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Radical self-acceptance is giving yourself permission to become acquainted with and accept yourself,
self-compassion, not judging yourself,
What do I like about myself? What don’t I like about myself, but really can’t change or don’t want to change? What don’t I like about myself and can change? What am I about? What matters to me? In
letting go of the hope that the narcissistic person will become kind, empathic, and interested in your life and you are recognizing that the invalidation, hostility, and carelessness are here to stay.
not about giving up or giving in or agreeing with the abusive behavior, but about seeing a situation clearly.
blamed herself for Clare’s down days.
sporadically and superficially empathic,
Maria ended up walking away from her career.
the narcissistic person projects their shame onto you, and you, because you’re an empathic and accountable person, may receive it, integrate it, blame yourself, and ultimately take responsibility for all the toxicity within the relationship. Only with this structure can these relationships persist. The day you finally accept that the narcissistic dynamic will not change and that it has nothing to do with you is the day these cycles shift—and the day the relationship stops “working.”
these relationships are about the loss of opportunities, hopes, aspirations, narratives, instincts, and sense of self. Ultimately,
She blamed herself for being socially unskilled, emotionally unintelligent, and incapable of intimacy, when in actuality she is warm and has a lovely sense of humor and deep empathy for others.
grieving the living is far more difficult than grieving the dead.
If you disengage from your family of origin, you may grieve that you never had a safe space, a sense of belonging, a soft place to land, or unconditional love. You may look back at your life and ask the question: How would my life have been different if I hadn’t been through this relationship?
that significant developmental window that was harmed.
there is no second attempt at childhood.
their presence can elicit the grief of your lost childhood.
While in the relationship, you may also experience ambiguous loss,[1] described as loss that is ongoing, unresolved, and unclear.
the person is there, but they are not there. In the same way, the narcissistic person is there but they are not really there as a companion or with empathy—and they are emotionally abusing you.
It can seem as though they are flowing into their best lives while you as a survivor are navigating a landscape of pain, loss, and regret.
Even after the narcissistic person passes away, their voice can linger within you for a lifetime. Healing means you still need to do the mindful work of facing that distorted voice down, whether the narcissistic person is living or dead.
Disconnecting from feelings can keep you stuck in them, so think of them as a gentle wave you are riding back to shore, and don’t try to jump off.
Writing down your experience allows you to track the small shifts in yourself as you slowly release this relationship
over time you can witness the improvement, and it can substantiate your commitment to growth and individuation.
After defining yourself by the narcissistic relationship for so long, the hard work is experiencing yourself outside of
a situation that you entered in good faith and that slowly revealed itself to you,
Narcissistic people rarely genuinely apologize, face meaningful consequences for their behavior, take accountability or responsibility, or meaningfully acknowledge your pain.
you get hurt and psychologically wrecked, and they get to move on with their lives with little insight into the damage they wrought.
it is not fair, I cannot change it; I can, however, chart a different and authentic course forward and learn from this.
a cigar box, shoebox, whatever works. Write down the losses from the narcissistic relationship on little pieces of paper—things you gave up, parts of yourself you lost, experiences you missed out on, hopes you sacrificed—and put them in the box. Consider it a strange coffin of sorts. Knowing these losses can be put somewhere can be a practice that intentionally pushes you to let them go and make space for your evolving sense of self. —
grief as a tunnel you must navigate through as the first part of the healing process.
There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered. NELSON MANDELA
her online dating experience was like a tour through a swamp of narcissism.
his monopolizing conversations, his grievances, their shared interests—Lin
Healing means you see narcissistic and antagonistic patterns clearly and don’t think that this time will be the exception. You learn to gracefully end the conversation and disengage.
more you engage with the narcissistic person, the more you end up disengaging from yourself.
The key to healing is to grow and flex the psychological muscle that helps you recognize these toxic people and patterns as they come up, and instead of trying to change them, you manage them.
You listen to your instincts and establish protective boundaries.
avoid taking the bait, not fall for the future faking, and recognize the gaslighting when it happens. To limit the narcissistic person’s impact, it also helps to not take responsibility for their bad behavior.
catching yourself in the distortions of euphoric recall, steering clear of the enablers, and journaling the hell out of this relationship so you have a point of reference and cannot trick yourself with denial.
dismantling a person’s sense of self
Gaslighting isn’t lying, nor is it just a difference of opinion. It’s designed to confuse you and undermine your autonomy and sense of who you
Resisting gaslighting early on in a new relationship can result in the gaslighter becoming frustrated and moving on to a target they can more easily dominate.
If you have been or are currently in a narcissistic relationship, you have been told how you feel, whether you are hungry or not, or even that “You can’t be cold, this room is warm enough.” If you endure this long enough, you may no longer trust your own assessment of how you feel or your preferences.
“I don’t even know what kind of TV show I like or what my favorite food is anymore.” Checking in daily with yourself can help you start to trust your reality and experience, and it can be part of a mindfulness routine.
Simply one conversation with a respectful, reality-reflecting person can be more restorative than you can imagine.
Think of how often you have apologized in these relationships—
I’m sorry I didn’t say that the right way. Over time, it becomes reflexive, but start paying attention whenever it happens. Over-apologizing is usually a response to gaslighting, and it causes you to gaslight yourself.
Being narcissist resistant means forever maintaining realistic expectations and girding for the inconveniences that will follow.
It can be useful to keep a gaslighting journal. Writing down instances of gaslighting, big or small, helps you realize how often it occurs and with whom, and it can help you feel less “crazy.”
(Ah, this inner voice may be trying to motivate me and I am afraid of failing).
