How Narcissists Target Conscience

Hello I'm Darren Magee and the topic for today comes from different questions asking how coercive, manipulative, narcissistic people silence their victims? How do they create situations in which the victims blame themselves for their own neglect and abuse? Now the obvious answer would be they do it through gaslighting, targeting their victims, self-esteem, self-confidence, they exploit their secrets and their insecurities. But there is more to it than that. So today I'm going to outline the different ways narcissistic people hook others into their world to collude with them. How they exploit people's hopes and fears to their own end and how they silence their victims. And the following could take place in a romantic relationship, a friendship, a workplace, any environment where someone is in close contact with someone who has very strong, deeply ingrained narcissistic traits. So I'm going to begin with the story of a nine-year-old boy. And he's doing something he knows he shouldn't be doing. He's playing with matches. Matches are dangerous. Kids shouldn't be playing with them but he's doing it anyway. And quite soon he becomes bored so he goes off to do something else. Before you know it half the house is burnt down. Mum and dad are distraught. They've lost their home. They've lost a lot of personal possessions, things that have great sentimental value, things they can't replace. But they're grateful that everyone is in one piece. Everyone is safe. But they have no idea how the fire started. They ask the fire officer what started the fire and the fire officer says, it looks like someone had been playing with matches upstairs. That little boy's already in a state of shock. He is terrified and without even thinking he just blurts out it was him and he points at his five-year-old brother. Later on when they're all in temporary accommodation that little boy's conscience is really, really tugging at him. He feels so ashamed of himself. He feels terrified. He tells his mum and dad, I'm really, really sorry. It was me. I did it. It wasn't him. I'm so sorry. I never meant anything. I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I'm really, really sorry. And he is very, very upset. And his mum and dad say to him, we know that it was you. And we are both very, very angry. But we're both also really glad that no one was hurt. Now skip forward 15 years. He meets this girl and she is the most amazing person he has ever met. He has never felt this way about anyone before. And he hopes he's never going to feel this way about anyone else ever again. She is amazing. She makes his day just by turning up. And he tells her the story of what happened whenever he was nine. She gives him a hug and says, you were only a kid. And in that moment, it's like the world's just wonderful indeed. Now skip forward another 15 years. He's pretty much at the end of his tether. She constantly sabotages him and then accuses him of being a failure. She constantly wastes all his money, keeps her own, but wastes all of his and then complains he doesn't earn enough. She openly flirts with other men in front of him and then accuses him of being controlling, possessive and having jealousy issues. She treats him like he is of no relevance whatsoever. And he has just about had enough. And one day he explodes. He tells her everything that is in his head and everything that is on his heart. Why he cannot take this behavior, this treatment any longer. And then she says to him, you burnt your house down. You nearly killed your own family. You lied about it. You blamed your little brother. Who the hell are you to lecture me about morality and decency? She exploits the guilt and the shame he feels over something he did when he was nine years old. A moment in his life when he did something stupid that he deeply regrets. A time when he was at his lowest and his most terrified, his most ashamed. And she talks about it as if it were just a few days ago. And that was enough to shut him down. So the first way narcissistic people shut people down and get them to blame themselves sometimes is by targeting their conscience. But then there are those who may have a particular agenda. They may ask specific questions, trying to get someone to say something that they want to hear, something that they can use to their advantage. They're really looking for something that they can utilize somehow to either emotionally blackmail or to throw someone under the bus for. They try to make their target say something specific so they can use it for some kind of leverage. And if that person says anything at all, even something as mundane as, well, yes, the manager can be a little bit harsh at times, that narcissistic person now has something to use, something to assassinate their character, to spread gossip about how much they hate the boss. Victims are often left having to defend themselves or apologize for something that they never meant or something that has been taken completely out of context. That being said, a friend of mine once told me that if you don't tell a narcissist what they want to hear, they'll probably just make it up anyway. But I think a clue to someone having a specific agenda would be whenever they keep asking the same questions or the same kind of questions over and over again, because that could well be a sign that they're not getting the answer they want. So they might ask leading questions, things like, do you not think, or what would you say about? And they tend to keep on going until they get to hear whatever it is they want to hear. Now when it comes to romantic relationships, the early stages of a relationship with a narcissistic person, many people refer to this as the love bombing stage or the information gathering stage. This would be when that narcissistic person uses all their charm to learn someone's secrets. Again, there is a little bit more to it than that, because they don't necessarily just want to know their partner's secrets, their fears and so on. They also want to know about their hopes and their dreams as well. And when they do learn them, well, they lead their partner to believe that they are the only person who can provide their needs, the only one that can give them what they want, what they desire. After all, they're both on the same side and they both want the same thing. And they exploit their partner's hopes, dreams, insecurities, even their vanity, their ambition and their desires. And they have that person hooked with all their wild promises. But their promises tend to come at a price. They might use those promises to talk people into doing things they might not usually do, but maybe don't seem that bad on the face of it. Well, at least not at first. For instance, maybe the partner's parents have invited them over for dinner. Seems like a nice idea. But the narcissist, they might say something like, well, you know, I was hoping we could do something together. I have arranged something special. The partner might say, well, my parents might be disappointed if we can't make it. The narcissist comes back with something like, well, why not just tell them we have the flu or something. We can't make it and we'll definitely make it up to them. We'll go next time. Well, eventually the partner might agree. It is, after all, only a little white lie. There's no harm in missing dinner. By the later date, that will probably be repackaged and handed back to them as how they would rather lie to their own family just to get out of having to spend any time with them. And if the partner responds with something like, it was your idea, I did it for you. Well, they might hear something back like, don't you dump this on me. I didn't make you do anything. Everything gets handed back as the partner being deceitful, greedy, callous, morally repulsive, and trying to blame shift. Kind of like the way narcissists do. But the partner is now facing the guilt and the shame of something they actually did, even though it has been twisted and perhaps grossly exaggerated. So how does this work for them? Well, it works for them because they lead their victims to believe that they are responsible for their own misery because of the things they have done, the choices they have made, even though they may have been coerced or tricked into them. They highlight and exploit past actions, beliefs, behaviors, errors. Like all scam artists and confidence tricksters, at first they appear to be genuine. As I say, they have the same dreams, the same goals, and they're all on the same side. Also, many narcissistic people have had a lifetime to learn how to manipulate. They know what to say, how to say it. They know how to behave. They also know what to listen for. They also know how to talk people into doing things that might not seem that bad, well maybe not at first, in return for their promises. But they tend to demand more and more while delivering less and less. When their victim eventually objects they've had enough of the narcissistic person, they now have a list of evidence of their choices, their actions, and their behavior. Whereas they are squeaky clean and beyond reproach. It's almost like they're an innocent bystander in their own lives. And when a narcissistic person has any kind of leverage over someone, they will use it anytime they need to in order to get what they want. And when they do use it, it works for them because they're targeting the victim's conscience. They use their victim's ambitions as evidence of greed, their mistakes as evidence of stupidity, their beliefs as evidence of being immoral. Another reason why their tactics work is how narcissistic people often target people's fear of public opinion. One of the most common threats you'll ever hear from a narcissist is, what would other people think if they knew what you were really like? And some of the things they threaten their victims with are things that maybe the victim actually has done or said at some point. Even though it may be grossly exaggerated or twisted completely out of context. And with many victims their anger, their frustration, their sense of unfairness gets turned inwards. It becomes internalized. They begin to ruminate over their past errors, their interactions with the narcissist, how they are always shut down. They never seem to be listened to. In some cases, they even blame themselves for the position they're in, for feeling stuck. Their self-esteem plummets as does their self-confidence. There is an increase in depression and anxiety. There can be a sense of helplessness because their fear of speaking up or speaking out has largely increased. Because especially in a long-term relationship, what narcissistic person has probably learned what buttons to push in order to shut someone down. In some cases victims of narcissistic abuse remain silent out of shame over the things they've been accused of or shame of being a victim in the first place. Some even question themselves, am I actually the narcissist here? So what's the antidote? Well I think a good place to start is to take responsibility for ourselves. We accept our faults, our flaws and our errors. Every single one of us have made poor choices at some point in our lives. We have made mistakes. We all have things that we regret. But we learn as much if not more from those mistakes than we do from our successes. Normally I would say something like maybe cut yourself a little bit show a little bit of self-compassion and stop judging your past self through the eyes of the person you are today. But instead today I'm going to say how about stop judging yourself through the lens of the person who tormented you. Reach out, seek help and support. I always say counseling is a good place to start. But if there's anything I've missed, anything you might like to add, please feel free to use the comment box below. Also if you found anything helpful in your recovery and if you feel comfortable enough, please share it in the comment box below because someone reading that might well benefit from your wisdom and your experience. But if you found this video interesting, if you found it helpful, please consider subscribing to my channel and until next time, thanks for watching.