Why is it the narcissist can never see your point of view?
A narcissist uses lots of different manipulation methods to keep your mind confused, from all the gaslighting, pity plays, silent treatments, projecting, blame-shifting, then offering that intermittent play nice idealisation stage, to have your mind believing they are genuine, they want you to think it’s all you, so you start blaming yourself, no matter what choices you made, No one deserves to be abused in any way shape or form, No One, you did not cause it, you can not change them, and no matter what you do, you can not control it, all you can do is walk free and heal.
Whilst in the relationship, you might have had questions like, “What’s just happened, what’s that all about, why are they so angry over nothing? Why are they not talking? What have I done this time? Where have they gone? What did I do? How can I get them to talk to me? What’s the matter with them now?”
As they switch from Idealising and love bombing you to raging in anger at you or completely ignoring you, with their blame-shifting, this can cause cognitive dissonance within our minds, where our beliefs no longer match our whole realities as we are living in two different realities with them, theirs that they do their best to manipulate onto us into believing and the truth, they will tell us an orange is an apple, and when we stick with it’s an apple they will say, your wrong, that you shouldn’t listen to others only them, if you stick with your reality, they’ll ask why you don’t trust them, if that doesn’t work they’ll do their best to make you think you’ve gone crazy. Sometimes with all their conversation manipulation, the truth is extremely hard to see, as we love and care for them. With the help of their pity plays, we try and try again to help them and make it work, not understanding it’s actually us that needs the help. We need to save ourselves from them.
After the relationship, it might be questions of. “Who are they? Why will they not just leave me alone?” “What did I do to deserve this.” No one deserves to be treated that way; you did nothing to deserve it.
Because of our emotional attachment to them, it Hurts all the more, as our logical thinking regarding them is usually attached to our emotional thinking. With their manipulation of us, it keeps us in the dark.
Understanding a narcissist’s toxic logic may help you distance your emotional attachment to them.
It gives more awareness of why they say and do the things they do. It gives you a deeper understanding of why they acted certain ways towards you, why they provoked you and responded in certain ways to you, that most people not on the narcissistic personality disorder spectrum wouldn’t do. Give you the reality back of what really happened so that you can move forward with your life.
When you make the narcissist breakfast, that they’ve been guilt-tripping you throughout the night before, yet when they come down, they take on a bite and throw the plate to the floor. They sulk off upstairs, and you’ve no clue what’s wrong, then when they come down a little later, like nothing ever happened, with no apology.
From your perspective, you cooked them a lovely breakfast, then had to clean up a lovely mess. From the narcissist’s perspective, you criticised them the night before by not agreeing to their demands. Therefore they awoke grumpily and chose the fact you hadn’t cooked their sausages just how they like them, cut their sausage the right way, brought them the wrong make of sausage, to throw the plate on the floor, or perhaps as you were supposed to be going out for the day with family, or doing something the narcissist doesn’t want to do like heading off to a Special Occasion, as they’ll feel like they’ll not be the centre of attention, they’ll be going all out to project their negative state of mind into you, send your mind all over before you head out of the door, and some do and will start their games in advance.
Of course, once they’ve brought you down, they will then turn the tables and ask what is wrong with you, often with a bit of a smirk on their face as they feel contempt that they’ve pulled you down, that you’ll not enjoy it and now they can, once you’re all over the place thinking about what’s happening, you become more puzzled and full of questions, often daring not ask for fear of reactions, from the last time you tried to explain or defend your intentions, thoughts, feelings or opinions to them, especially now the narcissist is seemingly all happy with everyone else, yet cold towards you, they might suddenly try to tickle, hug or say something nice to you, which you possibly react because of the morning’s events, yet to friends, the narcissist looks in a happy, playful mood. You look grumpy, meaning the next time the narcissist sees them without you, the narcissist can smear about just how miserable you were that day. They might even say in front of others something that’s humiliating to you, in a joking way that others don’t understand, and they tell you,” I’m only joking.” to see how far they can push you.
You’re on a day out with all the children, yet you have no money to purchase lunch as you loaned it to the narcissist, who’s promised to give it to you back on the day so that you can buy everyone’s including their lunch.
Yet you wait and wait and wait and nothing, you don’t have extra to buy lunch, yet the narcissist walks into the chip shop and starts ordering food, then looks at you to pay, when you then have to ask them for the cash, they throw the money on the floor and storm out, whilst you, the children and the staff, look bewildered, you purchase lunch for everyone after picking up the money. Then go find the narcissist with their lunch in hand. When you do find them, they throw theirs in the bin, give you the silent treatment and become the life and soul with the children, leaving you once again, hurt and confused, whilst the narcissist is the centre of attention. Why do they do this? First, they didn’t want to go out, even if it was their idea, second they felt criticised in the chip shop, believing you belittled them, in front of others, as they feel entitled to have what they want when they want, rules don’t apply to them. However, unspoken rules apply to you.
If narcissist got a reaction from you when they threw the food on the floor or the money, whatever it was, they did. Then they got a reaction by storming off, you and the children chasing after them. This gives them the attention they believe they deserve after you criticised them, it feeds their ego a little more, so heals them from the criticism enough to play happy parent getting positive emotions from the children, yet not enough to be nice to you, in their mind, you need to be punished. So you can be the one remembered as grumpy that day, and the children will forget about their actions.
When you don’t understand what’s happening, yet when you understand how a narcissist thinks, your reality becomes clear on so many past events.
A narcissist logic isn’t the same as others logic, how a narcissist thinks isn’t the same, they have different beliefs. Their cognitive distortions often mean everything is black and white to the narcissist, no middle ground, no grey. It’s their way, or you get punished way, but you have to work out what their way is when their logic is completely different to yours.
Black and white thinking. A narcissist has no grey area. To them, it’s either good or bad. There is no room for mistakes or errors in judgment; to them, it is all or nothing. They can only see things as either good or bad, as they themselves must be perfect, they place all blame onto others for situations or problems they might have caused, without cognitive reflection, they can not look back to see what might have led up to a bad situation and without empathy they can not see how someone else might be feeling, most have cognitive empathy so they can think how they feel, yet, can simply not put themselves into someone else’s shoes, to feel or care how they are making someone feel.
This is why most will Project all their failures and faults onto others, as to them they are entitled. They are superior, any mistakes made or any achievements missed, they will place that blame onto someone else. Being around this on a continued basis leaves us feeling like we are at fault, as all the projection is slowly drip-fed into our minds, also why we are somewhat too forgiving as we can see the good in them, often with all the blame-shifting when the bad comes out, we are led to believe this to be our fault, it is never your fault.
Always being right, as a narcissist is also most likely lacking in Cognitive Reflection skills, meaning once they’ve made their truth up, they can not look back and reflect. They’ve made their minds up that they are correct and all others are wrong. Narcissistic people continuously try to prove others wrong with various manipulation tactics. To a narcissist who always believes they are right, being wrong is unimaginable for them. They just can not and do not get it. They will go to extreme lengths just to prove they are right. Why there is simply no point explaining yourself or arguing with a narcissist, they simply can not and will not see your point of view.
Being right to them is more important than others feelings, that with their lack of Empathy, means for us going against what a narcissists truth is, can lead to devastating consequences for us, sometimes why when they are Gaslighting us they do it so well, as to them it is their reality and their truth, and they shall not be swayed. To most narcissistic people, “They didn’t say that.” And “That never happened.” To them, “You are being sensitive.” And “You are the one going crazy.” In their eyes and minds, it’s their truth, often why their Smear Campaigns are also done with such truth-telling lies. Yet because you are open to opinions and ideas, you can understand people make mistakes, their gaslighting then makes you question yourself, blame yourself, and as you care, you then forgive them for their wrongdoings, why when you are walking on Eggshells doing as they please they can treat you so well. You then start to blame yourself all the more when they start to miss treating you, as reality is showing you how good they can treat you. Yet, the reality is also showing you just how wrong they treat you, however when you question them over something that you believe them to be wrong about. They think they are right. They will go to great extremes to prove themselves right and prove you wrong—causing that Cognitive Dissonance within your mind over the mismatch of realities and beliefs that you are now living under the narcissist’s spell.
Their logic is.
They have to have the attention they want when they want. If they can not have positive attention, they will set the environment to bait you into defending or explaining yourself to them, not because they want to understand you, because they want to get you going to feel better about themselves.
They feel entitled to have everything their way. If it’s not going their way, they’re going to make damned sure it’s not going yours.
They are preoccupied with their ideal. Anything less than they believe is your fault, so they don’t see themselves at fault. They project that by shifting the blame over to you.
They have to be in full control of everything and everyone. If they can not be admired and adored by you, they take back control by playing on your emotions to pull you down.
They lie that much. Most believe in their own lies.
They lack empathy to care for those they hurt, often believing they hurt themselves by not conforming to their games.
Special treatment and excessive attention are everything to the negative or positive. They need others attention to cover up their own deeply hidden insecurities.
They believe they are special, that they are above all others, and their needs should be met first and foremost.
They are self-entitled and believe they are allowed to do what they want whenever they want. Rules do not apply to them.
If you do exactly what they want, when they want exactly how they want, they will treat you well. It’s your job to work out what they want and how they want it.
If you don’t get it right the first time, you are wrong, and they believe you need to be punished.
They have shame, and to remove this, they pass the blame. To them, it’s your fault you confused, hurt. There is little to no guilt or remorse. They will twist it onto you so they do not feel the shame.
Anyone who demands anything from them or is deemed to them as controlling is unacceptable, as they are the ones to be in control of all others
They do not care for others feelings or truly understand them, only their own.
Anyone who criticised them blocks them from getting what they want is against them and should be punished.
They do not care for others boundaries; these are a challenge to be broken down.
Their thinking is toxic, as it means they use and abuse all those around them to meet their own needs, without any guilt, they manipulate through pity plays, gaslighting and fear, they blame shift as to them it’s all your fault anyway.
They do not want to see your point of view unless it’s meeting a need of their own.
They lack cognitive reflection, they don’t look back to see the errors they made, so they lack the remorse to care for those they hurt.
They simply do not care for anyone other than themselves.
No contact, Grey rock and no reaction is key to breaking free, getting them to leave you alone and finding your own inner happiness again.
Cognitive distortions.
What can you do?
- Set firm boundaries and no longer allow them to cross them.
- No contact with any family member.
- Block and delete them all.
- Take care of your emotional well being, let anger, frustration, resentment, anxiety out safely.
- Call authorities if needed and get a picture of their toxic behaviour built up over time.
- Don’t overthink what they might do.
- When they come at you, don’t react or ask, “Why me?” Get some rest, clear your emotions, then ask. “What can I do about this?” If you can take any safe action against their games, do so.
- Remember you are not the problem, try to stay out of their way, give them a wide birth, focus on your life.
There are plenty of people out there that do understand, join support groups, and don’t be afraid to ask anything, and they will be able to help you understand and recover onto a much happier, fulfilling life.
Stop explaining.
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Elizabeth Shaw is not a Doctor or a therapist. She is a mother of five, a blogger, a survivor of narcissistic abuse, and a life coach, She always recommends you get the support you feel comfortable and happy with. Finding the right support for you. Elizabeth has partnered with BetterHelp (Sponsored.) where you will be matched with a licensed councillor, who specialises in recovery from this kind of abuse.
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