The High Price of Peace at Any Cost

I have made reference several times to what I call the Cult of Nice. When referring to the Cult of Nice I have commented on how this 'cult' labels it a 'sin' or 'wrong' to hurt someone's feelings. Both Christians and secular types who've swallowed pop psychology seem to often subscribe to this belief. This anti-logic provides a lovely escape hatch for malignant narcissists because you can be made into a 'sinner' for calling them on their garbage, or for simply stating truth. They wave the flag of their 'hurt' feelings and it is supposed that you will then cease and desist or risk being labeled a hateful, unkind person. You're accused of being mean...which is like a cuss word to the Cultists of Nice-land. The tables get turned so fast that the victim becomes abuser in a blink of an eye in this alternate universe of anti-logic.

Those who subscribe to this kind of thinking are not being rational in any way. Which is why I tend to see this as a religious/cult-like type of thinking. It is a faith-type belief in the supremacy of feelings over principles. The Cult of Nice is a false righteousness that attempts to dismiss or disparage real justice or right-doing through name-calling. It is a useful belief system which allows you to eliminate any opposition to your behaviors or attitudes by this pretense that others are responsible for your feelings. If you are confronted with an uncomfortable or unwelcome truth you can trump that truth with your 'hurt' feelings. Then the only 'truth' that matters is that you feel hurt, angry, upset, persecuted, etc. This is a custom made system by and for narcissists and other villains.

There is an adjunct to the "we must never ever hurt anyone's feelings" tenet of the Cult of Nice.

It is: "peace at all costs."

If I could be allowed to surmise, I think it is safe to say that nearly every family with a malignant narcissist has at least one family member who believes in the 'peace at all costs' maxim. This self-appointed 'peacemaker' has likely held most of the other family members in line for the family narcissist by forcing these other family members to 'go along to get along'. Because the family narcissist can make life very difficult when someone crosses their will, the family peacemaker will shame other family members by telling them they are responsible for not 'upsetting' Mommy Dearest, or whomever the narcissist is in that particular family. Because when 'momma ain't happy; ain't nobody happy' is reality for that family, the peacemaker emphasizes how everyone other than Momma is responsible for not rocking the family boat.

The urge to be a peacemaker is a survival mechanism when we are talking about children and hostages. I don't think there is any fault in those who learn how to read their abuser in order to avoid their rage. I am talking about a different person. A person who is an able-bodied, full-grown adult with the ability to walk away. When this able-bodied adult requires those who aren't free to walk away to bear the abuse and injustice in silence...that is when I get seriously pissed off. When the peacemaker makes excuses for the abuser's behavior, yet won't cut any slack to the victims...I am enraged. What is particularly disgusting is the phony righteousness that the peacemaker gets to wear. Too many do-gooders act like it is some badge of honor to placate the blood-sucking monster instead of locking the beast up and throwing away the key. I speak metaphorically.

I didn't always feel this way. No, for most of my life I've lived in the Cult of Nice through the misfortune of my birth into my twisted family. It took me a very long time to be able to see the insanity of the system and extricate myself. As I write this, the example that I am reflecting on is my own father. He is a living representation of the ultimate cost of peace at any cost.

Don't picture my father as a obsequious, weak man. He is nothing of the sort. He was a man of strength and forthrightness at one time...a long time ago. This was a man who would never stand by to watch some stranger get attacked and he not intervene. With fists if need be. This was not true, though, with his own children. He seems to have had no perspective where it concerned how his wife was...and how she treated his own children. He saved his pity for her. He made allowances for her bad behavior because he believed her childhood explained (and justified) her bad behavior as an adult. Because he made these allowances for the perpetrator, he was not able to see his way clear to protect his children from the beast. Because he pitied the perp, he ended up consigning helpless children to her abuses. He loved my mother above all else. His children were unwanted and annoying appendages to his idol, my mother. He tolerated us because he loved her. This also made it easy for him to demand of us better behavior than he expected from a full-grown woman, his wife. He only 'loved' us when we were invisible or when we performed as he expected us to.

My father today is a bitter, angry, cynical man. His mind gradually poisoned by Worm Tongue against his children and extended family. I have evidence in his own writing that he has surrendered his integrity in order to keep peace with the devil. His moral compass is so broken that he feels righteous and justified to demand of me, his grown daughter, that I too capitulate to the selfish demands of his infernal wife. He sees me as the problem because I will not bend over and grab the ankles in order to 'make peace'...like he has.

Yes, indeed. The price for peace with a villain is very high indeed. It has cost my father much. He has lost every one of his extended family members. He has lost at least one daughter. All he has left is his evil wife. And, perhaps, the one daughter who greatly resembles his evil wife, my sister. Was it really worth defending the indefensible all these years? I highly doubt it. I have seen clear indications that much of the time he can't stand to be around my mother. They live separate lives. He speaks impatiently and angrily with her much of the time. There are times when he is tender and indulgent with my mother. These are rare times when she has managed to use enough of her feminine charms to soften him. He is not a happy man. He has paid out too much of his soul, though, to cash in his chips. He will stay with her to the bitter, ugly end.

Count carefully the ultimate cost of 'peace at any and all costs'. It is very steep. In the end, all you will be left with is the cold comfort of your pretended integrity and righteousness minus your soul.

Can You Love the Narcissist?

Do you love the narcissist? Or are you in love with your fantasy of what you wish the narcissist to be? How can you tell whether you love the person or the fantasy?

The following applies not only to romantic relationships; it applies across the board of all relationships including parent/child.

You can not truly love someone until they have revealed their characters to you. Why is this so? Because who we are is revealed by what we choose to do. Our characters are the sum total of the choices we've made.

Until you know someone's character you can not say in truth that you know or love who they are. This explains why so many marriages fall apart. People fall in love with their imagined version of the other person and don't become acquainted with that other person's character until enough time has passed for the consistency of their characters to be revealed. This is why short dating periods are often disastrous in the long-term.

We each have a will. How we exercise our will = the choices we make. The choices we make = our behaviors. The consistent behaviors a person exhibits is the truth of who they are. Behaviors are the revelation of character. Behaviors reveal what has been happening in the unseen realm of someone's thinking. When a person, like Cho of the Virginia Tech massacre, suddenly went on a murderous rampage, he was not acting out of character. He revealed what his character truly was. We have a sudden, horrific and stark revelation of what his thinking and small choices have added up to. What Cho did is who he is. Cho forced us all to see what an evil character had been developing quietly step by step and choice by choice while no one was really looking. We often hear people protest after being caught in some bad behavior that "it isn't like me to do this". No, it is like you. You chose to do what you did. You revealed who you are, not who you aren't, when you cheated on your husband or when you cooked the books at work.

If, after having a clear view of someone's personal character traits, you have respect, admiration and trust in that person then you can correctly state that you love this person.

Then there is the situation where you have gotten to know the personal characteristics of an individual, and you find that you can not say you love those characteristics. Yet you insist that you still love the person. Never mind that this person lies to you, cheats on you, slanders you to others, even physically abuses you...you tenaciously insist you hate their character traits but you love the person. It is this so-called "love" which justifies why you are still in this bad relationship. Whatever the reason for it (there can be many), this is describing someone who has created a fantasy around the objectionable character. They are not in love with the person...they are in love with the idea of who they've decided this person is in spite of the evidence to the contrary. This is not reality-based thinking. To insist a person is "good" despite what bad things they actually do is an exercise in your imagination only.

Perhaps you insist that you love what this person could be if they only tried. This, too, is a refusal to live in reality. Can we please dispense with this sloppy thinking? Can we stop trying to fool ourselves in order to justify staying in a destructive relationship? Can we call things by their right names? Go ahead and insist that you love the rotten character, but quit doing it to make yourself believe you are a better person for doing so. Stop white-washing their character in order to convince yourself you need to stay connected to them. If you are afraid of leaving the comfort of the known for the discomfort of the unknown world of life without this bad character, then admit that truth to yourself. But stop pretending you love something that is hateful. Remember that a key component of mental health is the mind which insists on living in reality i.e. the truth. You are not doing your mental health any favors by engaging in these mental games which allow you to stay in a bad place. If you don't love what a person does then you can't accurately state that you love the person himself.

This type of imaginary love is a real problem for many adult children of narcissists (ACONs). It can be incredibly difficult to admit to yourself that you don't love your narcissist parent or that they don't love you. It seems to go against nature to make that admission. I see many ACONs insisting to themselves that they love their N mom or N dad despite the decades of ill treatment they've received from her or him. The ACON isn't ready to give up the idea of having a loving parent, so the ACON must pretend they love this abusive parent in order to justify staying connected. They are willing to pretend that their mommy or daddy really loves them "deep down" though they don't recognize they are having to imagine the love they "see" coming from their parent. This keeps the ACON in an actively destructive relationship. Many ACONs are willing to risk their marriages and their own children's emotional and physical safety in order to "keep the dream alive". This refusal to admit to reality is damaging to more than your own mental health. You can risk everything good in your life by insisting your fantasy is reality. Your refusal to walk away from a destructive parent is not a testament to your deep and abiding love for this person...it is a testament to your volitional stupidity. Do not call your dependency on a bad relationship "love".

It is okay to love a bad person, but only from a distance. Don't insist your love for a destructive person is justification enough for staying close to them. You risk all that is good and beautiful in life in order to love the unlovable. Maybe you think that means you are a better person because you can love and unlovable, but when your so-called love means the destruction of your own well-being, and the well-being of the innocents around you, then I insist you are not as good as you think you are.

Stockholm Syndrome and You

Using the four criteria to determine if a person is experiencing Stockholm syndrome, Sara Lambert shows how chronically abused children are demonstrably victims of this syndrome. In "Captivity & The Stockholm Syndrome" the author describes the environment the child lives in who is experiencing ongoing abuse.

I have been convinced for a while now that many adult children of narcissists show signs that they are operating from a Stockholm syndrome perspective. The article is careful to state that:

It is important to emphasize here that nothing about the Stockholm Syndrome suggests the captive does anything wrong or abnormal. The situation is driven entirely by the abusive captor and responsibility for it, and for the captive's responses, lies directly with him.

I completely agree with this statement. This syndrome is a survival technique; it is a quite effective one at that. But in order to live a healthy adult life one has to recognize if their behaviors are still operating from the mindset of a captive so they can break what are now destructive habits and thought processes. What helped you survive as a child in an abusive environment will be largely detrimental if those same adaptive techniques are applied in different context.

One of the criteria of Stockholm syndrome is that the abuser seems to show some kindness occasionally:

This is probably one of the most confusing and damaging aspects to living with an abuser that survivors report. What can a child make of a father who cruelly sexually abuses her at night but, the next morning, makes her favorite breakfast? She is left with a mix-up between cruelty and kindness, love and hate, which her undeveloped brain can not unravel, and so which may be with her far into her adult life.

I want to focus on this particular statement because this is what I most often observe in adult children of narcissists--they are confused and not sure if their parent is an evil abusive narcissist because they can remember times when their abuser was kind. There are happy memories here and there which the individual thinks are indications that their abuser is just a bit misguided at times, or has "anger management" issues, that if brought under control then the wonderful and loving person hiding in their abusive parent would be able to come out.

...which may be with her far into her adult life

Indeed. Does this describe you? How confused are you by happy memories with your abusive parent?

I have stressed in various posts on this blog that an occasional good deed doesn't weigh against a systematic and chronic series of abuses. It is very common for chronically abused individuals to try to put the fault on themselves when their parent continues to display abusive behaviors. Even though the adult has likely escaped from day to day control by their abusive parent, they often act as though they don't have control over their own lives. They often will abdicate their own desires and needs if those desires and needs contradict what they know their abusive parent would want. You have to make a decisive effort in order to break the psychological control your abusive and narcissistic parent instilled in you when you were their captive.

One component of the Stockholm syndrome is the belief that your abuser will kill you if you don't comply. This may throw some of you off if you don't recognize that it is possible to believe your abuser has power to kill you even if they didn't overtly tell you or show you that intent. My own mother did issue a direct death threat to me when I was around six years of age, but I remember having the feeling from a much younger age that my mother was life to me. A child is not insensible to their dependence on their parent(s). They are very aware that they depend on their parents for life itself. A child can be very young (as young as three) and have clear thoughts that if something happened to their parent they themselves would die. So, even without overt death threats, a child is very aware that their life is one that completely depends on the adult(s) in her life to feed her, clothe her and protect her. When a parent shows disapproval by emotional or physical withdrawal a child can feel like life itself is endangered. A child will often comply with any request of a parent who uses this cruel method to get compliance from the child. Parental withdrawal feels like a death threat from the child's perspective.

I hope you will read the linked article and carefully assess whether or not you experienced Stockholm syndrome as a child. If so, then ask yourself how much your behaviors today are still dictated by this dynamic with your abuser.

While it is hugely distressing for a survivor to realize that, as a child, she was so trapped, helpless, and manipulated, on the other hand this realization provides her with the freedom to put that past behind her and understand she now has control over herself and her life, and she does not have to remain hostage to her abuser any more.

That last statement is the intent and purpose of my blog. Whether or not you feel like it is true, you do have the freedom to make new choices. Choices which will free you to assert control over your own life. Freedom to break off from your abuser without any longer having to put their feelings and "needs" ahead of your own.

Life is way too precious and far too short to continue to live in the slavery your parent subjected you to as a child. Now is the time to sever the identification with your abuser which keeps you looking at your world through the abuser's eyes. As long as you continue to operate from the Stockholm syndrome you are prevented from living your life as an autonomous and mature adult. You will find yourself trapped in an infantile state which believes that your good feelings about yourself can only come from the approving glance of your narcissistic parent. Today is a good day to set your feet on the path of autonomy and wave good-bye to emotional dependence
on your abuser. They are not looking out for your best interests. They expect you to look out for theirs. This dynamic will never stop unless you stop participating in it.

There is nothing that justifies what they've done, so stop justifying it and start living.

Is it love?

How many times have you tried to rationalize the narcissist's behavior by convincing yourself that they really do love you if in their "own way" particularly if the narcissist is your parent? How confused are you as to what love is and isn't due to being raised by perverted-thinking narcissists? By perverted I'm using the broad definition of perversion which means to wrongly use or corrupt something.

Love is an internal principle. You can't impose it from the outside. To attempt to gain love or compliance illicitly always involves the external rule of force. A narcissist wants you to prove your love for them by forcing you to bend to their rules.

• A forced obedience is no obedience at all, but rather it is slavery.
• A manipulated obedience is no obedience at all, but deception.
• A purchased obedience is no obedience at all, but bribery.
• An obedience rendered in fear of adverse consequences is no obedience at all, but self-preservation.

All the above statements bring clear memories to my mind of my mother's methods in raising me. She used every perverted and externally imposed force to achieve compliance. There was no way to assuage her anger and rage, her petulance and sulking, her explicit or implicit expectations except by total compliance and capitulation.

It is never about love with the narcissist. They are incapable of giving or receiving it because life is always about getting their way. Force is always involved when getting ones way is not optional in ones thinking. Love can't use force and remain love. Love must woo, entice, attract. It is the beauty of a loving character that attracts. The narcissist has a twisted, ugly, and evil character which becomes apparent if you find yourself under a narcissist's power and control. To keep you in their power they must use force otherwise you would leave them to rot in their personal hell alone. Recognize it for what it is. Don't call what they do and say "love". It never was and never will be. They are tyrants and despots in their hearts. One of the powerful tools of enslavement of your soul is by their perverted definitions of love. Their demands for obedience always involve force in some form. If you are complying to their whims, wishes, commands from any of the above motivations then you are not motivated by love for that person either. You are their slave; physically, emotionally and mentally. Free yourself. That is what real love requires. Real love will not aide and abet evil.

Love = freedom of your will and your soul to do right.
Force = slavery of your will and your soul to do evil.

Are you a slave, or are you free?

Dad--Mom's evil henchman

I used to love and respect my dad. I used to think he was principled and strong. I used to think he loved me.

Much has happened, and these happenings have taught me many things. Several of which is that all of the above were illusions. Figments of my imagination. Fantasy and dreams.

Recent experience has revealed not only the present but the past. One of the saddest realities I have had to confront in my adulthood is that my father has never loved me. I won't bore you with my long list of remembrances that prove this point. I don't have to prove anything to you. I am only stating that it has been proven to me. I will sum up my realizations about my dad to you, though, just in case it may resonate in your own experience.

The only person who really matters to my dad is himself. Yes, he has worked hard for years to provide for his wife. And himself. By providing for his wife, he can claim this as proof that he loves her and has done his duty toward her. This works for her. There is little more she expects from him. Provide for her in the manner she has become accustomed to and the uneasy truce between them can be maintained. The symbiosis of their relationship explains everything to me about my dad's relationship to me. It was never about me. I have been an attachment to my mother since I was born. He would have never married my mom except that she became pregnant with me. All I have ever been to him is a representation of duty and responsibility. He did for me because it was simply the same as doing something for his wife. It kept her "happy", it met her demands, it shut her up. Which brings me to my first statement that the only person who matters to him is himself. He only pleases his wife in order to "keep the peace" so he can live his life in relative calm as well as pursue his own interests and live his own life. They live separate but parallel existences. It is a business arrangement. A little bit of mutual back-scratching, then they go about doing what they do for themselves. Both are locked in a perpetual pursuit of their own agendas. Separate agendas.

There is no human alive who doesn't fashion some code of conduct that convinces themselves they are "righteous"...i.e. that they are "moral". Some fashion their moral code according to an objective source, such as the Bible. Others just make one up as they go along and construct their code according to their subjective and perverted feelings and ideas. My dad lives by the moral code of the mobster. No matter how angry he may get at my mother, no matter how loudly he may condemn some behavior of hers to her face, no matter the long emotional estrangements from her....let some "outsider" (everyone is an outsider to those two including their children) come along and dare to contradict or attempt to hold his wife to accountability in whatever form and his mobster code of conduct is immediately visible. No one else is ever allowed to "dis" his wife. You make her unhappy and HE is unhappy. You will be yanked on as hard as possible by him in order to bring you back into line and make his wifey happy again. I see this dynamic as yet another iteration of his dedication to his principle of selfishness. If the wife is unhappy....she makes him miserable, too, because she cries, she rages, she whines, she mopes, she sinks into depression, she tortures him with her misery. He sees the only "moral" thing to do is to make her happy again whatever the human cost may be to the "outsider". No one else matters. There is no claim for redress, accountability, or justice that he will admit to be valid. The mobster code of "la familia" applies only to the two of them. The rest of us can rot in hell.

I see my father as Igor to my mother's Dr. Frankenstein. He is simply the club she wields to keep the rest of us in line. She has used him this way for as long as I can remember. I used to believe her lies about how much he loved his children, about what a strong and principled man he was, about how deserving of respect he was. Time and experience have been my teachers. He is as evil as she is. While she abused me with almost impunity, he turned his eye. He has NEVER stood up against her to protect me. Not once. When finally, as an adult, I appealed to him to hold her to account for her evil deeds just once, his refusal was absolute. This proved to me that his claim that had he known how she abused her children he would have intervened was a complete and total lie. He was being asked to intervene now, in the present, for a deed he witnessed himself and admitted for a short while she was in the wrong, and he refused to do the right thing by his family. His dedication to himself....and therefore to his wife....are set in granite. He is immovable. Not any part of his soul is moved by the importunities and pleas of his extended family. No righteous claim can find redress in his court of appeals. His integrity was surrendered to his evil wife many decades ago. He demands from the rest of us a similar surrender of integrity in the name of peace and family. It is a vile thing to behold.

I have no father.

The Opposite of Love is Not Hatred

A study on the concept of Nothing

How incredibly informative it would be if people could truly understand that the opposite of love is not hatred but indifference. It would force them to recognize the pathological relationships they are stuck in that are destroying their lives in some way. Many ACONs struggle for so long with their narcissistic parents because we all have memories of some apparently benevolent acts.

We look for "benevolent" acts in our history with the narcissist as a sign that they must love us "in their own way". We think that if they didn't love us then surely we'd know it because we think we would recognize the opposite of love. We think love's opposite is active hatred. I disagree.

Not to say that our narcissistic parents don't display actively hateful behavior, by the way. They can and do. But we are perplexed by the times when they seem to be acting loving toward us. (The operant word here is acting.) So we come up with explanations for the bad behaviors and give them a pass. Our narcissists tutored us well on how to do this.

I believe the hallmark of our relationships with our Ns seems to be the often overtly callous indifference we have suffered from them. They are indifferent to our best good. Indifferent to our humanity and individuality. Indifferent to our needs. Indifferent to our feelings. They nothing you.

Real love is other-centered. It is outwardly focused. (See 1 Corinthians 13 for a description of what real love looks like.) It involves self-sacrifice. It is always benevolent in its motivation. I've already pointed out how malignant narcissist means malevolent. Evil. Intent on doing harm. Please don't confuse anything the narcissist does as coming from a loving motivation. To do so is to continue to be their prey.

If we can understand the utter disregard of our personhood that is encapsulated in the word indifference, if we can let ourselves acknowledge the awful truth that these people are incapable of anything approaching real love, then can we see our way clear to cut loose even if these people call themselves our parents? I think so.

This indifference explains the sense we get of having our souls sucked out of us. Love fills us up. Indifference reduces us to husks. These people are toxic waste. Poison that will kill your soul first and then your body. We can forget ever feeling guilty for distancing ourselves from them because we think that on some level they must love us. Love is incapable of indifference because indifference is its antithesis. The narcissist does not love you. Never did. Never will. There is no room for such nobility of purpose and action as love in the narcissist's heart.

Indifference is what I feel for my parents. Bit by bit, as I began to understand the revelation of their narcissism, I was able to distance myself from them. Now I feel nothing for them. I don't have active, seething emotions that one would call hatred. No, I nothing them. They do not merit the emotional energy of hatred. They merit nothing. One can say that their indifference toward me all my life has finally come full circle back to them. My indifference is different from theirs in an important sense.....it contains no malevolence. I do not stay in their lives and torture them with my indifference. I have completely removed myself from their sphere so as to not afflict them with it. My indifference is in place only to save me. Not to hurt them.

The narcissist feels nothing toward you. My recommended course of action is that you get the hell away from them forever before they completely corrode your life. Then set on a path toward indifference. There is healing for your heart there. The narcissist doesn't merit anything from you that requires as much energy as either love or hatred. The wages for their actions toward you has come due. What have they earned? Nothing. As in, you owe them nothing. You feel nothing. They are nothing.