TRANSCRIPT – Narcissists: Everyone’s Love to Hate
Aka It’s always the narcissist’s fault
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Ah, narcissists.
The internet’s favorite love-to-hate villain.
I first started hearing this term, applied in the vernacular, about 10 years ago.
OF course, I knew about the psychological term of a “narcissist”, based on the Greek mythological story of Narcissus, who stares adoringly at his own reflection in a pool.
The loose definition from that perspective, is “someone who is obsessed with themselves and their image.”
But over the past few years, this idea seems to have taken flight to include ANY person who is abusive and in any variety of ways.
I hear this come up A LOT whenever I talk about the importance of chemistry and attraction in relationships.
People are quick to chime in and say how they had “so much chemistry” with their ex-partner and they turned out to be a narcissist.
And therefore, chemistry bad. Chemistry can’t be trusted.
I’m going to put forward a potentially controversial take here—what else is new?—on the idea of narcissists and why people are so obsessed with them.
Someone said to me a few years ago that a narcissist is essentially someone who hasn’t healed their trauma.
And they aren’t interested in healing it.
I like this definition. It’s simple and apropos.
When I talk about chemistry, the way I frame it is that chemistry is your sign that the two of you have something to learn from each other.
Nature, your biology, your higher selves are communicating on a primal, visceral, subconscious level and telling you that there is gold here.
You may need to dig for it. And alchemize it.
But there’s gold.
Now if you have an Anami framework, you know that the ONLY way you can transform dross or raw material into gold, is if you have the TOOLS to do this.
Living life in Anami Land is all about this:
Having a MUTUAL agreement to use your connection as a vehicle for growth.
This means that all your triggers, your insecurities that come to the surface over the course of your relationships, we looks at, we illuminate TOGETHER and we work through them.
And in so doing, we evolve into the highest and best versions of ourselves.
This is the only way that relationships actually work.
However.
Most relationships DO NOT work like this. Or anything close to it.
I’d say 99.9% of them.
Which is why, everyone’s ex is now suddenly a “narcissist”.
Instead the typical NON- Anami relationship is a place where people co-exist, committing to and reinforcing their own stagnation.
And since “Grow or Die” is a law of the universe, if you aren’t growing, then you’re dying.
Meaning, your relationship will not just remain in a purgatory of stasis.
If will descend backwards—potentially into a pit of hell.
The more intense chemistry you have together, the more potential you have to grow.
But if you DON”T grow, then you have an even higher potential for destruction as well.
So. Let’s say you meet someone.
There’s wild sparks flying, butterflies in the stomach, weak in the knees chemistry.
Fabulous!
You start seeing each other.
As they do, issues start to come up to the surface.
Let’s assume for the sake of argument, that you have more personal growth under your belt than your new paramour does.
You try to have conversations about these issues, and clear the space.
But, they refuse.
They change the subject, they get impatient, they “gaslight” you.
They basically DO NOT want to deal—at all—with any of the obstacles that are coming up.
Or if they do, it’s with an eyes-rolling, impatient, “let’s get this over with”, “I’m just humoring you to shut you up” type of energy.
Not collaborative or cooperative.
But adversarial.
This pattern repeats a number of times:
You come to some kind of impasse.
They aren’t willing to engage with you to resolve issues.
They deflect, deny, and make excuses.
LET’S PAUSE RIGHT HERE AT THIS VERY IMPORTANT JUNCTURE.
Because I know, that every single one of you has been here.
This person, your would-be partner, is giving you VERY clear, UNMISTAKEABLE signs that they do NOT want to grow.
They don’t want to go deep.
Sometimes they’ll outright TELL you this.
Or, they’ll just keep finding creative ways to show you.
NOW THIS IS YOUR MOMENT.
To get the fuck out.
To cut your losses—and honestly, this is still early stages in a relationship.
You are NOT going to be five years in when you begin to see this.
It’s more like five days. Or five weeks.
I wouldn’t even say as long as five months.
You’ll have seen the signs, loud and oh-so-clear, very early on.
And now you have the opportunity to walk away.
If you do? FANTASTIC!
Within you is enough self-love and self-respect that you were able to say that you deserve better and you trusted you’d find it.
So you walked away and shut that door.
OR…
You stayed.
You stayed and you begged and you pleaded.
You tried to change the mind and behavior of someone who was clear to you from the beginning, that they weren’t capable and/or interested in a healthy, loving, productive and healing relationship.
You stayed anyway.
Maybe you were lonely. You’d been single for a while and just. Wanted. A. Place. To. Rest. For. A. While.
Though ironically, rest and peace is the last thing you’ll get in this situation.
You’ll fry your motherfucking nervous system to shreds.
You’ll spend months or years repairing the damage that was done by remaining somewhere that didn’t serve you.
Maybe you just wanted to be able to say you had a boyfriend or a girlfriend.
Maybe you liked their lifestyle and the image of them and were so attached to it that you couldn’t let reality interfere with your ideal vision.
So you spent months or years with someone, in a situation that devalued you.
Every day.
Not only because of how they were to you.
But because of how YOU were to you.
Because you were shown the truth and you chose a path that chipped away at your essence.
Every day.
And then somehow, at some point, you managed to crawl away.
Maybe on your hands and knees, clutching the last shreds of your self-esteem.
You got out.
And then you learned about the term “narcissist”.
It described your situation perfectly.
They were abusive. They didn’t see you. They blamed you. They gaslit you.
Check, check, check, check.
AND THE CHEMISTRY. THAT GODDAMN CHEMISTRY just led you astray.
As a friend of mine said once said to me, narcissists give chemistry a bad name.
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Let’s come back to a simple, broad definition of a narcissist:
Someone who doesn’t want to grow or heal their trauma.
You spent however much time in a situation with someone like this.
The “chemistry” didn’t lie. It didn’t mislead you.
There WAS a massive opportunity for growth there.
But BOTH people have to be 100% in.
All in.
In Amami Land, the only acceptable answer to an invitation to grow is “Fuck yes!”
Or fuck off.
In this situation, you need to fuck off.
Right the fuck out of there.
**
You may have heard the old adage about the scorpion.
I’ve seen a few different versions of this.
But essentially, a man or even another creature picks up a scorpion, knowing its nature and the risks in doing so, and holds it, or carries it.
The scorpion, of course, stings him.
This is its nature. This is who it is.
It’s not going to change.
But the person or creature in the story keeps picking it up.
And they keep being stung.
Someone asks “Why do you do this?”
The answer is that this is the scorpion’s nature.
In fact, he does’t even blame the scorpion.
It’s just doing its thing.
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So when people stay with someone who is committed to NOT growing and NOT healing.
They are doing the equivalent of picking up the scorpion, holding it, petting it, trying to befriend it.
When the scorpion’s nature is to sting.
Who is at fault here?
Seeing people CONSTANTLY putting all the blame onto their “narcissist” ex-partners strikes me as THEM being the red flag.
Meaning, these people climbed into a nest of scorpions.
Then had the total idiocy and lack of self-awareness and what we might even call their OWN narcissistic tendencies, to BLAME the scorpions for stinging them.
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The problem with blaming someone else:
Whether it’s “the narcissist” or your parents, or your trauma—is that you will never heal, you will never progress, if the source of your pain and suffering is always outside of you.
It wasn’t YOU who chose badly.
It was the narcissist.
Like I said, I’m 100% positive that the narcissist gave you plenty of warnings.
And you ignored them all.
I’m 100% sure that your friends and family chimed in and also gave you plenty of warnings.
And you ignored them all.
***
THE ONLY way you will ever heal, is if you take responsibility for your own choices.
YOU.
Just you.
WHY did you stay with them?
Again, chemistry might be what brought you together.
But when things were made clear, why did you continue?
THIS is the most important thing for you to figure out.
So that you can heal whatever that hole in you is, that allowed this to happen.
Whatever crack or mutation that made it possible for you to believe—over and over, every day—that living in a nest of scorpions would be just fine.
When you DO this, then you can attract and create something more whole.
Because YOU will be more whole.
What would happen if you actually were with someone who saw, loved and adored you?
What part of you is hiding so that you actually WON’T be truly seen by someone?
Because that’s the part of you that CHOSE and STAYED WITH the so-called narcissist.
Every time you continue to BLAME “the narcissist’ you delay your healing.
And I’d even say compound your trauma.
Because now, even your healing is in their hands.
If you focus exclusively on YOU and what is in your nature that opened you to this scenario and KEPT you in this scenario, THAT is where you can find the power that you gave away.
You can take it back and rebuild on top of it.
I’m not saying that there wasn’t abuse or bad behavior in your relationship.
But again.
If you know it’s a pit of scorpions, that was clearly labeled “pit of dangerous scorpions”, you elected to put yourself there.
I’m going to come back again to the of chemistry.
STOP attacking and blaming chemistry, as though it’s some nefarious trickster who is out to get you.
As though it’s “the narcissist’s” trap of choice.
No.
Just like I said before, it’s a sign. It’s a beacon.
That there is learning and growth here.
But MOST people have NO idea how to grow.
They have ZERO tools to enter into a conscious partnership.
And I would say, if you have had “issues” with “narcissists”, this also includes YOU.
MOST people stumble and sting and traumatize themselves.
Over and over again.
In Anami Land, our raison d’être is to bring CONSCIOUS awareness into our relationships.
We’re armed with all the tools we need to be able to USE our intimate connections as the deepest, most profound and sacred containers for alchemical transformation.
But.
This only happens when BOTH people are all in and committed to this process.
Fuck yes, or fuck off.
If you continually place yourself in situations where you feel like you are puling teeth and trying to convince and persuade and coerce your partner to join you in growth, are you really a fuck yes?
If you were, you wouldn’t be there.
You’d find someone else who is also a fuck yes.
And you’d fuck yes yourselves into oblivion, self-realization and ecstasy.
You wouldn’t waste time falling into the same scorpion pit.
You’d brush yourself off, take some antidote, and find a place where the other creatures love and adore you.
And you love and adore them.
And you’d choose to live there.
***
On that note, we’re starting an Anami Land membership community.
We’ll be opening it up in the coming weeks.
This will be a place for people who’ve taken our salons to keep going in there work.
And for those of you who’ve been hovering on the outskirts of Anami Land, it’s open to you too.
People have been asking us to create a dating site for ages.
This will function as that, a community for like-minded Anami enthusiasts—singles, couples, men and women—everyone looking to take their lives, growth and relationships to the next level.
Go to kimanami.com/anamiland to signup on the waitlist and be notified of when we open the doors
