completely honest, if only we did not make everything so difficult.

You cannot understand why we make life so hard. There is nothing to be upset or concerned about. Indeed, with your tolerance and giving nature, we have surely landed on our feet. Your friends tell you that given everything you do for us we ought to drop to our knees and worship you when you come through the door in the evening. You laugh at such suggestions, since you are far too modest, but inside you do wish that there could be some acknowledgement, some thanks for everything you do. It does not have to be reciprocated, you are content with that role, but if only we would accept this massive advantage that we have and not spoil things, cause arguments and bring discord when there really is no need. You could understand it if you actually did something wrong but you do not, you know you don’t. From time to time you do find yourself analysing what you do and wondering if perhaps it is you that causes these sudden mood-swings, the lashing out, the sulking silences and the irritation. Once in a while you think you might have done something wrong and you apologise and make amends, not that it seems to get you anywhere. At times you think you would be better off if you came in drunk, kicked the dog and demanded that we make you something to eat before falling asleep in front of the television. Perhaps if you came in full of thunder and gave us a slap we might respect you more, because it seems that your dedication and subservience get you none. This thought tumbles through your mind often but you know you could not behave like that, because it is not you, but it does make you wonder what you need to do to gain our respect, our interest and our love once again, like it once was.

You cannot understand why someone would choose to be so difficult and so often. We have every advantage. Why not be content with that and life a wonderful life with a delightful family and doting spouse? Surely that is far easier than causing chaos, pandemonium and upset? Not only do these storms come out of nowhere, you just cannot understand why someone would behave like that towards someone that we supposedly love and care about. It makes no sense, no sense whatsoever, but you are not going to give up. You are not a quitter. You will work out what it is and then make the appropriate changes so that life really is a bed of roses.

How often have you felt this way? Many times I should imagine. It is extraordinary and unbelievable that we almost choose a life of conflict over what could be a peaceful and enjoyable life. This makes no sense to you at all. The fact is that we do not choose to cause confusion and chaos, we have to. Admittedly, we choose the degree and extent, the Greater of our kind doling out particularly savage and heinous machinations which increase the pain and misery, but all of us, whether Lesser, Mid-Range of Greater do not choose a life of conflict with you, our intimate partner, it has to happen.

We need to create drama because we feed off the emotional output generated by you in response to that drama and this provides us with fuel. It has gone beyond the point where we could rely on your admiration, love and affection, that has become stale although we do not dismiss it out of hand. In order to make that admiration, love and affection seem shiny and new (if only for a short while) we must create the drama, the downside and the conflict in order so there is a contrast. This contrast will allow us to reinstate our “good side”, the golden period and things will seem wonderful for a period of time but then the stale sensation returns once again. Thus the conflict must be resumed. You have no control over this. No matter how hard you try to please us, to accommodate us and to do the things that we like, this unquenchable need for fuel means that the roller coaster will not stop. There is often no logic to it, from your perspective. You may notice certain behaviours which tell you that the storm is about to be unleashed but often you will not know. This is because what triggers the storm is the ignition of our fury which is caused by your criticism of us. Those criticisms are usually more likely to be perceived by us than actual on your behalf and this means you will always struggle to identify them. Believe me, a simple “Hello, how are you?” can trigger the storm. In our world we regard this simple and pleasant greeting as unnecessary questioning and the suggestion that there is something wrong. If there is something wrong, then that is a criticism. This is why we seem to erupt over “nothing”. It is nothing in your world but in ours there has been a criticism and this ignites our fury with the resulting shouting, nastiness, sulking and silent treatments. There is no pattern to this behaviour. Once cannot say it is three weeks good one week bad. You may have months of the reinstated golden period before another tornado tears through your life. It may be a succession of tornadoes each and every single day for a month. It will always leave you confused and bewildered as to why we behave this way when there is so much good in our lives, so much to enjoy and look forward. As ever this is because you are looking at the world from your perspective. From ours it is vastly different. We do not choose to make life difficult, we have to.

 

 

 

“I love you.”

“I have heard this is a good one for getting a reaction from you because this is what you always want to hear.”

 

“You won’t ever amount to anything.”

“Not while I am interfering in every facet of your life, controlling you and making your childhood and your adult life one long battle.”

 

“I just thought I would call you and see how you are.”

“You do not give me enough fuel. You are an ungrateful son/daughter and I regret the day I gave birth to you.”

 

“It is my birthday next week and I just wondered if you had anything planned.”

“I expect something lavish and spectacular so I can be centre stage. If you haven’t planned such an event you are cruel and uncaring, just as I always thought.”

 

“I am proud of you.”

“For once you have done something I approve of and now I can take all the credit for it.”

 

 

“You were quite a challenge when you were younger.”

“I thought you might resist my cold-hearted manipulation of you, but I broke you in the end.”

 

“I suppose you have heard the sad news about your Uncle Paul dying?”

“A death! A funeral! Such a wonderful stage for me to dominate and all those relatives to suck fuel from.”

 

“I am trying to help you,you know?”

“I am trying to control you, stop resisting me.”

 

“I have done so much for you. All I want is some thanks.”

“I think I have done so much for you. I need some fuel.”

 

“It was a joke. You take yourself so seriously.”

“It was not a joke. Damn you for seeing through it. I need to back track quickly so I am not accountable.”

 

“You were an accident.”

“Go on cry and make me feel powerful.”

 

“Your father and I have discussed this as we think…”

“I have decided….”

 

“Your father agrees with me so there is no point running to him.”

“Your father knows better than to contradict me.”

 

“I had such high hopes for you.”

“You aren’t doing what I want.”

 

“That never happened.”

“It did but you are not allowed to hold that against me.”

 

“We never thought you would leave home.”

“You were not meant to move out of my control.”

 

“We hardly ever see you these days.”

“You should be providing me with fuel more often.”

 

“You weren’t like this when you were little.”

“You were so much easier to control back then.”

 

“I don’t love you.”

“I don’t love you. I never have.”

Know the signs so it does not happen again.

Know the signs so others are not ensnared.

Know the signs before it is too late.

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Truth seeker. The pursuit of the truth. A noble ideal indeed is it not? It sounds as if you ought to be armed with your sword of justice and your shield of purity as you make your way through the badlands in order to find the truth. In fact, this is what you, as an empathic individual is unwittingly doing when you become engaged with our kind.

You are all truth seekers. The empath, the co-dependent and especially the super empath. You want the truth and you will apply your indefatigable spirit to acquiring it without understanding the toll that this misguided folly will have on you as whole. The need to be told the truth, to find it and to know it is a core empathic trait and as you would expect, it leads you into the trap of being ensnared by our kind and is heavily exploited.

Being a truth seeker is a further sin of the empath. Those who are empathic tell the truth, but that is because of that other empathic sin, honesty. The empath must always establish the truth of a situation, the truth at the heart of an individual and in so doing the allows them to reconcile their own truths.

The empath must know the truth. He or she must not only need to understand why somebody is as they are, but they have to be satisfied that this is the truth of the matter. This desire for the truth makes an empath extremely vulnerable to us since we trade in lies, deal in deceit and all our currency is counterfeit.

Take, for instance, at the outset of the narcissistic dynamic, when we begin our seduction of the empath. He or she wishes to know that this wonderful person is true in their intentions and whilst the empath might be pleased that others talk about how enamoured the narcissist is about them, or how the narcissist seems utterly smitten, the empath must establish the truth form the narcissist him or herself. This of course opens the empath up to the charm, magnetism and allure of the scintillating narcissist as we are only too happy to tell you what you want to hear, to show you what you want to see and to do what you would have us do.

Oblivious to who you are dealing with (until otherwise educated) the empath will, through his or trusting nature and propensity to deal honestly with others, accept what the narcissist says and does. That amounts to the truth. The narcissist is skilled through his mirroring to reflect back at you your own truths and thus as you seek the truth, you are shown it. What you do not realise is that you are looking at your own truth, but since it is your truth and not ours, it is so utterly convincing. The adoration that you exhibit towards us is mirrored and reflect back at you. You wish to seek the truth of that adoration and what do you see? An adoration that is on the same par as your own – how can that then not appear to be the truth. In seeking the truth but looking for it from one who lies so effectively and defrauds with ease, all you find is your own truth, but you fail to recognise it as such and thus you feel you have found the truth and you are convinced that what you see is genuine love, is genuine passion and is genuine adoration.

You might liken it to a person who carries with him or her one half of a precious gem and seeks the other half. This person encounters a mirror, but does not know that it is a mirror and thinks that they see the other half stood before them since it looks so convincing, yet try to touch or grasp or find any depth or substance to this supposed other half and it will not be there. This is what eventually happens when devaluation occurs as you see the reflection and it dawns on you that all you are looking at is what you already had, being made to appear like something more.

Thus in wanting to find the truth and being shown your truth and not ours, you are utterly convinced as to the legitimacy of our love, passion and desire for you. Your truth seeking has made you vulnerable to our deceitful manipulations from the very beginning.

Yet, the matter worsens. Your pursuit of the truth leaves you vulnerable to perhaps one of the most confusing and bewildering aspects of the narcissistic dynamic, the need to establish the truth during devaluation. Once the array of machinations are wheeled out against you, the gas lighting commences, the lies, the insults, the intimidation and so much more is used against you, your quest for the truth has you stuck in the quagmire of our manipulations for a considerable time.

Firstly, you do not accept that this monster which now prevents you from getting a good night’s sleep, erupts at the slightest criticism, becomes demanding over apparently nothing, is the person who you fell in love with or who loves you. This is not the truth that stands before you. The truth must surely have been the person who first seduced you. You know that to be the case because you sought the truth then during the seduction, you saw it and you established it. It is that magical, wonderful, adoring person who seems to have vanished and in its stead you now see some grotesque version of the person you love. That is not the truth that shouts at you and belittles you, that is not the truth that turns each time you want to go out with your friends into a battle and that is not the truth that turns its back on you every night in bed. You want to find the true us, the one you saw and established during seduction and that need, that desire and that pursuit of this truth means you remain in situ, not escaping and allowing our abuses to rain down on you again and again.

Secondly, you experience the downside of our pathological lies during the devaluation. You were lied to, naturally, during the seduction, but that does not matter. You thought it to be the truth and you established it as so and besides, those lies felt good didn’t they? Yet know, the lies wound and hurt, they scar and mark, as we tell you lies about what we have been doing, where we have been and who with. You are no fool, or so you think, for you have followed us, had others report to you and you know the truth of what has been happening. Now you must establish that truth with us. You must seek the truth from our lips without you realising that we will never do such a thing since to do so would be to cede control to you. You have not yet grasped who you are dealing with and thus you remain unaware that we use lies to achieve so much of our aims. Those lies are used to make you dizzy, make you cry, make you exhausted and we keep on going and will not concede to the truth.

How many times have you heard yourself say:-

“Just tell me the truth, that is all I want you to do.”

“Please, stop lying, just tell the truth.”

“If you would only tell the truth.”

“I want the truth.”

“Give me the truth. Please I am begging you.”

Are those phrases and those of a similar kind echoing about your mind now?

Your desire to get to the truth, to hold the truth in front of us and get us to acknowledge it means you become drawn into the circular arguments, the endless arguments, the denial, the switching and the deflections which leave you shattered, mystified and spent. Why can he not see the truth when I do? The Toxic Logic of course, but you are not privy to such information at that time and so you gird your loins, climb back on your steed and ride out once again in the pursuit of the truth. It is no surprise that you then gallop into the swamp and become bogged down by lies, untruths and mendacity.

Thirdly, during devaluation it is often the case that you will turn to others to seek confirmation that the truth you once witnessed is indeed the truth and you can find it once again. You seek the truth from our coterie, our minions and our lieutenants. You go to them and need to ascertain that we are surely a decent person, who is loving and caring are we not? You walk straight into the facade and its false truth. You hear the answers which you want to hear, we are lauded for our generosity, we are praised for our kindness, we are complimented on our good humour, easy charm and reliability. There it is, you have sought the truth once again and you have found it, yet you fail to recognise it as the false truth and the false hope which it engenders. Instead of trying to escape from this devaluation, you remain in place, taking comfort from that the facade has told you and redoubling your efforts to find the truth with us. Thus, you remain and exhaust yourself tilting against the windmill that is us when you think you are slaying the dragon.

Accordingly, your empathic trait of being a truth seeker makes you vulnerable to our seduction and extremely vulnerable to the effects of our mind games, manipulations and habitual lying. Were this where it ends, but your quest for the truth has a further blow to administer to you.

The empathic sin of being a truth seeker heightens your susceptibility to the post escape and post discard hoovers. When we open those shutters and allow the bright, shining light of the golden period to fall upon your face you instantly see that the truth has returned, that false truth which you were shown what feels like such a long time ago. Yet, all is not lost, the truth has returned, it is in your grasp and all you need to do seek it out and embrace it is to return to our fold. By seeking our the truth once again you fall prey to our hoovers and our control over you is increased again.

The desire to seek the truth is noble indeed but seeking it from one who scorns the truth and takes refuge amongst deceit, lies and fraudulent intent can only result in this character trait of yours gaining the epitaph of being a sin of the empath.

 

I think I have said enough. I wish you would think the same. You have never shut up asking me about my day at work as I try to watch the sport on television. On and on you have gone asking question after question. It makes me wonder why you are so bloody interested. Fishing for something are you? Trying to catch me out? You won’t do that. I am cleverer than you. Much cleverer. What I do at work is nothing to do with you and you won’t find out about my plans there until such time as I decide that you should know. And it isn’t time, so I wish you would just be quiet and let me watch this game. You keep on going, talking over my television viewing which tells me that you regard my viewing experience as unimportant and that tells me you obviously think I am not important and you really ought to know by now that I am important. I hate you doing this. I can feel the burning from your selfish and treacherous action and it is paining me, but I know what to do. I know how to stop this pain and believe me I am going to do it and do it now.

You never know when to shut up do you? I suppose you think you are being plessant asking me how my day has been, but you don’t care, you just do it for the sake of appearances, to make you look good, the caring and interested partner. I know your game. I have you worked out, you are a fraud. Yap, yap, yap,like some irritating puppy around my ankles, on and on you go. Just shut up will you? I cannot concentrate with your wasp like buzzing around me.

“How is the new recruit getting on?”

“How is the project developing?”

“Where did you go for that business lunch? Was it good? What did you have to eat? Who was it with?”

Just shut up. No, you are still chattering away. I don’t think you are even waiting for an answer are you? Just asking questions to seem like you are involving me in the conversation when all you are doing is engaging in another of your pointless and egotistical monologues. Do you know how boring you sound? If I wasn’t trying to concentrate on this match I think I would slip into a coma listening to you drone on with your worthless opinions and your anodyne observations.

Just shut up. No? Very well. I will. No, I am not saying anything. I am not even going to nod, shake my head or make an affirmative grunt. Nothing. A total silence.

My goodness me, you have stopped. Perhaps you have remembered that you need to breathe? Ah, excellent you have noticed that I no longer appear to be listening. Believe me, I am listening and I am doing so with considerable attentiveness, because I need to listen to what is coming my way. Let me guess, I think you will lead with “are you listening to me?” any second now and yes, there it is as predicted. I am not going to answer. Go on, repeat the question and true to form you do so. Now I have your attention haven’t I? I can see you from the corner of my eye as I stare at the screen pretending that the figures running around with the ball are more interesting than you. They are not because what you are starting to do is what I am interested in. I can see you leaning forward, trying to catch my eye. I know you are there but I am not going to acknowledge you. Sometimes you throw something towards me to get my attention, usually a cushion. It is not a nasty action,not like when I throw things at you. That reminds me, I must replace that coffee mug which I hurled at you. You were light on your toes that day as it sailed past and smashed against the wall. Anyway, that was last week and this is now and I can hear you asking the question a third time. Will it be the cushion? No, you have chosen to stand up instead. Gosh, you must be looking to assert some authority from the get go.

“I am talking to you.”

I know that you are but I am not answering you but already I can hear the mounting irritation in your voice and already I can feel the flames rising inside of me as they burn away the cold, harsh iciness of your criticism. That pain is already receding.

“Will you answer me please?”

No I will not. I have to turn my head so you do not see my smirk at your attempt to be commanding. It amuses me. I can see your hands move to your hips and I half expect you to stamp the ground with your foot.

“What’s the matter? Why won’t you answer me?”

The voice rises higher, signalling your anxiety and frustration and the flames continue to build inside of me. I maintain the stony faced expression, ink black eyes staring at the screen. I can see the movement on the television but it as if I am watching it from very far away as all that I am concentrating on now is your voice and the continuing delicious flaming sensation that is sweeping across me.

“Why are you not answering me?”

The questions have altered now haven’t they? A switch from your nosiness about my work to you now asking why I have fallen silent. You can keep asking and I know you will. You will go on for some time. You will storm out of the room trying to force a response from me, but your slammed door just keeps the flames burning. You will come back in. you always do. You will return contrite and apologising although you won’t know what you are trying to apologise for. Still, that won’t stop you going through a carousel of reasons in the hope of breaking my silence.

“Did I upset you?”

“Did I say something wrong?”

“Did I not listen to you?”

“Did I say something offensive?”

“Please, what did I do wrong?”

“Please will you just talk to me?”

“I hate this. I hate falling out. What is that I have done?”

Every time you ask these questions, the pain and concern in your voice keeps adding to the sense of power that I am feeling. The wound you created has long since closed and now I am savouring the growing power that courses through me. You have no idea what you are doing as you try, as you always do, to make things right. I will stay seated here, not even looking at you. You won’t try and stand in front of me whilst I am watching the television. You will not dare do that or switch it off. You remember what happened last time when you did that don’t you and I know you won’t be in a hurry to experience that again. I can sit and revel in my power over you and you just keep adding to it with your pitiful and plaintive questions. You will try to find out what is wrong, you will blame yourself next and start to apologise as you scramble to guess what it is that you have done wrong in the hope that you stumble on the right subject matter and make things rights. But you will fail. Then you move on to trying to bribe me into speaking to you, suggesting we go out, or my friends come round for drinks tomorrow night or that you will cook me something special. Keep at it, I won’t respond. I will not even look at you. You are completely invisible to me as far as you are concerned.

I wonder how long I will maintain this silence with you? You haven’t worked out what to do yet, I am pleased to say. You keep on asking, pestering and questioning, driven by your own anxiety that causes you to want to ascertain what has happened and make things right. This means you might break off for half an hour but then you resume, trying a different tack. If all you knew you had to so was do exactly what I am doing and it would stop. Go silent and get on with what you want to do and I will start speaking to you and acknowledging you once again as I consider a different manipulation to use against you to gather my precious fuel. Fortunately, your empathic nature which means you want to understand and you want to fix and heal, will make you hang in there and all the while you provide me with fuel and power me. So long as you do so, so long the silence will continue.

Words are our tools. They come readily to us and we much prefer them over actions as they use so little energy. We have no sense of guilt, remorse or conscience that we are easily able to make promises with no intention of ever keeping them. You on the other hand hate to break a promise and we know that your adherence to this means that the effect our broken promises is significant against you and will allow us to draw fuel. You will be familiar with the nature of the broken promises if you have danced with our kind already but you may not know what we actually mean when we say certain supposed promises to you. If this dance is new to you, not only will you not know what is being really meant when we whisper these words to you, but you may not realise that this promise will not be kept. Here are five of the most-used promises we issue, that we always break and this is what we really mean when we say them.

1. I will always love you

I know that you love to hear such bold proclamations because they appeal to you as a love devotee. Indeed, you have been conditioned to believe strongly in the concept of love. I won’t always love you, in fact I will not even begin by loving you because I am incapable of feeling what you know to be love since it has been denied to me as an option. I understand what love is to you however because I am surrounded by people like you telling me what it means and it appears in books, on the television, on the internet, in films and advertisements. It is easy to understand what love means to you but impossible for me to feel it and therefore I can never love you. What I mean when I tell you this is that I am telling you what you want to hear so you will remain with me and provide me with the fuel that I crave. I am telling you that I will actually always want you so long as you give me what I need. My desire to be with you is entirely conditional on you furnishing me with fuel.

2. I will repay you

I will borrow money from you because of my sense of entitlement since either I have none and I want yours or I have plenty and I still want yours. If I have no money I need it and therefore I will want to borrow it from you. I will of course promise to repay you in order to induce you to lend it to me in the first place. I will then make repeated promises to pay you: –

“I am a little short this month, I will have it for you next month.”

“I am due a bonus in two months so I will pay you from that then.”

“I had an emergency and had to use the money for that.”

“I am not able to work at present but since you love me you won’t mind waiting will you?”

“If you really loved me, you would not ask for it back.”

Those of our kind who lack financial resources want the money for obvious reasons but also in order to strengthen the link between them and you, so that you have reason to remain in contact with them and to allow them to trot out excuses and reasons which will eventually provoke you through exasperation, frustration, irritation and upset.

Those of our kind who have ample financial resources do not have any intention of making repayment. Instead we use this borrowing of the money as a bridge between you and I and as above it is all about keeping a hook into you.

When we promise to repay you, we will not do so. What we are telling you is that we want to create a method of ensuring you are connected to us and able to draw fuel from you.

3. I won’t hurt you

Of all the broken promises this is perhaps the one which does the most damage. We are actually telling you this: –

“I won’t hurt you as long as you comply with what I want.”

It just so happens that we always omit the last nine words. We regard you as our appliance, an extension of our will and you are expected to do what we want. Provide potent positive fuel, succumb to our demands, run around after us, say yes when we want yes and no when we want no but you must guess which is correct. We want you obedient, compliant and submissive. Navigate your way through this maze successfully and you will not be hurt. Unfortunately, for you nobody is ever able to do this because you will always have to be hurt because we want fuel. You have to be hurt because no matter how hard you try you will always cause a criticism which will wound us and therefore we have to defend ourselves by lashing out and hurting you. You have to be hurt because there are even those of our kind, the malignant and the greater who delight in doing so.

The hurt will always visit you somehow.

4. I will be faithful

We cannot be faithful. We need fuel too much. Although most of it will come from you we need it from other sources as well and this will result in our infidelity. Infidelity comes in many forms, just as fuel does. To some it may be sharing long and intimate conversations, to others it is a kiss, to others it is sexual touching and to others it is full blown sexual intercourse. Our desire for fuel combined with our massive sense of entitlement and our failure to recognise boundaries means that we will be unfaithful. Add to that our lack of accountability, our failure to feel guilt or remorse and you stand no chance of ever ensuring that we remain faithful.

We say this because you want to hear it. This is most often used after we have been exposed as committing an act or acts of infidelity and we are concerned that you will leave us and thus take away our primary source of fuel when we have not secured a replacement yet. We will pledge that we will be faithful moving forward in an attempt to prevent you from causing a cessation to our supply of fuel. These are empty words. We will be unfaithful within the week, maybe not even that long, just so long as uttering such a promise stops you from going.

5. I will change

No I won’t. Even if I could, which is highly unlikely, why should I when there is nothing wrong with me. Everything I do is necessary to ensure my survival and my remaining elevated and superior. Just because you and others do not like the way that I behave does not mean that I have to alter what I am. I know however that you love to think that we can be cured of whatever ill it is that we suffer from. You want us to become better and different and naturally if this means we can get you to stay, do what we want and keep providing us with fuel we are content to tell you that we will change. We are experts at adopting false expressions of contrition as well to accompany this empty promise.

This vacant promise actually means

“I will carry on doing what I am doing and nobody will ever stop me.”

 

 

 

I seduced you. There is no doubt that this happened. I was the protagonist and I brought you under my spell. But let us go a little further back. I chose you. I identified you as a prospect and then undertook my investigative work to determine that you had what I was looking for (you did) and then I began to gather the material that would aid my seduction of you. You had no idea that you had walked into my sights. You had no idea that my gaze followed you around the room, that I observed where you worked, where you lived and began the careful assimilation of information about who you are from your friends and your online presence. In fact, your social media contribution was instrumental in allowing me to ascertain that you fitted the profile that I require in those I target. Not only that, your tendency to plaster your life over the internet provided me with a plethora of material to use in my seduction. More than most I felt I really did know you before I even met you. There are enough warnings about remaining safe on-line, plenty of guides about how to be secure in your internet dealings and to chart the waters of cyberspace in an enjoyable yet cautious manner. Not that you paid any regard to this as comments, photographs, location tags and such like were thrown like broadcasted seeds out into cyberspace. You posted photographs which showed inside your home, it was easy enough from your frequent location tags to work out the neighbourhood where you lived and then using the photographs to identify which was your house. You didn’t see me sat in the car outside as I waited one morning for the confirmation that was where you lived. I had a good look through your windows as well seeing as how you opened all the blinds and that hedge meant nobody saw me taking note of what lay within you house. Some might say that such an approach meant you asked for what happened. Would it be uncharitable to suggest that your lax approach to sharing your life on social media caused you to stand out as a ready target?

It was not difficult to engage you. You are after all a bright and vivacious person with many friends. Indeed, those friends enjoy talking about you to people and they offered up more information about you. Perhaps you should re-consider who you trust with information about you. I was always pushing on an open door with you and even the surprising hesitancy you showed when I suggested we sit in a booth together in that bar was soon overcome as I began to mirror you.

Did you not think it strange that I just happened to like jet ski-ing and was apparently a member of the same club as you, that I loved Thai food and enjoyed dance music? Our mutual love of rugby (I had to swot up on that admittedly) provided the opening for a date at a rugby match. Did you not think it was unusual that we clicked on so many levels or were you just swept away by the fact we did and therefore never gave it a second thought? Some might suggest that this was opening yourself up to my charms rather too quickly or are they being unduly critical of you?

We attended the rugby in the afternoon and I had already arranged dinner at a restaurant I knew you often frequented. You expressed such delight at this surprise by planting a huge kiss on my lips. I knew you are an excitable person but did you ever stop to think how, out of the thousands of restaurants in this city, I knew this was your favourite? You actually did ask me, as we dined, how I knew about this place and I explained a client had recommended it to me. When you explained it was your favourite I feigned surprise and added that I just thought you might like it. You did not pick up on how I was able to secure a booking on a Saturday and an excellent table to boot, but then how were you to know about the slipped notes passed to a member of staff. After all, I move with an air of considered confidence so it all fitted together didn’t it that I would command such close attention from the waiting staff through the evening.

You even missed the fact that somewhat inebriated I was able to tell the taxi driver where you lived. I had become somewhat amused at how easy this was proving to be. Your readiness to down glass after glass of wine in the company of someone you had not long ago met. Was that remiss of you or was it understandable given the way I made myself seem so familiar to you through my background work on you. I decided to let slip your address to the taxi driver, even though you had not given it to me, yet you completely missed this. As I helped you into the taxi, ever the gent, you missed the almost reptilian smile I gave. I didn’t. I saw it reflected back at me in the window of the taxi.

I had earlier plied you with plaudits and listened to you offer me up even more information, telling me where you worked, what you did there, information about your colleagues, taking me through your relationships with your family, your favourite musicals and so on. I logged it all as you opened up to me, pouring so much knowledge in my direction. There are those who might consider that to be a natural thing to do, the social lubrication which makes the interpersonal relationship easier and who is to say they are wrong? You accepted my compliments with good grace and returned them which pleased me considerably. I had to stop myself laughing out loud as you declared those phrases which told me that all lights are green.

“I feel like I have known you for years.”

“This is wonderful; we have so much in common.”

“You know me so well, it is fantastic.”

I threw a few of our well-used favourites back at you,

“I think we were fated to meet.”

“I’ve never clicked with anybody the way I have with you.”

“I know it is only the second time we have spent together but I feel a connection with you.”

I may as well have stood on the restaurant table and waved a huge red flag in front of you with klaxons blaring in the background. You did not notice. Was that negligent of you? Ought you, as a self-professed intelligent and independent person, to have seen these warning signs and acted on them? Perhaps you did and decided that the risk was worth taking. If that was the case, I know that there are people who would regard you as consenting to our entanglement with some degree of knowledge that something was not quite right but you were happy to waive this concern, it was too tempting to miss out on someone like me. Was that how it flashed through your mind?

The dates came and went and my tendrils wrapped around you. I stayed over in your house on the second date. You yielded readily to my overtures and we engaged in frenetic, athletic love-making which enabled me to play one of my aces. It was following one such energetic coupling that you held me and with sincerity shining from your eyes whispered that you felt you were falling in love with me. I smiled and nodded because after all, love comes quickly with our type and I was positively delighted that you had given this indication even before I had opportunity to play that particular card. Did you replay that conversation and all the other beautiful ones we had that evening of love-making? Of course you did. You always do because the recall of such scintillating times causes a soaring sensation in your chest. Did you evaluate what this meant? Did you consider it against other relationships in order to benchmark your feelings? Some might suggest that the cautious and sensible would do so and apply some slowing touches and undertake some verification of everything that you were being told, but you did not. Was that slipshod of you? You were given the signs. You were handed the warnings. They were plain enough to see. Many of them were conventional in nature. I only hid them in plain sight, as I always do. Perhaps you are at fault for not paying heed to them? Then again how could you be expected to resist me? I have done this so many times and you (surprisingly) have not been seduced by my kind behaviour. I bet you have said the label attached to my type less than half a dozen times. How could you be expected to put up any resistance when you are being flattered and wooed in such a convincing manner? Why would you stop someone from being so pleasant? Who would? Maybe it is an entirely unfeeling and harsh judge who expected you to know better and remain vigilant?

You let me in. You opened the door and left it open whilst providing me with a key to it and the back door too. You allowed me to permeate every element of your life from your bed to your buddies. Should you have listened to that one friend who cautioned you against moving so quickly? She was just bitter wasn’t she? After all, that is what we told you and why on earth would you have any reason to disagree with us? Your family all felt I was wonderful, even your sister who in the past has been notoriously difficult to please (actually she isn’t, you just need to know what to say but that’s a different story) so you could be forgiven for deeming their reactions as an accurate weather gauge of who I was. How could you have known what was coming? You are no clairvoyant and who would not have taken advantage of being chosen by such a wonderful, charming, magnetic and loving person as I? All my friends spoke highly of me. Did you not pick up on how rehearsed they often sounded when lauding my attributes? No, never mind, it was too much to expect you to do so wasn’t it.

On went our relationship, two entwined lovers, the world at our feet, happiness all around us, a beautiful and enchanting romance. Who would not want such a thing? You have to have an open heart haven’t you otherwise you can never be happy? You have to trust don’t you otherwise you will never find anybody? You have to bare your chest and lift your throat to the world. Nothing ventured, nothing gained and so on. Anybody else would have done the same, surely? Are you to be judged by the universal standard and forgiven for not seeing a predator making his way towards you, snaking his tendrils about you and sinking those sugar-coated fangs into your naïve neck? Or ought you have noticed but became too caught up in your fantasy of perfect love that you blinded yourself. Does that make you culpable? Then again, did you see the signs but actually ignored them, content to brush them to one side because your heart told you this was a once in a lifetime opportunity to be with me.

Were you a victim?

Or did you volunteer?

Why does he lash out at you, abuse, assault and insult?

Why do you get ignored and cold-shouldered?

Why does he walk off and disappear?

Here is the answer.

By understanding fury, what causes it and what purpose it serves you will unlock a fundamental element of the narcissistic dynamic.

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CAN e-book here

AUS e-book here

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