Dynamics

In recent years I did a family constellation and we left at a very confusing point. My practitioner asked me if I was “the big one or the small one” in relationship to my mom, and my unconscious had a really hard time answering that. I said, “I’m the big one” my mother felt so small to me in that moment.

But there was clearly some confusion and my practitioner said it was time for us to stop, but that it was worthwhile to investigate this. I put it away for a few years because I always felt in some ways older than my own mom, but it made no sense to me consciously.

It clicked today that a crucial element of our dynamic when I left home to go to college was my mom constantly texting me to ask me advice on how to parent my younger siblings. And of course I would always give it to her because in some senses, I recognized that I knew better and she did too. That was normal to me, I never realized how strange it was until just now as I’m healing through deeper layers of my family dynamics.

The thought, my parent asked me for advice on how to parent. That sits awkwardly. How could a parent ask their child how to parent after having been their parent? Isn’t this hard evidence for the fact that she didn’t know how, didn’t learn from parenting me, and was never willing to learn? Isn’t this evidence for the fact that she didn’t parent me? These realizations cut through me in such painful ways because I was gaslit all my life to believe that I was wrong, that they knew better, that every time I called them out on how they were abusing me that it wasn’t actually happening and I was just oversensitive and crazy and that it was all my problem.

It makes me see that I was always supposed to be the little one, and it wasn’t a failure on my part that that dynamic between a child and her mother was never developed for me. When I try to readjust my size, visually, I feel like I don’t trust her. I don’t feel safe as her child. I’d rather be the big one- my parents’ parent.

I think it can be such a strange wakeup call for those of us who were put in the position of caring for the people who were supposed to care for us because it shifts our relationship to the world. I remember that for the longest time I always attracted these people who were supposed to care for me- whether they were mentors, teachers, or therapists or the like, who actually ended up needing my care. I didn’t understand why I was caring for people I was paying to help me, how come no one would help me? These imbalanced and strange relationships made me cringe, yet they were so much of my reality that for a period of years I realized I was better alone and not seeking help. Help came with too many strings and too much of an outpour from me.

It wasn’t until a point in my life when it started to clear, and I found myself seeking help from people who could actually help me and didn’t break boundaries or didn’t insert themselves into my healing. I found that I experienced a lot of distrust because of past experiences, and operated from a place of defense which gradually dropped over a long period of time. There was usually a phase of resistance at the beginning when in my mind I tried to convince myself they couldn’t help me, but I usually stuck through it and gave them more chances. This to me was fear, because they were unfamiliar to me (and for those like me, unfamiliar is usually the safer option) and not intuition. This was another moment in which I needed to learn to distill the two, because there is sometimes intuition in fear too. I notice that pure fear comes from my mind, where as instinctual fear comes from my gut.

These people were safe because they didn’t tell me how to be, didn’t tell me what to do, and didn’t get caught in self indulgent and self absorbed emotional dumps that had nothing to do with me. They actually listened to me and wanted to know what was going on, and paid attention, they responded. This at the outset felt so scary to me because I’d never experienced it before. In these experiences no one is the big one and no one is the small one, they’re meeting me on equal footing and they’re here to guide and support, not be my authority.

That of course shaped a lot of the way that I practice too in my integrative sessions. There’s an interesting dynamic that forms that’s so particular, because I can sense when the inner child needs a gentle authority and is at the forefront of the healing. Sometimes the child needs to be seen, heard, and encouraged, sometimes they need to be attuned to in ways that were needed but never given. This is often before the adult and the child have established a healthy connection. Then at other points in time, I’m relating to the adult, and the adult can then liaise with their own inner child. Some clients need a parental energy at the start, and some others need a fierce advocate where they’ve never had one before to initiate and reinforce their developing security.

For those of you who are unaware, I studied power and gender dynamics extensively for many many years. What’s most interesting is in our imbalanced society we think that power is something that is taken, because so many of us actually feel powerless internally as the world is ruled by narcissists and sociopaths. If someone had an internal sense of power, they’d realize they didn’t need to take it from a source outside of themselves, but that’s just the codependent framework of the world at large. Oppression, suppression, taking.

What I came to realize was that power is something that’s received, if it’s given. Everyone has their own sense of power, and if they surrender it freely then that’s when it can be received. I notice these points when people try to do it in my healing practice, and I gently say no. I remind them of what they’re doing and that they have power, and I ask them to take it back.

I think that practitioners are in positions that can be very influential. That’s why I’m so careful about who I work with, especially energetically. Even if I’m not declaring my power, it’s a soft power. That’s what hypnosis and all of these modalities are- they’re exerting influence for change. No one ever saw a healer because they wanted to stay the same. I think it can be dangerous when someone’s ego gets involved or they’re not sensitive enough to the power dynamics at play because they can convince you to do things for self-serving reasons and not reasons for your, or for the, highest good. It’s something that’s always in the back of my mind for me, and for people that I personally hire.

In relating to myself, I’m the big one and the small one simultaneously. As I grow, I learn more about how to parent, and thus parent myself. There are some tangible things that can’t be changed, like how I grew up, but there are elements that can be healed continuously and presently. The dynamic between ourselves is always changing and always has room to grow. That’s where I’m coming to in recent times, is that my relationship to me is the most important relationship I’ll ever have. I may not be able to change what was the dynamic between my mom and me, but my relationship to me is in my full control and I can be hyper aware of the dynamics that I co-create, now.

Emptiness

I had this memory surface today of being at dinner with my mom and my siblings. That night, we were having dinner and I invited my friend to join. She was flakey by nature and not the most accountable when it came to time, so of course halfway through the meal she told us she wasn’t coming. It felt normal then, but I remember how we just waited on her and that’s it. The focus of our dinner was waiting on her. And then when she cancelled, the whole focus was still on her and her absence. That’s how my mother taught me to be- always focus on other people. We didn’t talk except for my mother asking “when is she coming?” we didn’t order. And when we finally did, it was, “why isn’t she coming?”

Getting to this point in my life and through my own healing process, it’s remarkable to look at it from a distant lens where I realize we had no genuine Homelife. It would seem normal for me now, for a friend who was maybe joining for dinner to fade into the background and for the family to be talking and engaged with one another. And for the absence to just be an annoyance, if that. I would imagine that it wouldn’t even matter as a detail. But back then, we had together a very real emptiness.

The reason for this comes down to not just because of narcissism, but because of martyrdom. In my mother’s mind, a good virtuous woman (and these ideas were from her very traditional Chinese upbringing) was one who sacrificed her own needs for those of others especially her husband. That was her duty. As a young child I believe she wasn’t properly cared for at a young age, and to gain any sort of identity or value in the home she took on the burden of the family always caretaking and controlling her younger siblings. This created a very fragile ego in her that was fear based. She needed to always be in control or else the fear would take over.

With this lack of interior sense of self and no healing work, she of course attracted my father who was an overt narcissist with a strong match to hers. Where she was covert, he was overt, so they could create a codependent dynamic unconsciously where both of them reaffirmed certain insecurities, shame, and also reinforced a sense of ego-ic value. When these counterparts meet, there’s usually a huge emptiness in both of them that need to be filled in various ways. The failure to look at and address this emptiness then becomes projected out onto each other and onto other family members, namely the person who then becomes designated as the family scapegoat. I was that person who received the backlash of their unconscious desire to not actually be parents (but their fragile egos needed to abide by cultural and familial norms to be accepted) because they weren’t ready and were too immature. Also, the whole family structure revolves around this emptiness and creating an external image that functions as smoke and mirrors to gain other people’s envy, so they can somehow fill this emptiness with that.

As a child who was born into this and abused narcissistically, I also learned to adopt that emptiness. In fact, my whole identity since I was a child was based around that. Because no one could mirror my needs, my emotions, at a young age, or validate my existence in necessary formative stages, I learned to overcompensate by directing all my focus onto them just like they wanted. With narcissistic and self absorbed people, they want the focus to be on them- I’ll post a video discussing this soon. If these are your parents, they form your basis of value and also your orientation. Because my sense of self was not formed, it was formed in relationship to other people’s needs and to this curation of approved of characteristics. My parents were achievement based, so that achievement became the foundation of worth in my household especially since my real human sense of worth and value were diminished and taken from me when I was little through words and abuse.

As I grew older, I noticed that for certain friendships where I had to be performative, there was a cut off point. One day I couldn’t keep up with the friendship anymore as it entered into more intimacy because that intimacy was not one I had with myself. The whole crux of that emptiness is based on avoiding oneself and so situations that required more openness, vulnerability and intimacy touched on that feeling of emptiness within that was so painful for me to feel. But looking back, my life did revolve around other people. It was always waiting for other people. Anticipating other people’s needs. Giving, doing. It was like I did not exist when other people were not in my proximity, nor needed me. Alone, I still defaulted to my trauma behaviors of dissociating, so I wasn’t home even when I was home alone. I noticed that I always liked to put the attention on the other person so I didn’t have to share much about myself, but this also led to conflicting feelings where I felt like I wasn’t heard, I wasn’t seen, yet it felt more comfortable for others to dominate the conversation because then I didn’t have to be vulnerable and I didn’t have to disclose that underneath it all, there was nothingness.

The long healing journey has been one of reclaiming my authenticity. Underneath all the things I learned I needed to do for love (which was fundamentally empty because it was conditional) and approval and attention was the core part of me that learned it was not okay. I stuffed into my shadow normal things that humans have: their own wants, needs, desires and a healthy level of selfishness. Part of the narcissistic tactic is to gaslight their victim into thinking that any needs they have are selfish. Any time that is “available” that isn’t given is selfish. Anything that can be given and done when someone has the capacity to even sans desire should be done. This is also where the martyrdom comes in, because I watched my mother martyr herself over and over for everyone, to feed her codependency and her need to be validated in being a “good woman”, and also to be a functioning co-creator in a marriage with an overt narcissist.

At the beginning stages of healing I didn’t know tangibly what “putting myself first” even meant. I spent a lot of time alone, self-isolating, so I thought that was enough. But it wasn’t, because I was still actively dissociating and playing into the image of what I thought I should be. I thought that was my authentic self, but my authentic self was hiding without any permission to express herself truthfully. For those of us who are more attuned to our higher chakras and have abuses like the ones I’ve just written about, the focus is on the lower chakras and healing those aspects of us that didn’t form in early development, the healthy ego-self, boundaries and the like. I was punished for having boundaries because those didn’t serve my caretakers. I thought I was putting myself first when I was putting myself last because I still did receive a certain level of validation that my ego needed to know that I existed. My ego had prioritized validation because at the root of it all I just needed to know that I was alive, that I had a purpose because it wasn’t reflected to me at all as a child.

I still have programmed responses and I feel them very strongly. These override my own instincts, but it’s been a long long time that I was conditioned to people please, to put my needs last, to self-abandon at every turn. Now, I take a pause and I really check in with myself. Do I want to do this? Do I even want this person in my life? I used to be afraid of people entering my life because in my mind it felt like they wanted something from me and I would then need to take care of them, did I want an added responsibility? My idea of friendships and relationships was so skewed to me needing to give, and not receiving anything in return which mirrored, emotionally, how I was received at home. This created the unfortunate trauma pattern of attracting those very people I was afraid of, because not only was this energetic, an imprint, but also because they fulfilled an expectation cognitively and therefore my nervous system was habituated to that feeling of familiarity.

I remember when I was maybe 7 or 8, I had a friend Lisa who would come over sometimes. We were out playing in the backyard, and we were muddy. Her dad came to pick her up and Lisa ran across the new Persian rugs that my parents just bought. My dad told me that friends are my responsibility and then punished me for the rest of the afternoon when I didn’t do anything. I remember crying, because at that moment he broke my spirit and programmed me to think that all things that my friends do becomes my responsibility and that I don’t have a separate identity outside of that. I noticed that that made my mental boundaries very penetrable, like I had no ability to fully think for myself- I adopted the thinking patterns of those around me, as well as their attitudes and beliefs, which happens so unconsciously for empaths who haven’t yet healed.

I also noticed that I had a tendency to take things to heart when someone didn’t respond to me, or didn’t consider me, because it put me in touch with the feeling of emptiness internally, of “I do not exist”. There was this big part in my identity that was like a black hole because I literally did not have the permission to explore it like a child normally does. And so, this healing journey is one of coming back home and figuring out what really does fulfill me in a way that is true, and not one that is performative. It’s one that I really allow myself to savor and to have, and doesn’t require me to change my plans or alter my space to make someone else feel comfortable when I don’t even want to share the experience. And that, when I’m home, and I feel fulfilled on my own, means that I look at others as additives to my life, not because they help me reaffirm my identity in the roles I was assigned, as caretaker or healer or giver, but because we can lift each other higher.

Energetic Transmission

Addictions

We’re all familiar with the obvious ways addictions can show up: recreational drugs, alcohol, food, sex and drugs

Those can bring us into dark territories and serve to numb and sedate us, and fill an inexplicable void.

Then there are the innocuous ones like coffee and work which are typically normalized and not so extreme

But what about the ones like love, sugar, social media, technology, adrenaline or feeling bad about ourselves?

In the past few years, my diet has become a lot cleaner. As I venture farther on my spiritual path I’ve stopped imbibing in alcohol and any sort of drugs as my body becomes more sensitive and as I stop partaking in normalized social behaviors. When I worked a full time job, it was expected of me to grab a drink with coworkers, or friends after works, or even clients. Alcoholism seemed so embedded in our social etiquette and in our coming of age narratives too. Everyone thinks of college as the time of experimentation with drugs, alcohol and sex.

Although I’ve gone months to a full year sometimes cutting out alcohol, drugs and/or sex, as my life becomes cleaner it forces me to re-evaluate where “softer” addictions still occupy spaces in my life and why it is that society normalizes these addictions, as well as what I’m trying to distract from by using them.

For instance, I’ve recently cut out sugar as part of a preparatory cleanse. This made me conscious about how sugar is literally in everything. For a day or two I felt depressed because I couldn’t engage in my life normally. With cutting out caffeine entirely, too, (I haven’t had any coffee in years but I do like green tea and matcha), my life drastically change and took on a new consciousness. I had to read food labels carefully. I couldn’t go to “grab a matcha” whenever I was feeling antsy at home or to distract from how tired I was some days. Without sugar, I quickly realized how hard it was to eat out, even at healthy vegan restaurants. Even my salad dressing has maple syrup in it!

Beginning in January I also stopped dating entirely and deleted every dating app. I started to realize how much of my time/energy/attention was being sapped by just scrolling through dating apps when I was bored. This was time that could’ve been spent on myself, instead it was spent swiping. I also took a break from all social media for a few months and did a technology cleanse for a few days. It became more apparent how inextricable it all is to our functioning- our addictions become essential to being productive in our lives.

I noticed I also had a habit of trying to make myself feel bad about myself. I used to be codependent, and codependency is an addiction. When we are addicted to narcissistic dynamics, we are obsessed with feeling bad about ourselves or finding ways we are dysfunctional or unlovable. This pattern felt so much a part of my life because it was modeled after caregivers that I didn’t even recognize it as an addiction I could free myself from.

All of this is making it clearer for me to see where it is I’m still “dependent” and where I have absolute autonomy in my life. The wonderful thing is that the more we take control over these aspects and clear our more addictions, more ways we give away our power, the more confident we feel in our lives. It is directly related.

I write this to encourage you to take inventory of your life too. How much of it is based on forms of addiction? What is it that you’re distracting yourself from, and what is it filling in your life? Often times we default to addictions because of unhealed patterns, not to mention addictions fill the spaces between the connection with ourselves. When we avoid things, we usually opt for addictions, even if it’s just anxiety that we’re smoking or drinking away. Maybe it’s loneliness and emptiness that fuels someone to engage in compulsive sex or dating. Some of these patterns of behavior feel so normalized in modern day, but that doesn’t mean that they’re adding to our health and happiness. In fact, I’d argue that they’re drastically decreasing our wellbeing. These mechanisms serve to sever our connection to ourselves more.

The more addictions I clear out, the more I notice more of what I’m suppressing in my emotional body. Although I’m well aware of my internal processes at this stage of my life, I get to see more nooks and crannies so to speak, the more I rid of these coping mechanisms. This is difficult, but this is the challenge of being human and the clarity, self control that’s achievable on the other side is well worth it, in my mind.

Stepping Away from Family : The Taboo of Estrangement

I am estranged from my family by choice. I chose to do something as extreme as this for my health and wellbeing, so you can imagine how difficult this choice was, how deliberate it was, and what must’ve happened to make this a necessary outcome. Within that choice are layers holding all the years and attempts I’ve made to shift the dynamic. All the self-work that was met with the same toxic reactions, all the attempts to destroy any self-esteem I was building. Eventually, I reached a point: enough is enough. I cannot grow with this in my life. And, I let go.

To me, this marks a huge stride in my own empowerment, self-sufficiency and self worth. I didn’t realize it at the time I committed to this choice, it was just a fact of life. I’d been pushed way past the point of pain and suffering. However, I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t have my qualms about it.

Especially because of the cultural piece— family’s are a huge part of Chinese culture, and because of our general, collective attitude towards the family unit, it’s a doubly hard endeavor. I think all I ever wanted as a little girl was a happy family. I have a tendency to romanticize and idealize sometimes, and of course, I always had the fantasy that my familial relationships would be fixed, people would come to realize their contributions and take responsibility. But that’s wishful thinking. A lot of people don’t, that’s a fact of life. It’s much better to believe that and be pleasantly surprised than to expect someone to change who doesn’t want to, and then to be disappointed over and over, in my opinion. So, I can step back and accept the reality and let time show me what I need to know.

I will just say that in our society, and I’m speaking for American culture specifically, there is a tendency to exalt family. It becomes the centerpiece. Anything that deviates from the family unit is unacceptable. While I was struggling, I had a therapist (who I terminated at a later point) who continued to tell me that family is part of someone’s framework of wellbeing and it’s our responsibility to make things work. My family was falling apart at the time for many reasons and she continued to insinuate that it would cause damage to my wellbeing if I didn’t fix it. She continued to try to push her agenda on me, her belief on me, instead of seeing my situation for what it was. Abiding by her framework, yes, and, sometimes wellbeing means family needs to be out of the picture entirely.

If you’ve experienced the same abuse and toxic behaviors in a family no matter what you do, how much you feel over responsible, how much you become over functional, the truth remains the same for this and any toxic relationship: you cannot fix it if the other person (people) aren’t willing to do the work. They will never realize unless you LEAVE otherwise your presence continues to enable their behavior.

Shutting the door for now does not mean shutting the door for good. Sometimes, people return to their families years later to shift the dynamic after they’ve come to a certain point in their healing. Sometimes, there’s more and more distance as people come to more and more realizations for why the relationship is damaging. I am not at the point of contemplating a return, yet, and I will admit it is painful for me to know that there are years passing that I won’t see, or know, in the lives of the people that I love no matter what. My love for them makes me want to know how they are, to watch them grow older, to fight for them at all costs. My love for them excuses them for any bad behavior- but, loving without realistic limits is unhealthy and we can have all that love for them but choose to love ourselves, too, instead of needing to be the one who constantly sacrifices their own self-love and respect for the other. Notice if ever you are in a dynamic that forces you to choose either you or them. That’s already a big red flag.

If something in this post is resonating for you- just know that if you let society’s expectations outweigh your own wellbeing, if you’re afraid of what people might think or say if you deviate from the norm, then you will never find what you’re looking for. You may put up with the pain and suffering in avoidance of the pain and grief of loss if you made that cut, but the second option allows opportunity for growth. You get, along with it, several gifts of strength, resilience and self worth.

For all the people out there who are estranged from your families and either are open about it or find it hard to talk about- I just want to say that I understand. I may not know the whole story and it may not have been similar to my experience, but I can only imagine what took you there. And, you are so brave. You are not alone.

For those of you who are thinking about making this choice but are still holding on out of unconscious fear- here’s your reminder that you have the permission to make those hard choices, and to take care of yourself.

The best response I’ve ever gotten from someone when I said, “I’m estranged,” was, “good for you for taking care of yourself,” let’s all normalize this conversation and shift it over to that response and attitude.

A note to clients: I will NEVER try to enforce that estrangement is THE way to go. It is what I chose to do and I consider it a last option, but it is not what is right for everyone and when I look at your situation, I look at it as YOUR situation and do my best to mediate any unconscious biases and clear my subjective filters. In the past I’ve worked with people who projected themselves onto me, who got overly and inappropriately involved in my life choices, and I know how harmful it can be so I am especially careful about this.

Root Causes of Unworthiness and How to Address It

Here’s a little video I recorded a while ago on unworthiness, not enough-ness and inadequacy.

I thought the image that popped up for the video was funny so I didn’t replace it.

Enjoy!

Narcissistic Abuse

This is speaking on behalf of the narcissistic abuse victim—

Pathological narcissists rely on fracturing their victim’s identity, so that they’re cut off from themselves. That’s why there’s so much gaslighting, denial, blame shifting and usage of distraction mechanisms. When you’re cut off from your inner knowing, it becomes harder to see the truth.

An example of this is, say, a narcissistic partner is cheating on you. You may get an intuitive sense that something isn’t right, but every time you ask, you’re put in the spotlight or told that you’re crazy. Examples of how this can take place:

1. How can you accuse me of something like that? I’ve never done that in my life (lying, denial, blame shifting- because now you’re the bad person, you’ve accused them)

2. Can you give me the benefit of the doubt? (blame shifting- it’s your fault)

3. You’re too sensitive (gaslighting)

4. You’re imagining things (gaslighting)

5. You’re crazy (gaslighting)

6. I tell you everything (lying, manipulation)

7. You weren’t right about x so how can you be right about this? (gaslighting, creating doubt)

8. Admission of something else, to cover up their deceit (a bid to appear honest, but still lying)

9. Active refusal to engage (stonewalling, punishing)

10. You’ve had bad experiences in the past so you’re projecting onto me (blame shifting)

11. Actual distortion of truth and the importance of honesty (i.e. I’m not lying about anything, I don’t count that as lying)

12. Everyone lies it’s not a big deal, or everyone does it, it’s not a big deal (minimizing)

13. I was just so lonely! It was your fault! (blame shifting, plea for sympathy)

14. They get angry and cause a scene (distraction)

15. You always need to be right don’t you? It’s like your ego can’t handle if you aren’t (blame shifting)

This isn’t all of it! There are countless manipulation tactics the narcissist can employ to make you feel like it’s YOU who’s paranoid, or ill, or to have reason to doubt yourself and your intuition. You can feel like you’re the bad guy for accusing someone so good. When this happens in the long term, victims often feel cut off from themselves, from their power, from their inner voices. This can manifest in depression, anxiety, panic attacks and actually feeling like you are going crazy. Something feels very off, and you feel more and more distant to yourself, to your family and friends. You wonder why your world just doesn’t feel the same way it used to. Where’s your joy? Why do you feel drained all the time?

This is a similar energy that some things like cults will do, or bad gurus.

The reason why these tactics are employed are because if you are out of body, if you are shut down, if you are separated from yourself, then you end up attacking yourself and doing the work for them. An example of this would be, the inner dialogue would be convincing yourself that you’re imagining things, or being paranoid, or convincing yourself that the narcissist is amazing and you don’t deserve them. Your mind goes overboard trying to rectify the cognitive dissonance you are feeling about the situation and the person, and also trying to quiet all the warning signals in the body. You then become more compliant, because you’re cut off from your power. You become more easily manipulated. You’ve surrendered.

Other ways we can feel when we are caught up in narcissistic abuse cycles are: insecure, we may even feel unable to sleep, we may have various ailments pop up out of nowhere, we may get colds all the time even though previously our immune systems were strong, we may find ourselves fixating on the narcissist to the detriment of our own lives. We may start feel really bad about ourselves, or fixating on our flaws, or working tirelessly to improve our communication skills or some aspect of ourselves because we feel like we are to blame (even though the narcissist does nothing). If in a romantic relationship, we may feel very jealous even though we’re not normally jealous. We may also feel very off balance, or unstable, when usually we aren’t this way. The narcissist will use this against you too, even though it’s their instability and chaos that’s making you feel these things.

WATCH OUT FOR THIS. Even though some of us might not be ready in various stages to see how we’re being manipulated because we can really care for, and love the other person, we need to listen to our bodies when we notice something like this happening.

It is what is called, “Crazymaking”. You’re not crazy, but they’ll make you feel like you are. They’ll keep devaluing you, insinuating things to diminish you until you feel so small. This helps them feel bigger, better, and maintain their illusion. They need YOU to believe in their good in order to feel that they are. They need YOU to feel crazy so that they don’t feel their shame about cheating, or their addictions and lies. Essentially, they need YOU to take over responsibility and blame. Narcissists rely heavily on outside feedback, and if they have their one person, their victim, who reflects back what they want to hear and believe about themselves, then everything is ok in their world. Their egos remain afloat, their secrets remain hidden, their truth becomes obscured, and their shame and inferiority are tucked away.

Empaths & Narcissists/Sociopaths

What came first, the empath or the sociopath?

Do either create the other? Why do they always exist in such close proximity?

Whenever I speak to an empath, it seems that they’re involved in some capacity with a narcissist whether in friendship, romance or family. Google this topic and you’ll see it discussed everywhere. Bottom line is, it’s not just the narcissist that’s attracted to the empath, it goes both ways.

Many articles out there will place the blame on one of the parties. It can feel comforting as an empath to read that it’s the narcissist’s fault, but honestly that robs healing from the empath because by accepting it’s partly your (disclaimer: I’m speaking as the empath, as that’s what I have experience with- trust me I’ve spent many many years empathizing with the part of the sociopath/narcissist but for the purposes of this post I’m writing for the empath) choosing, you can then take responsibility. Remember, all dynamics are 50/50 even if they seem skewed. Sometimes the choice is more PASSIVE which is why it seems less like a decided choice.

Someone can be narcissistic and not be a narcissist, someone can be sociopathic, and not be a full blown sociopath. Remember that this all exists on a spectrum, but the traits are there whether they’re expressed fully or not. The thing that makes narcissists so attractive is that there’s a charm, paired with a certain neediness. Empaths tend to be devotional people, and sometimes when someone is both needy, charming and grandiose, it’s all the elements needed to activate that devotion.

I’m literally WIRED to be attracted to narcissists because well, it’s my unconscious showing me my early childhood dynamics. Both my parents were narcissists, my father a full blown one, and my mother more on the covert narcissistic side. Covert narcissists can reframe themselves as martyrs, but their narcissism is just hidden. It’s like, I’ll do everything to seem selfless, but there’s an unconscious/conscious/energetic expectation that you then owe me. Guilt is the mainstay in any type of relationship with a covert narcissist. As they say, martyring can often be the most selfish thing in the world even if it doesn’t carry the appearance.

How do you identify a narcissist? They’ll love bomb the sh** out of you. They usually have high acuity when it comes to identifying your needs and wants, and will morph themselves to adopt those characteristics. There’s also, ALWAYS going to be some sort of “leak” where you do see them switch off to their real selves- and often they will actually tell you straight up (I’m not kidding). But, empaths will often want to give the benefit of the doubt, or excuse whatever it is they say even if it raises questions.

You’ll start to notice along the way that they put demands on your time and energy, and that everything comes back to them and their needs. Their expectations are high, and they’ll find some way to devalue your needs. They’ll also gaslight you and try to convince you of certain things, like why honesty isn’t necessary, or why, if you see through them, what you’re sensing isn’t real, true or logical. They need what they need when they need it. Selfishness is engrained, it’s like they can’t see outside of themselves.

Their egos control them, and they need constant narcissistic supply. This can differ from person to person what counts as that supply, but most will need love, validation, ego stroking. I know that some of these are what most people need, but they tend to require devotion that’s one sided, and don’t care if it causes harm to the supplier) They need to be admired by multiple people at once, and feel they can do whatever it is that they want including lie in order to procure that supply. An example would be a person who cheats on multiple people and strings each of them along based on false promises/claims of exclusivity in order to get what they want, and make sure that they’re the only object of affection for all.

The truth is in their eyes too, and this especially applies to sociopaths. There’s this.. stare… a vacant stare, or a feeling where you can’t see into their eyes like they have some sort of shield up that hides only nothingness. It’s hard to explain. There’s also this sense of unevenness in the eyes. When they look at you it’s like it only goes one way, like a smoke screen, one way mirror.

Last way you can tell? Oh, you know. You can feel it, if you’re an empath. The thing here to watch out for is if you’re programmed to feel comfortable with a socio/narc because it was in your upbringing, you can feel comfortable around them. Just be very conscious of this when you’re working this out.

You will feel drained. You will feel gaslit. You will feel like you’re going crazy. You will feel like nothing you do will ever be enough. You will feel taken advantage of. That’s their MO they will take advantage of you because both of those types of personalities think other people exist to provide something to them and that’s the only way you can exist to them otherwise they will find other supply.

How do you deal with them?

Most people will tell you how to set boundaries. Two of my favorite coaches who speak on this topic are Lisa Romano (she’s AMAZING!) and Stephanie Lyn (also AMAZING!)

In my experience, for me it’s better to DROP. I’ve sustained relationships with narcissists/socios for years, and it always weighs on me no matter how vocal I am or how many boundaries I set. Because the socio especially will say what you want to hear and agree to your boundaries without making changes, just to drag this on more.

You may feel aggravated and confused after talking to them. They won’t take responsibility for themselves, and they likely won’t in the long run. It helps to acknowledge what it is you’re getting from the relationship. Usually, empaths derive some sort of worth or validation unconsciously/consciously from the dynamic. Empaths typically like to feel needed because most empaths have at some point in time been unilaterally responsible for someone else’s needs, and those two types have a lot of needs! Once you identify what you get, try to figure out another way to develop it in yourself without involving yourself in a toxic relationship. It could be as simple as distraction, because the socio/narc is a GREAT distraction because so much of the focus is on them. I say this because even though it is an imbalanced exchange, it’s important to be conscious that it’s not one person’s fault. There are underlying needs that are being met and the sooner you recognize what those needs are, the quicker you can remove yourself from something potentially harmful.

My process now is, I will usually still give them the benefit of the doubt unless my intuition is screaming to remove myself from the situation immediately, which has happened before. If I sense from a conversation that I’m being gaslit, or told inauthentic promises, or when there’s absolute denial, I know it’s done.

Being fixated on a socio/narc takes up a lot of bandwidth from your own life and from the energy you can be investing in other people where there’s more even give and take.

Good luck!