Thought Crimes
Have you noticed that even when you do things right it can be crapped all over and made to be "wrong" by the narcissist?
One of the ways they accomplish this is quite simple and can often trip us up without us seeing what got us. Even the most benevolent act can be turned into its opposite by the assignation of bad motives. The narcissist reserves to themselves the right to determine your own mind for you. They will tell you what was really motivating you in order to take away from you the truth, reality or rightness of whatever you have done. It can be an amazingly effective sleight-of-hand.
When I think back on my relationship with my narcissistic mother this is one of the things that stands out. My mother takes extreme pride in her ability to "read" people. She has done this for as long as I've known her. Mostly, what that means is that she assumes the worst about someone's thoughts or motivations and proceeds on that as if it is the truth about that person. No matter how well you may know yourself, she asserts that she knows better than you do what your motives and/or thoughts are or were in any given situation.
A narcissist parent can teach a child from a very early age that he or she knows you better than you know yourself. They teach the child to surrender what the child knows for what the narcissist parent "knows". It is part of the whole brain-washing process. You may still need to overcome your training in this arena.
If a narcissist encounters someone who refuses to let the narcissist determine their motives or state of mind the narcissist has another tack. They will attempt to destroy you by assigning to you all kinds of bad motivations to the people around you. Malicious gossip. They don't have to convince you of your bad motivations; they only have to convince the people in your sphere of contact. Now, whatever you do is cast in the light of suspicion taking away your virtue by their pretense at knowing your motives.
There is no good deed which can go unpunished by this pretense at reading your mind. This is one reason why I am death on "hate crimes". When you allow the government to apply the law to your state of mind while you committed a crime you are asking for the scenario of "1984" (which was Orwell's attempt at describing life under Communism). Determining punishment because of a person's supposed motivations while committing a crime is asking for total tyranny. It is already a crime to kill people. Should you be punished more severely because you killed a gay person? A person of another race? By doing so government is actually saying that some people's lives are more valuable than others simply by virtue of being in a minority. This is not the place of government to make such value judgments on human lives. Government needs to stay as far away from punishing "thought crimes" as possible. I believe I am especially sensitive to this issue because I have experienced being more severely punished for behavior because of the supposed "thought crimes" while doing it. If the behavior is wrong, then the law can deal with that. If the behavior is not wrong, it should not be made "wrong" simply because of what you were thinking while doing it. What you are thinking while doing said behavior is not for anyone to "know" with so much certitude that it grants them the right to punish you more than if you had "good" thoughts while doing it. We can guess at people's motivations, but to apply the law to those motivations is just asking for tyranny.
Do not let the narcissist in your life have the right or power to determine for you what your motivations or thoughts are. They can make us feel guilty for our good or right behavior simply by convincing us that our motivations are sullied. Don't hand over that kind of power to them. Know your own mind. Don't surrender what you know about yourself to the bogus verdict of the narcissist. They are not in your head unless you let them in by acceding to their pretense at knowing your mind better than you do. Guard the gates of your mind with vigilance. Don't let just anyone in there to mess around and rearrange things to their satisfaction. If you don't guard the door to your mind and soul then you can be assured there is someone who is willing to break and enter and steal everything that is of value.
One of the ways they accomplish this is quite simple and can often trip us up without us seeing what got us. Even the most benevolent act can be turned into its opposite by the assignation of bad motives. The narcissist reserves to themselves the right to determine your own mind for you. They will tell you what was really motivating you in order to take away from you the truth, reality or rightness of whatever you have done. It can be an amazingly effective sleight-of-hand.
When I think back on my relationship with my narcissistic mother this is one of the things that stands out. My mother takes extreme pride in her ability to "read" people. She has done this for as long as I've known her. Mostly, what that means is that she assumes the worst about someone's thoughts or motivations and proceeds on that as if it is the truth about that person. No matter how well you may know yourself, she asserts that she knows better than you do what your motives and/or thoughts are or were in any given situation.
A narcissist parent can teach a child from a very early age that he or she knows you better than you know yourself. They teach the child to surrender what the child knows for what the narcissist parent "knows". It is part of the whole brain-washing process. You may still need to overcome your training in this arena.
If a narcissist encounters someone who refuses to let the narcissist determine their motives or state of mind the narcissist has another tack. They will attempt to destroy you by assigning to you all kinds of bad motivations to the people around you. Malicious gossip. They don't have to convince you of your bad motivations; they only have to convince the people in your sphere of contact. Now, whatever you do is cast in the light of suspicion taking away your virtue by their pretense at knowing your motives.
There is no good deed which can go unpunished by this pretense at reading your mind. This is one reason why I am death on "hate crimes". When you allow the government to apply the law to your state of mind while you committed a crime you are asking for the scenario of "1984" (which was Orwell's attempt at describing life under Communism). Determining punishment because of a person's supposed motivations while committing a crime is asking for total tyranny. It is already a crime to kill people. Should you be punished more severely because you killed a gay person? A person of another race? By doing so government is actually saying that some people's lives are more valuable than others simply by virtue of being in a minority. This is not the place of government to make such value judgments on human lives. Government needs to stay as far away from punishing "thought crimes" as possible. I believe I am especially sensitive to this issue because I have experienced being more severely punished for behavior because of the supposed "thought crimes" while doing it. If the behavior is wrong, then the law can deal with that. If the behavior is not wrong, it should not be made "wrong" simply because of what you were thinking while doing it. What you are thinking while doing said behavior is not for anyone to "know" with so much certitude that it grants them the right to punish you more than if you had "good" thoughts while doing it. We can guess at people's motivations, but to apply the law to those motivations is just asking for tyranny.
Do not let the narcissist in your life have the right or power to determine for you what your motivations or thoughts are. They can make us feel guilty for our good or right behavior simply by convincing us that our motivations are sullied. Don't hand over that kind of power to them. Know your own mind. Don't surrender what you know about yourself to the bogus verdict of the narcissist. They are not in your head unless you let them in by acceding to their pretense at knowing your mind better than you do. Guard the gates of your mind with vigilance. Don't let just anyone in there to mess around and rearrange things to their satisfaction. If you don't guard the door to your mind and soul then you can be assured there is someone who is willing to break and enter and steal everything that is of value.
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