Want to stop attracting covert narcissists? Then stop giving “saviour” people your attention.
Nobody has miracle solutions to anything. If they say they have, they’re lying to inflate their own egos.
….And they’ll project that onto you. They’ll accuse YOU of having an inflated ego to deflect attention from what is OBVIOUSLY the real problem. (Among other annoyances we all know come from narcissistic people).
Pills of wisdom #12
The superhero delusion is unfortunately common — a phenomenon where people who aren’t all that good at “saving” others start saying (and probably believing) that the world can’t live without them or their work. Ever met anyone like that? If you have, there’s a good chance they’re narcissistic.
(Or, at the very least, have strong and noticeable narcissistic traits)
In fact, let’s talk about people with narcissistic traits, because this is not a clinical analysis. This is a zero-frill and zero-bullshit “street smarts” sort of article. I’m going to lend you some of my practical experience identifying and cutting ties with people who have narcissistic traits, whether OR NOT they have a disorder. Nobody needs a full disorder to wreak havoc in other people’s lives, isn’t it? All it takes is some traits. So let’s stop being pedantic.
Maybe some of the mentioned people (whom I’m pretty sure follow me here. Feel free, darlings! Maybe you’ll learn a thing or two. I’m not afraid of you, for the record) will be confused that I’m now referring to them as “people with narcissistic traits” because when we were still in contact, I never said that to them or to anyone. It is indeed true. I’m a fawner, unfortunately. I don’t let total strangers walk all over me, so I don’t fawn with strangers; However, on the other hand, with friends and other closer people, I used to do that. I used to have the bad habit of trying to deny both to myself AND to the person that I had a problem with them, in hopes that it’d go away on its own (“since we’re so close and there must be some sort of bond keeping us together…Right? Right??!!”). I no longer do that. Hence the article. I’ve come to learn that no matter how long you’ve been in contact with someone, and no matter how many good memories you have together, sometimes the unhealthy parts of them DO NOT heal because they stay firmly in denial and refuse to do the shadow work.
This is why, if you’re dealing with an immature adult, you ARE dealing with an immature adult. They don’t “grow up naturally” like children do. If there’s no effort on their side to address the issues they REALLY NEED to address (not the non-issues they might use as a smoke curtain to distract you from the really serious ones. Okay?), they’re not worth your time and energy.
Digression finished, on to the article.
What helped me realise that “amazing” saviours tend to be narcissistic.
Not too long ago, I used to wonder (and even openly mention it in older articles) why I had such bad luck with psychologists, coaches, and other “helper” types. It wasn’t just my impression; My partner and some other close people confirmed to me when I told them the stories, “yeah, you’re dealing with someone at least unethical”. Seriously, the stories are bizarre, I don’t even need to exaggerate. This is why I kept wondering what was going on.
I consulted oracles too, in multiple occasions, to try and see what could be behind this issue. And the answer I kept getting (which today I understand) is “you idealise these people”. At the time, I didn’t get it because it wasn’t in the literal sense. If you know me, you know. I don’t idolise. Even the celebrities I love the most are people I treat like normal humans and don’t marvel at them too much. I was puzzled by the repeated message (which came in different wording here and there, but still boiling down to the same). What I needed to realise, and now understand, is that “idealising” isn’t always synonym with worshipping. Sometimes, it simply means trusting someone without hesitation. And that is something I did do. A lot.
Once I stopped giving helpers my undivided trust, once I stopped assuming it was just me being respectful of their work (like “oh, why be a karen, let them do their thing, Lucy. Don’t be fussy, ignore your intuition”)… I had a bit of a lightbulb moment.
I noticed that I had been giving people with superhero delusion my undivided trust.
I looked back, way way back, into my past, and remembered that when I was at school, the psychologists I occasionally saw for vocational tests and other routine stuff were NOT problematic — and neither did they sell an image of themselves as a “unique saviour” who has the ultimate solution to [insert problem here]. On the contrary actually: they were all “run-of-the-mill” professionals whom the school could afford and didn’t give a second thought about.
And indeed, looking back now, none of those run-of-the-mill psychologists and coaches and whatnot who simply did their job and didn’t put competitors down with derogatory comments end up hurting me at all. None of them turned out to be jealous of me, controlling, cult-like, childish, devil-advocates, derailers, cherrypicky and word-salad-users, etc [insert here other annoyances covert narcissists drive us all crazy with]. Not at all. They just did their job, got paid, and went home. Rinse and repeat. No egos being secretly inflated under the pretense of “loving their job too much” or “caring too deeply”.
So, here’s the second fallacy I’d been falling for my whole life: if a service provider puts on a bit of “a show” and has an above average price tag, testimonials/referrals and whatnot… they must be good. Right?
Wrong.
This is today’s lesson. It doesn’t only apply to professionals — you can extrapolate it to informal relations too, like friendships. If a friend is too frantic to impress you or lovebombs you or whatever, BEWARE — but I’ll focus on the professionals just to keep it brief.
I’m not saying that if someone DOES something amazing, they’re narcissistic.
In fact, it’s never fool-proof, it’s never 100%. It’s just a strong possibility to keep in mind. But my point is another, anyhow: if someone SAYS they can achieve amazing feats (and especially, if they just expect you to trust that without proof), chances are they’re narcissistic. Of course there’s nuance though. People can claim all sorts of things for all sorts of reasons. Merely telling a story of a moment in their lives when they achieved something miraculous or seemingly impossible does not automatically raise a narcissist red flag — this could be pure entertainment. Crazy stories are made to be told, right? Especially at a happy hour after work or some other kind of informal gathering. Nobody wants to hear about your boring day where nothing remarkable happened, lol.
The opposite is true as well: a covertly narcissistic person can very well “milk” their REAL stories for which they have proof and/or witnesses in order to sell you a miracle solution which is not gonna work because (surprise surprise!) this is relying on exceptions and not on a “rule”. So, whether it’s real or not, entertaining or not, isn’t the main issue. The main issue here is, instead, WHY and WHAT FOR they say what they say.
Remember this is about covert narcissism, specifically. Grandiose are a whole other beast. Coverts though (or regular people full of covert narcissist traits) will make their boasts sound natural, or sound like humble-brags, or “I-had-no-other-choice” kind of stories. This is why they’re harder to identify. They’re not only mistaken for, but they also ACTUALLY TAKE ADVANTAGE OF being mistaken for someone with genuine intentions.
Edit: some might deflect the red flag above by choosing role models of their own. They’ll say, “look at this celebrity/authority figure! They do/say/teach the same as I” as a way of implying “oh no, I don’t think I’m special, where did you take that conclusion from?” and pretending they’re not narcissistic… But that’s a disingenuous deflection, because if they were REALLY about that follower life, they wouldn’t be selling their own services, AND (to make matters even more red-flaggy) framing these services of their own as “unique” and “better than” what most people do. In the end of the day, the narcissistic tendency is still there — it’s just that, as the good coverts that they are, they do everything in their power to evade accountability.
If in doubt, just contrast that to a regular service provider’s attitude (where they have role models of their own) — instead of looking down from a hgh horse on “the rest of the world” or “the sheeple”, their approach simply boils down to “here’s what I’m selling, and these are the people who inspired me”. Period. No us-vs-them discourse.
In the end of the day though, no matter how they spin it or how well they craft their con, the covert narcissistic person’s Achilles heel ends up being the fact they’re “milking” their out-of-the-curve stories for personal gain at all. And this is something they cannot hide. They all do that. Some might pretend not to, or straight-up say “I don’t care if you use my service or not” (empty words! “Trust me bro” is such a classic, LOL), but the contradiction is still there because in between the lines what they’re really saying with these claims that “everybody else is wrong and only I am right” or “everybody else does X thing the standard way and only I am offering something new/different/revolutionary/whatever” is (if they were honest and/or had the balls to say this): “yeah, well, you should use my service. But let’s keep it hush-hush, I want to appear humble here”.
Don’t fall for that. Don’t keep it hush-hush. LISTEN to your gut. Avoid these people like the plague.
That’s it for today. Feel free to share your thoughts.
