This piece of satire is part of a longer guide, tentatively titled “How to manipulate people: A guide for narcissists/idiots.”
If you ever feel like you’re losing power, you must always reclaim it immediately.
Let’s say you’re in a company meeting, and you ask a question — but, oops! The answer was obvious. Anyone else would brush it off and move on, after all, it’s a single inconsequential moment in their seemingly infinite sea of experiences; some moments are just better than others, and aside from the highlights they’ll find with the friendships they forge, work moments are very rarely worth hanging on to.
But being a narcissist, your pride is so fragile that it risks shattering at the slightest knock, and your sense of self control is so loose that your identity is constantly hanging by a thread. So, the only option here is to reclaim your sense of power, which must always be sustained, and retaliate immediately (because remember, everything is a battle, and that’s how you like it).
The best way to do this is to criticise someone else: Say “that’s fine, but I’m still waiting on this other thing and I don’t see why it hasn’t been done yet”. This changes the mood of the entire meeting, and now everyone feels on edge: Their co-workers have been accused of incompetence, being “unable” to meet the seemingly simple criteria of accomplishing an apparently basic task.
One might presume that the obvious risk here is that, again, you’ll find yourself outdone as someone else informs you of your own further incompetence — but those who have been around you longer know that the smartest approach is always to relinquish control as soon as possible, and escape your biting aura. And for those who don’t, you know you’ll make short work of them, and soon your new enemies will learn the error of their ways.
Of course, if you stopped dedicating the majority of your thoughts to fighting imaginary battles, put some effort into overriding your compulsively combative nature, and accepted that the devastation you now feel, when a cool breeze brushes by you in a direction you didn’t agree to, is exactly what is really is: tiny, arbitrary, meaningless — then those mistakes you keep making would diminish, your loss-phobic nature would reset towards tolerance and acceptance, and your life would transition: from drowning in a stream, to floating freely on the winds of life.
But that won’t happen, so clearly, they’re the stupid ones for not handling you better. Of course the baby cries when it’s hungry, they should’ve known that about you by now, the idiots.
So perhaps no-one says anything. Mission accomplished then, an immediate victory on your part! You have reclaimed your power by sapping the life out of those around you, and you can once again reside comfortably within your kingdom of discomfort.
Or, perhaps someone speaks up. This is a difficult thing for everyone to witness, because anyone who isn’t a natural narcissist wants desperately to return to a place of harmony, and move on from the toxic atmosphere that you’ve created. Perhaps this, then, is the real victory? Control over all in your vicinity, the power to ruin the day of multiple people simultaneously, oh what strength you have! And let’s just pretend that sticking your finger up your bum then waving it around people’s faces wouldn’t have the exact same effect.
Returning to the aforementioned contention towards your adamant refusal to concede: This can work wondrously in your favour: Again, you are undoubtedly already well-known as an unpleasant person to deal with; so any responses to your own hostility will be seen, in the eyes of others, as further antagonising the rude little brat that they’ve learnt to tiptoe around so adeptly.
The group may, in their rush towards mental sanctuary, even take your side, forming an unlikely alliance against the very person who spoke up against your initial tantrum. And very soon, this new defender will learn that you have within your repertoire a million rebuttals to such a defence: Further criticism; more antagonism. You relish the chance to continue layering hostility upon the currently shared mood until your opponent reaches their absolute breaking point; ideally, pushing them to become aggressive themselves, as their own demeanour changes to match what’s inside of you all of the time. But that goal is, much to your personal and frequent disappointment, rarely achieved. It takes a lot of work to hollow out someone so substantially that their immediate response is almost as thorny as yours.
The result of your momentary manufactured conflict can go one of two ways: Either you belittle them down into submission, a risky manoeuvre among a less acclimatised group; or you deploy the fake dive tactic: you give them a win, and just as it seems the tone has shifted back in the direction of neutrality, you sneak in one last attack, a bitch slap to the back of the head of your departing opponent. Too exhausted from the battle (which, as everyone but you knows, was ultimately pointless and driven solely by your personal pride), your current enemy too tired to fight further, you finally achieve your victory. You have the power now.
There is one minor caveat: You may, at some point in your life, find yourself matched against someone keenly versed in the tactics of a narcissist such as yourself. They know that you’re not special, they know how you work, and they know exactly what you’re going to do — because they’ve seen it all before. There’s nothing new about your behaviour, as no narcissist is unique. Same patterns, same actions, some old, boring, worn-out wailings masquerading as war stories. They know that the only way to defuse you for good is to consistently point out your strategies: Oh, they mention nonchalantly: you did that last time; accepted that you made a minor mistake then told someone off right after. Piece by piece, they can strip you of your weapons, until your once-mighty blades are seen as the cheap plastic toys that they are.
But on your side, as you well know, is the human defence against the very words required to dismantle the discordance which causes discomfort. Firstly, nobody wants to be part of a conflict, but secondly, and most crucially here, nobody wants to be around it. It takes a certain type of person, therefore, to be able to confront your nonsense so consistently. After all, it took the brazen child to point out the emperor’s missing clothes. But once spoken, the spell was broken; likewise, once a tactic of yours is unveiled for what it is, you won’t be able to use it again without everyone knowing what you’re up to, and seeing you for what you are.
More likely though, you’ll find yourself facing a fanatic fledgling, keen to stamp out intolerance, but still wrapped up in the ego carried by everyone, which only a fraction of people manage to dissolve — after a long life lived leisurely, with many lucky opportunities for difficult bouts of self-reflection, acceptance, and release. As long as their is ego, there is something to be attacked.
And then the meeting is over. Everyone disperses, getting away from you as fast as they can, maybe a straggler even speaks to you in an attempt to further dissipate their own tension (side note: they’re clearly more vulnerable so be sure to target them later). Not only was the dip into discomfort a minor highlight to your day, but in your own deluded reality, you proved yourself yet again as a force not to be trifled with, an unrelenting power, an undeniable force of fast wits and intelligence.
For everyone else, it was just another pointlessly frustrating meeting, thanks again to you. Maybe you’ll get sick or go on holiday and won’t be there to hijack the next meeting, and people can just be themselves and make the most of the time they have within this life. Not that your derailing can’t be undone with a quick vent (“always with the drama, and over what, they were wrong about something? Bloody hell they need a life”).
Or maybe you’ve wrangled your place into a position of power, and it’s time for them to find a new job, and hope that the next place is more aware of narcissists, and your habits of forcibly repainting everything with the same, simple ugliness that colours your soul. A place with the support needed to address the harm you’ve dedicated your life to causing; with colleagues and friends who support those affected by your blatant malevolence, and who know that employing antagonistic adolescents preoccupied with mental masturbation is not conducive to a pleasant and productive environment.