Carnival of Absurdity

Here is a true story that illustrates the nature of a narcissist.

A woman who is a malignant narcissist, cannot tolerate a bad word about their narcissistic father from a sister or brother. Ironically, while growing up, this woman had the most animosity for him and had him pegged. He was extremely weird, but the day his wife died and he became dependent and his home and property became obtainable by controlling him, her opinion of him went upside down.

Afterwards, even long after his death, she used to go on and on singing his praises as though he were perfectly normal instead of crazy and filled to the brim with consealed ill will - expecting her sister to listen to this fiction about him without comment. This sister felt, quite accurately, that she was being manipulated into supporting her narcissistic sister's fantasy, and being forced into dishonesty by letting these lies pass – which is a tacit statement that one believes they are true.

So the sister began correcting the narcissist every time the narcissist recounted history falsely, especially about their father.

The narcissist made a federal case of this, twisting it into some sort of "harrassment." As is commonly reported by others about narcissists, she at times even threatened to call the police over someone ANSWERING things she had said. Obviously, narcissists want their unanswered say, and when they tell you to shut up with your answer to their assertion that the sky is purple, they think you must or they have the right to call the police on you for "harrassment."

I kid you not. I have seen this carnival of absurdity myself.

Here is what the sister answered her narcissistic sister (emphasis mine):

YOU are the one who has to shut up. Shut up about Dad if you don't want me contradicting the false things you say about him. That's all you have to do to get silence from me about him. But if you think that you are going to make me play along with your game of pretend, you've got another think coming. Every time you paint him as a saint, I will be honest and correct your lie. I don't care how mad you get.

In fact, shut up about anything you don't want me contradicting your lies about. So, long as you don't try to make me a party to your imagination, I don't care. You can pretend anything all you want. But when you try to make me play along with your fantasies, you get me saying the TRUTH instead. Every single time.

There. I am not some flat character in novel you are writing. I will not be controlled by you. I will not support your delusions by pretending with you that X was anything but mean horse's ass. So, don't blab on to me about what a saint you imagine he was if you don't want me to correct you about that.

That makes it pretty clear what is going on. You validate their delusion by not contradicting it, even when they shove it in your face.

Which is WHY they shove it in your face. They use your fear of their temper to suppress you.

But what if you tell the N that you don't care how mad she gets? Then what's an N gonna do?

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Narcissists give new meaning to the term "attention deficit"

Here is a good example of one of the strange things I have noted in narcissists. This is an example of one I know but very seldom run in to or talk with. Nonetheless, whenever there is a close encounter, it is always of "The Third Kind" ;-)

Over the years, this person has often told me that she can never remember how to spell the word maybe.

"Well, uh, it's just may and be put together."

"Yes, I know, but that's logical and I can never remember whether this is one of the words spelled logically or not."

"Well, uh, how else would you spell it?"

"M-E-B-A-Y."

"Well, uh, that would be pronounced ME-bay."

She hasn't even heard that, because she's talking over you, breathlessly gallivanting off onto another subject.

Time and time and time again. It's deja vu. No matter how many times you tell her that maybe is just may and be put together to mean the same thing as "may be." Though she has an advanced degree and teaches science, you'd need a battering ram to get that through her head.

Because she can't hear you. It's like a kind of autism.

By the same token, numberless times over the years, this woman has referred to my book and web domain by the wrong name.

"No, it isn't 'Operations Doubles,' it's 'Operation Doubles.'"

"Yeah, like I said, 'Operations Doubles.'

"No! Can't you hear the difference? 'OperaTION Doubles.'"

But she hasn't heard that, because she's talking over you, breathlessly gallivanting off onto another subject.

I long ago gave up trying to correct her.

But then one day she forced me to keep trying to correct her. How? By sitting at her computer, calling me up, and asking me to spell the URL to her over the phone. O my God, don't ever try to spell out your URL to a narcissist over the phone!

She's asking you to spell it to her, but her communication blocking reflexes are kicking in to make her keep butting in on you so you can't!

The result was like Monty Python's Flying Circus. I swear that she imagined she heard every conceivable spelling but the one I gave her. It is very unlike me to get impatient with people who seem to be trying, but it was so exasperating that I surprised myself by yelling at her to shut up and listen.

Not that it did any good.

Now she had a problem with the word doubles too. Though a tennis player herself, she seemed to think that the name of this website on tennis doubles would be named "Operations Double."

"No. It's about tennis. (Sarcastically) You know, tennis - tennis singles and tennis doubles. DouBLES. So it just makes sense that the website would be called 'Operation DouBLES,' right?"

But she hasn't heard that, because she's talking over you, frustratedly telling you to just spell it to her again.

For decades, this type of behavior in narcissists I have known mystified me. But over time, I began to see what the problem is.

They have a deeply ingrained mental habit of filtering out everything but the kind of information they want - their own reflected grandiose image - in their interactions with people. This goes further than 'selective memory." This is "selective consciousness."

Like Narcissus here. He's blocking out everything but the image of himself being reflected by his interaction with Echo.

Remember that you are bug in his esteem, unworthy of more attention than a fly on the wall. To give you any would pain him as a terrible comedown.

So he CAN'T pay attention to others, even when he wants to. At least not to those others that he is deeply invested in looking down on.

But our brains LEARN what kinds of information we pay no attention to. They learn to filter it from consciousness automatically. This is why when you first move to a neighborhood with a railroad crossing, the trains drive you nuts. But soon, you don't even hear the noise of the passing trains anymore (unless they happen to drown out some sound you are trying to listen to).

The same thing seems to have happened to the older narcissists I have known. I think their lifelong habit of filtering out all but what what they want to see in that mirror trains their brain too well.

They can't pay attention to anything. (Sometimes I wonder if they don't actually have a phobia of paying attention.) They are stuck in fantasy, unable to step out of The Looking Glass while at work and in other places where they need to tend to daily affairs and pass for normal.

This starts to really show in their fifties, when people outside their family start noticing that something is wrong with them.

I suspect that in the comments we'll soon see other examples of the same thing.

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A Dangerous and Terrible Thing

When a little child behaves childishly, we think little of it. Childishness is normal in children while their personalities develop. In fact, we don't use the term "childish" for childish behavior in children, because of its negative connotations. We call them "childlike."

We raise children to mental maturity.

When someone never steps up to mental maturity, you have the most dangerous and terrible thing in the world = a grown-up child. Why is what seems so benign in little children so malignant when it persists in adults? Because of the freedom and power adults have! Adults can do much more harm!

For example, would anyone be crazy enough to allow a furious five-year-old access to a gun? I hope not. I don't care how sweet that kid is, he couldn't be trusted not to get a really childish idea about how to solve his problem with that gun. So, what happens when a 40-year-old with the mental maturity of a 5-year-old is furious and sees a gun?

Besides, when childishness persists in an adult, it's always the childishness of a TROUBLED child.

Again, for example. Take one muddy kid and set him loose on an unsupervised playground with clean kids. He will run around, smearing himself off on every clean spot on other kids - till they are all muddy and crying and he looks good by comparison.

That is just a bad day at the playground.

But when he grows up, what if he keeps doing the same thing? What if he projects his faults and flaws off onto others by character assassination? People lose their jobs. Families break up. Businesses fail. Good leaders bite the dust and bad leaders get elected. No minor matter.

This is an old theme in art - that we can't let our love for children and our wise patience with them blind us to the true nature of childish behavior: take for example the novel The Lord of the Flies, the movie The Children's Hour, and this Twilight Zone episode described by Joanna Ashmund. It shows that a childish mind with the power to act on its impulses is a dangerous and terrible thing.

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Malignant Narcissists Are NOT Normal People

Here is an example of what I mean when I warn against assuming that narcissists act on normal human premises.

The victim thinks he can get through to her, because, "After all, why would she want to hurt me?"

Stop. He has made a wrong assumption. He is assuming that it's about him. Wrong. He is assuming that his welfare matters. Wrong.

It's ALL, ALL, ALL about her, the narcissist. Abusing him to treat him like dirt makes her feel grand. It has the same effect on her that a hit of heroin has on a drug addict. The pain in his eyes at being shamefully treated makes her feel powerful and grand to dominate and kick him around so. (Insert her inner Tarzan yell here.) His pain has a pain-killing effect on her. It makes her feel good, because this delusion seals over her deep-seated knowledge that she is scum.

So, since this balm of treating another like dirt feels good, she does it. Period.

That's all there is to a narcissist.

Nothing else matters. It's ALL, ALL, ALL about getting the next hit of her drug. Nothing else even gets considered. Which is why narcissists even damage their own children and their own business just to get a hit of their glorious drug.

Oh, and by the way, it hurts him? So what? What's that to her, the Center of the Universe? You might as well expect her to consider the consequences to some bug of not making sure she doesn't step on it.

Ask a three-year-old to consider the consequences of her actions on others. She won't, will she? She'll just refuse to. You will get just as far (= nowhere) with a 50-year-old narcissist.

She thinks you're a sap. It ain't wrong unless you get caught, and she knows how to NOT get caught. And she thinks that if you're too stupid to figure that out, you deserve whatever she does to you.

In a way, it's the victim's own ego that does him in. He won't admit that, in her esteem, he is nothing, zip, nada, zilch. That's degrading, humiliating. But it's the truth. And until he faces that fact, he is dead meat.

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A Special Thanks

Generally, the comments here at this blog are one of main reasons it's worth reading. So, I want to take this opportunity to thank those who have commented, because I often just haven't time to respond with comments of my own. So, know that you are appreciated. The comments here are thought provoking, and they provide many insights and and concrete examples of how narcissists behave.

Narcissist Sympathizers

How's your Irony Detector doing? Let's take it for a ride.

Because of posts like my last one, people view me as a "hard-liner" about narcissists. I hold them responsible for their conduct because they can control it and freely choose to abuse. So I am mean and nasty and unsympathetic toward these poor abusers.

But who thinks more of them than someone like me? By taking this stand, I am giving narcissists equal status with the rest of us. I am acknowledging that they have minds, a will, and will power to choose.

In other words, people like me aren't the ones degrading narcissists to the level of mere machines with buttons that get pushed. Indeed, that is a status lower than most animals, who have a free will and will power to choose their behavior.

The inability to choose for yourself is absolute impotence. So, all these holier-than-thous who want to SOUND and LOOK and SEEM humanitarian (notice that it's always "humanitarian," never quite "human") are insulting narcissists with their condescending misplaced sympathy.

I think it's time these holier-than-thous stopped degrading narcissists (and all the mentally ill) this way and showed some respect for them by doing them justice as beings with a free will who can overcome temptation.

Narcissists are people who have perfected the virtue of stubborness, refusing to attain the Age of Reason for - whatever - 20, 30, 40 years. So, like little children, they have no conscience. Like little children, they have no regard for anyone or anything else. The moment they see that Mamma's back is turned, they do wrong and slap back on their angel-face again the moment she turns around. Life is simple for them: it's all about what they want, and they gotta have it NOW.

I say they should CHOOSE to grow up already. IF they wanted help, maybe then psychiatrists could help them. But don't hold your breath. They have no incentive to grow up.

And now, here's the kicker. Let's look at the other side of the coin.

I often say that it really does appear that narcissists have real predatory urges that the rest of us do not have, and that they have feelings in response to things that the rest of us do not experience. For example, because of their twisted thinking, they take a PLEA for them to have a heart as an ATTACK.

This bizarre feeling occurs in them because they are pretending to be so infinitely superior to you that they shouldn't deign to even notice relative vermin like you, let alone have anything but contempt for a bug like you. That's the image of themselves that they identify with, and you DO attack it when you behave as their equal. You are inadvertently challenging their delusion of grandeur. But if they can resist the temptation to eviscerate you for it when there would be witnesses, they can resist the urge to eviscerate you when no one is looking, too.

It is self evident that people cannot control their feelings. Neither normal people nor narcissists can. We can control their expression as emotion, which is part of controlling our conduct. But feelings themselves are not a matter of choice.

So, we can't polish our finger nails over not behaving like narcissists behave, because we are not tempted to. For example, you can't take pride in never having murdered anyone unless you have been tempted to and overcame that temptation.

But look what side of this issue the nicey-nice narcissist sympathizers are on. The wrong one again, as usual. The same people who won't hold others responsible for their conduct do hold others responsible for their feelings. There is hardly any natural feeling a person can have that they can't make out to be some sort of sin.

Anger is their favorite excuse for such extreme perversity. The poor narcissist isn't to blame for abusing his or her defenseless victim (in a rage), but that victim is doing evil by feeling angry about it.

Enough to make the head spin.

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So narcissists can't control themselves, eh?

Update: revised and moved for inclusion in the book.

Narcissist walks into a room. There is a young, unmarried female colleague or his wife. He takes a quick glance around and sees that no one else is there. Then he abuses the woman.

Several hours later, he enters the same room. There she is again. But this time a half-dozen other people are present as well. He goes up to her and accosts her in the friendliest tone, complimenting her on something and just really gobbing the make-up on his image.

Now what was that about narcissists being unable to control themselves? What was that about them not "meaning" to hurt people?

...

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The Pied Piper

I was afraid to say this before. I thought, "Don't say it, Kathy. People will say that you're finding a narcissist under every bush." But the attention-seeking, the incredible arrogance, the preposterously backwards-twisted irrrationales and backwards reactions to things, the utter devaluation of others' and their lives (even those serving him), the screaming mockery of his Jesus-look get up and phony halo - all of it. What does this Bin Laden do? Nothing but destroy people and things. The moment we saw the Twin Towers, we saw his signature - WANTON DESTRUCTION.

Col. Andrew Nichols Pratt in American Thinker, "What makes Bin Laden Tick?"

Dr. Jerrold Post, a renowned CIA analyst who has devoted his entire career to the field of political psychology, recently labeled Bin Laden as a 'malignant narcissist,' a personality overflowing with narcissist—excessive self—admiration. He exudes grandiose self—importance; possesses a messianic sense of mission; demonstrates an inability to empathize with others; and, most threatening to the West, rages internally at being upstaged by our Iraq focus.

Bin Laden's ego is his raison d'etre and will be his downfall.

I mean when are the saps he's sending to die gonna catch on? The West's crusaders caught on. So when are these reverse-crusaders gonna catch on?

Duh, and see that it has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with one pied piper's power and glory?

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The Danger of Ascribing Normal Human Motives to Narcissists

In the ebook I have a chapter entitled "Narcissists Are from Pluto," which explains that they don't act on normal human premises. Which is why their actions blind-side us. That's because, without realizing it, we make certain assumptions about them, assumptions that are safe to make about any normal human being.

In fact, if narcissits looked like aliens from another planet, we wouldn't make those assumptions and would interpret their behavior much differently than we do. As a result, our red alerts would go off as we saw the warning signs that this is a predator almost immediately.

But the wolf wears sheep's clothing to fool us into allowing it to get close. Since narcissits look and try to act like like the rest of us, we make disastrous assumptions without even realizing it. We assume a lot of things about narcissists that we shouldn't.

For example, we assume that they hurt us because they have some personal animosity toward us. But I doubt that.

We naturally assume that anyone who tries to hurt us has it in for us personally. Otherwise, they wouldn't try to hurt us. And this is normally true. But I think it's a kind of anthropomorphism to map this normal human behavior on a malignant narcissist ;-)

If a normal person is out to get you, there is a reason for it. It is because of something about you or something you have done that fills them with a personal animosity toward you.

And their whole opinion of you won't go upside down for no reason tomorrow.

That's all because even this hostile relationship is a normal human relationship. It makes sense. It is natural.

And we tend to think this is what's going on in a narcissist.

But wait a minute. Consider the serial killer (psychopath) who stalks and kills TOTAL STRANGERS. Proof positive that we shouldn't make such assumptions, that they don't necessarily apply to a disordered personality.

I have seen two narcissists change their attitude toward someone literally overnight, just because the circumstances changed to shift the balance of power. In both cases, the narcissist completely rewrote history to "justify" changing their portrayal of that person overnight. Yesterday, he was her hated father, someone she never had one good word to say about. Today, he has always been a wonderful father. She has no end of praise for him and won't tolerate anyone finding fault with him. All because it's suddenly to her advantage to shift gears this way.

That ain't real, is it? It just proves that she couldn't possibly have really hated her father before. And you're an idiot if you then think she loves him now.

I know of two narcissists who tyrannized a school for decades, running one persecution after another by training the other male coaches as their "hunting hounds" in the Ritual Hunt. (By the way, the orginal meaning of the Latin word for "persecute" was "to set your hunting hounds upon" prey that you would "persecute" with them = chase, baying and biting at the heels to worry and eventually bring down the bunny and and tear it to pieces. A perfect analogy for persecution, eh?)

These guys were so relentless in their persecution of the priest who was principal that everyone assumed he had done something awful to provoke such hatred in them. The Big Mystery around there, which people dared speak of only in whispers, was the big question: What had the priest done to make them hate him so?

Answer. Nothing. Correction: he became principal, that's what. And had a mind of his own. Unlike the coaches, when Killer and Spike suggested that he come to them for guidance, he didn't obey, arriving weekly with his tail wagging at them for a critique on how he'd done his job. Unforgivable!

That isn't personal animosity. It was nothing but a power struggle.

Persecuting a chosen colleague wasn't enough if they didn't show that they were capable of persecuting the principal himself to their hearts' content. THAT put the Fear of Killer and Spike in everyone.

The priest was just an outstanding target of opportunity, that's all. One there was great benefit in persecuting. Indeed, what if you came to teach at that school and saw them persecuting the boss with all those baying hounds of theirs? You'd know whom to please – not the principal, that's for sure.

They were just making an example of him to show everyone else what would happen to anyone they set their pack of hounds on. Read "power play." So, it wasn't about the priest. It wouldn't have mattered who he was: anyone in his position would have "gotten it" from them. (Anyone stupid enough to turn the other cheek instead of just firing them, that is.)

It's the same with your narcissist. It isn't about you. Anyone in your shoes would be getting it, so don't take it personally. Never take an attack by a PREDATOR personally.

They don't relate to human beings humanly. They deny their own humanity as well as yours. The only difference is that they promote their humanity and demote yours in their delusions.

They relate to you as but an object. People don't get mad at objects.

Well, not after their first three or four years, that is. You will often see a little child hit a "naughty toy." That child's mind isn't fully formed yet. And a narcissist is a case of arrested development in this stage. Throughout life they continue to relate to objects, other animals, and human beings as all the same = objects in the playpen of their world.

I think this is why I have seen several narcissists absurdly get mad at animals as though those animals are just trying to make them mad. For example, those cats hanging around the bird feeder are evil. The brain-dead narcissist talks as though cats have a moral obligation to leave his birds alone. He takes what they do personally.

Like that priest once said to me, "They take everything personally."

But don't you take what they do personally. You're just a chess piece. It ain't about YOU - it's about what you can be used for.

You don't take it personally when a snake bites you. That snake is just being a snake. So, don't take it personally when a narcissist bites you either. He or she is just another kind of snake being a snake.

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Mental Illness is No Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Card

I will go out on a limb here and say that people who cannot control themselves are insane.

The word insane is derived from unsound. An insane mind is an unsound one.

The insane stick out among us like sore thumbs. You can often tell from a block away that some stranger is insane. As when, for example, you see him walking up a crowded street alone and wildly yelling and gesticulating to himself.

The insane may not realize what they're doing at any given moment. They may not remember doing something earth-shaking that they did an hour ago. They may do something horrendous and then be surprised that people disapprove of what they did. In other words, they don't know right from wrong. They have no idea that what they are doing will get them into trouble. They show this by not even trying to sneak around in order to get away with it. The insane are unable to control themselves and thus are but a puppet of their urges.

Insanity can be temporary, as when somebody just "snaps."

Now, what I have just said about insanity is consistent with legal theory here in the United States. This is why you need to prove sanity in order to get a conviction for a crime. The judgement of sanity is made according to the criteria I used above. Did this person show by their behavior that they knew what they were doing? Did they show by their behavior that they know right from wrong? Did they show by their behavior that they could control themselves?

The insane are not punished here: they are committed to psychiatric care.

But guess what? Serial killers and criminals with Narcissistic Personality Disorder are usually judged sane and sent to jail. Because they flunk the insanity test with flying colors.

We have a lot of sloppy thinking out there that all mental illness is insanity. That's exactly what you are saying if you claim that the mentally ill cannot control themselves and that they are not to blame for the bad things they do.

Well then, they deserve no credit for the good things they do either, right?

In other words, the mentally ill are all just machines with buttons that get pushed. Right?

Wrong. I challenge anyone to show me a psychiatrist or psychologist who will agree with that, in effect saying that all mental illness is insanity.

Mental illness causes TEMPTATIONS. Since when is temptation an excuse for anything?

What? People can't be expected to resist temptation? Jeez, then if I am tempted to steal someone's wallet, it's justifiable theft because poor, poor me was really, really tempted to! (sniff, sniff)

That sloppy thinking just doesn't hold up, does it?

It is sad that the mentally ill are tempted in ways the rest of us are not. But since when does TEMPTATION = CAUSE? We all get tempted 20 times a day. And we all are obligated to resist temptation. All but the insane are capable of resisting temptation. That includes the mentally ill.

The insane are not responsible for what they do. But other mentally ill people are. Mental illness is no Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card.

And the mentally ill shouldn't be treated as incapable of resisting their temptations. What a demeaning attitude! That's the way to lead them deeper into sickness, not the way to guide them to wellness.

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True Value and the Narcissist

It's easy to take an honest look at someone you have something against. And though i have no time for blaming the victim, those of us who have been victimized by narcissists must take an honest look at ourselves.

Why is it so hard to face facts? Why do we remain in denial so long, and thus play the fool?

People on the outside are flabbergasted by the abuse the victim takes. But it is really very easy to understand.

To face facts, one fact you must face is that you mean nothing to the narcissist. Zip, zero, zilch, nada. You are nothing but a punching bag. A thing, an object he (ab)uses to make himself feel good.

If he breaks you, that's nothing because you are just an object to a narcissist or psychopath.

That's humiliating. Who wants to admit that they are worth nothing to someone so precious to them? It's a spear right through the heart.

And stupid conventional thinking views value backwards.

True, if a thing is a commodity for exchange, it's of no more value than what someone will pay for it. Like a used car: if you can't get anyone to pay more than $1,000 for it, that's all it's worth, no matter how new it is.

But human beings are not commodities for exchange. They have INHERENT value.

This notion that the narcissist DEVALUES you is ludicrous. Let's try thinking straight and saying that he just fails to appreciate your value.

Which makes him a dunce. So, who is devalued by his failure? You or him?

Does that make it easier to face facts?

Narcissists know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

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Hurting You Isn't Something Narcissists Do by Accident

In all the jabber about narcissism, the worst noise is this idea that hurting you is something narcissists do by accident.

If you get nothing else out of "What Makes Narcissists Tick," get the message that frees you of that ridiculous belief. Which is nothing but a baseless assumption.

I don't ask you to take my word for this. Test what I say when I say that narcissists hurt you on purpose. Anyone can test any narcissist.

Here's how. The next time the narcissist is hurting your feelings or making you feel low, let your feelings show and tell him or her how they are making you feel asking them to stop it.

Be prepared for a shock. Any normal human being would soften and let up, but a narcissist will do exactly the opposite.

What does that mean?

Is revving up their engines, kicking in the afterburners, and running you right over an "accident" after you show your soft underbelly and beg them to let up on you?

It's no "accident," that's for sure.

Want to see a narcissistic rage? That's no "accident" either. The test: Just fall to your knees in tears begging them to have a heart and stop kicking you around like dirt.

The narcissist's response? He or she blows up into a rage. Is that rage an "accident" when nothing but how deeply they are hurting you provokes it?

No, it's a willful and wanton outrage.

Now hear this: THEY DON'T DO IT BY ACCIDENT. They aren't just inconsiderate and touchy.

Test their "touchiness" (if you can do so safely, or have somebody not at the N's mercy test it - someone who can defend themselves). Rage right back in their face. Act just as wild right back in their face. Threaten right back. Speak abusively right back.

Now any normal person would be provoked to rage by your doing this in their face. But narcissists are so UNtouchy that they do the opposite. Watch how instantaneously the raging narcissist becomes meek and mild and switches to his "I-wouldn't-hurt-a-fly-mask."

Don't take my word for it. Test it. You CANNOT insult a narcissist who isn't in a position to bully you! It's impossible. Try it, you'll see. Your lack of vulnerability gives them skin a foot thick! (Not to mention a rubber spine.)

"Touchy" my you-know-what.

They aren't touchy at all. So perceived slights aren't what set them off. The VULNERABILITY of a TARGET OF OPPORTUNITY is what sets them off - IF there are no witnesses.

That's predation, not touchiness.

Narcissists aren't inconsiderate of your feelings. To the contrary, they are extremely considerate of your feelings. Your feelings are exactly what they are trying to affect. They closely observe how you react every time they do something to hurt you.

And they are like sharks, able to smell a drop of blood a mile away. Why? Because your hurt feelings are their pain killing drug.

They are addicted to it. Ever since childhood.

That's what their mental illness is, an addiction. (In fact, all addictions are classed as mental illness.)

So where do people get the stupid idea that narcissists aren't to blame for what they do?

It's asinine to think that narcissists can't control themselves when we see them controlling themselves perfectly whenever witnesses are present. So, what? being behind closed doors makes them suddenly out of control of themselves? Baloney.

Their problem isn't lack of self control; it's lack of conscience. Conscience is what makes people behave the same in the dark as in the light of day.

Okay, they have an addiction to trampling people. They are hooked on the childish high they get from throwing somebody down, stepping on the victim's back, and thumping their chest with a Tarzan yell.

But since when does an addiction amount to a carte blanche? An addiction is just a TEMPTATION. It doesn't remove the addict's responsibility to resist that temptation.

If a heroin addict sees you with heroin, he will attack and may kill you for it - IF there are no witnesses present.

But do we absolve him of his responsibility for the crime just because he's addicted to heroin? Of course not.

Same with the narcissist. Since childhood he has done this mind-altering drug of abusing people and is addicted to it. He addicted himself.

Yet addicted as he is, he demonstrates the ability to control himself by behaving whenever witnesses are present, misbehaving only when he thinks he can get away with it.

Innocence that is not.

He does what he does because nothing but getting his drug matters to him. So he has no conscience. He lives to get it, whenever he can get away with it.

So, hurting others isn't something narcissists do by accident. It's how they live.

The victims of narcissists must understand this. They must quit falling for the masks predation conceals itself behind.

I don't care how much the poor, little, ole narcissist whines that he didn't mean to, and claims that he has an excuse because HIS feelings were somehow hurt, and weeps about what a miserable childhood he had and how sad and forlorn he'll be if you go away, and all that crap. It's a joke.

Painful as this is to admit, the victims of narcissists MUST understand it. It's the bottom line. It predicates your choices.

Don't take my word for it: test and see. 2 + 2 = 4. Always. Even on Thursdays.

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