One of the reasons it is so difficult to communicate with a narcissist is because their perception of life is almost entirely based on their feelings in the moment rather than the rationable reasonable facts that actually happened.
While listening to another video on narcissism the speaker gave the following example that resonated with me. Here was the gist of the video.
Narcissists can be on vacation feeling good and they will tell their friends that it was the best vacation ever only to change their tune just days later when they are no longer on vacation and are feeling down, then the vacation was the worst they have ever experienced. The responses of the narcissist are almost always based on momentary feelings. I could relate to what the video host said with my own examples.
They do not remember what they said so it is easy to change the memory of it while saying just the opposite of what they said before just days or weeks later.
I remember complimenting a woman on her interesting and functional purse. She told me it was really a camera bag that she thought would make a good purse. I told her it was a great idea because it had all the pockets needed to be organized. She carried that bag around for quite some time, I remember how useful it was.
Just a few months later I asked her if she still had that wonderful camera bag she was using for a purse and to my surprise, she said "I never had a camera bag that I used for a purse." When I tried to describe the camera bag to remind her of it she declared she never had anything like that.
This is only one of the times that this woman attempted to gaslight me, pretending something didn't happen that did happen. Since she could not validate me in any way she had to continually make me appear faulty in everything, even my memory of a purse.
When we encounter this once with someone we assume we forgot or they forgot or we misunderstood what they said. However, when these types of encounters occur over and over again we stop questioning our own recollections and begin to question their sanity.
Since narcissists lie so often they don't remember what they said and even if they did they would deny it to make us look foolish.
We never make judgments about someone on one or two minor events, but over time as these sorts of events pile up to become common we can see a pattern that is called "gaslighting."
When someone operates in the vein of continual competition with us we can never trust them. Everything they say and do will be with the intention of diminishing us in some way.
When these tactics of the narcissist seem constant then we know it is time to move on. We never want the narcissist to be able to begin arguments with us through denial of history. The devil did this with Eve in the garden, attempting to make her doubt what God actually said. Even claiming that God was trying to harm her in some way by not allowing her to eat the fruit from that particular tree.
When we know it is the devil behind the actions and words of the narcissist we will begin to see clearly what they are doing and when to walk away. The devil has a continual trick of goading believers into fights for absolutely nothing important at all, just because he can.
1 Peter 5:8 "Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil walketh about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour."
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