Surviving with Narcissists

Many people that we encounter daily in our life can be narcissists and without having a proper understanding of their behavior, we can become an easy target for them. As a famous saying says, “Prevention is better than cure”, it is always better to understand the people around you so that you would know better to handle the situations when you are with difficult people with Narcissistic traits. This article is purely to educate and give a point of view to the readers and not to self-diagnose people.

The most common traits of Narcissists can be listed below.

• Insecurity
• Lack of empathy
• Grandiosity
• Entitlement
• Gaslighting
• Superficiality
• Admiration and validation seeking
• Hypersensitivity, rage and a tendency to manipulate and exploit people

Narcissists are deeply insecure people. Due to their massive insecurities, they want to hide them from the world. Hence, they often use grandiosity, entitlement, and arrogance as methods of covering up. Moreover, they do not care about how much they affect other people. Also, they rule over people and are very paranoid of others.

As much as it may sound surprising to you, the Narcissists tend to be very charming and charismatic. It is the perfect way to shield themselves without letting others see the deep-lying insecurity issues of narcissism. It is genuinely a concerning point because people around them tend to attract and believe the narcissist due to the enchanting personality. Since the closest around the narcissists become a victim unknowingly, this is known as manipulating behavior.

“We are not flocking to narcissism because we love emotional coldness or invalidation or shallow people. We are drawn in because narcissism is seductive, I call it the three C’s of narcissism.

• Charm
• Charisma
• Confidence

-Dr.Ramani Durvasula[1]

It is greatly difficult to deal with narcissists when you cannot necessarily walk away from them. Few tips to follow to avoid confrontational situations explained in detail below.

• Radical Acceptance.

As much as astonishing it may sound, the self-reflective capacity is almost non-existent with a narcissist; they would not understand how their behavior would impact others around them. Therefore, you must embrace the fact that the personality pattern of a narcissistic person will never change no matter what. Your approach to such persons and your expectations must be realistic and you need to re-evaluate your thought process in any confrontational situations with a narcissist.

“Narcissists are made, not born.”

• Recognizing how to manage the situation.

It is advised by professionals for people who deal with narcissists to follow the DEEP technique.

As much as you want to defend yourself, it is better not to engage in a conversation with a narcissist to explain your side. Follow the complete opposite to disengage from that situation and the toxic conversations. It is best to follow the Gray Rock Method. This method is to be extremely inert with a situation with a narcissist so that the narcissist would not have anything to feed off in the situation. You would have to expect the narcissistic person to get angry at you when you use the gray rock technique simply because they are looking for a fight with you.

“The Gray Rock Method is a way to communicate with an abusive/manipulative/gaslighting person that focuses on disengagement.”

Make sure if you encounter a narcissist, never fuel their ego with Narcissistic Supply: attention, energy (both positive and negative), validation, or with arguments because Narcissists love to win fights. In the case of more than several people dealing with a narcissist, the narcissist tends to lose interest in the person who would disengage with them, which results in the narcissist moving along to the next person they can bicker. Additionally, you must be mindful when sharing your personal information. Especially sharing about the good and bad things that happened to you with them. They might mock you for the good things that happened to you and would utterly criticize bad things that happened to you.

The above techniques mentioned are solely for protecting oneself from a Narcissist. Professionals suggest that you never use the above methods to get along with a narcissist because you cannot. A narcissist would often believe that they are always right and have no insight about how wrong they could ever be. Containing a toxic and harmful thought process of a narcissist will result in more emotional damage for you. Hence, do not perform aforesaid to get along with a narcissist.

“Narcissistic Patterns are difficult to break.”

• Set Boundaries

Setting and strictly sticking to boundaries would help you to build lesser engagement with them. The less connection you have with them, the better peace of mind you will receive. Never let the narcissist tamper with the peacefulness of your life.

To sum up, about surviving with narcissists, it is up to the person who deals with the narcissist, on how to wisely handle the situation despite how difficult it can be. Smartly following suitable techniques and professional support would immensely help to keep up the mental health.

“No matter how hard the past you can always begin.” — The Buddha

Written by: Rtr. Imesha Ilangasinghe

Edited by: Rtr. Loshini Gnanasambanthan

References