Are you an echoist? A result of Narcissistic abuse

[Music] hi everyone this is Athena from Courage coaching thank you for stopping by today in today's video I wanted to talk about something known as echoism now echoism is more or less the opposite of narcissism and it usually occurs when the victim of a narcissist is scared of appearing narcissistic while narcissists are self-absorbed and lack empathy an echoist will struggle to ask for anything that they want or need echoist are people that like being in the background they don't like being in the spotlight they are the types of people that don't voice an opinion and they don't want to be noticed an echoist is constantly in fear of being perceived as a narcissist and they work on preventing any behaviors or actions that would make others perceive them to be this way so for instance they will be very careful to not come across as arrogant or self-absorbed but what happens is that echoist end up staying inside their head and they become overly preoccupied with themselves and they are always ruminating and worrying and being scared of their own voice because of how fearful they feel and how insecure they feel people that have echoism are usually incredibly modest they are overgiving but especially with undeserving individuals so they are basically doing exactly what they learned in childhood with their narcissistic parent they stay in the background they constantly meet the parents' needs and they don't ask for anything and they don't make any waves and they don't cause any problems when an echoist becomes an adult they do everything they can to stay out of the public eye and they don't like anything to be acknowledged or recognized so if they have any successes at all they don't want any attention for these successes if somebody recognizes any of their successes they feel really uncomfortable and they worry that they are being really vain or self-absorbed just like a narcissist is echoism is just a trait it's not a disorder in itself echoist are usually individuals that are quite withdrawn they are usually people Pleasers and it generally impacts this individual's relationships some of the main traits of somebody having echoism are the following fear of Praise or are seeming narcissistic in any way excessive focus on others they neglect their own needs they suppress any desires they have they are always agreeable with others even if they don't actually agree they actively reject or avoid any attention whatsoever they take on a lot of self-criticism and self blame and lastly they are highly empathetic echoism and codependency have a lot of similarities because both individuals ignore their needs enable other people's behaviors they suppress or desires and they focus on others too much but they aren't actually the same thing echoist unlike codependents are highly empathetic individuals and they are very good at listening to others without trying to manipulate or control another's um actions with their behaviors most people with echoism in romantic relationships are very passive and they don't enjoy taking the lead in a romantic relationship they find it very hard to express their authentic feelings to set boundaries and to State any preferences or needs they have it is very common that if you are in a Rel relationship with an echoist you will feel like the relationship is very much one-sided and that you can't really see the echoist true authentic self because they hide so much of themselves it's very hard to actually be intimate with them in a healthy way because echoist are so overgiving this makes them very vulnerable to further abuse especially with people that have narciss narcissistic traits what actually causes echoism well it is a result of narcissistic abuse where the individual suffered a lot of rejection and the individual suffered a lot of criticism whenever they voiced a concern or a feeling or anything at all that bothered them echoism is essentially a traumatic reaction to having been terribly rejected by one's parent an echoist learns childhood that they must suppress their own needs and always put other people's needs first so this also looks like somebody that was parentified by their caregiver and is always doing things for them and they are not getting their own emotional needs met as a child echoist believe that only by giving to others by putting other people's needs first that this is how they are going to be loved they only feel that they can be loved if they are giving and if they are always putting other people's emotions above their own and of course this isn't healthy because they need to learn that they deserve love and attention as well that they can be themselves and that they don't need to censor themselves to be in a relationship if you think you might be an echoist then please feel free to leave a comment below the video This is actually very common it's just not talked about a lot and if you have any questions at all then please feel free to send me an email to courage as all you need at gmail.com thank you so much for listening and watching today and I will see you very soon bye-bye