This is a much needed share, coming from someone who has spent countless hours, years, finances, experiences, on learning the nature of abuse and abusers. I’ve studied under leading world experts on narcissism, read countless books, talked to therapists, soul searched spiritually and followed my gut. This is what i’ve found.
From emotional abuse, manipulation, psychological abuse, the nature and layers of gaslighting, to more physical forms of abuse.
I’ve seen and experienced and learned from it all, and I continue to.
I actually for a couple years time, tried to become like those that had abused me.
I had become a part of the spiritual community, and was spiritually manipulated deeply. Communal Narcissists, (spiritually manipulative narcissists) one of 8 different kinds of narcissists, are deeply dangerous in my opinion, as spirituality is something very sacred to me and meant to be a reprieve from the struggles of this world, not an addition to them and a way to manipulate and control people in overt and subtle ways. People that seek spirituality are generally in a very vulnerable place and are seeking healing. This makes them more susceptible to manipulation. And this brings in emotional and physical abusers who crave having undeserved amounts of power and sway over vulnerable people, in by the boatloads.
In my early 20’s especially I thought this was the only way to get what I needed, and not get hurt. Become like what had hurt me. Without realizing, I was using narcissistic traits and strategies that were used on me, to survive.
I, am not a Narcissist though, I have come to find with the help of therapists.
And I’ve long since changed my way of existing to stop BECOMING my abusers to SURVIVE them.
Now, I just remove them from my life and leave at the first red flag instead of trying to play their games.
And I remove all their enablers too.
An abuser generally believes there own lies, so it’s easy to make others believe them.
It’s also why no attempts at holding them accountable will get through to them. They feel validated in any and all behavior they have been a part of. They will not wake up and smell the roses unless serious consequences are had, and that often will not do anything but make them more careful. They truly believe there own lies. They truly believe they have not seriously harmed anyone who didn’t deserve it. They truly believe its okay and valid that they are lying and evading consequences.
The communal (spiritual) narcissists are especially dangerous to me, because as you get into those communities you see the manipulation and gaslighting becomes more complex, the lingo changes etc.
Even when topics like rape, consent, suicide, come into play, they are able to convince themselves and others they have done no wrong.
Psychology is a complex topic, and the human brain is not sorted into black and white, good and bad. So studying gaslighters, and abusers as extensively as I have has been quite interesting.
I originally did it to make sense of my abusive family growing up, and then it came to be applicable in nearly every connection I had.
For a long time, I had to uncover my spiritual connection and restore it and let go of the controlling arms my mother had placed on it during childhood. I’m glad I grew up with such an open-minded mother who trained me in matters of metaphysics, but she was still a narcissist.
The next phase, was healing in a very grounded earthy way that involved studying under people with decades of experience, learning about psychology etc.
That’s where I’ve been for a long time, its been quite a process to say the least and one of the most rewarding I’ve ever been a part of.
On the topic of Narcissists, there are 8 types as described by leading world expert on Narcissistic Abuse Dr Ramani Durvasula:
grandiose, covert/vulnerable, malignant (dark triad or dark tetrad), communal, benign, neglectful, entitled/self-righteous and generational/cultural.
Lets get into the base building block for abusers of all kinds; GASLIGHTING.
With a quick google search, this is what comes up:
Dictionary
Definitions from Oxford Languages · Learn more
gas·light
gerund or present participle: gaslighting
- manipulate (someone) using psychological methods into questioning their own sanity or powers of reasoning.
- “in the first episode, Karen Valentine is being gaslighted by her husband”
To go into more detail, leading world narcissist specialist Dr Ramani Durvasula describes it as:
The most important thing I have learned that I can give to you,
they will never see your side. they will never validate what happened to you especially if it makes them look bad. they will never “wake up”.
Why do you need them to, to be free? Why do you need them to acknowledge what they have done in order to leave?
You need to stop leaning on the validation of others, if you want to build a life away from abusers of any kind. Wanting validation is normal and healthy, but it becomes a tool for your downfall if placed in the wrong hands.
Your abusive family will gaslight you, claim things never happened, or “didn’t happen as badly as you say they did” and whatever numerous ways of invalidating you they can grasp.
Your abusive ex partners are never going to suddenly see the light and wake up to everything they have done and change, though they may pretend to during the hoovering phase of narcissistic abuse.
As someone who was a slave to her empathy for most of her life, I can say this.
We have analyzed abusers in a way that truly only benefits abusers.
They are masters at hiding, manipulation, gaslighting, lying.
Consequences make just as much of a difference as Empathy does.
One is not complete without the other.
We live in disempowered society who’s minds and spirituality was colonized and rebels killed off, to the point that any evidence of fighting back at darkness, is seen as darkness itself.
Books I reccomend;
2 psychology based books;
And one book from the only spiritual teacher i’ve found who has deconstructed her spirituality enough away from the depths of patriarchy and colonization that I trust so far. Who has also endured a large amount of narcissistic abuse:
Take your sovereignty back.
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