Mayim Bialik's Breakdown - Dr. Ramani Durvasula: "1 in 6 People Are Narcissists!"

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

The Narcissism Doctor: “1 in 6 People Are Narcissists!” How to Spot Them & Can They Change?   Life-Saving Tips: Revealing Narcissists & Breaking Free from Trauma Bonds.   Dr. Ramani Durvasula is a clinical psychologist & Professor Emerita of Psychology at California State University, and the Founder & CEO of LUNA Education, Training & Consulting. She is also the author of books such as "It’s Not You: Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People."   Dive deep into the dangerous world of narcissism and discover how to spot narcissistic behavior, protect yourself from emotional trauma, identify the 6 types of narcissists, and learn about their covert tactics, like gaslighting and deprivation.   We’re breaking down the alarming rise in narcissism, its connection with addiction, the risks in online dating and why we often miss red flags in harmful relationships.   Dr. Durvasula explains the true definition of narcissism and gaslighting, the negative impact of being raised by narcissistic caregivers, how trauma bonding can evolve from a parent-child relationship to an adult romantic relationship, and the most disturbing aspects of being in a romantic relationship with a narcissist.   She also covers: - Her top tips for being GASLIGHT-PROOF - What grandiosity and lack of empathy really looks like in a relationship - Who is most at risk for attracting narcissists? - Why online dating is the perfect preying ground for narcissists - The biggest challenges narcissists face in therapy - Once you’re diagnosed as a narcissist, is that the nail in the coffin? - How to have compassion for the narcissist in your life and find a way to engage while sticking to your boundaries - Post-separation abuse and why some people may stay with a narcissist - Harmful institutions that are contributing to the narcissism problem - Why chemistry isn’t the most important thing in a relationship - Why she thinks so many people are interested in narcissism now   Dr. Durvasula wants you to know that YOU are not the problem.   Don’t miss these critical life-saving insights - TUNE IN to MBB today!   Dr. Ramani Durvasula's Healing Program, Taking Yourself Back: Healing from Narcissistic & Antagonistic Relationships: https://doctor-ramani.teachable.com/p/taking-yourself-back-healing-from-narcissistic-antagonistic-relationships   Dr. Ramani Durvasula's latest book, It’s Not You: Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/710202/its-not-you-by-ramani-durvasula-phd/   BialikBreakdown.com YouTube.com/mayimbialik Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We have completely incentivized narcissism. So a personality style that hurts other people is being rewarded. And for the narcissistic person, hurting the people doesn't even bother them. Online dating is the mothership for narcissistic people because they can use it so skillfully. They're very good at reading the data on another person and responding in kind. They're telling whatever story they need to get sex. They are using it as a validation-seeking app. Buy or beware.

We have to give people permission to identify what bad behavior is and throw the backstory away. What do you do if you're an adult child of a narcissistic parent? That parent may forever be a trigger of really early held wounds. Gaslighting is such a prevalent dynamic because it's a way to hold power. Then there's a denial of perception, memory, experience, or reality. I never said that. That never happened. That's not a thing. you're not remembering that right. You can't be feeling that way.

That's backed up with there's something wrong with you. Darvo. Deny, attack, reverse victim and offender. The gaslighter gets to maintain their power. And so that's not a safe relationship. Narcissism's on a continuum. At the mild end, we're talking about superficial, vapid, sort of an overgrown social media narcissist,

but at the severe end, we see the malignant narcissist. far more severe manipulation, coercion, exploitativeness, isolation, menace is always sort of hanging out there. So it's terrifying. It's the last stop on the train before Psychophathy Station. It's Miami-Bi-Lic's breakdown. She's going to break it down for you. Because you know she knows a thing or two. And now she's going to break down. Hi, I'm MyM-Bi-Alic. And I'm Jonathan Cohen. And welcome to My Breakdown. Our Breakdown? What do I have? I say? Usually ours, but you can have it this time, given the episode that it may be appropriate

for you to say, my breakdown. Today it's my breakdown because we are breaking down narcissism, people. We have become part of the trend sweeping the globe and social media and all the places where you can find Dr. Romani Der Voscela. She's a licensed clinical psychologist. She's a professor emerita of psychology at Cal State University, Los Angeles. And She's the lady. If you Google, who's the expert on narcissism? This lady comes up, this doctor, and we get to talk to her. She is the author of multiple books. The most recent is, It's Not You, Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People. She's also written, Should I Stay or Should I Go, Surviving a Relationship with a Narcissist, and Don't You Know Who I Am,

How to Stay Sane in an Era of Narcissism, Entitlement, and Incivility. She is a fantastic, articulate expert, both from her clinical practice and also from a vast, vast body of research. She knows everything about narcissism. And at the risk of being narcissistic and talking all about myself, Jonathan, what do you have to say about that? This is potentially a dangerous episode to miss or not to send to someone you know. It could be that one in six people have narcissistic tendencies or a personality. And if you're in a relationship with that person, it's not that you may not get what you want. They may be incapable of having the relationship that you want to have to feel fulfilled, to feel loved, to feel connected. We're going to explain, like, this is a major

risk for people out there dating or who are in a relationship and who may not be happy in it. Dr. Dervasala is going to break it all down. She's going to explain what narcissism is, what it isn't, how to spot it in a relationship, and how to try and prevent it from taking over your life and becoming a toxic source of trauma for you. We had so many questions for her. I think we got to all of them. Also, if maybe you've ever thought, were my parents' narcissists, how did that shape me? How is that going to impact what I seek in relationships, in work, in friendships, it's impacting you. You got to listen and find out if that might be one of the key factors that is influencing how you connect with people. Also, she talks about

where our culture reinforces narcissism in politics, in technology, in business. It's like a combination of thrilling and sort of devastating. And we hope you enjoy it. It's really a pleasure to welcome Dr. Romani Dervassila to the breakdown in person. Break it down. Welcome to the breakdown, Dr. Romney Dervassala. Did I pronounce your name correctly? You absolutely did. And so well. I'll tell you it's such a good place because I'll say 75% of the time it's wrong. So that puts you in a pretty exclusive club that you got it right. I feel very special. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Oh, my pleasure. You are, I mean, you're it when it comes to the world of narcissism. You are, I mean, not only an expert and not only an active practicing therapist

who treats people who deal with all sorts of things. You have really made a name for yourself in the world of narcissism in terms of really fleshing out what it means, what it doesn't mean, how it impacts not only the relationship, but the person who is in the relationship on the receiving end. I wonder if you can just kind of start us off. Can you define, what's your favorite definition of narcissism? Narcissism is a personality, not a disorder. And it's a personality that is characterized by low and variable empathy, entitlement, grandiosity, selfishness, superficiality, a sort of vapid attention to self-attractiveness, that kind of thing, excessive need for admiration and validation, arrogance, and a chronic need for control.

And, I mean, that's not an elegant definition. So, I mean, if we went to a real sort of a thinner definition, it really would be sort of narcissism is a rigid and maladaptive personality style that. negatively impacts relationships. The challenge with that definition is I think that it, there's many personality styles that negatively impact relationships and narcissism does this uniquely. Yes, right. Narcissism does this in a very unique way. And I think the big difference with narcissism and many other maladaptive personality styles is that the narcissistic person does well in the world. Do you know what I'm saying? So it's like it's one thing if somebody is sort

of eccentric and odd and strange and gets fired from jobs, that's a very very, very, you know what I'm saying? So it's like, it's one thing. different public profile than somebody who's charming, charismatic, compelling, confident, attractive, successful, very, very different game. So then the person who's being harmed wonders, it's got to be me because this person's got it going on. That's a really interesting rub because it's true. When you think about a lot of maladaptive, you know, especially externalizing personality disorders where there's a lot of acting out, it can sometimes feel really clear, right? Like, stay away from that or that's abusive, right? Everybody. knows it, it's textbook. But, you know, some of, some of the most famous people that people love to

watch on the internet, some of the most famous people that people watch on television, some of our most prominent politicians, some of our most successful CEOs, one could argue all of our successful CEOs, would technically fall under this umbrella category. So that's a really fascinating rub, because if we're focusing, as you do in your work so beautifully, on the person who's in that relationship, this is the aspect of gaslighting that often happens. And you talk about in, can I hold your book? Please, I want to hold it. It's used. It's all yours. So the book is a fantastic title. It's not you. Because for those of us who have been in relationships with these kinds of dynamics, you always feel like it's got to be me. Right? So the book is, it's not you. And you talk about

some of the features of the narcissist. And gaslighting is one of them. Inconsistency is another. A notion of this accusation that you're too sensitive, right? You have this dimmer acronym. I want you to talk about that, but I also want you to talk about deprivation

because this is one of these huge features. You know it when you talk to your girlfriend and she's telling you about the guy she's dating. And the phrase is, you're getting breadcrumbs. What is the deprivation aspect of narcissism? So the deprivation aspect of narcissism is that in many ways, it's sort of like a daily series of abandonments. And we don't think of it as abandonment

because we think of abandonment as a person who grabs a suitcase and leaves the relationship, right? That's our classical conception of it. But abandonment is that constant turning away from attunement, the disinterest, the disconnecting when they can, can't be bothered, then not being available when it feels like it's, quote, unquote, too much. It's the withholding. It's the withdrawing.

It's the silent treatment. It's the passive aggression. All of that. Pouting. The sullenness, the resentfulness. All of that falls under this deprivation. But above all else is that you can't count on this person. And that's deprivation, right?

Because in a relationship, the duties of a relationship are such that we should be able to trust this. A person may not always have the answer. They may not, they physically may not be available, but there's a sense within us, a held sort of sense of this person. But with the narcissistic person, they're like slippery, like holding an eel. You can't quite keep them in your hands. And so there's often this chase that's created that we feel like we're trying to get them to look at us, look at us. It's like a little child looking to a parent, like, how do I get this parent to look at me, look at me? Well, they're too focused at looking at

themselves. And so they're not going to notice the child or the adult in their purview. Can you talk about the dimmer acronym that you use? Because these are some of the most disturbing aspects of being in a relationship with a narcissist. When that acronym lined up, I remember years and years, even before I wrote the book, I wrote, I'm like, oh, that's interesting. Because it really does. It turns your light off, right? Yeah. It's dismissiveness and devaluation and invalidation and manipulation, and manipulation, mostly through gaslighting and minimization. If it's your problem, it's not a big problem. But if they were to have the identical issue, it would be.

close down the bridges. Like, this is a disaster. It's the entitlement that shows up as a hypocrisy quite often in the relationship. One set of rules for me, one set of rules for you, and with no sense of irony, and rage. There's this constant walking on

eggshells in these relationships largely to avoid the rage of the narcissistic person, which is always hanging out there like a potential menace. And for some people, it's the terror of having to deal with that much anger. For others, it's the terror that the rage might proceed an abandonment episode.

Miami-Bialx breakdown is supported by Superpower. We all know the feeling of leaving a doctor's office and kind of feeling like we didn't get anything out of the experience that was useful. Maybe they're like, you're fine, drink more water. There's no real data. There's no game plan. This has happened to me many, many times, especially on the perimenopause journey.

That's why we're fascinated by what Superpower is doing. They send a licensed professional to your home, or you can visit a nearby lab, one simple blood draw with over 100, biomarkers. That's way more than you usually get. It unlocks a true understanding of your body. Their app has detailed information on heart, liver, thyroid hormones, metabolism, vitamin and mineral levels, even environmental toxins. From disease prevention to treating that annoying brain fog or simply optimizing your gym game, superpower is the most comprehensive and advanced system out there.

I've been super tired of constantly guessing or just trying to read articles online about what to do for health. Superpower gives you an actionable health plan based on personal results. It's a game changer. Plus, they have an on-demand clinician team to answer questions. Supplement or prescription suggestions can be directly bought through Superpower, so you don't have to go anywhere else. They also have nutritional guidance, tips for lifestyle and behavioral adjustments. You even get your true biological age that you can track over time. Superpower used to cost $499. Right now, it's $199 for the full experience, which is much more affordable than anything else out there. Make this the year you stop guessing about your health with superpower. Superpower. Not only did Superpower

their price to just $199, but for a limited time, our listeners get an additional $20 off with the code break. Head to superpower.com. Use the code break at checkout for $20 off your membership. And after you sign up, they'll ask how you heard about them. Make sure to mention my ambiolics breakdown to help support the show. Okay, so this is, the dimmer acronym is super helpful. But I think this is a good time to sort of, I want to take a step back because a lot of the features that you talk about that are part of a narcissist. personality, right? I'm not going to call it narcissistic personality disorder because that's a different distinction. That's not what we're talking about. But a lot of these features, I think many of us could say,

like, oh, I dated someone like that, or my dad was like that, or my sister's like that. Do you need to have all of the things to meet kind of your definition of narcissism? And if so, what are the things that you would say, these are the things that you look for? If you're not sure that you're dating a narcissist, here's your list. So the things are the selfishness, the, and before I get to the second feature, I'm going to break the second feature down because it's probably the most important, but one of the most complex, which is that lack of empathy. I think lack of empathy might even be a bit of a misnomer because it's a lot more subtle than that. It's hollow empathy. It is shallow empathy. It is cognitive empathy. It is transactional empathy. It's performative empathy. And the problem with that

is those ways of showing up with empathy, performative, hollow, transactional, kind of look like empathy. It's like splendor. I'm like, well, my drink is sweet, but it's really not sweet, right? It's sort of actually a neural reaction to this particular, you know, whatever, the aspartame. But that's not sugar. We're processing it as sugar. It's like we're processing it as empathy. So what, give me an example of what hollow empathy would look like. Hollow empathy would be, I, gosh, you're going through so much my aim. I want to help. you any way I can. Gosh, what you're doing is so important. Please, I'm going to help you. I'm going to help you. You're amazing. I'm going to help you. So you're like, okay, in a couple of days,

you're like, gosh, they really said they're going to help me. So I need somebody to, I need somebody to go do this. And you're like, hey, you text them. Hey, thanks so much. You ask him. I'm like, hi, yeah, like really busy, interesting time to be asking me. Like, I'm not like, did you think I was, like, I'm not a personal assistant. So you're just sort of like, so does that make sense? It's this sort of performative like, hey, I'm here to be your person. I'm here to help you. I want to support you to anything you're doing. And then you're like, oh, okay, great.

And then it actually it's a real bridge of courage for someone actually who even has a history of narcissistic relations to say, well, this felt convincing. They really want to help. And then you ask. And you're looked at with contempt or dismissiveness or really? Or just they can't be bothered. They can't be bothered. That's what I mean.

Does that make sense? Does that bring that to a fuller picture? That's the lack of empathy. That's what I'm saying. So when I say lack of empathy, so you're saying what are the absolutes, the selfishness, that funky empathy, for lack of a better way to put it, the clincher, and the research is shown across all forms of narcissism, the entitlement. That's a huge one, that sense of they're more special than anybody else, that they deserve special treatment, that the rules don't apply to them. The rules don't apply. That's a big one for them. And that's why we see

meltdowns and coffee shops and airplanes like, oh, I get that everyone else needs a seat. I totally agree with that, but me? Me needing a steepo? Or everybody else can wait in line? Not me. Not me. Mm-hmm. Yep.

And so the entitlement in the hypocrisy can really set up a sense of chronic injustice in these relationships. Then there is the grandiosity. Now, grandiosity is also tricky because grandiosity and a grandiose narcissist is very much living in a fantasy world. I'm the king, queen, emperor, whatever of the world. Everything is, I'm going to make the greatest things happen. And it's going to be the greatest party ever.

It's giving me the greatest gadget ever. Funny thing about grandiose narcissists is they often convert the point. They often do get the things done. And I actually think a lot of the innovations in our world might have happened at the hands of grandiose narcissists. People who dreamed so big. Okay. I want you to talk about that. You list six kinds of narcissists.

So maybe can you go through? Obviously, Grandios is the first. So I have it listed. Tell us the six kinds of narcissists and any information about what makes them different from each other. So the grandiose narcissist is our classic narcissist. The preening, arrogant, pretentious attention-seeking, look at me, but kind of fun at times, narcissists. Life of the party, get it done, like stellar CEO on the stage. There's your grandiose narcissist. The flip, the underbelly, the dark side of this is the vulnerable narcissist. These are solid. resentful, victimized, aggrieved, passive aggressive. Poor me.

And how dare, you know, the reason only reason I'm not successful is I didn't have a trust fund or I would be running this place. So there's a lot of failure to launch there. So whereas the grandiose narcissists get things done, the vulnerable narcissist sort of walks around with this kind of hang dog, sad, save me, how come nothing ever goes my way? You know, why isn't anyone nicer to me? And they can get quite angry. And their anger is brooding and, again, very passive-aggressive.

It can be quite cruel. Yeah, I was just going to say there's a real vindictiveness. There's a vindictive. There's a poison to their cruelty. That's the vulnerable narcissism. Okay. The communal narcissists, these are the folks who, interestingly, get their validation because all narcissists need lots of validation.

We call it narcissistic supply. The communal narcissists get their narcissistic supply by being perceived as do-gooders, saviors, you know, of people who fix the world. These are the people who do all this charitable goody good stuff and they're doing it to get validation, not because of a commitment to the cause. These are never going to be anonymous donors. I can tell you that right now. They want to be, and it may not just be donating. It might be they're the person who always brings everything to the potluck and cleans up afterwards, but they need to be told, isn't she the best? Oh, my gosh, we're so glad Mary's coming because she does it all. And then Mary's okay, because

Mary's thought of his great. And Mary gets the award at the big awards banquet. So it can be small stakes. But if anyone doesn't notice how wonderful Mary is, Mary's going to go real dark, real quick. So at the most extreme, a communal narcissist sort of at the most severe end of it would be like a cult leader, a person who is claiming to do all these good changes in the world. Magnanimous. Magnanimous, self-development oriented, that kind of. of thing, but quite harmful, quite manipulative, quite exploitative. Then that takes us to the self-righteous. The self-righteous narcissist. Now, the self-righteous narcissist often doesn't clock as a narcissist. They're hyper-moral, judgmental, rigid, cold. They're obsessed with

rules and order to the detriment of the human beings around them. So this could be the person who's got a sick child, but is still knocking themselves out to get to Thanksgiving on time. And it's said, like, listen, the little one is sick. We're just trying to make sure they stop throwing up before I put him in the car, but little one is still sick, and they get to Thanksgiving 45 minutes later, and dinner's mostly done. And they explained, like, we said, we're only going to be about 45 minutes late because the child is sick. I said three. Yeah. And I meant three. And it's a very, it is to grow up like that. It is, there's an obsessive, like, it's, it's obsessiveness around rules and order, and it's a bit terrifying. And that's the self-righteous.

That's the self right. I'm right. There's a real workaholic quality to the self-righteous narcissist and a real sort of shaming of people who might be down on their luck. Well, this must be their fault. Got it. And it's that. Yeah. Next, we have the neglectful narcissist. So the neglectful narcissist would be sort of the narcissistic person who literally is viewing everyone through what I'd call an instrumental lens, which means what function do you serve for me. And so they may pay attention to you when they need the thing they need, but then they have no use. This would be a partner who expects the spouse to have dinner done and might say, oh, this is a real good pot roast and that's the extent of it. The dinner didn't show up. They might get angry. But everyone in their life is basically a can opener or coffee maker.

There's very, very little interest in intimacy, closeness. This also sounds like a CEO kind of personality. Could be a CEO kind of personality. Not the grandiose version, but a different kind of version. But very much like a, there's no there, there's no connectedness there. It feels, it's very empty interactions. And then. Finally, we have the malignant narcissist. So this is a good place to end because this would be the most sort of severe manifestation

of the narcissistic personality. Remember, narcissism's on a continuum. At the mild end, we're talking about superficial, vapid, sort of an overgrown social media narcissist. But at the severe end, we see the malignant narcissist. The malignant narcissist is, all the qualities. of a narcissist, but here we see far more severe manipulation, coercion, exploitativeness, isolation, menace is always sort of hanging out there. So it's terrifying. I always say

malignant narcissism is the last stop on the train before psychopathy station. Oh, I mean, it really is. It's quite severe. And you got to remember, too, Ma'am that these types can mix. So you could have a malignant, vulnerable narcissist. You could have a grandiose communal narcissists. It's like a choose-your-own adventure. It's like Baskin Robbins. I'll have two scoops, malignant and vulnerable. Thanks. I'm like, great.

So if you put, like, for example, malignant and communal, that's your cult leader. You put together the flavors and you can, you sort of see how these subtypes line up. And that's why this isn't that simple. It's actually quite complicated. You're fun at parties, aren't you? Oh, not so much. I'm a gal in the corner that's like, who's safe to talk to. Well, no one.

Mine, this is a great place to interject and talk about how prevalent this is. because if it is on a spectrum and people may have a little bit of each or some of all, how do we navigate? So to your point about prevalence, it's tricky. We really don't have good prevalence state. And narcissism is a tough thing to assess. It's also comorbid with so many things. This can be borderline personality disorder that just hasn't been diagnosed yet,

meaning it could be a feature. You said there's a huge overlap with ADHD, with depression, with anxiety. Correct. It's comorbid with so many things. So it's hard to isolate it. It's hard to accurately assess it. And what's really difficult is it's hard to assess in non-psychiatric populations, right? So a person walking around in the street often doesn't view themselves as entitled.

They view themselves as like, I'm efficient. I don't, I've, you know, I'm just, I'm making a comment on how this place is wrong. I don't think I'm more special than anyone else. So there's a lack of self-reflective capacity. All of that said, I'd say the spitball numbers would be if we included even the mild mildest levels, mildest levels of narcissism, we're probably hitting around a one in six. But if we were going to get more to a more severe, like the kinds of things that would disrupt a relationship, leave people feeling uncomfortable, here we're now probably talking more like

one in 10, one in 12, right? But it's still not, you know, we actually just collected some. And they're all on the dating app that you're on. And they're all on the dating app or is your Thanksgiving dinner. Ironic, isn't it? But it's, it's. interesting because we just collected some fascinating data myself and Dr. Heather Harris, somebody I collaborate with, and are just our first run through the data showing like this sort of disruptive narcissism is sort of hinting at a one in ten. I'm just, I'm not doubting any of your expertise. I just feel like this term is very prevalent. People are using this a lot. And you speak to that in your book a bit. You know,

sometimes people are just jerks, right? Sometimes people are not a match for you. Sometimes it's not you, right? The question I had, and this is part of your challenge as someone who works as a clinician, you know, I mean, you're seeing people in a clinical capacity and also in a public-facing capacity. Is there value in making distinctions between this feels like a narcissist

or this is just a jerk that you need to stay away from. What's the benefit to the nomenclature? Because you talk about the importance of not using these terms when they're actually not applicable because it loses power of a clinical distinction. It loses power of being able to sort of target care. Where do you fall on this? What's useful for you? I think it's much more useful. Forget the term and focus on the behavior. We have to give people permission to identify what bad behavior is and throw the backstory away. So the problem is people say, I know he's bad, but the reason he does this is da-da-da-da-da-da. And they gave a laundry list of everything from a bad day to a tough dad to whatever, you know, historical, something or other that happened to him.

I said, I have no doubt that stuff happened. And this behavior is unacceptable. So as long as you're with this person, you're enduring unacceptable behavior. And if you're able to sleep at night because you do a long string of rationalizations and as long as you don't make it about you, Okay, you do you. But the more you make justifications and then even internalize and say, well, maybe I'm a bad person for calling them out on their behavior, then it's a problem. The reason for framing it as a personality style is to really hammer home the point that these patterns aren't likely to change. One of the risky bits is when you think of us, when we frame it as behavior, well, behaviors could be changed.

You can train a rat to push a lever. You should be able to train a human being to change your behavior. You can train me to sit in this chair. Right, there you go. Well, you might just, you see, you could get up and leave. And so we'll see if we could train you to do that. But it's a, the challenge is that when it's a personality, it's not just, it, what the personality tells us, personality to me is sort of like, it's a predictive tool.

It tells me how this person is most likely to behave under a circumstance, right? So the narcissistic person is going to make the selfish decision. The narcissistic person is going to be careless. I can set a clock by that. That personality is telling me that. So I am not going to count on this person with getting the sensitive. piece of mail to FedEx. If they're on my staff, no, no, no, no, no. Joe does not take the stuff to FedEx. No, we're giving that to someone else. So we now know that. Because now not only

might Joe forget it, he'll blame everyone else for forgetting it. So in a relationship, what does that look like? Is that once, you know, once you get that diagnosis or once you are, you know, queued into the fact that you may be in a relationship with someone who has a narcissistic personality, is that the, is that the nail in the coffin? Are they not going to change? I've got a feeling devastated. They're not going to change. So you're staying in a relationship with someone where this is what it is. So you're going to engage with it differently.

I'm not even in a narcissistic relationship and I feel sad about it. It is sad because it is sad. I want to believe people can change. That's a lovely belief. And it ain't a thing. And in fact, there are stacks and stacks and stacks and stacks of self-help books in every bookstore that everyone can change. And I'm like, yeah, not so much. So hold, I want to stop you here, though, because

if someone has some sense of awareness about narcissistic tendencies, is it possible that there are behavioral shifts? I don't want people to be like, oh, once you get that label, you can't be in a relationship. Okay, so let me put it this way. Who stays with those people? Lots of people. 50% of people. You said forever forgiving empathetic rescuers tend to both attract and tolerate narcissists.

Yeah. So it's, you keep, you keep. making excuses, but here's the rub. We all do bad things in relationships. Every single one of us, you, me, everyone in this room. A lot of bad things. I hope you take responsibility, accountability, make amends and attempt to make shifts around that. Doesn't mean you're still going to be perfect, but it might be like, oh, I did that thing again. I am so sorry because you know what? That helps the other person feel whole. It helps the other person feel not crazy. And they'll say, okay, she's aware. She's doing it. So that other person now doesn't have to carry the

burden. If a narcissistic person could get there, that's 75% of the way. But to do that would mean an entire reconstruction of their inner apparatus. I don't know many people who have that kind of money for that kind of access, for that kind of therapy. If someone were to come to you and say, I'm a narcissist, I'm burning down every relationship that I'm in, what would you say to them? I'd say, okay, so let's do the work. and that means taking responsibility. They might give me their long life history. Sure.

They totally will make sense to me why they are the way they are. Totally makes sense. One of the biggest challenges in narcissism, in relationships, even as a shrink working with them, is the impulsivity. They say the things abruptly that are hurtful and you can't take back. And they'll say, oh, I just said that in a moment.

Like, you can't have that many moments because those things hurt the other person and you can't unring that best. And they get frustrated that you can't. Like, let me be impulsive. Like, let me have my tantrums. Even a three-year-old's not even allowed to have their tantrums, right? By about three, we're saying to the kid, you got to get this together.

Time out and whatever the hell that looks like, right? So it's the controlling of that impulsivity. I'll have to tell you the more adversity in a narcissistic person's backstory, trauma neglect, attachment fails, abuse. I actually think the more likelihood we could have good outcomes with them because we can do the trauma-informed work. with them and we could work on the regulatory stuff. We could address things like, you know, that sort of that, those sort of trauma responses that kind of run ahead of the thinking brain,

right? You're giving me hope now. But the problem with that hope is the amount of vulnerability that has to be summoned up. And it's really, you know what it likened to? I don't like likening narcissism to addiction as a clinical phenomenology, but addiction work is lifelong work. People who are in recovery from addiction. say that they're recovering. Every single day. One day at a time. One day at a time, one hour time, one 15 minute chunk at a time. Every day is about committing to not using about humility and all of that. And that's actually, I think, a heavier lift for a narcissistic person than it is for an addict in recovery. My jaw is like a little bit falling open because, you know, I really, I really enjoyed this book.

I got a lot out of it. I took furious notes and, you know, a lot of things really rang true. But I think that I have a real sadness and a real compassion for people who might be seeing themselves in some of the things that we're describing. The most painful, and you know, this is something I've done some reading about. And actually Will Wheaton, one of our first guests talked about narcissistic parents and things like that in our episode. When you have a parent who is a narcissist and obviously it's going to look different, meaning having a parent who's, let's say, a malignant narcissist is going to feel somewhat different

than having a parent who's a communal narcissist, right? But, you know, your chances are you're going to get some mix. There's a lot of talk, especially in arenas that you really hold court in, you know, in the arenas of social media and where people are wanting this information, there's a lot of discussion about what do you do if you're an adult child of a narcissistic parent? And I wonder if you can speak to this because it almost, sounds like is a relationship feasible that is satisfying if you have a narcissistic parent? The satisfying part is where it makes it tricky, right? A relationship's possible, satisfying no.

And that parent may forever be a trigger of really early held wounds. That's the challenge with a parent, right? Whereas in another adult relationship, you're not going to have that same kind of like gut punch of being in this person's presence, that even though you're a fully formed 50-year-old person, that the critical comment from that parent can still bring you to your knees in a way that it would not with another adult relationship. You still become the five-year-old child. Because that's not changing. Because you carry that. That memory was once very much a threat. As you become an adult,

you know, that parent can't really harm you in the same way. But we hold these things sematically and all of that. So I do think that it's once a person, if you can really radically accept the limitations of the relationship and have realistic expectations around it. Some people say it's an amount of time. Like if I can get through 90 minutes, but somewhere around 90 minutes, that's where they start cracking. I need to have someone who's almost their handler for a family event so they don't blow up a wedding or a baby shower or something like that. What does it look like practically to, because, you know, these are terms that, you know, may not mean something if someone, let's say, hasn't been in therapy. What does it mean to have

realistic expectations and to be an acceptance of not just a narcissistic parent, what does it mean to be an acceptance and have realistic expectations of a narcissist? It means you know it's not going to change, but it doesn't mean you're okay with it. I think some people take that term acceptance and twist it into like, does this mean I'm signing off on it? Absolutely not. You're not signing off on it, but this is what it is. It's almost like a rainy day on the day you were going to have a picnic. You don't say like, great, it's raining on my picnic. It's raining on this picnic. We're either going to have to reschedule or put up a can And this is the, what I'm trying to teach people is the equivalent of putting up the canopy.

Like, how are you going to work around these rainy days in this relationship? Well, and also, and this is, you know, kind of a foundation of, you know, the work of places like Al-Anon, right, that teach you how to deal with things that you cannot control, right? And what that looks like is, what does it look like to have compassion that is acceptance, but not, you know, forgiveness, right, for all hurts? Or engagement. Right. Or is it being able to say, I have done enough work on myself, right, to heal what gets triggered in me?

I have enough foundation that that can't hurt me anymore, right? The challenge is if you're in a relationship, a romantic relationship, where you keep needing things, meaning partners need, it's different than a parent because there's a constant interchange that is very hard to not have expectations. about if you're in a relationship. Right. So I think that the reason people stay my aim at when it's an intimate relationship with a narcissistic person, a lot of this comes down to practicalities. Minor children, family court does not care from narcissism and will happily give 50% custody to a narcissistic co-parent, even if it's the wrong place for them. So it's minor children, it's finances, it's culture, its religion, its stigma around divorce, it's fears of how other people will view it. I mean, we can't assume we know everyone's story around

and sort of beliefs and culture and all of that. That's one set of things. Those reasons are very, very real. And people are saying, I can't leave for these reasons. And I get it. I understand what a person says. Also, sometimes the sex is good. Sometimes they're funny. You said a lot of narcissists. Right. There's good days. And because of the gaslighting, you have this notion of like, well, there was just a good day. Maybe it's me, right? Maybe it's me. It's not you. But the challenge is that can you, so I imagine it's a bit like living in Seattle, can you hold on to those sunny days and say, I am not working today and I'm going out and I'm enjoying this sun and then recognize that probably the weekend's going to be a wash. That's what it is. You've got to ride those sunny

days hard because you're going to get a rainy one and you can't be like, what do you mean we're in Seattle and it's going to rain for three days? I'm like, really? Really, really? Like, It's going to rain, and you've got to prepare for that. Like, enjoy the sunny days. And that's what some people do. They say this person, and again, there's levels of betrayal in these relationships. Being repeatedly cheated on might feel intolerable, right? And yet they still have to manage the minor child situation.

Being invalidated all the time or not being listened to or ignored or be licked or mocked, all of those things. Those, if you don't have a lot of social support, that gets a lot harder. but let's say you work outside the home or you do have a strong friendship community or a spiritual community, you might just be able to roll your eyes at the relationship and recognize like I pulled the bum card off

out of the marriage deck and I'm just going to have to ride this one out. I've worked with many folks who are like, we're waiting for one to die and if I'm lucky they die first then I'm going to have a nice run when they're done. I mean, they're not murderous. They're just waiting.

No, no, I get it. They're not murderous. They're just waiting. that's really the tagline here. Never wanted that to be my tagline, but sure, I'll take it. I mean, I think both of us are a little bit, our jaws are dropped. Mime's comment about having acceptance and working through Al-Anon and setting your boundaries, it kind of struck me as like, oh, that's a great approach,

but then it made me realize that you can never really bring those issues to the narcissist because if they're truly lack empathy, they're not going to admit it. So you can set your boundaries and you can know yourself and you can talk to your group or your support, but there will always be an emptiness or an absence in the connection. And that's really what's striking in that description. And I think it's the radical acceptance

that it will be an emptiness in the connection. And then that's why you have to be very, very, very clear on what's keeping you in the game. So that's where there's almost a meaning and purpose and intention plays to this. Like, I'm staying in this because I want to see my kids seven days a week. I don't want joint custody of these kids. And I don't care about this marriage and this marriage is just something I wish didn't exist, but I'm putting all my focus on these kids. How many of your, what percentage do you think of the clients that you see choose that path of radical acceptance as opposed to leaving?

30%. Wow. And it's hard. It's hard. It's hard. but it's also hard for the 70% who leave and are dealing with my kids come back to me and they're a mess and they're confused. I mean, I don't think there's a good path forward. I think it varies situation to situation. Listen, we're doing this podcast in Los Angeles where rents are in the thousands per month. A lot of people can't afford to pay two rents. It's just not within their reach. So these are really uncomfortable compromises that need to be made and people are literally counting down to midnight on their children's 18th birthday and the next day they file for divorce. Because narcissists don't make great co-parents.

They don't make people in relationships. In fact, it's almost harder because, you know, in a way, if the narcissistic person didn't want the divorce, and they may not. It may, because, for example, keep in mind, too, how community property works, that half the money goes out the door. And the narcissistic person seems to think, again, the entitlement, that they'll be the exception to the rule of community property or they didn't have a pre-nup or something like that.

So they don't want to give up on that. So they'll, if somebody leaves them and they're having to pay out, stuff that they believe is theirs, then they get very bitter and resentful. And there can be years of what we call post-separation abuse. And usually one of the main weapons in that post-separation abuse are the children. Knowing that the numbers are potentially one in six people having a narcissistic personality of some level. Or one in ten. Yeah. What do you do? Like if you, if some, if people knew this ahead of time and they had the crystal ball and they weren't drunk on love chemicals for the first few weeks or months of the relationship and they could hold off getting married or, you know,

getting entangled to the point of not being able to extricate themselves from a relationship. Do the one in ten people just not have partners? Do they date each other? What happens when two narcissists date? Are they happy with each other or is it more conflict? Here's the thing. I'll answer your second question first, and I'm going to go back to an earlier point you were making. Two narcissists get together all the time. I mean, think about it. They're superficial and vapids. You've got these two gorgeous people who just like attention and making themselves the most Instagramable couple in the world and attention seeking and fabulosity all around. Like, you can imagine narcissists get together all the time. It's volatile. It's sort of a competition of who gets the most attention. I'm thinking of actor personalities.

where you see these like two famous, awesome people, and like, I mean, not naming names, but it's like a thing. And it's a mess. And it's, you know, and here's the thing. And so it happens all the time. And it would be, it's great when they get together. It really is as long as they don't have kids. Because then they really harm those kids. And so since we're never going to have a situation where we can mandate, well, I'm two narcissists to get together. You can't have children. That, that to me, that collateral damage is, is a lot. But if they get together and don't have kids, then that's great. We've just gotten two off the island. So great. And they're probably going to have a great time. And it's love bomb, fight, scream, make up sex, pout on social media, you know, be hot together on social media. Great. But the other issue, this idea of what do the rest of us do, it's not that simple. And I think that this has reached beyond just individual relationships. It's sort of how do we take the blame for harmful institutions, harmful governments, harmful rules, harmful systems. We internalize all of this. And so, how do we take the blame for harmful institutions? It's sort of, how do we take the blame for harmful institutions? We internalize all of this. But I think that, and it's also not as simple as I'm in a relationship with somebody and it was really great and now it's really bad because we don't come into a relationship anew.

Our nervous systems have been shaped by a lifetime of conditioning. And if part of that conditioning was early life trauma or early life narcissistic relationships, this feels like normal. So people are going to question it. And then to your final point, we are never going to live in a world where I or anybody else is going to convince people, hey, you met someone attractive, charming, charismatic, and compelling at a party. Don't talk to them. Talk to that kind of ordinary person in the corner. Who does that? You'd have to change the entire genre of rom-coms and fairy tales. We talk about, you know,

I mean, it's a, these are compelling people. These are financially successful people. These are the people you bring home and everyone's applauding you for finding the great partner. Okay, so this is sort of one of the points that I think it's like the elephant in the room because it's not that, you know, having narcissistic tendency genes make you more attractive. It's that people who have a easier time socially, right, might be more likely to have these kinds of features when things are coming easier to them. I mean, Jonathan was asking, like, are all narcissists attractive? The notion is not that they're all attractive, but the idea that that someone, let's say, might have more ease in a culture that favors, let's say,

attractiveness, which, you know, or money. Or money, right, or those kinds of things. Those people then are having access, right, to a different population of people to manipulate. Yes. They have access to more people to manipulate because, listen, everybody thinks they're the exception to the rule until it happens to them. I was just recently having a conversation with someone who's a friend, so he's happy for me that my book did well, but he's like, he's like,

When you put this out, I didn't think anyone was going to buy it. And he's like, and you got a month on the list. And he's like, how did that happen? I said, because it's the thing. And he said, it's not happened in my life. So are there people out there who've had these lives of divine providence? Here's the rule. If you think it hasn't happened in your life, you're the narcissist. You're the narcissist. Or you're lucky and it's going to. Or you live in a very, very, very small tiny way. Probably. Probably. Or you're privileged. And so you're kind of untouchable. You know, because I have to say one group that sometimes doesn't get it are people who have a ton of money and power. And because everyone around them is bought and paid for them, they don't have to deal with that kind of lip. And, you know, they can, so they, they have created. No one challenges them. No one challenges them. So their lives look big, but they actually aren't big because their feet rarely touch the floor. They aren't dealing with like, you know, sitting in the road 31C or anything like that.

Everything's easy for them. So I think some of them don't actually fully get this. And some of them often are of the narcissist too. Okay, so let's also talk about some of the skills that narcissists have. We live in a culture, and I'm speaking specifically of capitalism, you know, this kind of Western culture. We live in a culture where those features are in many cases applauded and rewarded. And there's a whole, there's a subset of people, and I've seen them on the internet.

it's not always men, but there's a lot of men who have an extreme adoration and almost idolatry for narcissists of this variety who are very successful. Yes. I wonder if you can speak to this kind of double-edged sword of no one wants to be in a relationship with someone who would treat you horribly. However, those features help people. get ahead in ways that we just as a society keep reinforcing. Well, and that's the rub, though.

We do. We have completely incentivized narcissism. So a personality style that hurts other people is being rewarded. And for the narcissistic person, hurting the people doesn't even bother them. So they're ultra-incentivized, right? And so, yes, we have incentivized it. That's why this continues to become a burgeoning problem because people, listen, I mean, it's an easy ride if you marry a person with a ton of money.

and then it's an easy life, so you think. But then if it's cruel and manipulative and loveless, there was blood money involved in that. You might end up in the White House and say, how did I get here? Exactly. Or in the C-suite or in the, you know, at the Oscar ceremony or whatever.

And so we have incentivized this. And what that means then is that the rest of us need to be savvy, know that we're not going to be the exception to the rule, and not always go for the big, shiny thing. Because the stuff that sustains long-term relationships are respect, empathy, compassion, patience, reciprocity, mutuality of regard, and above all else, psychological safety. Who's taught to look for that? What does he do? What does he drive?

Where does he live? That's what people get asked. How often does you meet someone new? Does somebody say, well, are they patient? Are they kind? You don't ask that question. I feel like there's an aspect to the culture of online dating. which in many ways, in my amateur opinion, seems to lend itself to a proliferation of this kind of

interaction, meaning the whole basis of kind of swiping, you know, and that sort of initial thing is a very surface thing. And people who are narcissists are going to look good on a dating app. Am I right? Oh, beyond good. They know, I've never online dated. I'm too old. I missed that whole thing. But apparently there's like a whole grid of images, right, of the person on their dating profile. It's as though there must be the narcissist guy to creating the grid of pictures. They've got the picture with the abs, holding a puppy, sometimes a cat. There's a waterfall, there's a sunset.

There's the Eiffel Tower or the Great Wall. It looks great. It always looks great. They've got the night out with just that sort of Miami tan, the drinks. I mean, it's like they all use the same playbook. online dating is the mothership for narcissistic people because they can use it so skillfully, right? Tell me how. Because they can portray themselves in this fabulous way.

They're very good at reading the data on another person and responding in kind. They can keep 20 lines in the water because they have such a shallow empathy, right? So for someone else who feels like, ooh, I feel guilty like I'm having this meaningful conversation with person A, I shouldn't be saying these things, the person B, the narcissistic is. numbers game. They got 20 of these things running. And look at all the validation they're getting. 20 times the validation. Are you kidding me? And sex is the biggest validator. And sex is so they're using it for sex. They're telling whatever story they need to get sex. I mean, it is a, they are using it as a validation seeking app and not really for relationships. And so I think it's a really fraught space for people who feel that they don't understand this narcissism thing. I'd be like,

buyer beware. New idea. Dating advice for people online dating to be authentic. Pictures of you crying. Pictures of your laundry. Pictures of you with the pencil sticking out of your head as you're writing. Pictures of your crappy card that you actually... Pictures of your supplements and prescriptions that you have to take. Pictures of you sitting in the middle seat and coach. Yeah. How about that? I date you. I love it. That's hilarious. I'm going to say something kind of controversial. There's something about the deprivation that you talk about that many narcissists kind of thrive on,

you know, this breadcrumbs kind of notion. And I've long felt, and, you know, we're the same age-ish. I've long felt that the combination of online dating and also this wave of, I'd say, third and fourth wave feminism have sort of combined in a way that I think in some ways can encourage accepting breadcrumbs. Yes, 100%. I'm not wrong and crazy. You're not a bit of feminist.

No. Okay. So can you explain it better than I am? Explain it better than I am. It's the whole cool girl ideology. I love this woman. I love this woman. I don't need anything.

I'm cool. I'm easy breezy. He can have sex with 86 people. I don't do it too. I'm cool. I'm my own woman. Like, I don't care. Not caring is not a source of power.

Care. Own your emotions. Own your needs. If you want monogamy, hold out for it. If you want somebody who stays in touch for it with you, ask it for it. If you want someone that makes you feel whole and not crazy. That's always a, yeah, there's something to hold out for. But I do think that the whole cool girl phenomenon.

And it is something that, I mean, listen, that talk about a trap being set, playing on on feminist ideology. It's like it was designed by narcissists. It was designed by narcissists. It's like we're in the matrix of the narcissist. We didn't realize it.

That's right. No, no, no. That idea that the cool, basically the cool girl is a girl with no needs, no wants, who is amenable, who is, you know,

who kind of goes with the flow, who makes no demands. That's easy, breezy cool girl. That is not healthy. That is a, in essence, it is a throwback to prior to feminism. It's a throwback to just becoming what the other person wants.

No, I'm my own person. I'm still going away with my girlfriend. Okay, so where are you filing all that disappointment stuff? When you're that whole weekend with the girlfriends, you're staring at your phone wondering why he didn't text, but I'm not going to respond because I'm easy, breezy. But in fact, what you're doing is you're subjugating your needs to this easy, breezy identity.

And so I think that there's a real power and being clear with yourself about what matters to you in a relationship and understanding the origin story. of those needs. That's the work, folks. And this whole cool girl, easy, breezy, we got to put her to bed. That's freaking brilliant. I'm sorry, that's brilliant. And you said it much better than I would have. Are there cool girls who, that's an authentic expression of who they are? Or is it fundamentally that majority of people are suppressing needs and cannot operate in that model? I think a lot of people are suppressing needs. Are there some cool girls out there? I think there's people out there who

feel very fulfilled by other things going on in their lives. They're fulfilled in their careers, other meaningful and purposeful activities, their social group. They're like, listen, I have a friend I have sex with and I'm very comfortable. However, that sex person is respectful and nice. Like, they both agree. Maybe sex person and that woman say, like, I guess that's, there's a major that's how people are. They're a sex person. The lover. But the other, right, the other person, the other person is nice. They're not playing games. It's like, hey, I'm going, you know, I'm traveling for three weeks for work. I can't wait to connect with you when I get back. And there's a meaningful connection and they talk things through. That to me is the cool girl model working. But the cool girl model

being a throwback, what is it, 1989 when the book the rules came out of subjugating your needs to like, oh, if I, if I expect this person to, I'm going to wait four days. I'm not expecting them to get back in touch with me. It's actually manualized needs. subjugation. That's the problem. So I think it can be authentic, but it does require that other person they're interacting with being a decent human being. That's a great clarification. It's a really important clarification. The difference between communication, respect, clear boundaries, an ethical understanding of what each person needs versus a lack of clarity, shadiness, lack of expectations. Am I waiting for someone to call? What are they doing when they're not with?

me and having no idea. I want to take it to the brain level, just because I like to. So in answer to Jonathan's question, the first thing I thought of was what feels safe. And this is a huge conversation when not just talking about women, not just talking about feminism, not just talking about the patriarchy, and not just talking about online dating. This is a question of in our culture, and it applies to men, women, non-binary people, what feels safe to your nervous system? Correct. And by and large, we are just primates. We're primates that have desks and glasses and computers and makeup and deodorant. But we are primates. And while not everyone chooses to have monogamous relationships or

have children, we're still all in a state of nature, really, trying to figure out which connections feel safe for our limbic system. When am I going to feel that consistency is happening? And does that foster a desire for me to increase intimacy with this person? So what I think you're speaking to and what I for sure am speaking to is the notion of teaching ourselves to have less needs and not requiring confirmation of safety, that never will feel okay to our brain in the same way that being hit by a parent because they don't like something that you're feeling will never feel right. Correct. But the challenge here is society is telling us, silencing those needs, makes us better. Right. Like, oh, look, she's a saint. She asks for nothing. So we're getting this hollow validation from the world. Our nervous systems, like, this doesn't feel good, but the world is telling me it is. Those disconnects are often what also confuse people. We don't talk about safety. And safety's everything. And by definition, narcissistic relations.

are unsafe relationships because they're asymmetric relationships. Talk about the asymmetry. There's a power differential because the narcissistic person can't be in a relationship unless there is one. And don't assume that power difference means because somebody has more money or they're the physically stronger partner or something like that. Sometimes that power can come through manipulation and other things. So it's the partner who's not comfortable with their being equity and balance in a

relationship. It's the partner who has to have the upper hand. A lot of that gets created through gaslighting, through that destabilization. And so that's why gaslighting is such a prevalent dynamic, because it's a way to hold power. If somebody's always off balance, they're going to have less power because you're sort of in survival mode trying to make sense of what's going on around you. The gaslighter gets to maintain their power. And so that's not a safe relationship. So I'd like you to define gas lighting. This is one of these, you know, I have, you know, if you've heard any episodes of what we do here. I almost always point out a term that people are using incorrectly or they're overusing it or that's actually not OCD. I'm just that sort of person.

But this is one of those, you know, gaslighting is kind of up there with like triggering and, you know, it's toxic. So my favorite definition of gaslighting is a joke. Jonathan, tell me that I'm gaslighting you. Say like, you're gaslighting me. You're gaslighting me. Do you even know what gaslighting is. That's my favorite gaslighting joke, right? Here's another one. Have you heard the joke about gaslighting? No. Yes, you have. They liked your joke better than mine. Define gaslighting for us. So gaslighting is a relational tactic, communication tactic maybe, in which one person destabilizes the other person. So initially, there's those pieces to it.

A gaslighting relationship, number one, is predicated on some level of trust or familiarity or expertise. That's why a doctor could gaslight us. A lawyer could gaslight us. And certainly a family member could gaslight us or a partner can gaslight us. But a stranger, not as much.

Because we don't, we may not, literally out of nowhere, we may not have that sense of trust, right? There's not an investment in that. There's not an investment. The second piece is that then there's a denial of perception, memory, experience, or reality. I never said that. That never happened. That's not a thing. You're not remembering that right. You can't be feeling that way. That sort of thing. And normally you'd say, like, that's not true. I felt that.

But what happens in gaslighting. So this next step is what makes a gaslighting. That's backed up with there's something wrong with you. That's the dismantling piece. You're mentally ill. You're way to. too sensitive. This is not a normal reaction to this. What's wrong with you? You need to see a doctor. So now what they've done is it's not just enough that you have a, that never happened. Because that never happened could be a lie, right? And gas sitings not lying. And you can have proof of that, right? Yes, it did. Correct. Here's the text. And when you're dealing with just a liar, the text is enough to sort of bring the lie to an end. The liar might get angry. The liar might push back, but ultimately the liar is going to be caught in the line and say, okay, you got me. What next? Versus the gas

fighter, well then even if you show them proof of the lie, as it were, they'll say, oh my goodness, look at us. I am in a relationship with a CIA monitor. Like, oh, great. You, how fun for me to be stuck with a paranoid lunatic for the rest of my life. Or what are you keeping tabs on me? What are you keeping tabs on me for? What secret? So now you're on the defensive. Yeah, I am. And no longer, is this a conversation about that lapsed memory, now it's you defending your mental status. The entire conversation is shifted to your destabilization. This relates strongly to a phenomenon that Dr. Jennifer Frye calls Darvo. And Darvo stands for deny, attack, reverse victim, and offender.

Say it again? Darvo. Deny, attack, reverse victim, and offender. So they'll say, I never say. said that. I never said that. But you're the one. You're the one. Tabs on me. And you know what? I can't believe I have to put up with this. I do so much for this family. And all I do is put up with your BS reversal of victim and offender. So the Darvote to me is like the clothes, the clothes on the gas light. And the thing is gaslight doesn't happen one time. It happens

all the time. And it's cumulative also. Because the more you're destabilized, the less you feel stable. Correct. So people then over time, they go along to get along. They stop. talking, they stop pointing things out, they wonder if they're the problem, and then you can imagine how that results in lifetime silencing after that. I mean, it's so painful. It's terrible. If I were to say to you, I'm entering the dating world and I'm going to be putting myself out there, how can I be gaslight proof? How can I be narcissist, toxic relationship proof? What are the things that I, Give me five things that will set me apart from the people who fall into those traps. If somebody is denying experience, perception, reality, you don't have to push back.

You can say, I think we're having different experiences and hold that line. And that's hard to do because as you're getting to, in essence, we're asking people to literally reprogram their entire nervous system over Chardonnay. That's not easy to do because you're saying, you can't. If somebody says, well, I never said we were going to do the session session, say, I actually do remember that happening, but I think we're having a different experience. If you do that early enough in a relationship, the narcissist of the gaslighter is going to walk. Okay? That's one thing.

Because they can't engage. Because they see that there's no point of entry, right? Number two, you need supports. You need gaslight free zones. Those might be therapy. It might be friends. but it's places to say, do you guys think, I keep getting this accusation that I'm too sensitive. And this honest group is saying sensitive.

Like, if anything, you're almost, you're made of your anodyne. Like, you're too strong. Like, where are you hearing this from? So you have these places where you get to be you and you don't get shut down. The other is listen to your body. We're just talking about psychological safety. We are not good at paying attention to when we feel safe. Like we'd be better at it if we were walking down a street late at night and we heard footsteps, right?

We're more wired for that. But that sense of sort of zoning in on ourselves and paying attention to those somatic cues of like something's not right here. Let yourself step out of it for a minute. Sometimes even just getting outside, having a sky over your head instead of a room, going to the restroom, like getting out of the situation in and in recognition of like this doesn't feel right. Something's not right here. But even as I give this guidance my aim, I'm going to. to tell you people who have histories of being raised by narcissistic parents, histories of trauma, places where self-doubt has really gotten concrete and cemented, these are really difficult

maneuvers. That's why I'm saying at a minimum, having the gaslight-free zones. The other thing I tell people is, just like I tell people, you've got to do dating homework. And what's dating homework? What's dating homework? Dating homework is when you go home and you do homework after the date. This is, again, people like, what if I drink too much on the date? Well, here's a good reason to drink too much on a date to go home and write down. How did it feel? What was it like? What did we do? Why? It's not a dear diary thing. You, and really go in strong. Like I, you know, was a little bit weird how they were with the waitress. And so like get in there. Because the more of this you write down, we tend to forget. There's this, again, Dr. Jennifer Fried, she talks about betrayal blindness.

This idea that we kind of put away the inconvenient pieces of information that keep us from being able to maintain a connection to someone that we want to have work out. Put that icky stuff down, knowing it's just for you. But then you have something to look at and say, okay, it's one, two, and three, there was this funky stuff with bartenders and waiters and sort of inappropriate thing. Like, you might give yourself permission. But the more we write things down, it gets out of here and at least puts it out there so we can look at it. Most people don't want to do dating homework. It's not very nice. I want to sort of

highlight what you just said because you've given us a scenario where narcissists are going to look really good. They're oftentimes going to be successful. They're likely going to take pretty good care of themselves and the things about them, meaning they likely would have a nice car, flashy jewelry, or, you know, be really well put together. I'm picturing that they smell good. You know, they're wearing an expensive cologne. Like, this is just the picture that my brain is painting. So if you're putting me in a situation where I'm on a date with this person, and you've already told me that this person also is skilled at charisma, right?

Making people like them. They can be manipulative, which means you might get a really good table, right? You might get to the front of the line. I don't mean to be a downer, but how am I supposed to date in a world where all of those qualities previously, I've been taught, are attractive. Well, because a couple of things. Now you know, let's say someone's dated multiple narcissists. All those attractive qualities also then got...

Because I'm forever forgiving a rescuer and I'm empathetic. Right, but there's also a conditioning of all those fabulous things with an icky ending and that conditioning remains. So there's some learning that happens over time. We're not taught this, right? We're not taught this. And so the whole idea, the whole cell is the charming, charismatic, attractive person. This is who you want to bring home.

This is who you want to share with your friends. This is who you want to bring out into the world. We want to be the perfect picture in the bride magazine or something like that. There's still that fantasy kind of that archetype that's put out there. But I do think that over time it is cumulative. And you do sort of feel the hustle while it's happening because you feel it in your body. It's one too many compliments. You're like, okay, what?

I had a conversation like this the other day where the person was trying to get me to do something I couldn't do on the schedule they wanted. So they kept saying, we know what a busy person you are. You were such a busy person. My goodness. I was like, okay. And I really turned me off because I felt a no in your body. I felt like I was being played.

And it's paying attention to that. And I did. I felt it viscerally. And I could feel myself shutting down. Pay attention to your shutdown at times in a conversation. Those many dissociations. are also your body and your mind talking to you. That's your autonomic nervous system being like,

this feels on a brain nervous system level not safe. I wonder if you can touch a little bit on the dynamics of a relationship with a narcissist. You talk about trauma bonding. This is another one of those terms that, you know, the sort of like classical, like clinical description is sometimes if people actually experience, let's say, a car accident together, they can have a trauma that has bonded them. That's not what you're talking about. So talk a little bit about what trauma bonding is.

So trauma bonding is a perception of an intense connection that's created by an alternation of good and bad in a relationship. So where it's most profoundly experienced is the child who has this idealized conception of the parent and even idealized moments that night that the parent might, everyone gets dressed up and they dance in the living room. And that happens. And then it's like 90 days of all the horror and the meanness and the cruelty and the mockery and all that, and then another one of those days comes along.

The child has no choice but to attach to a parent. That's a survival need. And so as a result, the child really, really gets good at justifying, creating narratives where, in fact, they're even the bad ones, subjugating their needs, doing whatever they need to do to remain not only attached to this parent, but keep this parent in a relatively idealized way. The meaner the parent, the more idealized they're going to become, right? Because with a healthy parent, the child is allowed to create a rather comprehensive, like a whole black and white altogether conception of the parent.

Like, well, sometimes mom's tired when she comes home from work, but like they feel safe. The inconsistencies don't leave the child feeling unsafe. But the connection the child has to make to that chaotic parent, to that at times available, at times not subjugating parent, it's called the trauma bond. Now, in adulthood, that repeats again, it's that relationship where there are those good days and especially we, when it started strong, four weeks, six weeks, six months of really sort of exciting and fun and new and novelty and dopamine and this feels great. Then it sort of starts slipping off, but it doesn't go off a cliff. It's a very gradual rolling down a hill. I always say it goes from, you know, you go from like 99% good, 1% bad, becomes 90% good, 10% bad. And as you segue down to 50-50,

that's where the trauma bond kicks in. Because now you're doing the heavy lifting of justifying, rationalizing, becoming a one-stop shop, saying like, by the time it's done, you're the person's life coach, house cleaner, sex partner, driver. You take care of everything because if you can be all things to this person, you maintain the fantasy of keeping them back on that idealized perch. Because it's, again, the trauma-bonded relationships are very black and white.

And so that, and they get people, say, I feel stuck. Like, I even intellectually know this is not a healthy relationship, but the idea of leaving it is filling me with a sense of panic. And so people stay so they can avoid leaving and feeling panic. So it's a, it's almost a physiological stuckness. I'm just struck by how much our early years are programming us to either think something is normal or feel that it is familiar to us and for us to want to pursue that. And, you know, Maim and I have talked on the show.

It's like, well, why think about your childhood? Why go backwards and think about the past and think about the early imprints? And this is such a great example. I think a lot of people still struggle to understand, you know, when we talk about our nervous system is programmed to do X or, you know, our nervous system expects something.

I think that's still very vague. Can you maybe summarize a little bit about how we're kind of all walking around with this programming looking for what feels familiar to us, which may not be helpful. I think familiar is safe. And we go back to my name's original point of we're actually programmed for safety, right? We are a mammalian species that wants to be safe. So we can stay alive long enough to reproduce and live our lives and do our thing, right?

Obviously, we've evolved past that. It's not that simple, but it is that simple. We want safety. we kind of have the obvious safety stuff, like, you know, saber-toothed tigers and, you know, snarling dogs and footsteps in the night figured out. The psychological safety part, though, that's a lot, that feels a lot more, if you will, subtle. And even when we look at trauma, when we look at big T trauma, someone being assaulted or kidnapped or being in a burning home or something like that, again, clearly we can see sort of physically that is a trauma.

But as we look at betrayal trauma, for example, a child feeling they can't try, a parent. It feels more subtle, but the brain actually holds it with the same kind of potency. And so we're forever on a safety quest. And if we want to put it in very simple terms, I don't know if you've ever been at a point where in your life where you were in survival mode. You didn't have enough money to pay the rent or you were just sort of traveling and everything went upside down and you just couldn't, you know, it was like you were having to stay in hotels or sleep in airports. Were you in your best? Were you thinking ahead? Were you planning ahead? No. We're messy when we survive. And so when people are trying to create psychological safety, what they're not trying to do,

they're not able to do, I should say, is working on their identity and this bigger, deeper, work of authenticity because you're just trying to stay alive. And so we have all of that in common, every human being, even the narcissistic people. In fact, they're probably seeking safety more than anybody else. That's why we see all these grandiose defenses, like the entitlement and the validation seeking. They feel so psychologically unsafe. They've turned into big bullies. And they feel they feel safe when they're big and they overwhelm everyone around them. So we're all kind of on the same grail quest. But I think we forget in all of this what we really mean by psychological safety and how to create that for ourselves. And nor do we pay attention to it when we've got it. So when we're around

the people, we feel safe with. Tune into your body and pay attention to how that feels too. You know, what that parasympathetic state feels like, that state of full relaxation when you're in the presence of goodness and safety. Many people don't always get it, but I think most of us have at least one place where we feel that. And we need that, but we often don't get that. So I think everyone's on the same quest. We just do it in different ways. To get through to a narcissist, it would be, do you understand you're trying to feel safe? But it's very hard for a therapist to do that because they hate the vulnerability that comes from the idea that they were unsafe. So they'll often lash out at the therapist and drop out of therapy. Oh, that's my favorite trick, that narcissists.

system. I think there's also a distinction to be made when we talk about the nervous system and safety. When we talk about familiarity feeling safe, that's not the same thing as is this safe for my nervous system to be in a relationship that's abusive. So these are two different kinds of safety. Yeah. So familiarity, I mean, you know, when you hear people talk about chemistry, right, this relationship has chemistry. Chemistry is familiarity. So when people tell me we have lots of chemistry, I'm like, oh, no, no, no, no. Chemistry is never good. That's usually what people hold out. for it. They'll go on a date with someone. It's like, there was no, he's really nice. He's this, that. He looks great on paper, but there's no chemistry. And I'll say, I love no chemistry.

Because chemistry usually is this, again, this familiarity. And so familiarity, it's, again, to my aim's point, it's, we're not true, if we come from a psychologically unsafe family of origin or other places like that in our lives, we don't even know from safety. So then that which is familiar, feels easy. I wouldn't even say the word safe as much as it's soothing. It's the reason we get stuck living in the same place because we like not even having to think about the two rights and the left we have to make to go to the grocery store. Like having to learn new things all the time, it's a little bit of a challenge. And so it takes us back to what we know. And our identity is very much related to this idea of I'm not enough. So someone comes along

and treats us as though we're not enough. We're like, okay, well, that tracks. And so here we go. So breaking out of the familiar is very, very hard to do. People are really, really interested in narcissism right now. You know, this is not the first book or the first, you know, kind of set of research that you've done on this. Why do you think people are so interested in this?

I think there's a lot of reasons. I think, first of all, narcissists, look at, look at, um, podcast genres and look at television. There are no Netflix series on the nice person next door or the friendly person at the grocery store. It's the serial killer next door. My husband was a scammer. That's what people want to watch. We want to understand the thing that scares us. And people who do scary things, if we can understand them, maybe we think that they're less scary. And while narcissistic people don't track necessarily as scary, they're often. They're and very successful, they get away with stuff. I don't know if you remember being a little kid,

maybe four or five, six years old and watching a kid having a tantrum like in a restaurant or a public place and watching, like, wondering like, how far is this going to go? Like, what is this kid going to get away with? Like, I was definitely the overcontrolled little kid. I'm like, they're going to be able to pull this off. We're fascinated with the person who gets away with it, right? And so when you throw in all that other stuff, how compelling they are, I think that's one piece of it. I think the second piece of it is a lot of people have sort of been bumping around in the dark wondering, why do I feel this way? Why do I keep getting in my own way? Why do I keep self-sabotaging? Why do I feel like I'm not enough? And that's why I don't even like the term self-sabotage.

I'm like, you're being perfectly finely sabotaged outside of you. And then your self-sabotage is merely a mirroring of that process. It's very hard to be in a series of narcissistic relationships or have more like have a parental one and a partner or maybe a boss or something like that and then exert the sense of I am more than enough you just don't do that so I think that this became a new a new paradigm for how to see this I do have to say world politics changed a lot in the 2010s I think narcissistic world leaders have always been a thing but when we look at it as a collective it wasn't just one country it's multiple countries that have had a continue to have these very overtly in-your-face narcissistic leaders. And I think it was,

we once did have, there was a time of, I mean, because women didn't get to get in politics, statesmen. We did have, that, that has gone away. It is politics as entertainment. And I think that has also caused a lot of interest because these are, these are stakeholders who, first of all, the elections have become entertainment. And then I think social media has added to this. I don't think social media has resulted in there being more narcissistic people in the world. I think they've always, there have always been narcissistic people. I think it's given them an amplifier. I think it's given them a megaphone. I think it's made the vulnerable narcissism problem worse. The brooding, angry, sullen, aggrieved. They're dangerous. This is a danger. I actually don't think

the grandiose narcissistic people are dangerous. I do think and know that the vulnerable narcissists are dangerous because they're powder kicks. And social media has given them a powder keggy place to be. So I think what social media has done, too, if we look at the influencer economy, it has rewarded people for validation seeking and sometimes quite handsomely. So we've also turned this into an incentivized state. Can you be a successful boss without some aspect of narcissism? I absolutely think you can. In a strange way, I think it might even be a little harder because to balance on that razor's edge of empathy, compassion, but also boundaries, solidity, authority. It's harder than just being, you know, ruling by fear.

Ruling by fear is a lot easier, right? You just got to the chase. People do things you want. Because I think, obviously, when you have a boss who's not narcissistic, there's a chance of people taking advantage of them, especially if your direct reports are narcissistic. Remember, it's not just the boss who could be narcissistic. It's the employees. And the employee will absolutely take advantage.

A narcissistic employee will take advantage of a compassionate boss. And so I do think, though, a successful boss can be not narcissistic. And I've seen it happen many, many times. It gets trickier and trickier, though, the more narcissistic people there are in the employee base. Sure. But also, like, you know, when you think of, I'm not naming names. when you think of like Elon Musk, you know, when you think of these enormous companies that also have changed the way we view reality. They've changed the way we view technology. They've transformed

our culture. Yes, they have. Like, those kinds of movements do tend to come with a very particular personality that I'm not saying, but might be classified as on the narcissistic spectrum. I don't think we can have huge, that kind of world-shaking innovation without narcissism. I'm to be frank with you. I don't think it's possible because it is the child who lies in bed and things, I'm going to build a rocket launcher out of my bedroom and a Barbie pool on the roof. And they believe it. And then when they're adults, they do whatever the equivalent of that Barbie dreamhouse building it is because they believe it. And that fantasticalness, if it is combined with intellect and grit and some shady stuff too, and charisma and all of that, that's where we get computers.

that sit in our pockets. That's where we get, you know, cars that are soon going to be driving without people in them. That's where we get things that as a child, I mean, again, I'm of an age where I'm like, what I do in my day is unfathomable to me with the tools I've got. And that took people with very specific personality. So perhaps the eradication of narcissism isn't necessarily what's best for innovation. And I'm not saying, I'm not calling for it, because I don't think it's possible. Here's what I'm telling people. It is about knowing what you're getting into. Great.

I'm glad we've got these folks. I'm glad. You know what? I'm very grateful. I couldn't work in that environment, though. But it's beyond that. I'm saying when you have these big, huge, larger than life innovators, appreciate it. Appreciate the genius, if you will.

Just don't marry them. Or like I said, everybody's got a different level of tolerance. I mean, I think, yes, everyone has a different level of tolerance. Yeah. Or have realistic expectations. A person might say, you know what? Because I have known people. It's rare. These are unicorns. People who will say, I knew what I was getting into. But this person had more money than God. And my life is private jets and four seasons hotels and beach houses. And I get to kind of do my own thing and I've got people help me. And I'm, I'm, I, this is, and I get to see my grandkids and it's great. And is this is this, is this a big love story? Probably not. But damn, my life is comfortable. And I am not messing that up. And so I just ask him to be. And that works till it doesn't.

And be discreet when you cheat. And you know what? I will say that person had it figured out because she said, I don't have a broken heart. I knew exactly what I was signing up for. And she said, I know exactly when I'm being gaslighted. And I know exactly the performative dance I need to do. But you have to have outside support. You have to have interest.

Exactly. Right. It sounds like the main pain point is trying to get something from someone who is not capable of giving it and having your expectations constantly going back. You know, Mime has the saying you can't get orange juice from the hardware store. Oh, mine was milk from a hardware store. Yeah, it's usually milk in the hardware store. But yeah, yeah.

And you can actually get milk at Hope Depot just by the way. That's true. That's true. They've changed. Well, now anything is possible. But you use an important word there, okay, which is capability. It's the capability. And I think that when we can put it in terms of capability, it feels less personal.

They really just don't have that capacity. It's not in them. They have capacity for a lot of other stuff, you know, to draw all the attention in the room towards them, to whatever it is they do to manipulate. They do have those capacities. They don't have this capacity. And I think that we do. We are very much in a world of, no, anything's possible. No, this one ain't possible. I am never going to play for the NBA. I love basketball. I'd love to shoot a free throw. I'm never going to, I never would have, never could have. So there are things we're not all capable of everything. And there's a subset of folks who are not capable of holding up their half of a healthy relationship.

And so that's, and it's understanding that it's a lack of capacity. And you are not going to be the person who pulls that capacity out of them because they ain't got it. The book is It's Not You, Romani Dervostela. Did I say your name correctly twice? Amazing. Thank you so much. This is really incredible. We're so honored to get to talk to.

you. Thank you. Thank you so much for the work that you do. I mean, you do incredible work, obviously, as a clinician, but to share it with such a broad audience in such a articulate way is so incredibly helpful. And it's just been really a pleasure to have you here. Thank you so much for having. I really enjoyed this conversation. Thank you. I don't know if I should feel hopeless or hopeful after taking in all of this information from Dr. Jarvisola. Just follow G.I. Joe's tagline, knowing is half the battle. I hope so. It's about what we expect and what we're seeking

and knowing if the people around us are capable of providing it. We also didn't get to mention, but I'll mention it now. She has a healing program called Taking Yourself Back, Healing from Narcissistic and Antagonistic Relationships, where every month she guides you through, like a topic that helps you heal from a narcissistic interaction

or narcissistic abuse. So, which is, I mean, if you're a member, you get all of these, like, lectures with her and journal prompts, and it's really cool. So people should absolutely check that out. You know, I think that what was most alarming to me was, you know, her notion that if you are entering in particular, the dating pool, you're just going to kind of like know that you're going to meet this. And I was thinking, like, when she was talking about homework after a date, I thought that was really powerful. and also I've been on fun first dates where it would be nowhere in my mind to try and analyze anything that wouldn't be positive about that person. I just wouldn't want to see it. And I wonder if there's a way and maybe this book can help people or maybe her program can help people. Like, is there a way

to eliminate getting so intoxicated with the fantasy and the possibility, which is going to be especially strong with someone who's a narcissist because of the charisma? Because of the charisma. because of the manipulation, because of the flashiness and all of that stuff, you know, is there a way to be able to say, gosh, when I go on a date with someone, I'm going to pay attention to how they treat the weight staff. I'm going to pay attention to how they treat other patrons. I'm going to see if they, you know, hold the door open if they see that someone's walking out, male or female, you know, are they aware of their surroundings? Is there substance to them that I'm interested in? And look, I know a lot of people,

would be like, I don't care about that stuff. I just want someone pretty and attractive and has money. Great. If that works for you, that's fine. That's my radical acceptance of you if you choose that. But I think for people who are wanting, you know, a gratifying relationship, it sounds like if we listen to some of these pointers that she's offering, it sounds like you might be able to stop yourself from entering into something that clearly is not going to feel safe. Ma'am, tell us a little bit about the relationship with a parent and how that impacts a child if the parent has narcissistic tendencies. Well, you know, when you think about all the different types of, you know, narcissists that Dr.

Jarvostla explained for us, you know, there's going to be different variations. And as she said, there's kind of different flavors of this. So if you have a grandiose, you know, narcissistic parent, you know, that's someone that's probably going to promise the moon. In many cases, they may actually be able to deliver the moon. But in terms of, you know, an empathetic connection or a meaningful connection, they may not be able to have that. You know, I mean, as she said, like, if you're going to be that person and you're going to run a company that changes the world, you may not be the kind of person that needs to have kids if you want to have a meaningful connection with them. If you have a parent that's a vulnerable narcissist or a malignant narcissist, that's going to be really detrimental. You know, children can't make sense of that. They can't make sense of someone who's punitive. They can't make sense of someone who, you know, who's going to use a negative and really harmful manipulation and in many cases abuse. You know, rage is a huge component of narcissism. You know, a lot of times people, honestly, can just be assholes or jerks or they can be self-righteous. They can be all of these things. But if there's not that aspect of walking on eggshells because of their, you know, you know, you know, lashing out at you, that's a different category and that's not, you know, kind of what she's talking about. So when you think about it like that, you know, you think about a communal narcissist even as a parent. They might be the life of the potluck. They might be the person that has to bring

the thing. But what's happening at home? What's happening if you cross them? What's happening if someone outdoes them, right? That's going to impact the child because they're witnessing that. And in terms of having a parent who would fall under the neglectful narcissism spectrum, that's literally the definition of conditional love, I will only give to you if you give me what I need. And the list of what I need, right, may vary, it may not make sense, especially not going to make sense, you know, to a young child. So this is a really, really, you know, specific. And there's a lot of literature specifically around what happens if your mother is the narcissist. And I don't mean to be gendered about it. But historically, there's specific research about what it's like for, you know,

historically the parent that is, in theory, the one who might be, you know, breastfeeding or in charge of child care, which statistically speaking women tend to be in charge of child care, even if they are the primary breadwinner. So there is a special notion of what relationship changes happen when it's your, you know, your mother that's the narcissist. But yeah, this is not a fun one. It's really not a fun one to go through life with a parent who's a narcissist. You know, what it looks like is you never get your needs met, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever. You can never win. And she talked about that.

You can never win with a narcissistic parent. There's always a price to pay. You always have to pay the piper. And it also sets you up for having a really, really unsafe set of expectations around what intimacy looks like. You can also start shutting down and not expecting that there is intimacy, so that can lead to people who are closed off, intimacy avoidance, relational avoidance.

Yeah, I mean, I think also, you know, we didn't really talk a lot about the overreforms. overlap with addiction. There's a tremendous overlap with addiction. This is the kind of thing of like, you know, add fuel to the fire of narcissism in the form of alcohol and like everything gets bigger. It'll get better until it gets a lot worse, right? Rage is going to be worse if someone is, is intoxicated, right? So there's also this notion of like when you grow up in addiction, you'll see a lot of the same patterns as if you grow up with a narcissistic parent, even if there's no alcohol in the home. This is one of those, you know, kind of dysfunctional, you know,

maladaptive personalities that if you grow up with it, it's going to look a lot like you grew up with someone who was an addict. Make sure to subscribe for more great episodes like this one. And, you know, on YouTube, there's a little bell icon if you go to our YouTube channel, which is Miami-Bialic. If you hit that little bell icon, you will get notifications. You need to get notifications. So please like us, subscribe us, share us, get us anywhere that you get podcasts, share it with friends, let people know everything they need to know about narcissism. And And from our breakdown to the one we hope you never have, we will see you next time.