Open Letter to Amber Heard

Dear Amber Heard,

I’m sorry you are going through a painful reenactment of your childhood drama on the stage of the world.

You are a perfect example of the dangers of going public with our personal stories without first liberating ourselves from the emotional prisons of our childhood.

When we go public with our stories it should always be after we have truly liberated ourselves and we should be driven by love to encourage others to do their own emotional work to liberate themselves from the emotional prison of their own childhoods. This emotional work should always be done in private with the company of an enlightened witness. Read the article The Essential Role of an Enlightened Witness in our Society at alice-miller.com

When we allow ourselves unconsciously and compulsively to be driven by the unresolved repressed latent hatred towards scapegoats standing in symbolizing our childhood abusers to avenge ourselves it will harm us further -- and all those around us -- and there are never winners in these situations -- and keep us lost in our stories and endless stuck in the emotional prison of our childhood.

I’m sending you a copy of my book A Dance to Freedom: Your Guide to Liberation from Lies and Illusions in hopes it will be an Enlightened witness in your life and encourages you to free yourself to never again reenact the painful dramas of your childhood.

Wishing you much courage and strength to free yourself,

Sylvie Imelda Shene

Open Letter to Johnny Depp

 Dear Johnny Depp,

I’m sorry you too went through a painful relationship like I did. 

Your words below to Amber; I too said many times similar words to my ex with whom I was in a relationship for a very long 10 years. 

"All you wanted was to make me fucking miserable. Well, I'm finally there. I'll never be able to understand how I fell in love with you. I loved you more than anything... I did everything I could. But, you never fuckin' loved me." 

My ex was much younger than me too, a Leonardo DiCaprio clone, but as Amber did to you, he too brought me to the lowest point of my life by standing in symbolizing my childhood abusers and slowly regressed me into the state of the child and reenacted the painful drama of my childhood to a T.

I turned every stone looking for clues to get to the bottom of why I attracted a man into my life that triggered so much pain in me and reduce me to ashes.  Literally, I rose from the ashes.  

I wrote a book A Dance to Freedom: Your Guide to Liberation from Lies and Illusions sharing my life experiences and psychological discoveries hoping that will help other people in the same place I once was.  

You can be assured no one ever AGAIN will bring me back to the emotional prison of my childhood.  I’m free at last!

I’m sending you a copy of my book and I hope it brings you clarity and understanding in your life and frees you to not let anyone ever again slowly take you back to the emotional prison of your childhood. 

Best wishes,

Sylvie Imelda Shene

Are You a Narcissist’s Flying Monkey?

 Are you caught up in a narcissist's emotional abuse of others?

Anyone who remembers watching the Wizard of Oz as a child will probably remember how horrifying the Wicked Witch of the West’s flying monkeys were. These monkeys were sent by the witch to do her dirty work, and the phrase has since become synonymous with people who end up doing the dirty work of a narcissist.

Some of the reasons people become flying monkeys include:

Self-preservation and protection. Rosie’s motivation to become her brother’s flying monkey was understandable and was based on self-preservation. Like other people who do a narcissist’s dirty work for them, she didn’t pay much, if any, attention to the impact of her actions. Her need to look after herself was far greater than her need to protect anyone else. Forming an alliance with the person perceived as the strongest member of a family or organisation is one reason people adopt this role. Telling tales, spreading misinformation, and using gaslighting techniques against anyone who dares to question the narcissist might just mean you get to keep your job and don’t find yourself on the receiving end of narcissistic rage.

Rescuing the narcissistic "victim." If you tend to fall into a rescuing role, you may feel compelled to jump to the defence of the narcissist who blames everyone and everything for whatever is going wrong in their life. Sticking up for the narcissist meets your inbuilt need to feel valued and needed because of your rescuer role.

A loss of sense of self. Some flying monkeys are so browbeaten by the narcissist that they have far less capacity than otherwise might be expected when it comes to knowing right from wrong. They may have experienced years of emotional abuse at the hands of the narcissist and have lost a sense of self and independent decision-making along the way.

Loving the drama. Some flying monkeys really thrive on the drama. When you’re involved with a narcissist, it’s almost inevitable that you’ll be involved in a few dramas along the way. What can beat the adrenaline of being caught up in lies, secrecy, and deception?

Being a narcissist. Flying monkeys often have strong narcissistic traits themselves, including a desire for attention, a lack of empathy, and a desire to bully and manipulate others. They may be involved in a family, work, or other situation in which they know that their best opportunity to fulfill their narcissistic desires comes from allying themselves with a more powerful narcissist.

If you have had your fill of being a flying monkey, the narcissist in your life is unlikely to be happy about it and, at the least, may not want anything to do with you once you cease to be of use. Being used by a narcissist to take care of some of the least desirable aspects of their business is always going to place you in a compromised, stressful environment and you should ensure that you have the appropriate support in place when you choose to change your role.

Read more in the link below:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/women-autism-spectrum-disorder/202010/are-you-narcissist-s-flying-monkey

Traits of a Narcissist

In order for someone to be a diagnosed narcissist, they must embody at least five of the nine recognized traits, based on the APA’s criteria (2013) and Mitra and Fluyau (2021):

1. They have a grandiose sense of self-worth and self-importance. They exaggerate their achievements or expect to be recognized as superior without any basis.
2. They are preoccupied or obsessed with success, power, beauty, love, etc.
3. They believe they are unique and can only be understood by specific people.
4. They require and demand a constant flow of admiration and attention;
5. They have a sense of entitlement without exerting any energy for such treatment, and they have an unreasonable expectation of favorable treatment or compliance with their demands, however baseless.
6. They cannot empathize with anyone, nor will they attempt to identify with or recognize another’s needs or wants.
7. They are arrogant, haughty, and regularly display these behaviors and attitudes. They will look down their nose at other people or project their shortcomings onto others.
8. They are envious of other people and/or believe other people are envious of them.
9. They are deeply manipulative and will stop at little to get what they want. This person will weaponize or exploit anyone—even children or animals—to achieve their own end result.

Read more in the link below:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/love-in-the-age-narcissism/202205/identifying-the-narcissist-in-your-life

Toxic workplaces are a billion-dollar problem

1. [I have no doubt is  billion-dollar problem!]
2. "In dysfunctional, toxic and narcissistic groups, friendly empaths are outcasted and scapegoated while predators and bullies are popular and glorified." I can testify to that to be true!
3. https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2015/02/stalking-soul.html?m=1
4. ---------------------------------//----------------------------
5. Disrespectful, or lacking in consideration, courtesy and dignity for others. The researchers' previous work found respect, or the lack thereof, was the single strongest predictor of how employees as a whole rated the corporate culture.
6. Unethical behavior, including descriptions of the organization being dishonest or lacking regulatory compliance, including with Occupational Safety and Health Administration standards, which protect workers' safety, and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which protects sensitive patient information.
7. Cutthroat or backstabbing behavior and ruthless competition. Nearly 10% of employee reviews noted poor collaboration at their company, which didn't have a huge impact on turnover. But what did correspond with low culture scores and higher turnover was employees saying that their office was "Darwinian" or that colleagues often "stab each other in the back."
8. Abusive management, including bullying, harassment and hostility. Nearly one-third of Glassdoor reviews discuss management in general, but 0.8% described their manager as abusive.

When people quit due to a toxic work culture, it's as much of a human cost as it is a business one.

Employees who work in toxic environments have higher levels of stress, burnout, mental health issues and other stressors that can lead to poor physical health.

The Society of Human Resources Management estimates that 1 in 5 employees have left a job at some point in their career because of a toxic culture, which cost businesses more than $44 billion per year prior to the Great Resignation.

Disengaged and job-searching employees means lower productivity, and replacing an employee can cost up to twice the employee's annual salary, according to Gallup.

With the business world focused on retention and hiring these days, researchers on the MIT analysis say organizations must set up and model a supportive, inclusive culture as the pandemic reshapes how we work.

They also recommend leaders break down how people rate company culture, like by geographic region, department, function or level of seniority, to find "microcultures" where employees don't feel psychologically safe and supported. "Even in relatively healthy organizational cultures, even a small share of people who describe the culture as toxic can drive attrition," Sull says.

Read more in the link below:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/31/these-are-the-5-biggest-signs-of-a-toxic-workplace.html

The great malady of our society

“Wherever I look, I see signs of the commandment to honor one's parents and nowhere of a commandment that calls for the respect of a child.” Alice Miller

The great malady of our society, implicated in all our troubles and affecting us individually and socially is the idealization of our parents and childhood and the denial of childhood suffering. When we idealize our parents and childhood and deny childhood suffering, it does not go away. It appears symptomatically in obsessions, addictions, violence, greed, deceit, and loss of meaning. Our temptation is to isolate these symptoms or try to eradicate them one by one; but the root problem is the idealization of our parents and childhood and the denial of childhood suffering.

"...All social violence--whether by war, revolution or economic exploitation--is ultimately a consequence of child abuse should not surprise us. The propensity to reinflict childhood trauma upon others as an adult in socially-approved violence is actually far more able to explain and predict the actual outbreak of wars than the usual economic motivations, and we are likely to continue to undergo our periodic sacrificial rituals of war if the infliction of childhood trauma continues. The human race is now quite able technologically to satisfy its needs if we can live together without violence toward each other. But unless we employ our social resources toward consciously assisting the evolution of child-rearing, we will be doomed to the periodic destruction of our resources, both material and human. To Selma Freiberg's dicta that "Trauma demands repetition" I would only add "repetition through social action." We cannot be content to only continue to do endless repair work on damaged adults, with our therapies and jails and political movements. Our task now must, in addition, be to create an entirely new profession of "child helpers" whose can reach out to every new child born on earth and help its parents give it love and independence." -- Lloyd deMause www.psychohistory.com

Above excerpt from The History of Child Abuse by Lloyd deMause www.primal-page.com/ph-abuse.htm

Psychohistory Articles Menu www.primal-page.com/psyhis.htm#menu

The Primal Psychotherapy Page www.primal-page.com

“Inability to face up to the suffering undergone in childhood can be observed both in the form of religious obedience and in cynicism, irony, and other forms of self-alienation frequently masquerading as philosophy or literature. But ultimately the body will rebel. Even if it can be temporarily pacified with the help of drugs, nicotine, or medicine, it usually has the last word, because it is quicker to see through self-deception than the mind, particularly if the mind has been trained to function as an alienated self. We may ignore or deride the messages of the body, but its rebellion demands to be heeded because its language is the authentic expression of our true selves and of the strength of our vitality.” From the book “The Body Never Lies: The Lingering Effects of Hurtful Parenting” by Alice Miller

“Our parents project the repressed feelings of their own childhood onto us and without realizing it blames us for the things that once happened to them. Like the psychiatrist Henry in Brigitte’s story (see Chapter 2), parents often react blindly and destructively because they are still caught up in the reality of their childhood without realizing it. To survive cruelties---beatings, humiliations, and neglect---they had to conceal their own feelings from themselves. Now they have become slaves to those emotions they cannot control them because they cannot understand their meaning, and they cannot understand their meaning because, like Adam and Eve in Paradise, they have been told to regard cruelty as love. They have been taught to obey incomprehensible commandments and have been made to remain in a state of blindness all their lives, threatened with brimstone and hellfire should they dare to dissent” Alice Miller, taken from the book “The Truth Will Set you Free” page 96

"It is a never-ending source of acute distress for me when I think of the devastating power of denial in producing the barriers in our minds. One of the ways this obstructive power manifests itself is in the persistence of theologians and philosophers in discussing ethical issues without taking any account of the findings produced by brain research and the laws governing infant development. These factors are crucial to a clearer understanding of how evil originates and how we actively perpetuate it. For psychoanalysts, it is also high time to rethink the concepts of destructive drives and evil, "perverted" children, which they have inherited from poisonous pedagogy. But in order to do so they would have to take modern research on infancy seriously." - Alice Miller

Above excerpt from BARRIERS IN THE MIND

 Chapter 7 from The Truth Will Set You Free

 By Alice Miller

“Many people who can tolerate the loss of beauty, health, youth, or loved ones and, although they grieve, do so without depression. In contrast, there are those with great gifts, often precisely the most gifted, who do suffer from severe depression. For one is free from it only when self-esteem is based on the authenticity of one's own feelings and not on the possession of certain qualities.” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 34

“It is precisely because a child’s feelings are so strong that they cannot be repressed without serious consequences. The stronger a prisoner is, the thicker the prison walls have to be, and unfortunately, these walls also impede or completely prevent later emotional growth. “Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 58

Getting through the strong repressed feelings of the child we once were -- is not an easy task -- but it's the most important work for us to do on this planet if we want to grow and liberate ourselves and if we really want to create a more peaceful world. Everything else we do is just a temporary and superficial fix. As long as people's repressed feelings of the child they once were remained repressed, they will be driven by them sooner or later in one form or another to hurt themselves, others, or both.

“Several mechanisms can be recognized in the defense against early feelings of abandonment. In addition to simple denial, we usually find the exhausting struggle to fulfill the old, repressed, and by now often perverted needs with the help of symbols (cults, sexual perversions, groups of all kinds, alcohol, or drugs). Intellectualization is very commonly encountered as well since it is a defense mechanism of great power.” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 11

“We cannot really love if we are forbidden to know our truth, the truth about our parents and caregivers as well as about ourselves. We can only try to behave as if we were loving, but this hypocritical behavior is the opposite of love. It is confusing and deceptive, and it produces much helpless rage in the deceived person. This rage must be repressed in the presence of the pretended “love,” especially if one is dependent, as a child is, on the person who is masquerading in this illusion of love.” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 23

"We do not arrive in this world as a clean slate. Every new baby comes with a history of its own, the history of the nine months between conception and birth. In addition, children have the genetic blueprint they inherit from their parents. These factors may help determine what kind of temperament a child will have, and what inclinations, gifts, and predispositions.

But character depends crucially upon whether a person is given love, protection, tenderness, and understanding or exposed to rejection, coldness, indifference, and cruelty in the early formative years. The stimulus indispensable for developing the capacity for empathy, say, is the experience of loving care. In the absence of such care, when a child is forced to grow up neglected, emotionally starved, and subjected to physical abuse, he or she will forfeit this innate capacity. While I ascribe immense significance to the experiences of infants in the first days, weeks, and months of their lives to explain their later behavior, I do not wish to assert that later influences are completely ineffectual. Rather, if a traumatized or neglected child can later come to know what I call an "enlightened" or "knowing witness," he or she can deal positively with the effects of that childhood trauma.

We know today that the brain we are born with is not the finished product it was once thought to be. The structuring of the brain depends very much on the experiences of the first hours, days, and weeks of a person's life. In the last few years, scientific studies led by neurologist and child psychiatrist Dr. Bruce D. Perry (www.childtrauma.org/) have further established that traumatized and neglected children display severe lesions affecting up to 30 percent of those areas of the brain that control our emotions. Severe traumas inflicted on infants lead to an increase in the release of stress hormones that destroy the existing, newly formed neurons and their interconnections." -- Alice Miller

Swords and Knives: A Review of Alice Miller’s The Body Never Lies: The Lingering Effects of Cruel Parenting

 Swords and Knives: A Review of Alice Miller’s The Body Never Lies: The Lingering Effects of Cruel Parenting

A Review by Stephen Khamsi

There is an unwritten law, and unacknowledged commandment, that adults may exploit children in extreme ways and in accordance with their needs and neuroses. There is, moreover, a social taboo against recognizing any of this. Parents are protected while children are sacrificed.

Tragically, much of psychology is comprised of nonsense and noise . . . rats, statistics, medications. So we are fortunate to receive the rare and exceptional work of Alice Miller. Her most recent volume, The Body Never Lies, continues one of psychology’s most important collections. Previous volumes include The Drama of the Gifted Child, Thou Shall Not be Aware, and For Your Own Good, among many others.

Dr. Miller’s chief concern has always been childhood suffering, its denial, and the lasting effects on individuals and on societies. Her current book continues this thread and focuses on the denial of real emotions, the tension between what we really feel and what we “should” feel—and the enduring effects these have on the body. Real feelings are direct and visceral, and real feelings conflict with morality. The author’s hope is to reduce personal suffering, isolation, and tragedy.

Our bodies, according to Miller, keep an exact record of everything we experience. Literally—in our cells. Our unconscious minds, moreover, register our complete biography. If emotional nourishment was absent during childhood, for example, our bodies will forever crave it.

“Negative” emotions, to take another corporal example, are important signals emitted by the body. If ignored, the body will emit new and stronger signs and signals in an attempt to make itself heard. Eventually, there is a rebellion. At this point, illness often results. The body is tenacious as it fights our denial of reality.

Dr. Miller was moved to write this book after she heard about a mother who deliberately used pharmaceuticals to provoke illnesses in her children, which ultimately resulted in death. This condition is known by the psychiatric community as Factitious Disorder by Proxy (FDP), and is more widely known as Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy (MBP). Most commonly, MBP is a pattern in which caretakers (usually mothers) deliberately induce physical problems in their preschool children, present their ailing offspring for medical attention, and then deny knowing anything about the cause of the child’s malady. This is, of course, a most egregious example of an all-too-common betrayal.

Betrayal? We all know that child abuse and child neglect are pervasive and destructive. And we know that violence toward children may be stored within them and that, later in life, they may turn the violence on themselves . . . resulting in depression, drug addiction, illness, suicide, or some other form of early death. “When life begins with needles and pins,” so goes the Tears for Fears song, “it ends with swords and knives.” Sometimes swords and knives are directed at other people—sometimes at whole nations.

In The Body Never Lies, Miller pays particular attention to the Bible’s Fourth Commandment. This is the edict that one must honor one’s parents, no matter their conduct. For thousands of years, this commandment—in concert with our personal denial of early maltreatment—has led us toward repression, emotional detachment, illness, and suicide. This Commandment, notes Miller, is a species of morality “that consigns our genuine feelings and our own personal truth to an unmarked grave.” While many of the Ten Commandments remain valid, the Fourth Commandment is diametrically opposed to the laws of psychology.

To illustrate her ideas, Miller provides brief portrayals of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Anton Chekhov, Franz Kafka, Friedrich Nietzche, Friedrich von Schiller, Virginia Woolf, Arthur Rimbaud, Yukio Mishima, Marcel Proust, James Joyce, Saddam Hussein, and Adolf Hitler. What do these writers, dictators, serial killers, and others have in common? They all followed the Fourth Commandment. They honored their parents, even though and even while their parents did them harm. Each individual sacrificed their truth in the unanswered hope that they would be loved, and almost all died in denial and isolation, tragically unable to admit to their own personal truths. These lives and these stories lend credence to Miller’s argument that moral laws lead to repression and to emotional detachment.

And what about these unlived emotions? Emotions have a basis in reality. And the “negative emotions” are reactions to neglect, abuse, or a lack of nourishing communication. They are important signals emitted by the body in an attempt to be heard. The banished emotions reassert themselves. Real needs and real feelings make their return to the body.

Sadly, many of us were unloved, neglected, and abused. The remedy? While there are no simple answers, we do know that the body is healed when one admits to personal truths and to real feelings. But how do we admit to such truths and to such feelings? We need to feel our pain and our powerlessness so that we can, paradoxically, become less pained and more powerful. We need to admit to our “negative emotions” and change them into meaningful feelings. And we need to see through poisonous pedagogy in order to embrace and to embody integrity, awareness, responsibility and loyalty to oneself. Our greatest personal task is to learn the difference between love and attachment . . . to extend our love when it’s right, but to break off attachments when they are destructive. Our greatest therapeutic task is to locate an enlightened witness—a mature and helpful individual—who can be fully present without judging. The latter is indispensable in the process of psychological integration and personal liberation.

Techniques generally fail. The attempt to convert “negative emotions” into “positive emotions” fails, according to Miller, because these are manipulations that reinforce denial, rather than lead to honest confrontations with one’s authentic emotions. And forgiveness, she suggests, rarely has a healing effect. One may rightly forgive their parents if the parents truly realize what they’ve done, and when they honestly apologize for the pain they’ve caused. Otherwise, preaching forgiveness is hypocritical, futile, and actively harmful. The body, after all, doesn’t understand moral precepts.

Still, Miller retains a hopeful view of the future. Society at present always sides with the parents, but individual bodies fight against lies. It’s possible that our collective body may rise up and lead to a future society built on conscious awareness. First, though, we must jettison our “fundamentalist faith” in genetics and, I would add, pharmaceutical “miracles.” With the help of a witness, each damaged individual may advance through infantile fears and can reject the illusion that one’s parents will save them. When we finally feel our real truths of being unloved, neglected, and beaten; when we internally separate from our parents and caretakers; when we eventually experience love for the worthy child we once were—only then can our bodies really rest, and only then can we get on with the important business of real life.

 Stephen Khamsi, Ph.D., is a psychotherapist in private practice in San Francisco.

This article appeared in the Summer 2005 IPA Newsletter.

One More Birthday

"You can't heal the people you love. You can't make choices for them. You can't rescue them.

You can promise that they won't journey alone. You can loan them your map. But this trip is theirs." Laura Jean Truman

Dear M,

Soon you have another birthday! 

I wish you a Happy and Peaceful birthday as much as possible. 

I wish things were different and we have grown closer instead of growing apart. 

As I'm getting older I don't have the time to waste any longer waiting on others to grow into mature conscious adults and I'm becoming less patient with people's unresolved childhood repression, constantly and endlessly reenacting their painful childhood dramas and bringing me into their childhood painful reenactments. 

I waited for over 20 years to see if you would find the courage to walk away from your mother and let her and her money go and just focus on your own life and your own money and you would learn to use your triggers constructively to resolve your childhood repression. 

Now, my only regret is that I didn't confront you sooner about you making others your scapegoats who too like you were affected by your mother's child-rearing practices and methods and are as much of a victim of your mother's upbringing as you are... their lives, like so many lives in our world are a tragedy and it's very sad to constantly witness... 

It makes me sad seeing you following the same path and becoming like the people you despise and hate so much... your hatred is justified but has to be understood and consciously felt within the context of your childhood. Repressed hatred cannot ever be resolved by scapegoating. 

"Alongside reactive hatred of the parents and latent hatred deflected onto scapegoats, there is also the justified hatred for a person tormenting us in the present, either physically or mentally, a person we are at the mercy of and either cannot free ourselves of, or at least believe that we cannot. As long as we are in such a state of dependency, or think we are, then hatred is the inevitable outcome." Alice Miller

https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2021/10/what-is-hatred.html?m=1

These words Alice Miller wrote to me come truer every day: “Thank you for your thoughtful letter I agree with you that there is a difference between the powerless, legitimate rage of a desperate child that reacts to the cruelty of their parents and the rage of the adult who is attacking others out of denial of their history by imitating the behavior of own parents from the position of "power" (even grandiosity). The first rage (of the child) should be felt and expressed in therapy, it can be then RESOLVED. The second one (of the adult), directed toward scapegoats, can NEVER be resolved (see dictators). If therapists see it as an end point of their therapies and don’t enable the patients to confront the early parents and the feelings of that time they do much HARM to them. Staying trapped in the hatred toward scapegoats can't be the successful end of a therapy. I hope that you can continue your work if you have this difference in mind and can also explain it in your forum."

https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2017/05/scapegoating.html?m=1

The only change you have made in your life is changing or reversing the roles - NOW you play the role of your powerful mother she once was-- and your mother NOW is playing the role of the vulnerable defenseless child you once were, but you remain in the emotional prison of your childhood nevertheless. 

“This incapacity to love from the outset occurs much more often than we imagine. It is not the fault of the mothers but of the ignorance of society. In a progressive maternity ward, a woman having her baby should have access to enlightened assistance in perceiving and becoming fully aware of the body memories within her. This would prevent her from passing on the traumas of her own childhood (abandonment, violence, and so on) to her baby."

"If the repression stays unresolved, the parents’ childhood tragedy is unconsciously continued on in their children” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 23

I hope one day you find the courage to do your emotional work, the most important work of one's life, and free yourself from the chains of repetition compulsion of reenacting your childhood painful dramas with your mother or with people standing  in symbolizing your parents.

"#NarcissisticMothers have a tendency to pay more attention to their children while they are still young and dependent. However, as the children get older and assert their independence, the narcissist’s mask slides off and the manipulation tactics go into overdrive."

"The truth is, narcissistic parents don't have children because they want to nurture and guide their offspring through life; they have children so that they have an automatic, built-in relationship in which they have power, one in which the narcissist can write the rules without any checks and balances."

With my book and all my writings, I give you the map and keys to liberate yourself, if you ever find the courage to leave the emotional prison of your childhood, as the quote above says this journey is yours to take. 

It takes courage to see, face, and feel our painful truths -- intelligence alone is not enough; but it rather helps create seductive rationalizations, theories, illusions, and lies to help us run from facing and feeling our own painful truths. 

These words by Alice Miller could not be truer: "Pain is the way to the truth. By denying that you were unloved as a child, you spare yourself some pain, but you are not with your own truth. And throughout your whole life, you'll try to earn love. In therapy, avoiding pain causes blockage. Yet nobody can confront being neglected or hated without feeling guilty. "It is my fault that my mother is cruel," he thinks. "I made my mother furious; what can I do to make her loving?" So he will continue trying to make her love him. The guilt is really protection against the terrible realization that you are fated to have a mother who cannot love. This is much more painful than to think, "Oh, she is a good mother, it's only me who's bad." Because then you can try to do something to get love. But it's not true; you cannot earn love. And feeling guilty for what has been done to you only supports your blindness and your neurosis.

I try to reach the child in the readers, allow them to feel. I see my style as ranking keys. Everybody can take one so that they can go open their own door to find something. Or they can say no, I don't want to go through this door; I will return the key. I try to evoke feelings, images. In this way, I offer keys to your own experience. You can then go look at your children and learn from them, not from me. Because only from your own experience can you really learn.

In my first studies, I was very abstract; I wanted to understand the most abstract ideas -- of Kant, Hegel, or Marx. My dissertation in philosophy was very abstract. Now I see that each philosopher had to build a big, big building in order not to feel his pain. Even Freud.

If a child has been molested and the therapist doesn't deny this fact, many things can open up in the patient. The therapist must not preach forgiveness, or the patient will repress the pain. He won't change, and the repressed rage will look for a scapegoat."
https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2011/04/alice-miller-most-significant-thinker.html

I wish you much courage, 

Sylvie 

"Some children in a narcissistic household detect how the selfish parent gets his needs met by the other family members. Those children observe how manipulation and using guilt gets the parent what they want. They emulate the narcissistic parent and develop a false self, use aggression and intimidation, and bully the other siblings and other parent in order to get their way. Those children become narcissists themselves."

Inside the Mind of a Malignant Narcissist

IF YOU'RE ASKING YOURSELF THE QUESTION AM I THE NARCISSIST? THAT'S HOW YOU KNOW YOU'RE NOT

"Only empathetic people with a conscience engage in this type of introspection. To the #narcissist, you are the problem and their ego will not allow them to consider otherwise." DR. MELANIE CABRERA, PSY

"If you don't have empathy with animals, you don't have empathy at all."  Ricky Gervais 

I will never forget them abandoning the friendly black kitty I had rescued and fixed while I was there on vacation. If she fought for and cared about the kitty as much as she fights for and cares about her mother's money, she would have earned my respect.

"No Empathy

A narcissist will demonstrate a significant lack of empathy. A lack of empathy is one of the most defining characteristics of a narcissist. He/She cannot put themselves in another person's shoes or understand the other person's feelings. The narcissist did not develop this ability as they were growing up. Do not expect that he/she will develop empathy as an adult."

"A malignant narcissist will accuse you of abuse when you leave them. They do this to silence you. A survivor shares their account of the abuse in order to help others. Note the difference." Yes, that's the difference between me and them.

"If you want to deeply hurt someone's soul beyond the capacity of any words known to man, just wait until they have developed a very personal and strong emotional bond to you. Pretend to love them and be their friend. Then, begin to emotionally abuse them, withdraw from them, devalue them, and discard them like they never existed and you will see a job well done. - Inside the Mind of a Malignant Narcissist"

"When asked about narcissistic personality disorder, a therapist sadly shook his head. "I've actually never seen a client with NPD because they are convinced they don't have a problem" he said. "But they leave ar high body count", he added. "Their victims are the people who come to see me.”" They live under the illusion that they are perfect and it's only others that have problems and are wrong. 

"On the rare occasion a #narcissist actually goes to therapy, it’s often for manipulation purposes. Therapists not sufficiently trained in personality disorders make the best" supply! #NarcissisticAbuse #NarcissisticAbuseRecovery

"The narcissist is unable to be alone with his/herself. Isolation is unbearable and even terrifying to the narcissist, because he/she needs to feed off the constant attention and validation of others. For the narcissist, isolation equals starvation."

"Why does it feel like the Narcissist hates me?

Narcissists have contempt for people they are jealous of. And it does not matter if you are their spouse, friend or even their own children.

Narcissists feel entitled and more deserving than other people and it does not matter who it is. As insane as it sounds if there is something that they envy about you, they will want to destroy you. They suffer from pathological envy. Another reason they are so rough with victims and push them around is because it makes them feel powerful and in control. That's how they get their ego boost and their Narcissistic supply."

"Do narcissists ever wonder what they did wrong when the supply that had everything and gave them everything walks out on them?

Sure. But, not in the way you want them to. They wonder how they messed up their game. They know their actions are unconscionable. They are aware that they are abusing, and using people. So, the question for them is, where did go wrong in my grooming of this person? How did they not get attached properly? How do I adapt my lies to keep the next one longer? They aren't upset because they lost love and a great relationship. They simply do not function on that level. They are upset because they lost. Period. Now they have to start all over with someone new."

"What is a narcissist most afraid of? The answer is humiliation, ignorance and overlook by others around them. If you can create a situation in which a narcissist feels his or her cover has been blown and other people see them as they truly are, that would be a perfect "revenge", because a narcissist is empty from inside and their worst fear is that others will see that emptiness."

"Being discarded for not being a good source of narcissistic supply is an achievement. It means you are stronger than they are. You are smarter than they are. You held your own and won. You knew you deserved better and expected that from your partner.

The reason hoovering has failed is because he/she knows you are SMARTER than that. Hoovering you would cause them exposure. Narcissistic injury. The person they are with now, or whom they are chipping away at now, has been identified as weak, and easily manipulated.

The narcissist has sensed your strength and intelligence and is frightened of you." 

"When toxic parents use the "we gave you food and shelter" just remember prisons also give you food and shelter. That does not mean that they love you or can meet your emotional needs"

"We cannot try and argue, reason or debate anything with a malignant narcissist. This is often where we get stuck for a long time. We expend our energy trying to make them "see" what they are and what they did.

This is futile. They will never see. They will never understand. The reason for this is that they already know and will adopt all sorts of defense mechanisms to protect themselves. When they know that you know, it becomes a dangerous situation for you."

"Narcissistic abuse is insidious because the abuse is covert, cunning, and indirect. Narcissists go to great pains to avoid being observed publicly as being abusive. The Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde behavior create fear, distress, confusion, inner turmoil, and chaos for the victim. The constant 'walking on eggshells' and attempting to avoid further conflict can be crippling. To complicate matters a narcissist is rarely medically diagnosed and often goes undetected in society (home, work, organizations, and social settings)."

"When conflict arises, we are able to let it go and move on. Narcissists must get revenge.

We trust in the good of all people.

Narcissists believe everyone is just like them.

We like to help people feel good about themselves and feel relief when a conflict has been resolved.

Narcissists like to fight.

We take responsibility when we've made a mistake. Narcissists blame everyone else.

We enjoy being compassionate.

Narcissists enjoy being manipulative."

"The only way to get rid of a narcissist for good is if you cause them Narcissistic Mortification. It is different and more potent than causing a Narcissistic Injury, which only injures them for a short period of time, and then it's over. They will get angry, throw tantrums, and rage but it doesn't affect them permanently.

On the other hand, a Narcissistic Mortification will stop a narc from ever contacting you again because they do not ever want to experience it again. It is too devastating to them and will avoid you like the plague.

The way to cause Narcissistic Mortification is to humiliate and embarrass the narc IN PUBLIC, in front of witnesses that the narc abuser looks up to, and considers useful or significant. Doing this behind closed doors will not work, it has to be done in front of other people he considers significant.

If you do that, the narcissist's defense mechanisms are abruptly and completely dismantled and they are left feeling naked and exposed. They will never ever want to experience that a second time and he will never come near you again."

"About the only time you've had the narcissist's undivided attention was at the start of the relationship. They needed to know everything about you so they could mirror it back to you. This was so you would like and trust them. It's the oldest trick in the con artist's book."

"You always have the right to defend yourself. Abusive people will act like you don't have to right to stand up to them, disagree with them, voice your opinions, express your emotions, or say anything in response to their criticisms, accusations, sarcasm, bullying, rudeness, or cruelty. You have every right in the world to stand up for yourself. Unfairness, disrespect, hypocrisy, and double standards are red flags for narcissistic and emotional abuse."

"Abuse is not about one person hitting another person. It is about one person needing to control another person completely and utterly. Their rules must be obeyed no matter what. These rules are changed constantly and if not obeyed the abuser will punish their target. The whole world looks for marks in order to establish if there was abuse without really understanding the real meaning of what abuse is all about"

"Why do narcissists hold on to resentments rather than discuss their issues?

They don't engage in anything where they may be to blame. Confrontations are not allowed. You're always to blame. If you do try and discuss anything hard they will shut you down, blame you, twist the issue till you're made out to be the perpetrator and they're the victim. It's best to sweep it under the rug like they do. You won't win and you'll be the bad guy."

"YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND THAT SOME PEOPLE NEVER REALLY GROW. THEY NEVER LEARN THEIR LESSON. THEY NEVER RECOGNIZE THEIR MISTAKES. THEY NEVER ACKNOWLEDGE THEIR FAULTS. THEY NEVER ADMIT THEY WERE IN THE WRONG. YOU WILL NEVER RECEIVE AN APOLOGY FROM THEM AND YOU WILL NEVER SEE THEIR BEHAVIOR CHANGE."

"Narcissists have secret lives. They lie effortlessly. They are two-faced - appearing with a perfect public image that most people believe. In the shadows, when no one is looking, they do tremendous damage to family, friends & those who live with them."

"Narcissists only surround themselves with people who enable their behavior, ignore their behavior, or encourage their behavior. Anyone who tries to hold them accountable will be accused and blamed for the exact things the narcissist is guilty of. And the people who know the truth will remain silent."

"For the narcissistic abuser the words, compromise, resolution, apology, or remorse do not exist

Their sole purpose is to win. They see you trying to discuss the relationship as a competition which they have to win. Their trophy is your life and soul. Their grand prize is control."

"Narcissists are trapped in the mind of a two-year-old, and they possess no cognitive ability to reason, to negotiate, to cooperate, to give and take, to love, to empathize. Rather their lives consist of ultimatums, demands, greed, egocentric thinking, bullying, temper tantrums, silent treatments, and a plethora of 'I WANTS' and 'GIVE ME'S'."

"Agreeing to things just to keep the peace is actually a trauma response. When you do this, you're disrespecting your boundaries. No more making yourself uncomfortable for others to feel comfortable. You have control now. You run your life. Take up space and use your voice."

"BREAKING UP WITH A DYSFUNCTIONAL NARCISSIST IS LIKE WAKING UP FROM A COMA. YOU HAVE TO RE-LEARN EVEN THE MOST BASIC THINGS OF YOUR DAILY LIFE. THIS IS BECAUSE DURING THE COURSE OF THE RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR NARCISSIST YOU WERE SLOWLY, AND METHODICALLY, BEING 'ERASED'."

"To The Adult Child Of A Narcissist

You could reach the highest pinnacle of success. Crawl to them on your knees through broken glass. But nothing you can ever do or become would be enough to secure their love.

It's never been about you being unworthy or undeserving, even though it feels that way.

The only way out of this maze of suffering is to face the truth: They never loved you and never will because they are incapable of caring for anyone but themselves.

They are an infinite loop of emptiness A heart forever twisted to gaze only upon itself. They cannot give you what they do not have." John Mark Green

"WHY NARCISSISTS WILL NEVER BE HAPPY

No matter what type of relationships narcissists seek, they are never happy. They go about their lives seeking something that is not achievable because the ego has created the biggest fog, especially for them.

If narcissists should be in a long-term relationship, it is only to act as camouflage. Sort of leading a normal life but the lies, the cheating, the fakeness, the selfishness, and the hate will always be there."

"In dysfunctional, toxic and narcissistic groups, friendly empaths are outcasted and scapegoated while predators and bullies are popular and glorified." So true!

"Narcissistic Smear Campaigns

1 PREEMPTIVELY starts a smear campaign by planting seeds in the minds of others

2 Begins the smear by painting himself or herself as the devoted, loving, innocent VICTIM of you

3 Twist stories and tells lies about your  character making sure to incorporate a GRAIN OF TRUTH

4 Lines up REPLACEMENT to use for future reputation management, supply, and triangulation

5 DISCARDS you out of the blue, then 5 flaunts new supply and uses your reactions as proof you're to blame for all the problems in the relationship"

"What is the darkest manipulation tactic?

Covert manipulation.

It is done under the guise of them "caring" for you. These spiders lure you into their web of abuse by showering you with attention, love, kindness, and being thoughtful and supportive. Everything you've always wanted.

Then, once they have you on their web, they start to take those things away, little by little and they say it's your fault they're going away. You try and improve and please them. You're now caught in their web with a spider and its slowly wrapping more of the web around you.

Then, when there's no more energy to suck out of you they leave you to die alone stuck in their web. It takes you YEARS to get out of it and nobody can help you get out. You have to find your own way of untangling that web, and it's not just physically but psychologically and emotionally stuck in that web too.

After the person (spider) leaves you to die on the web (or during your relationship with them) they go and make another web and the same cycle repeats itself with the next victim.

Covert abuse is by far the worst because it's done under the guise of love when the reality is quite the opposite, it's the definition of EVIL and DEATH"

"Trauma stays in your system. When something is so traumatic and painful, that it is too much for a person to handle, the body protects that person by repressing it and allowing the person to disassociate from the pain. The problem with that is the trauma is never processed, so it stays in the body and causes all kinds of havoc. When a person is experiencing ongoing consistent abuse like in narcissistic abuse. This causes Complex post-traumatic stress disorder."

"The thing victims need to understand is that narcissists don't think like normal people, they have different agendas. A narcissist's goals are things like controlling you, getting their narcissistic supply, or anything that feeds their dysfunctional appetite. So while you are trying to have a conversation with them about, let's say, the problems in your relationship, they are doing things like stonewalling (ignoring you, or looking at you with that blank stare, and saying nothing at all.) or diverting your attention, and manipulating the conversation a different way. You have to understand, They don't want to talk about the relationship. They don't want to take responsibility for their part in anything, and they definitely don't want to work things out. They want to continue to do what they want, without repercussions. You have to clearly understand, that they don't want the same things you do. That is why they play games, manipulate, lie, and everything else they do, it's a way to divert responsibility, keep control, and make you feel unimportant and unworthy. That is why none of it ever made sense to you, they have a completely different agenda. One you don't know about or ever agreed to. " -Maria Consiglio

"SIGNS OF FINANCIAL ABUSE

*Threats of leaving or withholding money for basic expenses

*No access to bank accounts or credit cards

*Every 'cent' is tracked

*Forced career choices

*All bills in one person's name

*Withholding financial information/details from you

* Telling you that you can't understand finances

Financial abuse is one of the many ways an abuser tries to control their partner. The lack of access to financial means is a major factor in a victim's ability to leave their abuser. and not to return back to the abuse!"

"Narcissistic abuse can kill you! I am not talking about domestic violence and the risks involved with physical abuse.

I am talking about the torture to your mind and soul.

It can kill you. It can drive you to a point of feeling as if ending your life is the only solution"

"People expect evil to appear in obvious forms, announcing itself, clearly displaying its intentions.

That's what people expect, but that's not the reality. Evil is subversive, manipulative, tricking you into thinking that it's good, and tricking you into giving it your consent."

"The very systems that are supposedly there to assist those living in domestic violence to escape, and get back on their feet, abuse them more. Social services, judges, lawyers, police, and representatives of the court, enable abuse and degrade people more."

"Never discredit your gut instinct. You are not paranoid. Your body can pick up on bad vibrations. If something deep inside of you says something is not right about a person or a situation, trust it." I do! 

"You are a lot of things to a malignant narcissist. You are a possession, a means to an end, a form of supply, a way to charge their empty soul, but you are never a person, you're a thing. A thing to be used for whatever their need might be at any given time"

"Please understand this, Narcissists are severely emotionally stunted, underdeveloped adults.

Regardless of how high mentally functioning they appear to be, they have the emotional intelligence of an angry, irrational young child."

"Types of Flying Monkeys

Flying monkeys can be divided into two main types:

• Complicit and Willing (Conspirator) Well-Meaning Dupes (Deluded)

Each of these two types can be further divided into smaller categories:

• Positive Intentioned Negative intentioned

Some flying monkeys can be very hard to recognize and some function as flying monkeys ENTIRELY without ever realizing it. If we are to protect ourselves from this behavior, It Is IMPERATIVE that we understand these people and how they are utilized against us.

Recovering From A RELATIONSHIP WITH A NARCISSIST"

"Evil vs Broken 

Do not confuse a broken person for an evil person. A broken person can be fixed an evil person cannot. An evil person causes pain, they hurt others. They deliberately cause chaos. A broken person would never do any of those things because they know how it feels to be on the other side of those actions. Don't confuse someone who can be saved with someone that you will need to be saved from."

"A narcissist is always a narcissist! Being narcissistic is not just being mean. A narcissist creates a fake self and world (sometimes more than one) and everything they do is to maintain and present that fake self. A narcissist has an uncanny ability to know the proper behavior in any given situation (circumstances + individuals involved) to get what they want out of that situation and support their overall goal of making the fake self seem real. If someone likes a narcissist, then the narc has played the role properly to convince that person that they are nice, lovable, caring, etc. The narc manipulates, or attempts to, everyone. But for the primary people in their lives - significant other, parents, children, employees, closest 'friends" - they also attempt control. They think they must control those people in order to keep the fake self alive. This addition of control in close "relationships" makes it appear that the narc is not being narcissistic in non close relationships."

"Ex Recycling - Psychopaths keep their exes strung along for added attention & triangulation. They use these people to appear in "high demand" at all times, creating competition and jealousy with their current partners. Their exes can usually be placed into one of two categories: 1) In Love With Me. 2) Crazy. The "crazy" exes are the ones who saw through the psychopath's lies and refused to take part in their games anymore. The "In Love With Me" exes are the ones who still believe they play some sort special role in the psychopath's life. When the psychopath runs out of new victims, they will recycle these old targets and convince the world that they were soul mates all along. But the only truly happy people are the supposedly crazy ones who finally turned their backs and left all of the manufactured drama behind." 

"Narcissist (n): a more polite term for a self-serving, evil asshole with no soul." Yes, thier souls have been murdered in childhood. 

The best revenge is none. Make the time and space to heal, mourn your losses, move on, and don't become like those who hurt you.

I SUFFER FROM THAT DISORDER WHERE I SPEAK THE TRUTH AND IT PISSES PEOPLE OFF

What they hate in you, is missing in them. Keep shining.

"I feel like I should want more, but I don't. I want less. Less stuff. Less rushing. Less stress. Less noise. Less unnecessary baggage."

"Solitude is for me a fount of healing which makes my life worth living. Talking is often a torment for me, and I need many days of silence to recover from the futility of words." Carl Jung

6 Signs You're Dealing With A Machiavellian & What To Do

Machiavellians generally share the following behaviors and traits:

1. Manipulation

Machiavellians lie, cheat, and flatter to get their way. They are long-term planners and calculated strategists, able to read people and to use their fears or weaknesses against them. They will bend rules, trick people, and fake sympathy to gain favors, McIntosh says. They can be charming at first but later resort to more aggressive tactics like bullying. Overall, they lack morals and are more than willing to cause harm to get what they want. (Here is how to recognize manipulation, for what it's worth.)

2. Self-interest

Ever the cynic, Machiavellians believe that everyone is acting in their own self-interest, so they do not form close relationships and do not trust easily. Money and power mean more to them than relationships with people. They can be incredibly disloyal, as their determination can lead them to ignore social pacts or bonds of trust. This trait also distinguishes them from the other two Dark Triad types (narcissists and psychopaths), as they do not necessarily have to be the center of attention. (yes, money, control, and power that all they care about)

3. Deceit 

Machiavellians understand that having information is useful. They often do not share information with others unless it is in their favor to do so. They may manipulate otherwise innocuous information and can be very crafty about taking information out of context. (Now I see that all these years she follow me around was just to take information from me and not to learn from me and become a more compassionate and understanding person. What makes me most sad is that she uses all the information she got from me to give her an advantage in the games people play) 

https://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2017/10/the-games-people-play.html

4. Unemotional

Machiavellians lack empathy and compassion. Generally, they are neither able to identify their own emotions nor recognize those of others, which is part of what enables them to be so willing to do truly anything they deem necessary to achieve their goals, even at other people's expense. Despite their strength in manipulating others, past research suggests Machiavellians actually tend to be less emotionally intelligent.

5. Ambition

Machiavellians are highly ambitious, and they'll use control and manipulation to achieve those ambitions. A 2016 study evaluating Machiavellianism among supervisors found these personality types make abusive and aloof managers, with the abuse becoming most prevalent when in a perceived position of power in the workplace. The researchers consider that power may be an amplifier that draws out the Machiavellian's preexisting behavioral predispositions, emotions, and beliefs. 

6. Competition

Machiavellians are highly competitive, so they view everyone as adversaries. They are willing to take a back seat or be a team player at times when doing so is to their advantage. Machiavellians are sensitive to the power dynamics in social contexts and can switch between cooperative and competitive tactics.

Read more in the link below:

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/articles/machiavellianism