This blog may die an untimely death because the topic on my heart is a difficult one to write about. Yet, it is definitely on my heart, so much so that at this point in time I feel I have to write about it.
Years ago, a friend and I had a running discussion. She maintained that a third person we knew - whom I'll call N. - was not just annoying, bad, occasionally mean, and/or irritating but that N. was actually wicked, evil. I maintained that this was not the case, that if we had known N. under different circumstances, we would have seen a completely different side to their personality.
Many years later, I realized that my friend was right and I was wrong - that N. was actually a poster child for something called Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I found out about this by accident and wish I had known about NPD from the start and not years after the fact.
The narcissist knows right from wrong but lacks the ability to empathize and this makes them dangerous to others. For some reason, they enjoy hurting people and because they can't empathize, they have no compunction about doing it.
They also operate from a false self-image, believing themselves to be perfect, superior to others, desirable to others, and therefore deserving of praise and admiration. While they may be accomplished, they definitely are not perfect and their actual abilities never support their fictional self-image.
When they don't get what is their "due", they don't hesitate to punish others via verbal, emotional, and/or physical abuse. Like all abusers, they draw their victim in with honeyed words, seductive actions, money -whatever it takes. This is known as "love bombing". However, once they have the target where they want them, they begin a cat-and-mouse game of systematic abuse interspersed with short times of "love bombing" - just enough "good times" to keep the victim from bailing when the abuse becomes too much.
During this process, they isolate their victim from family and friends so that the NPD becomes the only source of emotional support. Soon the victim finds themselves caught in a web of one; they are the fly while the narcissist :spider" works from above, from a position of control, busily enlarging their web in the hopes of catching others.
This is particularly hurtful because they choose victims who are compassionate, people who really know how to love and who are susceptible to the narcissist's manipulative pleas for help. By the way, narcissists are great actors, all of them, and they have a tendency to paint themselves as the victims while in reality it is the other way around. They thrive on sympathy, often presenting themselves as needing to be rescued, when in fact it is others who need to be freed from their verbal, emotional, and/or physical abuse.
So what is a Christian to do when they've been steamrollered by a narcissist?
I'm no expert but I think the first thing is to recognize the truth. Jesus said that if we abide in His word, we will know the truth and the truth will set us free.
Freedom! To be free from the pain, the false guilt, the memories, and the susceptibility to the narcissist's manipulative ploys! To be free from the desire to strike back. To be free... to live again, to love again, to enjoy the future, and leave the past behind. (There will always be scars but as the popular saying goes, scars truly are an indication of healing.)
So what is the truth regarding people who can be classified as NPD?
The truth is that narcissists have an evil agenda. They aren't just misguided, a little moody, upset now and then because of this or that, sometimes mean but deep down inside still loving. No. Deep inside they are void of the ability to love and their intellect is systematically "reading" others, exploiting others, and then hurting others.
A corollary truth is that no matter how hard you try, no matter how many times you increase your efforts to please them, no matter how nice, loving, compassionate, sympathetic you are, things will never get better. While there are counselors who work with narcissists, the "cure rate" is abysmally low. To fix a problem, you have to first acknowledge the problem and the narcissist, by his very nature, won't do that - everyone else is the problem. So even counselors do not have a good track record at bringing people out of the NPD pattern.
From the Christian standpoint, the solution lies with God. But again, the narcissist has to humble themselves in order to repent, and be saved. So it seems to me the best and only thing you can do for your adversary is to pray for them to be delivered from evil and for them to be saved. Apart from that, the best thing is to keep your distance. As the Bible says, "What fellowship can light have with darkness?" (II Corinthians 6:14). It's a good question to ask ourselves.
Knowing the truth, starting each day with Ephesians 6:10-18 and asking God especially to gird your mind and heart with Truth - that's where the first step lies I think. In his book, When the Enemy Strikes, Dr. Charles Stanley writes that when you ask God to help you "put on" His belt of truth, you need to specifically ask Him to enable you to discern not only what is being said but also what isn't being said - things that the speaker should be addressing but is glossing over. Ultimately, as you soak your heart in the truth of God's word and in the light of His presence, the best thing you can do for yourself is to cut all ties (as much as possible) between you and the narcissist. Those emotional ties can lie dormant for a long time but God's truth can do a deep cleansing on your heart and mind and you can truly be free to live and love again.
If you carry a heavy burden of guilt, angst, etc, and don't even know where to begin in Bible reading and prayer, ask God to lead you to a Christian counselor - He provides help for us supernaturally but also through others who come alongside of us for a season, sharing their wisdom and guiding us to the life we desire. I don't mind saying that I've been in Christian counseling and consider it to be one of the best things that I ever did. It was hard work but it was totally and completely worth it.
Lately an old hymn has come to mind as I've researched this topic and thought about it. It's a hymn I haven't heard in years, maybe decades, but one that I used to love. I'd like to close this first blog entry with that particular song, hoping that it will mean as much to you as it has to me lately.
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