Furthermore, you’re dealing with someone who is going to be willing to do and say whatever it takes to provoke you, to win the right fight, to manipulate you into either getting their way or making you wrong, bad, or the issue somehow, and more than anything, take the heat off themselves. Of course, they’ll also go to great lengths to manipulate the perceptions of others and to manipulate outcomes. And if they’re resentful and motivated enough, they’re also going to be willing to go to any lengths to seek revenge—and that’s probably the last thing you need.
The truth is, because narcissists lack a fundamental moral compass, a conscience, and they are empathy-impaired, they will go to lengths that you and I cannot even conceive of. They don’t have the same emotional response to their shocking attitudes and behavior, which is why they can often be so shocking to us. They do and say all the things—they contrive situations and circumstances, they manipulate and play games, leaving great big chunks of the truth out of the equation.
So my point being: forget showing up with your big heart and all of that love that you carry, and all that empathy—that is who you are, it’s not who they are. Forget trying to become a better communicator—more understanding, more patient, more tolerant, and long-suffering. Like, “If only I could twist and contort myself enough, maybe I could make this work.” Forget all of that. Forget showing up with what you would normally show up with in a discussion with a reasonably sane and healthy adult. Forget bringing that to the table with a destructive narcissist. You’re not dealing with a reasonably sane and rational adult, so everything that you would normally bring to the table of the conversation with a relatively reasonable, sane, rational, and healthy person isn’t actually going to work with the narcissist. So forget all of it.
What you want to do instead is the exact opposite. That’s what I mean by “think counterintuitive.”
Now, here’s what you do want to do: with as much detached, flatline, non-emotional, non-reactivity as you can possibly muster, use one-word responses and super short, succinct, clear, and simple statements like:
- No
- No thank you
- I’m not available
- I can’t do that
- Thank you, but I’m not interested
The point being, “No” is a full and complete sentence when you’re dealing with an empathy-impaired emotional manipulator hell-bent on targeting and exploiting you. And it might take a little practice to get good at this, so you might consider practicing in the mirror beforehand. But if you can practice delivering the information with zero emotion attached to it—no high-voltage energetic intensity coming off of you when you’re saying what you need to say, super detached, super clear, and succinct, followed by silence—you’ll find that the message lands, whether they like it or not. Stand your ground and do not waver, and they will hear you.
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