If people don't want to hear what you have to say, it is normal for you to not want to hear what they have to say either. Comes with a discussion on narcissism

 

I asked Google Search and Google AI this question: "If people don't want to hear what you have to say, is it normal for you to not want to hear what they have to say?"

The answer to that is "absolutely". 

What that link reveals:
* Your brain tends to perceive some form of "rejection" from people who do not want to hear what you have to say. 
* Emotional distance starts to happen. Unless establishment of "caring about the other's views and feelings" has been established in most other conversations, you will start to distance yourself from that person. In other words, disagreements have to be rarer than agreements, otherwise you will not feel connected or understood. 
* If there is a chronic inability to listen to you, people start to distrust others who do not listen to them. 
* Respect for the person who will not listen to you begins to fade and can create "a fading away" of the relationship as well. 

The result is:
   Listening has to be a two-way street in order to maintain a relationship. Otherwise, the person who is not heard will seek other relationships where they are more seen and heard than in the relationship where their opinions, thoughts and feelings don't matter. 

Narcissists do not understand this principle because they rarely listen to others, or they "listen and distort". Everything is filtered according to whether the other person is providing the right kind of narcissistic supply they crave, and whether the other person can be "thought-controlled" by the narcissist. 

They also consider their voice, their opinions, and their viewpoint to be the most important in any relationship. - that link says they look at what they have to say as "the law". Once a narcissist thinks they know you, conversations become one-sided (they dominate the conversation). They invalidate - differing opinions and insights are not considered, and they deem them wrong, irrational and disrespectful of them. They maintain rigid, harsh opinions and try to condition you to be quiet or to remain quiet when they are opinionating, making decisions for you or the two of you, deciding how to narrate their dominant position over you.  They also condition you to be quiet lest they rage, create a conflict, or dismiss you over your difference of opinion. 

That link about trying to "thought-control" others is interesting. It basically says that they test new sources of narcissistic supply by:
* testing if you'll agree with them 
* to see if you put up boundaries (i.e. how much you'll stand up for yourself)
* to see if you'll follow their demands
* to see if you'll question their behavior (to see how much "bad behavior" that they can get away with)

It also talks about what kind of narcissistic supply they want:
* easy targets that will not argue, not question them and their motives, and who will easily "give in"
* targets that will tend to flatter them and tell them what they want to hear 
* targets that will change their feelings, opinions and thoughts to adopt theirs
* targets who have exceptionally poor boundaries where the narcissist can "take over", "call the shots" (i.e. control), "make the decisions in your relationship" (i.e. dominate you) and "achieve more and more power" (i.e. watch you cave into every single one of their demands ... eventually - they keep testing how far you'll go without push-back) 

But since this requires them not listening to you or caring what you are going through (and they really do not care), the relationship tends to have a "point of no return", because at some point the defenses you experience, "turning off their voice when they speak", having trauma symptoms when they push you to perform for them, not respecting your boundaries (almost no narcissists respect the boundaries of others), becomes a brain issue for you. 

What happens to your brain is the beginning of PTSD symptoms, and it is the main reason why people stop listening to a narcissist, distance themselves from a narcissist, and leave narcissists. 

Also being in one-sided conversations where you are not listened to, not heard, not understood, and where the other person is pushing their agenda on you is exhausting. 

If you get a headache, stomach ache, feel tense and anxious, feel like your mind is drifting away from what they are saying or only absorbing parts of what they are saying, those are the beginning signs of PTSD. Feeling sad can also be part of these symptoms, though there are better remedies for sadness than for these other symptoms. 

Here is a bit more on narcissists' strong tendency to listen and distort:

* Narcissists do not listen to understand; they listen through the filter of their ego.
* When you speak, they selectively absorb only what validates or threatens their inflated viewpoints, intelligence, opinions, views and feelings on subjects, and their self-image. They often twist your words to validate their own perspectives or angles or to rewrite reality. They often sound like politicians with an agenda to win arguments, or to win validation of their own views. 
* Most narcissists operate with ego-filtered listening. They briefly listen to the facts you are presenting or your feelings, but they don't listen long enough; they try to find an angle, often interrupting and treating your words as an attack or personal criticism (narcissists rage when they feel criticized). They make it your fault that they don't listen to you, because they will take any disagreement of facts as an attack on their self esteem and feelings of grandiosity and control. In other words, they react emotionally when you present facts that differ from your theirs. And emotions from narcissists tend to be highly dysregulated. 
* They indulge in "defensive editing": they find instant ways to edit what you said so that it aligns with their narrative (even if it is not what you said), or they take the opposite tack and edit your agenda so that they can villainize you. They often try to make a disagreement into an accusation about your character.
   "You are crazy" is a common one. So is "You're too sensitive." So is "You're ungrateful for treating me this way" (over a disagreement of facts - keep that in mind). So is "You brought this upon yourself" if they try to punish you for disagreeing with them (punishments over disagreements are mostly reserved for malignant narcissists who can perceive any and all disagreements as a giant threat to their control over you, not just their ego). And note: the punishments can be severe. 
* If you express hurt, they hear it as an accusation. 
* They will almost always reframe what you are saying so that they can turn conversations into what they believe, or what they want to believe, or to attack your character. 
* They often use the DARVO tactic to get you to question your own memory of the conversation, and so that they can play the victim if your facts are too strong, if the argument has caused a rift between you, if they unsuccessfully "lost" an argument, if they've punished you too severely over a disagreement. 

Some of the reasons they do it:
* Exerting power, control and domination, and obtaining narcissistic supply is all that is important to them in relationships, and in any discourse. They are not happy unless they are managing and controlling other people, and getting away with distorting reality. If they feel any of this is slipping away and not advancing, they will make life very difficult for you and any other people who appear to "side with you". 
* Admitting fault shatters their feelings of superiority and omnipotence, that they are the "strong leader" who can divide and conquer people, that they are the smartest person in every room, that they can manipulate any person with ease, that they can crash through any boundary (and for malignant narcissists, any legal boundary), that they can do things that most people can't do and that they deserve much more admiration and special treatment than other people do. 
   Seeing hypocrisy and entitlement in their actions is not acceptable to them: they play the victim, deflect, respond with hot or cold rages, or attempt to rationalize and make excuses for their behavior. 
* In distorting reality, and trying to keep you off-balance. They feel they must maintain control over you by getting you on the defensive all of the time, trying to prove your point to deaf ears. 
* For a narcissist, conversations are about "winning". In other words they see conversations as competitions with only one outcome: they are always right, and you're only right if you agree with them or coddle their distorted beliefs and attempts to distort reality. Otherwise, you are viewed as the enemy who is always wrong. For them conversations are a zero-sum game with only one outcome, and only one winner, them. And if they feel that they won't win, they will have a fit and resort to some form of attacks, emotional outbursts, or playing the victim.
 

MORE WARNINGS

With malignant narcissists (also commonly referred as dark triads), they dis-respect your words, character and autonomy of making your own decisions about anything in your own life, and if you decide to exercise your freedom to counter their distortions, most of them don't even respect the sanctity of your body, your belongings, your privacy, your home - any boundary at all. 

What this means:

* Your body: They believe your body is exploitable, either for pushing and bossing around, for mishandling, unwelcome touching, sex at their command, physical punishments (domestic violence and/or physical manifestations of child abuse), threats of bodily harm, death threats. They also don't care about your body and health unless not caring is obvious to others, and unless their reputation takes a hit from not caring. 
* Your belongings: a lot of malignant narcissists destroy your belongings, throw things away that are important to you, or sell them, or steal them.  
* Your privacy: Most malignant narcissists do not feel you have a right to privacy. What that link reveals is that they really do believe that they own you, that they do not see you as a separate person, that you are like an employee or slave, and they are the boss or slave master. Whether they believe they are the boss or slave master has to do with whether they reward you for doing what they want. If they reward you, they see themselves as your boss, if they don't, they see you themselves as your slave master.
* Your home: malignant narcissists do not believe in the sanctity and protection of your home from them. They see it as another boundary to crash, or another challenge that they will see if they can invade. As far as they are concerned, your home is a boundary to overrun, to enter, to control and disrupt. They believe your home is their home because they feel they deserve it in their distorted perception that they are so superior that they have a right to be in it, or own property that is not theirs. This is true even when they cry like a baby if they experience a home invasion themselves. 

Malignant narcissists push, and push, and push you to adopt their perspectives or threaten you that you will be put on their enemies list. The pressures to get you to give into them can be endless.

You can see why therapists would never suggest you stay in a relationship with a malignant narcissist. There is too much danger of quick and devastating escalations of abuse, and since malignant narcissists are usually sadists, you won't survive very well in any relationship with one. Most people go to domestic violence centers to get help assessing the dangers, and for drawing up plans of escape. 

Things to remember: A lot of malignant narcissists are criminals. 

They also want to punish you if you disagree with them. What that link reveals:

* They want total control over every person and every situation.
* They view any boundary to their desires as a major threat. 
* They will never care about people they hurt; they will justify every invasion, every criminal offense, every law-breaking activity, even indulge in stalking or death threats if they feel it suits their agenda.
* They will use every arsenal at their disposal to weaken you, silence you, disenfranchise you, and to make you feel afraid of the consequences of "going against them" in any manner, even in opinions. Rage, intimidating others, planning revenges, fear-mongering, smear campaigns and sadism rule every malignant narcissist's thoughts.  

WHY EMOTIONAL DISTANCE HAPPENS
WHEN OTHERS REFUSE TO LISTEN TO YOU

What the sentence of the heading reveals in terms of this link: 

* Another person chronically not listening to you or silencing you makes you feel your safety is compromised (unless you have people in your life telling you that your voice is needed for a worthy cause). But still, you will not feel safe. People who do this often assume authority, that your visions, opinions, feelings, experiences, sense of safety and peace, and perhaps your very life do not matter (to them anyway). You will be able to tell if they are assuming authority because they will laugh at you, roll their eyes, or mock you when you talk. There will be a general atmosphere of bullying you, ordering you around, or smearing your reputation. 
* Talking to them seems exhausting, with little or no acknowledgement of your viewpoints or feelings. 
* Quiet resentment takes over. If they are putting you into a cycle of letting you talk, then not letting you talk, back to letting you talk, then not letting you talk, this puts the authority of "what will be talked about" totally in their hands, and never in yours. That's not a relationship; that's someone who is trying to have power over you, trying to control you and dominate you.
   If they assume authority over every narrative, and every conversation, and expect you to give into them, this also shows heavy traits of narcissism in this person.
   And warning: Punishing you by not letting you talk can turn into a scapegoating situation, where you will be targeted for the blame of "not keeping the peace".  However, keeping the peace does not mean silencing yourself about important matters. It can mean you are free to bring up these important matters with others instead.
   At any rate, you will probably not feel trusting or friendly with people who are not interested in what you have to say. This is normal.
   In my view, however, they deserve politeness (a mild short form of friendliness and acknowledgement), as all human beings do. 

If another person chronically does not want to hear what you have to say, and you are silenced a lot, and you are invalidated, you will probably experience the beginnings of PTSD or trauma symptoms. What that link reveals:

* The stress at the very least, will put your body through fight, flight or freeze reactions. The other person will be associated with giving you those symptoms as well. 
* You will feel hypervigilant before or during interactions with the person.
* You may feel numb, hopeless, dizzy or exhausted after talking to them.
* Your mind may wander off of the topic they bring up and you'll feel a sense of heightened anxiety, and you may even experience your own thoughts taking over instead. The sadistic narcissists will enjoy seeing this in you, so beware. 
* Physical symptoms like rapid heartbeat, stomach aches, and headaches may appear when around this person
* The brain views chronic silencing, especially of your feelings, as a threat to your survival. Even mild forms of "social outcasting" are generally viewed by the brain as "these people will not protect me and I'll be the first one sacrificed when the group is attacked" - it comes from our human past when people lived in tribes, and where relationships built on safety and trust in one another were a "must". 
   It may be beneficial not to become too attached to people who chronically refuse to listen to what you say, or who refuse to listen to important matters (such as your safety). If you are emotionally attached, you may find that your emotions and mind start detaching more and more, that you stop sharing, that your sense of trust and safety begin to lower, that your respect for the other person lessens, and your anxiety heightens. If this person dominates a group, finding your own group becomes important as "the alarms" in your mind that you are not safe with this person are real. 
* Over time, the chronic stress of being around such a person can effect everyday activities and mere chores, putting your mind in fight, flight and freeze reactions even when there is no one in your immediate environment who is silencing your voice or emotions. The mind also "re-lives" these kinds of adverse experiences in nightmares and in waking reality as well. Your mind is often called upon to review troublesome situations you are in. 
   People who want to control and dominate you, and do not care about you or your feelings count as a "troublesome situation". 

Solutions:
* If your symptoms seem to have a life of their own and you cannot control them, trauma therapy may be able to help. 
* Limiting or ending engagement with the person is always a road you can take too.
* Telling your story to others who show consistent care of your feelings and insights is better than talking to people who do not care about you. 
* Feel free to express yourself in other ways and with other people. It is not wise to keep talking to people who are not willing to listen, who are not willing to consider other people's points of view, or feelings, who assume authority over you or others even though you haven't given them permission to have authority, who don't care about you or others ... these people will never have your best interests at heart, and dare I say it, probably no one who disagrees with them. 

You have a right not to listen to them, even though, I bet, they will not like it, and insist that their voice, their desires, their way of looking at situations, their impetus to over-run you, shout your voice out of existence, over-dominate your voice is "their right". However, I doubt anyone's voice matters to them with this attitude, accept agreeing with them. 

This is to say that if it is "chronic", or over dire issues, it is more of a "them problem" than a "you problem". 

No one has the right to authorize a leadership position over you if you don't want it. You have a right to reject their leadership any time you want, and you are not a bad person for doing so. 

FOUND ON FACEBOOK:

The Pursuit of Power, Control and Domination in Narcissistic and Sociopathic Abusers: Their Be-all and End-all Agenda

As Psychologist Alexander Burgemeester states in the article, When the Narcissist Can't Control You Anymore, This Happens:

... A major component of narcissism is gaining control over others. This type of behavior is often a reaction to a childhood completely dominated by a narcissistic parent (or parents)- controlled in all aspects of his young life and not allowed to develop control over his own life.

Healthy parenting involves allowing children to learn where the boundaries lie, whereas narcissistic parenting involves the parent(s) establishing complete emotional control over their offspring.

The narcissist feels threatened when they lose control; they are afraid they will be exposed for who they really are, and they are petrified of losing their narcissistic supply.

They can’t bear this feeling, and to defend themselves against this gut-wrenching emotion, the narcissist will go into attack mode. These are the things you can expect when the narcissist can’t control you anymore.

Narcissistic People see other people in their environment as extensions of themselves. They are the center of the world- the controller, an idol to be adored and admired. In their mind, this makes it acceptable for them to control and abuse others. An expert in knowing best how things should turn out and how people should behave, the narcissist tries to control them ...

The pursuit of power, control and domination in relationships is the number one agenda for all abusers, most of whom tend to be narcissists and sociopaths. They simply cannot imagine any relationship empty of this huge desire. In fact, as they become closer to other people (who become part of their inner circle), this desire will begin to overwhelm them to the point where they will be hurting and manipulating others to fulfill this agenda. They feel they must have power, control and domination to feel emotionally regulated and calm. 

Emotional dysregulation for narcissists and sociopaths is usually in the form of rage. They try to make everyone they are in close personal relationships with feel that the demand or command behind the rage is reasonable, and that it is the only thing that will make them stop raging and hurting other people. There is no doubt that their rages are destructive, and some people around them capitulate to their demands to dampen the destruction. 

It tends to be one of two cycles: 

1. they rage, the other person capitulates to the demand, they become calm again for awhile until the next time they are having a fit about how much dominance they have, so they rage again, over, and over, and over, and over again in a cycle kind of way: rage, satisfaction, insecurity about their domination status, back to raging again to get their victim to capitulate to the demand-of-the-moment. .

2. the narcissist (or sociopath) rages, the other person backs off, the narcissist becomes more enraged because the person is backing off (the narcissist hopes that if they "up" the rage to a punishment in "blackmail style", that the other person will capitulate), but the other person becomes traumatized by the punishment which makes them back off more, which makes the narcissist or sociopath ever more  rage-ful and escalate the punishments because they aren't getting their way. Then some narcissists think that if they enact extreme forms of revenge, then that will get them their way. Many of their closest relationships will eventually end up looking like this. And in the meantime, their revenge fantasies can take over their entire lives.

Sometimes they feel that totally destroying the other person will result in emotional regulation and well-being for them, but most often it does not because paranoia can and does take over after every act of evil and destruction that they perpetrate, depending on what kind of narcissist or sociopath they are: Paranoia will be much more of a factor for narcissists and sociopaths who want to have some semblance of social standing, to be looked upon as pillars or prophets. Paranoia is less of a factor for sociopaths who are grifters, loners, who do not have a reputation to upkeep or maintain (and instead their reputation is built more upon how clever they are in breaking societal norms, fooling you and others, and getting away with it all). The latter can be much more dangerous than the former for this reason.

However, trying to reach a stage of emotional regulation and equilibrium that pleases them does not necessarily have to have rage as a precursor. For instance, they are quite capable of emotional regulation in public: with bosses, with their friends, with some of their colleagues, with certain family members who they have deemed to be totally on their side. They can even be criticized to some extent in their line of work without becoming enraged. They will especially be regulated for a potential mate in the love bombing stage. 
                                                                                                                                  
When they feel confident that you can be effected by their opinions and how they treat you, often the controlling behavior begins to manifest a little more clearly. When they feel they have finally hooked you and enmeshed with you, that is when the domination and small signs of rage begin to come out (the rage tends to be subtle at first: the cold shoulder, "behavior lectures" - telling you how to behave in all kinds of situations, what to say to whom, toying around with your self esteem a little, toying around with your perceptions - called gaslighting, inserting themselves between you and others - called triangulation). This tells us that the rages are manipulative, and used to get their victims to surrender to their desires, and especially since the rages tend to ramp up in intensity over time especially if the narcissist is not being held accountable in any way. 

Most people experience anger when there is an injustice. Narcissists and sociopaths get angry when they want to dominate and control you. Another big difference is that when most people feel they are being criticized, they feel hurt, whereas narcissists and sociopaths instead tend to rage and get destructive when they feel criticized. They feel their grandiose ego is being questioned, so they go on the attack.

This is from the same article as above by Psychologist Alexander Burgemeester:

When a Narcissist can’t control you anymore they will fail to find Narcissistic Supply sources, just like a drug addict that can’t find any drugs. This precipitates a narcissistic crisis.

The narcissist becomes more desperate and more compulsive in looking for his drug. The more they fail, the more he is hurt and expresses his emotional turmoil by acting out (not uncommonly with ‘narcissistic rage’).

The Narcissist is so afraid of losing their Narcissistic supply (and of unconsciously being emotionally hurt) – that they would rather “control”, “master”, or “direct” the potentially destabilizing situation.

Narcissistic Rage

If you think you’ve seen your narcissistic partner angry, well hell hath no fury like narcissistic rage! You will witness their wrath in a way you’ve never experienced before, and let me warn you in advance, it will scare you.

Scaring you becomes the only way that they can think of to maintain control over you. It's also a punishment: "How dare you not let me control you! Just for that I'll ..." and then the threats come out. They won't say this, but they will show you that being recalcitrant about pleasing them is going to end up with a lot of pain for you (what they don't tend to realize is that pleasing them ends up being a lot more painful for you because of their rage cycles). 

Going from enmeshment, flattering you and caring about your every move, to a long campaign of hatred, silence and destruction also tends to happen quickly, in the blink of an eye, a sign that they never loved you. To them, love means that in return for you idealizing them, they may pretend to idealize you, but of course, they will always try to let you know that you are also more flawed than they are and that their idealization of you is always going to be on shaky ground. They put themselves in charge of correcting your flaws and this is where power and control begins to manifest in your relationship with them. 

Their love has nothing at all to do with intimacy, trust, sharing and bonding. It has to do with how controllable you are. And if you aren't controllable enough for them, they devalue and discard you, or alternatively, try to destroy you. 

When they feel you are disillusioned with them, when you have caught them at lies, manipulations, gaslighting, cheating, triangulating, broken promises, and hypocrisies that are the hallmark of narcissistic traits, they discard you because once you have seen these traits, they know you will no longer be idealizing them. Again, love to them means idealizing them. We know that this is peculiar to narcissists and that the general population does not conduct themselves in relationships in this way. 

But this is all they tend to know or want to know. Their "brand of love" is so wrapped up in the urge for domination and control that it overpowers everything, like a strong addiction (only it is an addiction at others' expense). They just want to manipulate and order people around without the inconvenience of looking into how it is effecting them and you.  

And it is hard for them to keep their narcissistic traits hidden (especially these days with so much discussion about narcissism) that they feel that when the traits are exposed or complained about by the other person, they take it as a challenge: they see it as a race of who will devalue the other the most and who will be the "believable one". When you see the rage and destruction after your legitimate complaint, that is the crux of what it is about for them.

Many people expect and hope for a resolution in a close personal relationship, and instead of getting resolution, from narcissists you get devaluing, rage and destruction. It means that they are having a temper tantrum about the amount of power and control they are losing when it comes to you and your life, and about a race to the bottom. 

When you are in a normal relationship, it is assumed that neither person is perfect, and that issues can be worked out with self reflection (owning up to mistakes), talking things through and compromise. Narcissists don't do that. Instead of self reflection they give lectures about what you are doing wrong and how it is all your fault. Instead of talking things out, it is about the silent treatment (a form of abuse that ends relationships, and if it doesn't, it becomes a trauma-bonded relationship that is still likely to end, if further down the road). Instead of compromise it will always be about their need to gain dominance and control over you. 

These should be unacceptable terms in your close personal relationships, especially in light of the fact that what you approached them about is something that hurt you. Instead of dealing with the hurt (whether they were gaslighting, or cheating, or being unjust), the narcissist or sociopath decides to hurt you more. 

So, why are they hurting you more instead of resolving things between you? The short explanation it is: "Okay, since you don't idealize me any more, I don't idealize you any more either! In fact, I devalue you!" They won't say it, but they will show you. Many narcissists are playing tit-for-tat games like this a lot of the time, for any slight they feel. Their relationships tend to be transactional, and their emotional make-up tends to be immature, so tit-for-tat games are just another Junior High Mean Kids kind of transaction. It is important to know this before you confront them. 

When you reach the conclusion that what they want is a tit-for-tat game, it tends to make you more disillusioned, which brings out even more rage and destruction in them. Instead of being some pillar where their words have clout, they don't care about their integrity any more: all they want is to be a destructive hurtful force in your life. When you experience this, it is shocking. It can happen even if you were hitherto their dear spouse or their dear child. It is no longer about a resolution, or even about a relationship; it is about protecting yourself at all costs, period, from their unethical styles of attack. Again, they think of your confronting them as a call to arms, and they will use what ever their constitutions dictate, which can be pretty dark, including ramping up more and more cruelty, and in some cases, stalking you, stealing from you, violence, and other crimes.

In this way they act like addicts: if they can't have their junkie dose of getting idealized by you and controlled by them, then you are at the very least "useless" (one of their favorite phrases for people who are not serving their narcissistic supply needs) or at most, they punish you for not giving them their hit of narcissistic supply by volleying egregious never-ending attacks. 

So what are their unethical styles of attack? The most common ones are (taken from the same article by Alexander Burgemeester):

* Aggressive Outbursts: An aggressive outburst can take the form of intimidation, overtalking their victim, yelling, threats of harm, throwing objects and verbal abuse.

* Violent Outbursts: Violence typically takes place when narcissistic rage gets to an uncontrollable level and they feel they have no other outlet apart from physical force. The violence is either towards their victim or themselves.

* Passive Aggressive Behaviour: This is a more subtle form of rage, but it is equally as damaging. Passive aggression involves giving their partner the silent treatment, backstabbing, agreeing to do something important and then denying it when the time comes. Gaslighting, orchestrating someone’s failure, procrastinating and guilt-tripping.

He goes on to list others:

The smear campaign, doing a disappearing act, stalking you, humiliating you, lying and denying, baiting and provoking. 

In the end he points out the dangers:

Do narcissists destroy who they can’t control? The answer to this question depends on the type of narcissist you are dealing with. Narcissism is a spectrum Personality disorder, the higher up the spectrum they are, you can expect an all-out war when they can’t control their victims. A word of caution, if you are dealing with a high spectrum narcissist, you might want to be very strategic about how you plan your exit.

If your partner has ever been violent, there is a high chance you are dealing with a more severe type of narcissist, and in situations like this, I wouldn’t risk it, instead, I would advise that you seek legal assistance in the form of getting a restraining order. In this way, you can more or less guarantee your safety.

Either way, once you are confronted with the reality of who your partner is, you need to make some quick decisions about whether to remain in the relationship, because it is exceptionally rare for a narcissist to change.

Another way to tell if they are high on the spectrum is whether the abuse is reactive or proactive:

Reactive abuse tends to be momentary, impulsive. They might verbally abuse, but then apologize for losing it later. This type of abuser tends to be lower on the spectrum ... However, if it is a cycle, they are not particularly low on the spectrum, or as likely to change. Most of all, be aware that reactive abuse can still be violent. Instead of verbal abuse, they become violent, and have regrets over their violence a day or so after. This is dangerous and at this point it does not matter whether they are low or high on the spectrum.

Proactive abuse is planned abuse (what is more often associated with Antisocial Personality Disorder, but narcissists tend to be in between, so they practice both reactive and proactive forms of abuse).

The best way to tell if someone might have a preponderance of Antisocial Personality Disorder traits is how sadistic they are. Sadism, planned attacks, no guilt or remorse for hurting others is more aligned with Antisocial Personality Disorder. Cruelty to animals and/or children and/or people with disabilities is another sign. Never apologizing is another sign. Lack of empathy and pathological lying is another trait. Phrases like "I would never lie to you" is another sign, especially when all of these other traits are visible. 

One of the things that keeps their perspectives in this tit-for-tat one way track is the disorder itself: the lack of empathy, the pursuit of dominance and control by betting on your capitulation throughout the relationship even under abusive attacks, the arrogance where they believe they are better than you are and better at running your life than you are (which is really their attempt to fulfill their own fantasies:  that they are your leader and that you are their follower), getting caught at blatantly unethical deeds, feeling entitled to get what they want at the expense of others, and gaslighting in order to make their victims feel incompetent about anything other than the narcissist's or sociopath's control and perspectives. So there are a lot more reasons they go for tit-for-tat games than simple devaluation.

HOW THEY TRY TO HANG ON TO DOMINANCE, POWER AND CONTROL

So, we have discussed rage as a tool they use to try to get people to do what they want. Rage is inherently scary, so it can work for awhile. In effect, they are saying, "I'll be scary and threaten them a whole lot with things that I have learned will hurt them, and through that method, they will do as I say."

The reason why it works in the short term is the same reason it works in a war: you threaten the enemy a bunch of times and if they don't give into the demands, they throw bombs at you, sanction you, make up stories about you to get an entire army to attack you, and so on. 

One thing they aren't smart about is that the victim will know that it is a war for the narcissist, and that the narcissist regards their victim as the enemy. In order to ward off the offensive from the attacking narcissist, you launch a defense: perhaps a security system, a neighborhood "watch", a police report, a police "watch", a family "watch", plans to thwart the narcissist from attacking again, various types of vigilance, or you slap a restraining order on him, which for first time offenders takes one prior warning - at least in the USA. 

So where is the domination, power and control that they were so desperate to obtain and hang on to after this kind of shielding? Some people make statements that narcissists are intelligent. But where is the intelligence when this is the obvious outcome? 

flying monkeys:

These are the narcissist's recruits and henchman, often obtained through love bombing. They tend to be brainwashed individuals who believe the lies the narcissist has told about you. These are not people who look into both sides of an issue. They tend to be belief oriented in the way that cult followers are. Narcissists are NOT going to be telling the truth about you, and they often slant their tales in such a way that they are the victim and you are the perpetrator. 

These are also the people that the narcissist blames if the attacks become criminal or highly immoral. In order to stay on that pedestal, they have to at least pretend that the attackers acted on their own behalf, and not on the narcissist's behalf. 

Where is the fulfillment of domination and control of you in that? 

Yes, they have flying monkeys who they are getting domination and control over, who are acting like little helpful puppet soldiers, and the narcissist seemingly has the ability to control the army, and even control the perspectives of the army, but it is all based on lies. The narcissist is again, risking their reputation on lies that they may or may not be caught at. These aren't relationships that will ever be close, enlightening, full of trust and iron-clad promise. Not bright either, nor anything to be proud of.

For the original victim, this is a disgusting nauseating display, as well as a desperate one where the narcissist's every relationship seems to be based on lies. It comes to our realization too: "Wow! They can't be authentic at anything or with anyone! What meaningful relationship can come about when it is based on a pile of lies and brainwashing just to hurt another person outside of their orbit! Wow, I must be important if they want to send out a brainwashed army to attack me!" - you are that important. Their revenge fantasies can become an obsession, which is why some of them turn into stalkers or hoover-ers who try to love bomb you back in order to fulfill more revenge fantasies. 

What it does in the end is to make having power and control over you again an impossible goal for them to achieve. They also tend to lose some of their recruits when the truth becomes more apparent. Brainwashed people tend not to be sadistic, so that is another area where the narcissist can fall hard.

smear campaigns:

Smear campaigns aren't very effective at getting you to recruit yourself again to their power and control fantasies. It produces the same kind of nausea in their victims that flying monkeys do. 

love bombing: 
 

Eventually love bombing isn't a very good tool either. Victims get wary of it. It becomes just another invite into the idealize, devalue, destroy cycle that the narcissist is getting to be known for. It doesn't matter how many flowers and kisses there are (for partners in this mess). It doesn't matter how many bogus promises and "Everyone loves their child" meaningless phrases they spout (for children who have endured enough). 

Victims get cynical: "Oh, you love me, do you? Nothing like a lot of lies, destruction, and abuse to convince me that this is love! Who do you take me to be? Stupid? I would never go back to you! I wipe you from my life forever! Get lost!"

Where is their intelligence when it comes to this? Do they think that love bombing is an automatic smoothing tool they can use with the same effectiveness and results over and over again? Do they really think their victims are going to ignore the back-stabbing when it comes to this? 

verbal, emotional, and physical attacks:

VERBAL: The reason they attack you verbally (which really means they are attempting to attack your self esteem) is that they want to convince you that you are so flawed that you need to take orders from them, learn behavior and etiquette lessons from them, learn how to talk to other people in a way that will make them happy, and learn that the only way you will survive in their company is to be dominated by them. The movie, "Sleeping With the Enemy" demonstrates this pretty well. In that movie, the wife of an abuser has to put away cans on a shelf with military precision or he will show his dissatisfaction. He is always correcting her on this "flaw". She also has to make sure every towel hangs in perfect precision too. Micro-managing the actions of others in every detail of domestic life is common in relationships with a domestic violence offender (called coercive control), and a pompous expectation of the abuser since they make it clear they cannot even control themselves, particularly when it comes to their rages. Their messy abuses, their putrid plans to take down their victims, their mucky lies, rebellions, crimes and etiquette is often in blatantly stark contrast to what they are trying to teach, that their lessons become laughable, and the wife in that movie makes it plain that it is laughable too when she has a little fun messing with the towels in the bathroom. 

So where is their intelligence in implementing this? The narcissist is practically screaming: "Never mind my blatant hypocrisies, and the fact that I'm insulting you so much to smash your self esteem to get you to do what I demand! Just follow my orders anyway! Just make me happy in the relationship since I'm the important member of the relationship here, and you're not! You're just the servant! Got that?" - Really!? Anyone with half a brain is not going to fall for this line of BS after awhile.

EMOTIONAL: Emotional abuse looks much the same as verbal abuse except that instead of trying to do destruction to your self esteem directly, they try to destroy your self esteem indirectly. They try to meddle with perceptions of what is happening instead.  They try "dirty tricks" to make it seem that you are going insane. They try to convince you that your insanity means they have a right and an obligation to control you. While you wouldn't appear to be insane unless they played "tricks" on you, this can be pretty evil. This is called gaslighting and it is extremely common for narcissists and sociopaths to use to get you under their domination, control and spell. They will do everything they can to convince you that all of their domination and control is for your benefit too, when it's really only for their benefit. Gaslighting takes "planning", and insidious reminders to the victim that they are insane and disabled by their insanity, so it is usually categorized as "proactive abuse".
   It's also about brainwashing, so that you look at them as your holier-than-thou cult leader. 
   It is less obvious than verbal abuse, because just like the movie Gaslight, you may come to believe you are actually insane because your abuser will have drastically different perceptions than you do over the same events. 

   Being gaslighted can also effect your self esteem: "I'm nothing but a crazy imbecile who needs someone to lead the way and take control of everything I do and say because I can't think straight or see reality for what it is. Supposedly I'm living in a world of hallucinations!" Wow, is that an evil thing to do to someone! And that is when the power and control agenda becomes really dark. 
   Someone who is gaslighted is likely to find out about it when they go places and do things where their perceptions are not being questioned or challenged at all, or when they go into therapy. It used to be that before the mid 1980s that parents and spouses who gaslighted could get their child or marital partner committed to an insane asylum, to shirk the responsibilities of marriage or parenthood, just like in the movie. Now they gaslight just to achieve ultimate control, to have a puppet, with the reasoning that ultimate control will not necessitate abandonment of their partner or child. In a way, gaslighting has gotten worse because the people who want to shirk responsibilities are using gaslighting in extreme ways to make up for NOT abandoning. One reason why some narcissists don't want to abandon underage children or a spouse is because they don't want it to sully their reputation that they have been touting as being a model spouse or a model parent. They have invested their image in being a model, or even better at being a spouse or parent than anyone else (to inspire envy in others, and thereby tendencies to worship), so to withstand their natural instinct to abandon, they gaslight in extreme ways instead. 
   Isolating their spouse via false narratives and triangulation, and home-schooling their children so that they won't experience anything other than their abuser's gaslighting then becomes the agenda. It is power and control on steroids, so it is an ultimate toxic unhealthy relationship for the victim directly and the perpetrator indirectly. 

   Other emotional abuses include constant shaming, constant blaming, invalidation of your feelings and thoughts ("only I know what you feel and think" kinds of messages from your abuser - which is also another form of gaslighting), triangulation (where you are compared unfavorably to someone else), false gossip (it can be anything, but it generally tends to be about how crazy you are so that they can get narcissistic supply in the way of sympathy), broken promises (particularly in the way of "future faking": promising something in the future and making sure it never materializes), bullying and blackmail practices and the silent treatment usually accompanied by stonewalling. 
   All of this adds up to pain inside the victim, and the perpetrator knows it, so it is just another predictable scheme to administer pain in the hope that they will gain complete, never-ending domination and control over the victim. 

Victims who are in these situations too long develop trauma symptoms. That becomes a liability to the abuser (they are called upon to care in order to maintain the relationship, and they don't do that, nor do they want to do that), so in the end they try a carpet bombing approach form of attack with all of the abuses that they can think of to get the victim to give into the demands the abuser wants, and the way the victim used to deliver. When this doesn't work, they can either ramp up attacks by stalking, or appear deflated and default to abandoning you to look for another victim who will do a better job of giving them the power, domination and control that they want. 
   The reason it doesn't work is because it's like punching out someone who is bruised and scabbed from head to toe and lying in a hospital bed. Not much narcissistic supply in that.

The way that emotional abuse isn't smart is for the same reasons that verbal abuse doesn't work over the long term. The primary objective is to bombard you with pain, plus confusion, and as we know, a person who is in pain is not going to be feeling well at all, with emotional, mental and physical symptoms, not exactly capable of narcissistic supply administrations. Someone who is deeply hurt and traumatized will have, as their main objective, healing. They can't heal when they are still in the company of a person who is hell-bent on hurting them again and manipulating them in ways that are totally self-serving. Plus, being around an abuser sets off even more symptoms: it is the body's alarm system.

Perhaps some narcissists know what they put their victims through, but I would bet a majority don't. Besides being unempathetic, putting their domination addiction front and center in their relationships so that they are blind to anything else, and a penchant for giving the silent treatment, I have a feeling they don't really have a clue. Many, many survivors of abuse report that they never felt their abuser ever knew them. They thought that the only thing their abuser ever really understood about them was what their vulnerabilities were, what they could obtain and not obtain from them, and which buttons to push to get a reaction. It was about how much the abusers could penetrate personal boundaries, and that's it. That's not much enlightenment. 

People who have managed to de-sensitize to their abuser instead of being effected by them, who have many other family members or friends who understand what is going on and take up the slack of a deeply unsatisfying and rigid relationship, who spend the least amount of time with their abusers, and who rarely listen with open ears to what their abusers say, often report that they got bored with them. Yes, bored. These abusers tended to be on the lighter part of the spectrum, but the tactics were so predictable and incredibly obvious that they found them more yawn-inducing than painful, traumatizing, disappointing or disillusioning. They still related to their abusers, but not in any kind of deep meaningful way. "Whatever" and "You don't say" and "That's interesting" became their predictable unemotional responses to the narcissist, and not much beyond that. Their deepest relationships were always on the outside of these relationships. So this doesn't add up to much domination and control in any real sense of the word either.

As for the silent treatment, which I have written about at some length, it is a passive aggressive form of abuse. It seems to be used by narcissists and sociopaths on their adult children the most. A great deal of the time it is used as a form of punishment: "If you don't give me more power, control and domination over you, at least to the point that I had when you were still a young child, and do what I want at all times including adhering to the role I have assigned you, I don't want to have anything to with you!" They don't say that directly, but they make it pretty clear that these are the terms. So what I have seen is that the adult child apologizes to the narcissist when the adult child did not do anything wrong. So they feel they are being forced into an apology they do not own. It certainly smooths things over, and that's the only reason for the apology, but it tends to create a lot of resentment inside the victim. The resentment exists because not only was there nothing to apologize for, but silent treatments typically are administered under duress such as when there is an important event being planned (like a wedding) or when the victim is going through a tragic time (like the death of someone near and dear to them). The apology only works for a little while until the narcissist gives the silent treatment again (and they predictably always do it again - remember that the amount of power and control is never enough for these people - it's an addiction where they need higher doses of it, always). Also, most silent treatments are given for erroneous reasons, or they are given as a guessing game: "You know what you did wrong! Don't tell me you are too stupid not to know the reason!" - which is another form of gaslighting. So, eventually the silent treatment becomes a permanent state, an estrangement. The victim experiences pain and many trauma symptoms every time it is doled out, plus resentment, and it breaks the relationship bond forever.

So, how does the narcissist or sociopath gain power and control from this bad idea? It doesn't seem all that smart either. They know that this abuse tactic will hurt their adult child, certainly, but they don't know much beyond that: they don't know enough about human behavior and the human condition to make this work in the way they want it to. 

I think I have demonstrated why administering any kind of emotional pain does not work in any way that will bring a narcissist or sociopath their pie-in-the-sky dreams for ultimate power.

There is a reason why therapists trained in domestic abuse tell their clients to walk away from these relationships (before trauma symptoms take a big foot-hold, and knowing that perpetrators like to re-use and recycle these same predictable abuses over and over again). 

PHYSICAL: Physical abuse is also about power, control and domination, but instead of trying to smash up your self esteem or reduce you to an insane imbecile, it is used to intimidate you and dominate you instead, physically. Abusers who prefer physical abuse usually have victims who are shorter, or less brawny, or who have some physical, emotional or cognitive disabilities. They also tend to choose victims where they perceive a power imbalance (where they have the advantage). They don't pick on people their own size, in other words. 

Physical abuse most often follows a period of verbal and emotional abuse, and a lot of unsolicited lectures where you are being expected to follow the directives of the abuser. It tends to manifest as in-your-face rage, with a lot of guilt-trips, in other words, close proximity rage (shouting in a way where it is as loud as it can be, spitting out the words to the point where the spit lands on your face). The abuser gets angry and comes towards you in a way where the head comes forward, the fists clench, the upper torso and neck muscles tighten, and he gets loud, extremely loud, and usually a lot of insults follow. In other words, it is breaking the physical boundary that would connote a more respectful discourse. And that's the problem from the very beginning: a respectful relationship is sacrificed by the abuser in order to intimidate you to give in to them. 

During the rage and directives, they are also infantilizing you. Infantilization means that they are treating you as though you are still a child (when you aren't) who needs to be told by a big daddy or big mommy figure about what to do and how to behave. Infantilizing means it is happening in adult relationships: marital abuse, sibling abuse and workplace abuse are the most common forms of infantilization, but it can happen between a parent and an adult child too. Infantilization is inappropriate to the age, education, intelligence and status of the victim.

Physical abusers tend have grandiose overt narcissistic traits. However, darker Machiavellian personalities can also be physical abusers (for instance malignant narcissists), but in order to qualify, there are also planned attacks. Since narcissism is on a spectrum, the abuser can be mostly of the grandiose overt type, but if they never apologize for their attacks, never are concerned how these attacks are effecting their victims, and they exhibit some propensity for planned ways of hurting their victims, or if they steal (especially stealing items like photographs and mementos as opposed to food, for instance), you are most likely dealing with someone who has traits of secondary psychopathy. 

Like all abusers, grandiose narcissists will be giving you "behavior lectures", i.e. that you need to adopt certain behaviors to make them happy. Behavior lectures are also a sign of infantilization. However, the physical abuser tends to give behavior lectures much more frequently than other types of abusers, on the whole, and it can sometimes be at every encounter. These abusers also tend to be micro-managers: they take on the role of the despotic boss who must comment on whether you are doing something right or wrong, while you are expected to be the servant. Like most abusers, roles are everything to them. 

Just about everything has to go their way after they put you in a role or they rage. Again, the rage is going to be intimidating, in your face, so you will definitely feel you are walking on eggshells. Most victims keep quiet, and do everything that is expected of them (up to a point) to keep the abuser from going into a rage again. However, I discuss fighting back a little later in the post, which some victims will do at the very beginning of being physically abused. 

But assuming the victim isn't fighting back, and the victim mostly goes silent, the perpetrator is still very likely to rage again, over increasingly erroneous reasons, and then again, and again. They basically turn into rage-a-holics (addicted to rage to get their way). It seems that after awhile everything is deserving of rage and derision in their eyes. Grandiose narcissists are also people who only care about gaining power, control and domination, but it is a lot more of an obvious manifestation than the gaslighter, for instance. You can actually see that they are dangerous from the beginning when they engage in physical abuse unlike the gaslighter who can get away with gaslighting for a much longer period of time. 

And predictably men who are physically abusive become more and more dangerous (except if you are doing absolutely everything they want you to do, and help them bully others to some extent).  

At some point when they are raging in your face, there is likely to be a push (usually to your shoulder) accompanied by words such as "Do as I say!", "Do it now!", "Get going!" and so on. Other favorite phrases are "You're selfish!", "You're useless!", "You're driving me crazy!" (when you are emotional yourself), "You think you are so special!", "You're no good!", "I don't have time for your drama!" If they are also alcoholics, they tend to swear a whole lot too, and do not have the capacity to understand the reality of a situation, especially when they are drunk. 

The grandiose narcissist seems like they are not in control of their emotions at all, however, like most narcissists they will be emotionally regulated in public and with people they don't know yet. Grandiose narcissists can be very two-faced, overflowing with flattery in situations they aren't comfortable in, but hyper critical and insulting behind other peoples' backs. If you see the nasty side of them, this is their true self because they don't come out of the nasty side of their personality until they have something to socially gain from a situation. They are also insufferable braggarts who give advice about subjects they know very little about. 

This happened to me once. I was in the presence of a grandiose narcissist who was giving all kinds of advice to a teenager who wanted to be an artist. Her father was an artist, and I had a masters degree in the subject. He went on and on and on, acting like an expert in the subject, with a syrupy delivery (pretending to care a great deal about her fate), but had no idea of what he was talking about. It was all I could do to hold back my disgust. So grandiose narcissists love to grand-stand and make a big impression, but most often they are more like the Emperor with No Clothes.  

Anyway, the physical abuse starts with pushing and shoving. Some of how they behave is also to pull you in a direction where they will demand an action from you when you get there. Also common is grabbing objects out of your hand. They might handle both of your shoulders and turn you around when you are walking in a different direction. They tend to grab you to scare you. Some other kinds of beginning physical abuses are pushing you up against a wall, pushing you against a door, pushing you aside to get to where they want to go. Generally there are other kinds of unsolicited touching. Grandiose narcissists can give hugs and pat you on the head or back, but they also tend to do a lot of pushing, shoving, standing in doorways with their fists clenched so that you can't get past, and all kinds of other actions to let you know that they are in control and they are in a rage. 

All of this happened to me with Johnny (not his real name) - I talk about Johnny in this post. I went to a domestic violence counselor when these beginning types of physical abuses were happening to me about how to handle the situation. I actually down-graded what was happening: "Doesn't he have to slug me first for it to count as physical abuse?" And his answer was, "Not at all. That's coming next if you stay in this situation. This is what we see. If someone was pushing and shoving you on a street, and someone saw it and called the police, the police would have him arrested! This is illegal! It's a crime! And when there is pushing and shoving, it usually escalates very fast to slugging. The slugging could start in a week. Is this what you want? You are in an especially dangerous situation because he also has a major drinking problem because alcoholics can see hostility in facial expressions that aren't there. They can also have blackouts where they are violent and don't know it until they wake up in jail." 

He was also a favorite golden child in his family of origin, meaning that he wasn't going to change, and that the parents who anointed him that role would side with him no matter what, enabling him to be a domestic violence offender. 

I was not surprised when I confronted Johnny about his behavior and asked how his present wife handled it and his answer was, "She does what I tell her to do!" I was also not surprised when Johnny's ex-wife said she had left over an escalating domestic violence situation with him, and when I learned one of his kids was punched in the stomach by him while in a shower getting ready for school. There is a lot more to the "Johnny story", but the main point was that when I began my research project into domestic violence, I found I was given the right advice: get out when the pushing and shoving start, or preferably before.

Pushing begins because the narcissist doesn't feel they have enough power, control and domination over you, and they think this is the ticket to getting it. Like all narcissists, they always want more power, and with the grandiose narcissist, they usually do not have the patience to wait for it (unlike the emotional abuser or the covert abuser who has a lot of patience to get you incrementally gaslighted and under their control). Not having patience has everything to do with why it escalates so fast into slugging, and other forms of egregious physical attacks. 

Warning, if they put your hands around your throat, or chin, or face, or attempt to strangle you, this is a particularly dangerous sign that you are in a life-threatening situation. 

As for the impulse to fight back ...

So, let's say the perpetrator has shoved you at the shoulder in a rage. The natural impulsive inclination is to defend yourself by shoving his shoulder. You defend yourself by showing that you are on equal footing and that you won't be his victim. The reason why this impulse happens is because when you don't fight back, your system will launch into trauma responses. But, here's the problem with acting on impulse: as I've said, narcissists who physically abuse usually choose victims who are smaller than they are. They aren't going to shove around a big male who is 6'8", has huge muscles and weighs 300 pounds when they are only six feet tall. One reason male perpetrators tend to choose women is that they are usually smaller, are more likely to default into pleasing behaviors to ward off attacks, and because of societal attitudes about women (that women are property or inferior), that if you want to take your rage out on someone, you take it out on a woman instead of a man as Jonathan Katz's book so well illustrates. 

If you leave, one of the things that domestic violence offenders are known for is their apologies to their victim, usually holding a bouquet of flowers (unless they have some Antisocial Personality Disorder traits where they won't be apologizing at all unless they want to draw you in to attack you). However, the apology is just another manifestation of future faking where it is designed to get the victim back into role again, and back into another round of dominance and violence (the idealize, devalue, destroy cycle). Some of them may initially mean it when they say they want you back, but if you listen closely, they will also make excuses for their behavior ("It's just the way I am; I just fly off the handle!" and other sorts of statements about why they are unable to control their emotions and why they can't compromise - but remember that they don't act that way in public). 

One reason why physical abuse doesn't work over the long term in getting steady narcissistic supply in the way of power, control and domination is because it is dangerous. Most women who are in domestic violence situations want to get out. And on top of it all, many of them get restraining orders too. Plus the behavior lessons and lectures are absurd from someone who physically abuses. So, that doesn't seem all that smart either. 

You have to wonder why anyone would want victims, especially estranged victims who want nothing to do with them and use police to get rid of them (sullying the perpetrator's reputation). As I've said before, narcissists sort of survive like this, but this doesn't add up to a life of happiness. Grandiosity is the closest they get to happiness, but when their grandiosity is chipped away by victims who have no respect for them, and can't stand to be around them, they are pathetic. 

FINANCIAL: Financial abuse happens in 98 percent of all abusive relationships. The problem with being dependent, co-dependent, or trauma bonded to an abuser is that he will want to control the money to control you. If you are the breadwinner, he (or she) will find excuses to take it from you to pile up reserves in his or her name only. If they are the bread winner, every minute financial purchase will be vetted. 
   Finances are often used to threaten too. "If you don't do what I tell you to do, and do it exactly how I want it, you won't get another cent!" or "If you don't do what I tell you to do, and do exactly how I want it, I'll get a divorce from you and take your money away from you!"
   If you get a high paying job to counter it, narcissists and sociopaths are known to try to sabotage it.
   If you don't live with them, it's best not to talk about your successes and failures in your career or in your finances. In fact, the more you can keep your career and finances in the dark, the better.
   The problem for victims in these situations is that it puts you in an unstable financial position, constantly. The perpetrator's emotions and actions are unstable, and then you have to deal with financial instability too. It's a giant whiplash of instability on a constant basis. 
   One reason why so many women stopped being home-makers and raising children as their full time occupation was because of financial instabilities like this. They felt vulnerable, so they went out to earn their own paycheck. As long as the society is misogynistic and excuses men for abusive behaviors, it makes sense for women to be financially autonomous. You also have more solid ground not to put up with abuse. And peace in this way can transform your life. Again, abusers only pick on people who they think are weaker than themselves, including being vulnerable to financial attacks. 
   The reason why financial abuse does not work at maintaining or gaining power, control or domination for abusers is because it is a painful whiplash for the victim, who will react to the whiplash by becoming trained and financially autonomous.

NARCISSISTS AND SOCIOPATHS
BELIEVE THAT MOST PEOPLE ARE JUST LIKE THEM
AND WHY IT SHOULD MATTER TO THE REST OF US

 Narcissists and sociopaths really do believe that others are just like them, with one caveat: they think the majority of people are more stupid and crazy than they are. At the very least they think that the rest of us wish we were just like them. 

The rates of narcissism are going up in the country, which tends to happen when parents, as a whole, isolate their children (alienation), become more selfish ("me first"), more abuse-oriented in solving problems, more rage-oriented, more neglect-oriented and less family oriented, where family estrangements and divorces are becoming the norm, the rates for all of the Cluster B personality disorders will go up, including narcissism and sociopathy. You can't starve a population of children where the only attention they get is rage, criticism, inconsistency, strong-arming, abuse, estrangements,  insults, and isolation, and expect a good outcome. You'll even get tyrannical despotic authoritarian national leaders and people who think it's a good idea to kill other people over differing political viewpoints, or a facial expression, or a disability, or a different cultural background - take your pick.

So in terms of close personal relationships, what does it mean in terms of how they treat you? 

WHEN YOU ARE ANGRY:

We know that narcissists and sociopaths feel anger when their domination and superiority is being questioned and threatened. They must keep their grandiose egos intact; they must keep believing that they are "the special golden god", the one who can control and dominate everyone in sight. It is why they rage when you are resisting being controlled and dominated, and when you start questioning whether they should be an advisor to anything in your life at all. In contrast, the rest of the population tends to get angry when there is an injustice committed against them, or people who they cherish. They have healthy egos and they don't have to resort to an inauthentic life of lies, cover-ups, distortions and plans to hurt and dominate others. However, since narcissists believe everyone is just like them, when you get angry, they will take it to mean that you are trying to control them. They want to be on top, so your anger will infuriate them and that is when you see callous disregard. They won't see that you feel  injustice. This is also why, when they sense anger in you, they escalate it to a power struggle, even an outright war - they think it is about who can destroy the other person the most. It is important to know this. The communication fails because they are putting their own stamp on what you are going through (because they think they have superior knowledge, superior psychic abilities, superior intelligence, superior everything). This is why they don't know you. This is why they don't get you. This is why they don't care about what you are going through. This is why they shut you down when you are trying to tell them what you really think and feel. You run up against their wall of arrogance, where the only thing they will accept is that they know what everyone feels and thinks. They'll even come right out and say it. It is called perspecticide and invalidation and it is primarily associated with narcissists and sociopaths. Normal folks can slip into it every once in awhile, especially if they are lied to a lot, but with narcissists it is on-going, a part of their very personality, and in their every day interactions with others.

They are, in effect, speaking a different language.

WHEN YOU ARE HURT AND CRYING: 

When you cry, the same sort of thing is happening. While you are feeling pain, and crying because of it, many narcissists, and especially those with Anti Personality Disorder traits, will "fake cry". They also love to pretend that they are victims of their victims. They love to turn things around so that when they discard you, they are telling others that you discarded them instead (do you see how much they mirror?). So when they see you cry, they think you are "fake crying." That is why they don't show you empathy and why they tell you to stop irritating them with your crying, that they aren't going to listen to it. They aren't listening to it because they manipulate people with fake crying, so they assume that is what you are doing too. This is sometimes why a grandiose narcissist might hit you when you cry. 

So, let us say that you are crying because you were victimized by someone else. You were raped, or someone stole your money - it can be anything. They don't believe that you were victimized, because they play the victim just to get attention. So, they think you are just trying to get attention. 

And they know exactly what they are doing when they try to make their victims appear to be perpetrators - it is a plan to get out of being accountable. So, after you are victimized, they are going to be calloused because they think you are pretending to be victimized too. It is also why they sometimes lecture you, and tell you that the abuse was your fault. It is also why they tell you to apologize to your abuser (extremely common, especially for narcissists): it is their way of saying they believe you are faking it. 

But they also "just plain like it" if you are forced into apologizing to your abuser. They see it as a "sucker sign" that you might apologize to them when they abuse you too. 

They also think that when you share your hurts with them, that you are trying to enlist them as a co-bully, because that is what they do when they are telling someone they were victimized. They see your hurts and tears as a power-and-control move because when they are down on power, control and domination, they cry and tell others they were victimized by the people who won't hand over their autonomy willingly and let the narcissist control them. 

So if you are getting un-empathetic calloused responses, this is why. 

This is the problem with living a life as a narcissist, full of lies, half truths, fantasies and distortions where the only thing you care about is getting narcissistic supply, power and control, and fooling everyone as to who you really are. 

WHY THEY THINK YOU ARE LESS INTELLIGENT:

They rate intelligence in terms of how well a person can get what they want: rewards, wealth, children who worship them, a spouse who can worship them, how many notches on the bed post they can obtain (for somatic narcissists, both male and female), how well they can twist stories and make up stories without detection that put them in a superior position. 

They don't necessarily measure intelligence in terms of knowledge, but they certainly don't like it when someone appears to be a lot more knowledgeable than they are, which is why they turn into arrogant blowhards as in the example above. They try to fake their way through being knowledgeable about a subject they really don't know anything about. They also take it as an ego hit when someone points out that the narcissist doesn't know what they are talking about. They also try to manage their children's careers, hopes and dreams in such a way that is best for them, not the child. Narcissistic parents should never be the managers of anything because of their propensity to serve their own egos, but they should especially not be the managers of their children's careers. I'll be talking about why in another post. 

Now in terms of why they think everyone except them is so stupid, and why they idealize themselves as the pinnacle of intelligence ... It is because they think they are doing power, control and domination better than anyone else. Most of us could care less about whether we have power, control and domination over others. We are happy with peace, stability, working together, compromises where everyone has a say and can be fulfilled, real love, and real work (rather than using work, and workers in triangulation games, and using the workplace as a bullying playground). Peace, love and stability comes with empathy.

Case in point: Let us say that the narcissist is caught: they aren't as knowledgeable about a subject as they are pretending, they aren't as steadfastly committed as they are pretending either, and they keep getting fired from their jobs (but they tell you it is always the boss's fault, that their talents are being overlooked - even though you may suspect it is because they got into a power struggle with their bosses instead), in fact it is pretty clear they aren't the person they have advertised themselves to be at all. So why do narcissists think that a pile of lies, fooling others, bullying others, and being so blinded by an addiction to power and control, and pretending to be someone they aren't, and all kinds of downfalls from grace, is such an intelligent way to be?

It turns out that the most intelligent among us have high amounts of empathy. This is a subject I'll be covering in more detail later, but for now: 

You can see from what I've written in the last two sections (anger and hurt), that they are incapable of understanding what other people are going through. They don't get that everyone is different. They don't get that most people do not want to be narcissists or sociopaths. They don't get that we aren't jealous of them (that it is a fantasy in their minds). They don't even get who most people are. They wouldn't have to practice perspecticide and invalidation so much if they truly knew. The only way they would have knowledge of what we are going through with our feelings, and thoughts, is to have empathy. They don't have empathy, nor do they want it, so they stay blind. They might know piles of facts, and remember the facts that seem to work in getting them into a real or alternatively "emperor without clothes" type of dominant position, but other than that, they are the least able to understand other people aside from how they can manipulate them and put them into a role. Narcissists who have woken up a little bit from so many people walking away from them, leaving them feeling stranded and alone, do start to wonder why so many people have left. When situations hit them hard, they are capable of not playing the victim. Some of them even begin to understand how they caused it on a cognitive level, but if they are still being enabled by someone, they will never get it. 

The enabled ones are the bitter old people who glare at their victims with hatred on their deathbeds.   

    

WHY THEY THINK YOU ARE CRAZY:

The reason why they think you are crazy is because, in their minds, you let them gaslight you and convince you that you are crazy. Only a crazy person could not see through the gaslighting agenda and manipulation. So after awhile, they believe that you truly are crazy. You have been talked into it, whereas they would never have been talked into it, and would have fought back with every fiber of their being to convince everyone they weren't crazy. 

So, is being trusting being stupid? They think so. They live in a cesspool of untrustworthiness, including their own untrustworthiness. But do most people think it is stupid to trust? Actually trust is something most people expect in their close personal relationships, especially with a parent or spouse. And the high majority of close personal relationships are trustworthy and where trust can be expressed. We were actually built to trust in our closest people to survive (our ancient history). So, it isn't stupid to trust. Being untrustworthy is an aberration to group and community survival. The way you tell if someone is untrustworthy in a close personal relationship is if they are trying to hurt you, if they don't show signs of empathy, and if they are lying. 

However, when you grow up with a parent who likes to hurt you, and abandon you and is arrogant despite having hurt and abandoned you, you are going to normalize abuse and lack of empathy in relationships to some extent. Either you become that person yourself (become like they are), or you get married to a person who hurts you. That seems to be the trend. However, as long as you are aware that living in pain and unhappiness was pushed down your throat in childhood as being normal, and you finally understand that "normal" is being able to trust and to be trustworthy, then you can have the life you were meant to have: true trust, true love, and so on. You don't have to live in environments that are devoid of trust and happiness. And as long as you know the signs (lack of empathy, abuse, etc), you can steer away from people and a home environment like your original home environment that lacked all of that good stuff. I found happiness, and there are a lot of others who find it too even after the most grueling abusive unhappy childhood. 

Anyway, some narcissists do notice that other people are not nearly as concerned about gaining power, control and domination as they are. They think that's a deficiency, a disability. And the disability they come up with is that you are crazy. 

They also think you are crazy if you don't hold them in the highest esteem, when you think of them as an equal instead. "Are you kidding? As an equal? You have got to be crazy to think that you are as superior as I am! You don't have nearly the power and control over me as I have over you!" - those are the unspoken words (taken from narcissists who want to share their truth about how they think).

A group of us were talking about men who reach high places of power in government and who grope or accost women sexually. I mean really - how hard is it not to grope a woman? How hard is it to ask people if they are uncomfortable with how you touch them? But this is what happens: you pursue power and then feel entitled to treat other people badly, treat them as sex objects even (a role), and even hurt them. Then you fall from grace and disgust a whole lot of people. You are laughed at even. Rinse, repeat. This is how narcissists live too. So, those of us who don't want to live this way: are we crazy? Maybe they are actually the crazy ones and project it onto us.

IN CONCLUSION   

You can see how stuck their minds are on power, control and domination to the point where it is an obsession. It is the be-all and end-all desire for them (a desire that can never be fulfilled), and they think other people are stupid and crazy when it is not the be-all and end-all for them.

It is why they lack empathy; it is why they abandon the people closest to them; it is why they rage so much; it is why they give you the silent treatment; it is why they hit you; it is why they don't want to hear what you have to say; it is why they are so arrogant; it is why they can't find satisfaction in their relationships and why they resort to endless criticizing and gaslighting. It is what they want when they get up in the morning and when they go to sleep at night. In fact, every one of the tactics they use is to get more power and control, even, if it suits them, pathological lying, the one thing that is bound to get them "found out" and falling off of their fake self-made pedestal. 

However, when it is not the be-all and end-all, you actually are a lot less likely to have estranged children, or an unhappy marriage, or look at every relationship, every piece of land, every experience as an opportunity to manipulate and exploit. It is only when most of us realize this that we will have peace among human beings, and peace in the world.

  

Final note: my writing on how narcissists think and why they behave the way they do was inspired in part by Sam Vaknin's explanations of what is going on in the narcissist's mind (he's a self-proclaimed narcissist, and psychology professor, and tries to teach others what is going on, and is amply aware that narcissistic thinking is drastically different from how most of us think - he's even said that the narcissist's arrogance is a delusional shield for a human being that most resembles an empty shell, that narcissists believe that the arrogance and the pursuit of power is protecting them from a world of criticism and derision, the kind of criticism and derision that they dish out).   

New video since publishing this post (and the best I have found on this topic so far):

"The Hunger For Power That Drives Narcissists"
by psychologist Les Carter for "Surviving Narcissism":

"How Narcissists Are Bound By Their Own Need For Dominance"
by psychologist Les Carter for "Surviving Narcissism":

description:

A major feature of narcissism is the need to be in control. Or as Dr. Les Carter explains, narcissists don't just want to be in charge, they insist that you should be subordinate to them. But because their tactics are so off-putting, they miss out on the aspects of life that truly matter. They eventually are tied down by their own egotism. Rather that succumbing to their dominance, you can see it for the misguided way of life that it represents, choosing freedom over their efforts to confine you.

What is "coercive control"? (Glossary of Narcissistic Relationships)
by Dr. Ramani Durvasula

please note that after this video aired
Hawaii passed laws about coercive control,

and coercive control laws are being considered in California and New York.
Hopefully these kinds of laws will be passed nationwide too.

"9 Signs Someone is a Narcissist"

by PsychToGo:

"7 Signs Someone Is A Sociopath"
by PsychToGo:

"The insults you hear in a narcissistic relationship"

by Dr. Ramani Durvasula:

FURTHER READING:

When The Narcissist Can’t Control You Anymore, This Happens - by psychologist Alexander Burgemeester

How Micromanipulations Help Narcissists Stay in Control (Narcissists use a mix of direct and covert tactics to manipulate others) - by Kristy Lee Hochenberger for Psychology Today

14 Thought-Control Tactics Narcissists Use to Confuse and Dominate You - by Dan Neuharth, Ph.D., MFT for Psych Central

Ten Ways Narcissists Take Control - by Leslie Glass for "Reach Out Recovery"

Power and Control Phases of Narcissistic Relationships - by Donna Hines for Linked In

How Narcissists Control You. What Techniques Do They Use? - by Taylor Bennett for Counseling News

Fantasies of Unlimited Power & Craves Power/Control - for Narcissistic Abuse Support

How to stop psychopaths and narcissists from winning positions of power - by Steve Taylor, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Leeds Beckett University for The Conversation

Narcissists and psychopaths: how some societies ensure these dangerous people never wield power - by Steve Taylor, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, Leeds Beckett University for The Conversation

Power and control in the male antisocial personality - by Linda L. Nauth (professional article)

A personality disorder of excessive power strivings - by W. Charney for PubMed.gov (professional article and a proposal for the DSM)

Control Freak (saying) - Wikipedia

How to Recognize Coercive Control - a Healthline article

Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence (Abusive Partners: Coercive Control) - The State of New York

What are the Signs of Coercive Control? - Medically reviewed by Janet Brito, Ph.D., LCSW, CST — Written by Louise Morales-Brown for Medical News Today

What Is Coercive Control in a Relationship? - by  Brunilda Nazario, MD for WebMD

Coercive Control and the Definition of Domestic Abuse - by Arfie Ghedi for 1A

Children experiencing interparental coercive control - by Dr. Lauren Smith for ESSS online 

7 Signs Your Partner Is Pulling An Emotional Power Move On You - by Lea Rose Emery for Bustle

Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life (Interpersonal Violence) - by Evan Stark (book)

Do ‘Coercive Control’ Laws Really Help Abuse Victims? - by Marie Solis for New York Magazine (The Cut)