Arya Fights in the Dark: a Note on Narcissists
“Swift as a deer. Quiet as a shadow. Fear cuts deeper than swords. Quick as a snake. Calm as still water.”
The only media which has been able to capture and hold my attention in the last few years has been the series Game of Thrones.
I started watching it before I was diagnosed with Complex PTSD, and continued watching it through the ensuing collapse of my career, marriage and life. The intricate and multi-faceted storylines of white-walkers and dragons brought back to life, war, intrigue, betrayal, mind-games, love, death, sex and magic were the counterpoint to the chaos and carnage in my own life; a poetic enactment of my inner world which I found deeply reassuring. If you aren’t the sort of person who finds re-animated zombies, and grueling battle scenes deeply reassuring, I can tell you that this is not the post for you and I’m probably not the writer for you. If you go out the way you came in, turn left and go straight down the hall you will find the room full of evangelical Christian women who write beautiful spiritual inspo pieces which will nurture and minister to you. No hard feelings, I promise.
Taken as a whole, the cast of female characters in GOT is like a powerful kaleidoscope of every facet of feminine energy; in all its beauty, strength, awe-inspiring generativity and shadow. One thread ties their story lines and personalities together, I think, and it is the deepest message which spoke to me the most powerfully when I needed it most. It is the same message, interestingly, as the one the cross of Christ holds for me. For each of the female protagonists, the seat of their ultimate power and victory was in their pain and suffering. The specific area in which they were the most wounded, turned out to be the area in which they were the most triumphant.
Arya as a character, is the one I resonate the most with. For those who decided long ago they would never bother with this series, let me attempt to briefly sketch her. Arya is the stocky, small, plain tomboy girl-child in a cast of other female characters who are either willowy, regal beauties, powerful sorcerers, accomplished warriors or queens. She has one of the most bizarre story lines, which does not follow anything like the pattern of her sister, her mother or the other feminine characters in her world. She always feels like a square peg in a round hole. She spends her childhood being in trouble for doing things that are seen as the province of the males, refusing to conform to the stifling pattern of highborn women, needlework, flirting, marriage and childbirth. She wants to be a fighter. And so her father eventually finds her a fighting tutor, who teaches her the ‘waterdance’, which is in fact her initiation her into sword-work. She eventually becomes one of the fiercest warriors, arguably the fiercest warrior. But the way she arrives at this mastery, is slow and brutal to watch. I won’t go into it here, because it is too convoluted and won’t make sense, but if you know, you know.
Here is the moment though, the moment I wanted to write about. Because I wanted to write a post about dealing with the narcissists in your life at Christmas, and to do it, we are going to pay attention to how Arya fought in the dark. There are so many brilliant resources on narcissists, how to spot them, how to mitigate their damage in your life and how to heal from narcissistic abuse. I try to make a point of not re-hashing something you can Google, or find online somewhere else, so I highly recommend watching some good You Tube clips and reading some books or articles around this, because it will help you feel less alone, and more equipped.
“Most of us will have to deal with a narcissist or three in our lives, and will likely have to continue dealing with them if they are in our families. This is because, to cut out a narcissist completely is one of the most dangerous things you can do.”
This then, forms a litmus test for the question ‘is this person a narcissist or not?’ If you were to play with the idea of cutting them out of your life completely, blocking their calls, not returning their emails, moving house etc. to avoid them, think about the repercussions.
If thinking about the repercussions turns your blood to ice, you are likely dealing with a narcissist. There are two different types, covert and overt. Overt narcissists are more likely to use aggressive love-bombing and their charisma to entrap and keep you around as narcissistic supply. Covert ones are harder to spot, because they have an expert ability to make you feel as if every iota of their pain, heartache, misfortune, discomfort, is either your fault, or at the very least can be remedied by you. And if only you do the things they want you to do, behave in the ways they’ve groomed you to behave, everything is fine. If you assert your selfhood or independence or autonomy in the presence of a covert narcissist, you will get quietly sidelined, punished through withdrawal and quiet, unexpressed rage, a infinitesimal look of disapproval will pass discreetly over the features of the narcissist and your stomach will drop as you realise you’ve done the wrong thing. Covert narcs relish their poverty, their morality, their saintly image. They are often deeply invested in careers where they help people: nursing, psychology, social work, human rights activists. They are often softly spoken and are beloved by a wider community of people who revere and admire them – who they appear to be and what they stand for - from a relative distance. But they have very few close friends. Very few people are allowed all the way in, because a covert narc must be able to control intimate relationships. Having children, for covert narcs, is a very simple way to ensure a steady supply of what they need; validation for their own crippled selfhood. Children of covert narcs are often chronically anxious, and many develop highly dysfunctional relational patterns as a result, if there is no intervention or alternative model of parenting presented to them. Most of the literature online is about overt narcs, who are easier to spot. Which is why I won’t go into it here. We can all see the mini-Donald Trumps of the world lumbering toward us. They are like grizzly bears. Lethal, but you can hear them coming. Covert narcs are like tarantulas. Silent, fast and deadly.
Covert narcissists are harder to work with, because they are harder to spot. This makes them more dangerous. I only have one covert narc in my life, and they are hands-down the most dangerous person I have to deal with.
As a side-note, those of us who have sustained early narcissistic injury by narcissists who formed us in one way or another, either at church or in the family home, or at school, in romantic relationships which we got into whilst we were still very insecure, or even in the workplace, can at times, exhibit behaviours of narcissism. This can be terrifying indeed, especially if you have been cursed with insight, because you can worry that somehow its contagious and you’ve caught it. This is because the other thing that narcissists are BRILLIANT at, is subterfuge and gaslighting. One of the easiest tricks in the narcissist’s toolbox is projection. So they will make YOU feel like a narcissist so that you don’t cotton on to the fact that in fact THEY are the narcissist. So, remember, ‘narcissistic injury’ and ‘narcissism’ are different: one can be healed from (I’ve done it) and one is a lifelong condition for which the affected one lacks all insight, and resists all efforts to shift out of. There is no point in confronting a narcissist. That is one of the most dangerous and ineffective strategies to attempt to free yourself. Don’t bother.
“The prize for the narcissist, is the self-hood of the other. Narcissists are interested in supply, not connection. They have two modes of relating. Total enmeshment (which they think is intimacy, but which feels to the other person like being consumed by a black-hole) or absolute rejection. They don’t know how to relate in the middle ground, with friendly and well-boundaried connection.”
As anyone who decides they will be brave enough to write about narcissists does, I have to be very careful to protect myself here. So in order to not land myself in too much hot water with too many awkward questions asked at Christmas dinner, I present to you here a laundry list of how supply can look, across the various narcissists I manage in my life:
· Physical touch, which often leaves the other person feeling repulsed, or drained and exhausted
· Public recognition and praise
· Publishing and talking about published works
· Being told they are needed / wanted
· Private accolades from needy and vulnerable people seeking help in their distress.
· Being invited to key events
· Being given access to loved ones; children, friends etc.
· Being validated by a tribe which is seen as desirable
· Social media followers
· Having disciples / acolytes / mentees
· Entrapping significant others into supporting or scaffolding their social media image
And the list goes on.
One is able to maintain being in the good books with a narcissist if one is able to sublimate one’s own selfhood into the narcissists requirements. By that I mean, as long as me being me doesn’t get in the way of me being a good option for narcissistic supply, everything stays sweet.
As soon as me being me (sovereign, independent, with my own power and agency) conflicts with the narcissists agenda to have supply from me, that’s when we get into trouble. Being groomed by a narcissist to be ‘good’ (in their eyes) is possibly one of the most damaging phenomena to happen to a soul. It has effects similar to being sexually abused, in terms of loss of selfhood, agency, dignity and sovereignty. When we start to heal these wounds, we start to incur increasing amounts of opposition from the narcs in our life who benefited from us being ‘good’ or ‘compliant’. This is also a great litmus test for this. Who is celebrating your integration? Your healing? Your spiritual and emotional growth? Who is high-fiving you and encouraging you to flip your script, pivot, change direction? They are not narcissists.
The ones who are subtly warning you about the consequences for your life-affirming choices, giving you cues that you are off-track as you shift your attention into your own agency and away from keeping them happy. Who is withdrawing affection and love from you to punish you when you make choices that don’t conform to their conditioning of you? They are either dickheads or narcissists or both. Either way, best to start backing away slowly.
There is a fearsome moment for Arya, where she has failed her master. She has transgressed and used her burgeoning power which she has learned from him, for her own ends, and for that she must pay a price. The price, is banishment from his presence, and the loss of her sight. Arya in that moment in her story arc, is a fierce warrior in training, desperate for the mysterious knowledge she can only get from her master. She knows she still has so much more to learn from him, she isn’t ready to leave. Against her pleas for mercy, she is unceremoniously exiled and blinded. She begins life on the street, as a blind beggar, and slowly, as she is tormented by someone from her former life who comes to beat her up periodically, she re-learns how to fight. But this time, she must learn blind. As blow after blow after blow is rained down on her by her brutal and unrelenting opponent, she is hammered over and over again, being smashed and mocked by someone who can see perfectly. This is a great analogy for being in the presence of a narcissist when wounded. They are like sharks. They can smell when there is blood in the water and they come in for the kill.
By paying attention, using all available senses, developing a powerful inner sense of intuition, and allowing painful wounds within to forge a potent centre of resilience, a sense of self begins to emerge from the alchemy of this kind of suffering, which does not have its locus point anywhere but in the ground of the soul, where Divine DNA meets the human body. The gifts from before, whatever they are, start to become heightened in distress and suffering. In the absence of previously relied upon locus points for Arya, her sight – a deeper and more grounded personal power begins to emerge.
Even though it doesn’t feel like it, when this personal power emerges, you are already home free, when it comes to navigating around narcissists. Because their ultimate goal is to keep you dependent on them, in some small way. They want you to need them. And when everything you have is stripped away and you learn that you don’t need anything except the breath in your lungs, all of a sudden, you become both delightfully free, and also a threat to the narcissist.
I’m convinced that God is Goodness, and that goodness is both available to me in every moment and inherently creative. And that creativity is the ability to transmute, heal and alchemise brokenness, suffering and pain into strength and resilience. I’ve seen it happen over and over and over again in my own life, and I know so many others who have also seen it. Dealing with narcissists is the most dangerous thing I do these days. And I have to do it periodically. Except now I know that I am like Arya, and that my season of exile and blindness with all of its training and diligence in attunement, deep listening and discipline has prepared me to deal with them in ways they could not possibly understand.
When I think about what happens now when I am in the presence of one of the narcissists in my life, here is the scene which plays out in my mind right before I get out of my truck. (Because you must try very hard to never let them come to your house. Always go to them so you can leave when you want. #hottip.)
There is a scene in GOT, where Arya has gotten her sight back. She is now a fully fledged warrior, and she is on the run. The person chasing her is her brutal opponent, the one who began her training, and then beat her mercilessly when she was a blind, exiled beggar. Arya runs down a narrow laneway, flings open a door, and before her is a small room, lit only by a single candle. Her pursuer is hot on her heels, and we feel unbearable tension because we know that Arya is now cornered in this tiny window-less room, and has never beat this opponent before.
The moment her attacker comes bursting through the door and it falls shut behind her, Arya holds her sword steady in front of herself, takes a deep breath, and the second before the scene ends and cuts away, she slices through the candle, snuffing it out completely bringing about total darkness. This is her one edge, her only advantage. She has learned to fight blind, and her opponent has not. And so, she emerges victorious.
In the moment when we face someone who has repeatedly assaulted our self-hood, in a series of small or large ways, what they fail to understand is that their assault has likely forced us to learn how to fight blind. Those of us who decide to attempt to free ourselves from the grip of the narcissist likely had to pay a very steep price for that. Including exile, betrayal, financial loss, the loss of previously enjoyed privileges or access, important relationships or our own reputation. Some of us, like the coyote caught in a bear trap, will have to metaphorically gnaw off our own limb to get away. All of these punishments force us into a brutal discovery of the seat of our own personal power and resilience. And once we have it, we can never be used as narcissistic supply again. It is only ever for our own support, nourishment, and as an instrument to chart our course. Often when I work with clients we talk about the re-orientation of our internal compass. Narcissistic abuse, like sexual abuse, interferes with our own internal compass. It will tell us that up is down, that dangerous is safe, that good is bad and bad is good, it will fuck with our decision-making capabilities, hold our executive function hostage and in all ways, confound and paralyse us. But once our inner compass is fixed, aligned, healed, it begins to function again as an excellent way-finding instrument. This is entirely possible, I promise you. I wrote about what happened when I healed my own compass, in a previous piece about spiritual authority. Because for me, it was so inextricably linked to my own sense of personal sovereignty and belonging to myself, which then delivered me finally into a sense of belonging to Divine – the union I had been chasing my whole life. This union with Divine, that powerful homecoming, unlocked old and new gifts in me, ones which had lain dormant for decades, and new ones which merged together to forge me into my own humble little version of the indomitable warrior Arya.
These days, I am unfuckwithable. Which means, look, the narcissists in my life can have a hot crack and see how far they get but I don’t like their chances. Mostly, they behave themselves around me now. I have perfected the eye-glaze, the energetic withdrawal, the bait-and-switch, the deflect-and-move-on, the downward-facing shoe observation and all the other narcissistic survival techniques, but they are not what saved me. Healing and learning how to fight in the dark is where the juice is. There are no prescription or formula for this, the only thing I can offer you is my own story, woven together with Arya’s waterdancing in the dark, in the hope that you can see some threads which tie into your own story, and from there, chart your own course. Because ultimately, that’s what we must all do.
What I can tell you is this: if you choose to free yourself from the clutches of a narcissist and begin to heal, do not be surprised if you find yourself exiled, a beggar on the street, stripped of your old privileges and power. Because healing from this kind of trauma requires a total self-annihilation and rebirth. It is just that evil and dark, its grip total and devastating. I hope that if this happens to you, you get a glimmer of wonder amidst the grim of it all. I hope you know that your real training is about to begin, and that when its over, you too, will become unfuckwithable. I hope that while the blows are raining down on you, that you will find the wherewithal to start to learn the pattern, to begin to stand and find your own feet, to learn the exquisite waterdance of the expert fighter and to move with the pain instead of away from it. I hope you discover that all the gifts you had before are now exponentially activated, and that the humility you learned in blindness and exile has uniquely qualified you to wield them with expert precision and without apology.
And may you, too, have a moment to meet your fiercest foe by candlelight, and choose instead to fight in the dark.