Transcription
Just when a person hits the breaking point with a narcissistic person, that the rage and all of the invalidation and the berating and the humiliation finally gets to a person and they take a stand against the narcissist, the narcissist is masterful at playing the sulking, petulant victim. So let's talk about the shame rage spiral in narcissism.
Now, I recently had the pleasure of reading a 2015 academic article written by Cran and Johar from Iowa State University. And the article was on narcissistic rage. It was a really great paper that broke down narcissistic rage and the different ways it shows based on whether a person is more of a grandiose narcissist or a vulnerable narcissist. But the authors did a nice job of also shedding light on something that is really worth talking about on this channel called the shame rage spiral.
Their manuscript, and they were talking about other people's research too, it brings up a quote from a famous theorist who studied narcissism named Heinz Kohut. And he wrote, "The need for revenge, for righting a wrong, for undoing a hurt by whatever means, and a deeply anchored, unrelenting compulsion in the pursuit of all these aims are the characteristic features of narcissistic rage in all its forms."
So, so it's a fancy way of saying it, but Kohut and many other authors point out basically that if you question a narcissist's reality, they will punch back. Which is really interesting because one of their primary maneuvers is to question your reality and gaslight you.
Now, remember, the narcissist has to construct a false self and an egocentric sense of reality to protect their rather broken, confused, invariable sense of self and self-esteem. So they get really angry if you poke at their grandiose or victimized sense of self, and they get really defensive, rageful, and mean. And all that's the stuff I talk about on the narcissistic rage video, if you want to check that out.
So let's talk about the shame rage cycle. Theorists such as Lewis, who write about shame and mental health in general, have very much described this cycle in a much more scientific, well-articulated way. Basically, when a narcissist gets activated, perhaps someone questions them, or does better than them, or asks for a little more from them, or just simply holds the narcissist accountable. The narcissist experiences two things, kind of in order: shame, and then rage. The rage is a manifestation of vindictiveness, retaliation, punishment, in essence, wanting their perceived perpetrator to feel as bad as them.
So let's talk about shame. Narcissists are not the only ones who feel shame. We all do. It's a universal emotional state. Shame is a sort of public emotion based on the idea that we will be seen and then subsequently rejected or discarded for our shortcomings, our deficits, our vulnerabilities, and that the uncomfortable parts of ourselves will will be exposed to the world. And that's really uncomfortable. And when we don't process our shame, some of which we carry from early childhood, it turns into negative emotional states that can plague us throughout our lives. Negative emotions such as depression, anxiety, hostility. And these are these appear to be, when they appear, we get triggered, or they get triggered by shame-inducing. And why does that happen? Because we're afraid our deficiencies will be seen. Shame harms us from the outside in and the inside out.
So narcissists get into a real cycle of anger when their shame is triggered, which actually works well for them because at that moment, when they're like, "I'm not dealing with this," they aren't having to grapple with the really horrible internal feelings that shame evokes. Instead, what they do is, instead of dealing with the feelings, they just get angry at the person who evoked the shame, whether the the other person intended to do so or not. And then they blame the other person and project feelings onto that person, or they just fully discard them. They want to get ahead of being discarded themselves. Now that their shame is public.
Now, other researchers such as Roar have pointed out that shame doesn't just elicit rage, it can also elicit a passive-aggressive response, especially in covert narcissists. And this can devolve into the narcissist ruminating about their plan to finally punish or dominate or control the person who called them out or triggered their shame. So whether it's traditional, old-fashioned, in-your-face rage, or the passive-aggressive, sullen, resentful, brooding, obsessive rage, the reaction is rage.
So then, over time, as that does turn more and more into rage, the narcissistic person then chronically starts to rage at people who evoke their feelings of shame. Now, rage isn't good, and people don't judge rageful people well. It's not a good look. So now the narcissist gets stuck in a cycle of feeling shame, lashing out with rage, feeling more shame as a result, lashing out with more rage. And you can see how that escalates. Most of the narcissist's rage has a shame-based origin. And in this way, the entire world can feel like one big shame-inducing threat for narcissists. Thus, they have their grandiosity, their defensiveness, their entitlement. All of these are their suits of armor that protect those narcissists from shame. But they're not always going to work.
So the short story is, the narcissist's fear of being found out means that they are at constant risk of shame. Inevitably, the shame gets triggered. Boom. And then they rage. And this is why so many people get stuck in the eggshell-walking cycle around narcissists. Nobody wants to trigger them. But most people aren't clear that the thing that you're actually trying to avoid triggering is the shame, because that's what leads to the rage.
It makes it all but impossible to have a healthy relationship with the narcissist, because you never know what's going to trigger their shame. And it may be something that has nothing to do with you. They just take it out on you. They may get triggered because it may happen because you didn't notice that they did something around the house. It may happen because you reject a second helping of something they cooked. It may happen because you get a promotion and they don't. It may happen because you called them out on a lie that they told. It may happen because you caught them watching porn. It may happen because they aren't able to change a child's diaper. It may happen because they didn't get into the college they wanted or the job they wanted. It may happen because their brother bought a bigger house than them. It may happen because they didn't make their sales quota. It may happen because not enough people like their Instagram post. It may happen because they saw their friend was sharing a new success on social media. It may happen because someone insulted them.
So as you can see, all of these are experiences that may reveal the vulnerabilities or deficiencies of the narcissist to the world. And those are the kinds of things that trigger the shame cycle. So you can also see how shame sets off rage, sets off shame, sets off rage. So without understanding it, most people in these relationships live in confusion, walk on the proverbial eggshells, and hope to goodness that things go okay. But that would only work if you're the only person in the narcissist's life.
The narcissistic person likely goes to work, or goes to the store, or is on social media, or goes to a social gathering, and something might happen there. And then when they get back to you, they just spread that rage toward you because they need a target. Now, when experiences occur in the narcissist's life that uncover their deficiencies, the cycle is typically then to rage at other people, blame other people, become vindictive towards other people, and then feel more shame when people push back on their bad behavior for generally being a raging jerk.
So what are you supposed to do if you're in a relationship with a narcissist? Honestly, not much. As a therapist, I get to work with clients who are narcissistic, as well as clients who have experienced narcissistic abuse. I must say that the work of shame is the hardest work of all with a narcissistic individual, to let them know that they are just as solid a person with or without the promotion, or the better car, or even if they told a lie. My work then becomes to teach them the appropriate ways of addressing those moments without raging at people. And it's a tough battle because the shame sequence gets activated so quickly.
When a narcissist perceives that they're going to get found out, maybe some of you are. But in general, with your loved ones, you aren't their therapist. To the narcissist in your life, so it's not your role to do this. And listen carefully, and even if you did, it wouldn't work. And the narcissist may rage at you even more and treat you with even more contempt for trying to soothe them. Again, the shame gets activated.
This shame rage cycle is why sometimes narcissists will come around with apologies after going on a rage bender. They want to erase it, in a way. And if you don't accept their apology, voila, the cycle starts again because their vulnerability was made public. The shame rage cycle is why so often these relationships are almost impossible to fix. The kind of therapy the narcissist requires is hard work, requires long-term commitment, a very skilled therapist, and regular therapy for a very long time. These things are not available to most people. And most narcissists are very contemptuous of therapy, anyhow. When the therapist really starts going in deep, that's often when they drop out.
So perhaps if you understand this cycle, though, it's my hope that you won't personalize the shame rage cycle. There isn't much you can do. There's actually, to me, something quite tragic about this dynamic. That fear, that paralyzing fear. What would happen if someone really saw your faults? Being such a destabilizing space. And compassion in these spaces can get very tricky, as many of you know. I'm a big believer in balancing on that razor's edge of compassion and self-preservation. And it's a really tough spot with the narcissistic people in your life. Especially because in your compassion, you want to be there for someone and not contribute to their cycle of shame. But to be a punching bag for their rage helps no one and is actually very bad for your health.
This all brings up larger societal issues of why don't we work with people, families, and especially with parents, and also with healthcare providers and educators to help people learn to just be okay with themselves, faults and all. Listen carefully again. Shame has no place in a child's life. And for both, both narcissists who likely were shamed for not being good enough as kids, and for their victims who were also shamed for not being good enough as kids, we can see how this cycle puts into place this whole system, almost of oppression and victimization of these narcissists who rage, and of people who endure the rage. And on both sides, it's happening because of early messages of not being good enough and of shame.
Listen, I can't change that tide by myself. It's a societal shift that, frankly, I have to believe will have to take, will take many generations to happen, if it ever can. But in your life now, right now, if you're stuck in a rage cycle with a narcissist, at a minimum, I hope this sheds some light on it, lifts some of the blame off of you, and encourages you, need, encourages you to seek out the help you need to process this and lift the burden of responsibility to be the one who fixes this problem off of your shoulders. The narcissist themselves can and must seek out help to end this cycle. You can't do it for them. So I do hope this illuminates some of this. And also to give you another example, think of the shame cycle, the shame rage cycle. You know where it often manifests? Social media posts. Ever see that happen? Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. Insult, insult, insult back and forth. They get into rages, they get into, they get into all kinds of shouting matches on social media. That's a great example of the shame rage cycle. Someone says something, maybe they don't like the narcissist's post, or the narcissist makes a comment, and people kind of say, "That's not okay." The shame gets activated. Why? Because social media is a public space. And then that narcissist escalates, escalates, escalates. Many of you have seen this happen where a narcissist may actually, in some cases, lose their career, lose, lose a lot of things because they can't stop themselves. In these spaces, they tend to often take their rage to social media. They tend to take their rage to Yelp. They tend to take their rage to these places where they can be angry at people. Then people shame them. You've seen this cycle before. So this shame rage cycle plays out in lots of places: individual relationships, families, and in public stages like social media.
So how do you handle flying monkeys? We can make this a short video and just say, "Disengage and be done with it." But the challenge is that it's not that easy. And sometimes the flying monkeys in your life, they're not as toxic as the original narcissist. So let's address ways for managing the flying monkeys that are inevitably a part of your life if you have a narcissist in your life.
Let's start by breaking down what flying monkeys are. They are typically enablers, but they can also be people who are ignorant about narcissistic patterns and do not see it, and are like clay in the narcissistic person's hands who can manipulate them with ease. Flying monkeys are typically people who were at one time, or may still be, connected to both you and the narcissist. These could be family members, friends, co-workers, neighbors. The narcissistic person will mobilize the flying monkeys, typically at times when things aren't going well between you and the narcissist. Maybe it's a close relationship that's unraveling, a contentious family relationship, a difficult workplace situation, or a friendship that's falling apart. Because the narcissistic person is always looking for a way to create advantage for themselves, and they want to maintain a narrative that deflects any blame and responsibility from them and place it on someone else, and they have to end up looking wonderful in everybody else's eyes, right? Mobilizing the flying monkeys is a way for them to achieve all three of those things and put the blame on you.
Now, that means that there are people around you, around all of us, that can be mobilized into that role of flying monkey. One of the most painful parts of flying monkey is that these are people, they're often people who you may have considered to be friends, or trusted family, or just good people in your life. Unfortunately, because narcissistic people are so skilled at wearing a mask, they may have tricked these people. And there are so many people out there who don't want to believe that there can be the darkness of narcissism in our midst. And any of us who have been through narcissistic abuse and really get it, I think we're regularly shocked at how few people out in the world at large do get it.
Now, flying monkeys are people who are often vulnerable and recruitable. And the manipulations of the narcissist are no match for their rosy-eyed or naive vision of the world. Flying monkeys, like I said, can be enablers and often want to maintain a sort of pretty and simple view of the world. And who can blame them? I wish the world was simpler than the the way the view of it that I've got these days. But that makes the flying monkeys vulnerable to a twisted narrative, and also one with the narcissistic person beautifully is able to paint themselves as a victim.
Just like the the original flying monkeys in The Wizard of Oz, they're a flock, they're almost like a flock of birds. They mob and come at you as a group, which leaves you feeling even more gaslighted because it seems like an entire group of people are on the same page in a way that is completely at odds with your reality and siding with the narcissist. This can be devastating if it is a family and you actually believe that some of these family members had your back, or you've had their back and been there for them in the past. Or it could be a long-standing group of friends whom you have known for years. In fact, you might have been friends with them even before the narcissist became friends with them, or colleagues that you have supported for years. It's a betrayal. And because it's a betrayal at such a large scale, it is overwhelming and unsettling.
So to the original concept of this video, how are you supposed to protect yourself when it comes to flying monkeys? Sadly, there isn't much that you can do from a prevention standpoint. It's an exhausting life to have to continually monitor your life and wonder, "Is that person going to become a flying monkey? Is that person going to become a flying monkey?" Is this? There's no way to live. In some ways, all you can do is go through your life as your best you. And if the people around you don't seem to understand narcissism, be careful around them because they are the ones that that will be the most recruitable as flying monkeys.
It's really where we can address the flying monkeys is what you do as it's happening or after it happens. Number one, you got to hold on to your reality. It's very easy to be gaslighted and start to doubt yourself and feel deeply confused when lots of people are sharing the same distorted narrative. Trust yourself. There can be so much grief when you're experiencing the whole flying monkey phenomenon, and that grief can drain you and sometimes leave you doubting yourself even more. You know, you, you know what you experienced. And even if the flying monkeys want to gaslight you alongside the narcissist, you got to hold on to your reality.
Number two, don't try to convert the flying monkeys. The group of flying monkeys with the narcissist leading the fray can feel a little bit culty. And sometimes the flying monkeys can get really zealous about their support of the narcissist and the idea that you may be to blame. All you can do is calmly and gracefully stand in your truth, even if you're so angry inside. Don't get into the mud with them. They will want to hear your side of things. And if you choose to do that, stick to the behaviors of the narcissist and don't get lost in talking about gaslighting and narcissism and other words that might put them on the defensive. Because when you use those words with flying monkeys, they'll often push back and try to paint you as the bad person.
Number three, keep in mind that sometimes flying monkeys come back around. Before you welcome them back with open arms, pay attention to who they were and don't forget what they were willing to do. Flying monkeys may come around for a variety of reasons. They may get burned by the narcissist, or see them more clearly, or see that you aren't reacting to them. It doesn't mean you have to give up on the friendship or the relationship with the flying monkey. But you may want to proceed with more firm boundaries and be armed with the recognition that this person was a friend that became a flying monkey, that they were able to do that to you. One of the hallmarks of survival from narcissistic abuse is to move cautiously and slowly. But it's important that you learn to not justify and to not get lost in the cognitive dissonance swamp. Sadly, going forward, it may feel like a friendship or relationship with this former flying monkey that's less deep. Again, a key mantra of narcissistic abuse survivorship is to protect yourself on the basis of the wisdom of the lessons that you've learned from the narcissistic relationship. And that means caution and boundaries.
Number four, not all flying monkeys are created the same. Some are trying to play both sides, being your friend and the narcissistic person's friend. Tread very lightly there. You do not want to be a source of intel for the narcissist with a flying monkey telling them what's going on. So keep your answers and thoughts terse and brief, and don't show your hand to the flying monkeys. Some flying monkeys are as bad as the narcissist and want to jump on the bandwagon of harming you. In that case, do not engage. Some flying monkeys are just stupid, almost like the dim-witted kid in high school who just wanted to be friends with the cool kids no matter what. And sadly, in adult life, the narcissist often is the cool kid. The stupid flying monkeys aren't always dangerous, but they are definitely not a great person for you. You can do better.
Number five, hard as it may be, build new sources of support. There's nothing like a band of flying monkeys coming at you to be the wakeup call that you need to switch up your game and find some new people. This may start in places like therapy, but lead you to cultivate friendships with folks who are separate from the narcissist and don't know them. And make sure you do have a safe space like therapy to talk about this, because the betrayal, grief, and confusion of a flying monkey attack can be overwhelming. Flying monkeys are a deeply painful situation. And flying monkey situations have destroyed families, ended friendships, and even harmed careers. And all of that on top of having to weather the narcissistic abuse. Many times, people will tell you when you talk about this idea of flying monkeys, "It's all in your head." Remember, it's a real phenomenon. So just hold on to your reality and watch your head and your back. And if any of you have some suggestions on how to manage flying monkeys that you've used that have worked for you, please drop them in the comments. I've only offered up five, but you may have techniques that I haven't thought of.
Let's talk about the victim bully. I know you've heard about it, but let's just really break it down. It's really going to help you understand narcissism a lot more clearly. And if any of you have really encountered that victim bully dynamic in your narcissistic relationship, drop it in the comments. But the fact is, if you have a narcissist in your life, I can already guarantee you, you have encountered this dynamic.
So the narcissist, we could actually almost call narcissism victim bully, but yeah, we call it narcissism. So the victim bully is one of the most classical dynamics in the narcissistic personality and in the narcissistic relationship. And like I said, I'm surprised I haven't talked about it. I think I've inserted itself here and there, but it's really important to understand this dynamic, the victim bully, accurately, because it also sheds a lot of light onto understanding the trauma bond.
Now, let me lay out a scenario for you in a rough way. So there's a big, bad, bullying, bossy narcissist, about raging around, yelling, demanding, being selfish, entitled, the basic, expectable stuff from a narcissist. People are kind of afraid of this person. They walk on eggshells. Everyone is is typically cutting the narcissistic bully a really wide berth. Finally, someone snaps. They don't even care about the narcissistic person's rage, and they snap back and they say, "You are such an a-hole. Just stop. You are such a jerk. You are ruining everybody's day around here. Nobody wants to be here anymore because of you. We just wish you would leave. You are such an awful person."
Okay, they say that to the narcissist. Then the narcissist does a Charlie Brown on you, head down, and they start in on, "Okay, I was just trying to do what people wanted. I spent the whole day. I spent the whole day trying to make sure I got you guys the right food and the right stuff. I was just trying to help everyone." And then they may lean into saying things like, "Oh God, you guys have always been out to get me. I am so good to everyone. Why do you always target me? Okay, if that's what you want, you want me to leave? Okay, I guess I'm gonna leave. If nobody wants me here." They may even walk away, right? "I know, I know you don't want me anymore. You just use me, right? So why don't you all just have a good time without me? And it's always seemed that, no, you just expect me to just bring all the stuff and do everything for y'all, but you have more fun when I'm not here. And honestly, none of you understand, understand me. None of you even want to understand me."
And then they sort of shamefully walk out of the room. And the whole thing is sort of sad and pathetic to watch, right? And then you, the empathic soul that you are, after seeing that, want to reach after them and say, "Listen, okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. All right, we don't need to do this anymore, right? I was so harsh." It's amazing how quickly you forget how ragey and awful they were just a few minutes ago. "No, I, I listen, I didn't mean to hurt you. You're just getting, you were getting rough on everyone, but we really, we, we want you to stay, okay?" And then they're going to mope a little while longer. And you try even harder to pull them in. And before you know it, the very bully all of you were scared and aggravated about a little while ago is the victim that you are now trying to soothe and appease and make sure everything's okay.
It's the ultimate sleight of hand, the switching of the masks, the shapeshifting move that they're so good at. It's the victim bully sequence. Narcissistic folks have this mastered to a magical art form. Vulnerable narcissists tend to be the ones that are the best at it, but every narcissist does it. It's what makes the trauma bond so traumatic.
Just when a person hits the breaking point with a narcissistic person, that the rage and all of the invalidation and the berating and the humiliation finally gets to a person and they take a stand against the narcissist, the narcissist is masterful at playing the sulking, petulant victim. And because most people stuck in narcissistic relationships tend to be pretty good, kind, compassionate, empathic people, they struggle with seeing the sort of the the consequences like that leave the narcissist looking so victimized and sad. And they recant and they find themselves trying to cheer up the victimized narcissist. Because people who've suffered narcissistic abuse are uncomfortable with that tension, with that conflict. It's a brilliant but sick maneuver by the narcissistic person. In one quick second, they are able to turn the tables from someone actually being really angry with them or upset about them to someone trying to appease them. In many cases, narcissistic people are so good at playing the victim that people tend to forget the bullying sequence that just happened and just focus their their energies on making sure that the narcissist is okay.
Another way that the victim bully sequence plays out is when you do call them out on their bad behavior. They try to play it off as a joke. You may say, "You know what? You just did or said, it was hurtful or it was wrong." And they will come back with, "Oh, come on, that was a joke. I was just joking. Can't you take a joke?" And if you push harder and say, "It's not really okay to make jokes at another person's expense, or that hurts them, and that it sort of felt abusive." That's when they'll start to become rageful. Because basically, at that point, you're kind of calling them out as a bit of a rotten, abusive person. And that inflames the whole shame rage spiral. At their deepest core, narcissistic people know that they're not nice people. And when that primal stuff gets stirred up, their claws come out. Trying to make it about being a joke, frankly, is gaslighting. And it puts them in the victim position of being, "Oh, so misunderstood. You didn't understand my joke."
The structural reason for this is because every narcissist has both the grandiose and the vulnerable elements encompassed within them. They're grandiose when stuff's going well, right? But when the grandiose stuff isn't working, stuff in their life isn't going their way, or they get called out, or they experience something that activates their shame, for example, someone calling out on their behavior, then the vulnerable narcissist comes out to play. And then the victimhood descends. The victim bully sequence confuses people. But once you recognize it as a strategy or a tactic by the narcissistic person, it makes more sense than seeing it as the narcissist being two different people. They are, in fact, one person, one very tactical, manipulative person.
Over time, this victim bully thing has worked, worked for them. Don't get me wrong. When they are hurt, and for them, hurt means ego injury, not necessarily hurt feelings, per se. But when something happens, something that makes them not look good to other people, or they feel that they aren't being adequately appreciated, it doesn't feel good for them. And that's when they slide immediately into the victimized, "woe is me" part. And of itself, isn't that interesting? Many of us, even not narcissists, can pretty easily fall into a victimized space when people are calling us out. The difference is that the narcissistic people have the bully piece alongside the victim piece. So the juxtaposition of the two is what is so striking. That they can go from being such jerks to being so victimized, just like that.
I am thinking of one situation I had observed. The guy was a whole class narcissist, arrogant, superficial, validation-seeking, insecure, angry, treated people around him horribly. At one point, the person he was dating, and because he was so insecure, he would waste lots of money on gifts, not just for her, but for everyone around him. Was notoriously big tipper, that kind of thing. Well, at one point, she was witnessing yet another of his rage festivals and yelling. He was yelling at various household employees and family members. But this time, his girlfriend, who wasn't very nice herself, she had had it with him. And it turns out that he had also just purchased a very expensive gift for her. He gave her the day before. But because she was so exasperated with him, she left because she thought he was acting like such an awful person.
After she left, he became an instant victim. He couldn't believe that nobody could appreciate him. He took such good care of everyone. He buys everyone so much gifts. He spent so much on her. So now his narrative was that she was just using him. And then he slumped into a deflated balloon. He cried. He told her he missed her, and that people have always left him, and he would buy her anything she wanted. And you know, nobody likes him. And he knows, knows the only reason anyone likes him is because he spends money. Who knows if she came back to him because of the gift, or because of him? She claimed she came back to him because she felt so bad for him because he was so pathetic, and she felt guilty, like she was to blame. And as far as I know, I don't have contact with these people anymore. The cycle still continues between these two. They are caught in their trauma-bonded dance. He vacillates between bullying, and then when people call him out, becoming the victim. And anytime she finds her strength to leave his victimhood, and I'm guessing the rather expensive gifts that he purchases, pull her back in. This was a toxic dance wrapped in a transactional mess, narcissistic relationship.
The victim bully is every narcissist ever. We see it all the time. For example, when idiot celebrities tweet or post stupid, thoughtless opinions on social media without thinking about who they would hurt or how insensitive the comment would be. And folks, this is on all sides of the political spectrum, right, left, and everybody in between. I think maybe normal people do this too, but when normal people do it, nobody cares. But then the celebrity gets called out, and then it's a whole victimized, "Oh, okay, I know I want, I wasn't thinking, I was misunderstood. It's so hard to be a celebrity. I'm shutting down my social media because I'm so misunderstood," blah, blah, blah. It's the same thing. Celebrities and politicians with their enormous platforms and egos can be bullies, and then they immediately behave like victims when they get called out for behaving so badly.
The main reason narcissistic people get away with stuff, it's actually quite interesting. We understand, frankly, that three-year-old children need consequences for their behavior. If they mouth off, they get a consequence. They don't tidy up their toys, maybe they get a consequence. If they throw their food, a consequence. Hit their sibling, consequence. Don't clean up their cubby at school, consequence. But adult narcissists, no consequences. The victim play, that's their response to a consequence. We, we hold them accountable. Narcissists, every so often, we hold them accountable, and then they immediately become a victim. And all of us fall for it. "Oh, poor sad narcissist." But really, bullies don't like consequences. If consequences are good enough for a three-year-old, then they are good enough for a 43-year-old. So when you feel pulled to rescue the victimized bully, stop yourself and recognize that they're just a three-year-old that's pissed off about time out. It makes it a lot easier to try to not get in there and appease them. And remember, the narcissist isn't two people. They are just one well-oiled manipulation machine.
Let's take on this issue of devaluing and discarding. The classical narcissistic fairy tale starts with idealization, and then moves on to devaluation, and then discarding. Everyone thinks it won't happen to them, and yet, without exception, the story goes down the same way every time. To feel thrown away by another person is an awful experience, but yet it is sort of a universal part of the narcissistic relationship. So let's start by taking a look at the narcissistic relationship cycle.
In most cases, not all, not all by any means, but many, most, the idealization often takes the form of love bombing, which is another video in this series. So love bombing or idealization lasts just long enough to get you stuck in this relationship dynamic. Just when you exhale and believe in the fairy tale, then bam, that's when the devaluation phase starts. Devaluation can start slow. It's when the little criticisms begin, when you start experiencing the contempt, when the gifts and the big nights out go away, when the narcissist's phone becomes much more interesting than you sitting in front of them, and when the sideways comments like, "I don't know, like, are you really going to wear that?" and other comments of that ilk start to creep into the relationship. It can be a real time of intense confusion in the relationship, because you can't figure out when the love bombing ended and when the contempt began. All you know is it's though the weather changed. It went from being very warm to very cold, kind of quickly.
The devaluing phase tends to happen just as you start to feel more settled into the relationship as a real relationship. You may have actually been resisting the relationship for a while, and you might have even have been savvy enough to think, "Hmm, this love bombing is a little bit too good to be true. I'm not going to be played." And then just when you settled in, when you felt like it was a real and whole relationship, that is when the devaluation begins. The reason for this sort of shift, it's a bit nuanced, but it largely happens because at the deepest deep, a narcissist's self-loathing is actually so deep and so unprocessed that just as someone does see the good in them, it's as though it activates their self-contempt, which they then project onto you. And then, voila, devaluation. It's as though they project their devaluation of themselves onto you.
Now, devaluation can last for months, years, and even decades. It becomes, before you know it, it's sort of a new normal. Your life tends to be punctuated by insults and by invalidation. The discard is just what it sounds like. Discarding is honestly like throwing out the trash. It's like they're done with you now. Sometimes discarding never really truly happens. You may just kind of get stuck in the purgatory of devaluation forever. But discarding happens when they cast you aside. And it, this is almost like discarding is like, it can be really cold. And you can actually have a narcissistic relationship that keeps happening even when you've been discarded.
So, for example, your narcissist may have an affair, an extra-marital affair, just cheat on you. So you were, in essence, discarded, but you still stay in the relationship. Or they may take a job or take advantage of an opportunity that doesn't take you into consideration. So either you have to leave your life behind to join them, or be left behind. So they're just kind of doing what works for them. The discarding is often motivated for the narcissist from a place of both contempt and of boredom. Basically, your narcissistic supply has become quite stale, and narcissists tend to be very novelty-seeking. So it all depends on your story.
No matter what, it feels awful to be discarded from a relationship that you actually believe that you're in. Many narcissists expect you, often, to do the dirty work and end the relationship so they can turn around and say, "H, she was the one who left me. He was the one who filed for divorce. She moved out and walked out on me and the kids. Uh, he walked away from his family." When that happens, they get to look good to the world. And since the narcissist is often going to turn around and tell the world a false story, then you look like the one who is unfeeling, or unkind, or willing to walk away from something, which doesn't feel good.
Now, the mistakes that people most often make during the devaluation and the discarding phase is to ask that killer question: "Why?" During the devaluation phase, they're going to gaslight you and deny that they are devaluing you. And in fact, they may turn around and call you paranoid, or hypersensitive, or crazy. Now, during the discarding phase, if you try to make them accountable for their behavior again, you're going to run into more gaslighting.
Now, people want to make sense of this process. So asking why is understandable. But there's really no sense to be made of it because the narcissist isn't going to cop to it. The narcissist isn't going to turn around and say, "Yeah, I'm not capable of making healthy attachments, and I'm deeply insecure, and I have contempt for intimacy, so I am actually, yeah, I'm rejecting you, and I'm treating you badly to see and test my hypothesis that you will observe my insecurity and that you will leave me, and my fantasy is that's the case, and then let's see if that comes true." No, they are not going to say that to you, even though that's the dynamic that's likely unfolding. So asking them for an explanation is likely to bring more harm than good because they themselves aren't in touch with what's happening.
Now, the devaluing and discarding cycles happen in families as well. In general, if you weren't just blindly going along with a narcissist's agenda, then they often think that you are against them. And in a family, this can happen when you just don't go along with the program with what the narcissistic parent, or sibling, or aunt, or grandparent want. Your family members, the family members will find out that if you, or they learn that if you appease the narcissistic family member, then you will be able to keep them calm and stay in their good graces. And this can be particularly profound if the narcissist has some kind of power, so for example, the money that they may use to control family members. So if you do lay down some real boundaries, that's when often in a family, the devaluation and discarding cycle can begin.
Now, for scapegoats in a family system, the discard and devaluation cycle is an eternal part of the scapegoat's role in the family system. They're constantly being devalued, constantly being devalued. And if the scapegoat tries to set a boundary, boom, they'll be discarded.
Now, devaluing and discarding can also absolutely take place in workplace settings. And in those cases, it's in which narcissistic bosses and narcissistic managers and leaders devalue the people that they think aren't their team players. Basically, these are the people who are not the yes men or the yes women. And then ultimately, they may make life so miserable for the people who don't just sign on with whatever twisted agenda they have, that those people actually end up leaving or may get fired.
Now, the devaluation and discarding cycle is, sadly enough, often followed by hoovering. That's why it's a dysfunctional cycle. Some people get so disgusted by the discarding cycle that they do ultimately leave. But it's not unusual for that insecure narcissist who wants to keep control to try to Hoover them back. Now, if you fall for it and allow yourself to be sucked in, that whole cycle is going to begin again: idealization, devaluation, and discarding. It's just sort of this eternal cycle that's really only going to end if you're the one who's going to be courageous enough to break it. And it can really be quite addictive. Lots of people confuse the excitement of hoovering and idealization with love. It's really not. It's abuse. And therapy becomes a key tool to at least start thinking about how to end the confusion and the conflation that love and abusive relationship cycles are the same thing.
Now, narcissists devalue and discard for many of the reasons mentioned, but also because they devalue intimacy, and because they have very limited empathy. They don't really care how these cycles are hurting you or impacting you. They just do it without thinking. And in some ways, the chaos, it feels comfortable for them. They don't have any regard for how it hurts you, but they do kind of like the excitement and the roller coaster nature of this cycle.
Now, these toxic cycles take a tremendous toll on the people who get stuck in them. Basically, this turns relationships into roller coasters and almost like addictive cycles. And these can often perpetuate early childhood patterns you may have had around rejection. In some ways, these toxic cycles keep their relationship exciting for the narcissist, and it's very easy to get sucked into their vortex and cycle. And for some people, this cycle strangely enough becomes sort of a reenactment of trying to win over their unwinnable parent in childhood. It almost feels familiar to be rejected, and it can feel exciting when you are hoovered back in and idealized for a minute. And in that moment, you're almost taken back to childhood where you feel like, "I've won that parent over." But then when the devaluing and discard cycles happen, and it's inevitable that they will, sadly, those cycles feel familiar too, and your ancient script of feeling like you're not enough gets activated again.
Now, some people allow these devaluation and discarding cycles to happen because they'll often buy into the narcissist's narrative about how difficult their lives were. And the narcissist's lives may very well have been quite difficult. The narcissist will often share a story about having never seeing love when they were growing up, and that it was so terrible for them. And you endure the narcissist's cycle because you believe it's the loving thing to do, that maybe you're going to correct it for the narcissist. And it's not allowing yourself to be harmed in the name of love. Is that love? Their tale of woe or abuse or trauma, it may be very, very true. They may have actually had a very rough childhood. And it is, you're sorry about that, but it's not your responsibility. It's not your responsibility. You can't change their history. And remaining there as an object that at times they value, but more often reject, is not only not doing the narcissist any favors, it's taking a tremendous toll on your mental and physical health. There are no winners here.
Now, being discarded is an awful feeling. It can raise tremendous triggers around abandonment and rejection. And lots of people will fight for the relationship at that point. They want to maintain that fantasy of the happy relationship or the happy family. The fact is, in some ways, we are really stubborn creatures, we human beings. And we fight for those things we can't have. We get stuck on the things we can't have. And things often become much more interesting when they're slipping away, or we're just not allowed to have them. We're all the kids who want the thing in the cookie jar. And don't fall for that trick.
If you have been devalued and then you're being discarded, receive it, believe it or not, as a gift. I know that sounds paradoxical, but it's a chance to get away from a relationship that is likely making you sick. But to do that, you have to value yourself first. And that requires a deeper dive into where those scripts about self-devaluation come from and flipping yourself over into a space of self-compassion.
Keep in mind that self-compassion is like Kryptonite against the charms of the narcissist. Once you have self-compassion, honestly, the narcissist is rendered powerless, and you can finally walk away. It's interesting to think that in a discard and a devalue cycle, that you could actually get that kind of power. You often feel like you're stuck at the whims of the narcissist, when they will devalue you, when they will discard you, whether that's a partner, family member, or even a boss. But the fact of the matter is, ultimately, believe it or not, in these cycles, you have a lot more power than you think, in the form of self-compassion.
Self-compassion not only allows you to say, "Yeah, no, I'm not doing this cycle. I see what it is. It's not good for me," and allow you to step, allow you to step away. But self-compassion also allows you to feel compassion for the other. And as difficult and challenging as these narcissistic relationships are, as I said many times, narcissistic individuals have had very difficult backstories. In fact, it's what explains a lot of their personality and why it's organized the way it is. There is no need for you to engage in those kinds of toxic cycles. You don't have to devalue and discard. From a place of self-compassion, you can also let them go from a place of compassion and in your heart, hope that maybe they can go and get the help they need to grow into a healthier future. However, that's not your job. Self-preservation is a right. And if you're going to preserve yourself in these cycles, you've got to exercise that right and break the devaluation and discard cycle.
Thank you again for tuning in. I hope this video helped you understand the theme, the terms devaluation, and more importantly, discarding, which are very much a part of the narcissistic relationship cycle. As always, if you like this content, I just ask that you hit the bell, subscribe to this channel. Not only will you get notifications about the rest of this series, but all of our future series and the weekly content we put out 52 weeks a year. So thanks again for tuning into this series and look forward to seeing you on the next episode.