A Narcissist will manipulate behavior with their intended target and use ANYTHING to convince them that they are seriously damaged.

A Narcissist will manipulate behavior with their intended target and use ANYTHING to convince them that they are seriously damaged. Manipulative behavior refers to a person’s use of gaslighting, love bombing, and other diminishing interactions in their connection/relationship with you to gain power or influence. These tactics often include attempts to damage another person’s emotional and mental well-being.

From my Book – Greg Zaffuto – Author – From Charm to Harm and Everything else in Between with a Narcissist!

Alternatively, a Narcissist will even use dime store psychology on you, or strong dogmatic religious beliefs or a false consensus from friends, family, co-workers, etc. to justify their lies and inexcusable behaviors concerning you. For example saying things like: “I pray for your healing daily” or “You have issues that you need to address with a therapist” or “My therapist agrees with me about your actions” or “My mother agrees with me and understood what I did because of the way YOU treated me (this concerned an affair my Narcissist had.”) “I think I am right and you are wrong.” These are nothing more than tactics for deflecting responsibility and reinforcing them with ill placed and FALSE comments from other people that aren’t even involved. A narcissist rarely, if ever, admits they are wrong unless it is to zap you with a thinly veiled insult. For example, “I am sorry for thinking you were a kind and generous person. I see that I was probably wrong about you.” A narcissist rarely if ever takes responsibility for their hurtful actions. If you call them out on their bad behaviors, they claim it was your fault for pushing them into it (in other words, you deserved it) and you’re a bad person to make a good person like them (the Narcissist) act that way. You should be ashamed of yourself! I was continually blamed for my Narcissist’s horrid and raging temper with comments that I pushed the Narcissist to act this way. No I was a great, caring and giving person. Everything I was accused of were only delusional and fake accusations of things I was supposedly doing that would come out of thin air to start an argumentative situation with toxic drama, silencing, and betrayal as my punishment.

The narcissist uses a simple technique of manipulation to make and keep their target/victim compliant and that is WITHHOLDING. By not giving you what the Narcissist knows you want or desire from them (things that are normal to any relationship) they can make themselves feel powerful, important and in total control. Here is a simple example of withholding: Think of two pups playing, one pup can be totally bored with their dog toy and about to put it down when he/she notices that the other pup wants it, then he/she plays “keep away” by keeping the toy to themselves or withholding it, even though they are bored with it or finished playing with it. That pup is exerting basic dominance through control and establishing itself as the ‘alpha dog’ or by withholding through knowing the other pup wants something they have. The Narcissist displays this negative behavior constantly throughout their relationship with you in very subtle to very overt ways. Over time this constant withholding establishes the Narcissist’s dominance over their target/victim. It is a process that has been preceded by their extreme attention and ‘love bombing’ to get you positively conditioned to trust and even love them, only to reposition us and start their abuse to extort every aspect of your life from you. Really with a Narcissist their behavior can be more aptly described as a three-year-old brat and not that of a fully grown person.

Everything is a power play for the Narcissist too! For example: When a target/victim asks for simple support with “Could you or would you……,” the first thing out of that Narcissist’s mouth would be “You will have to wait.” The Narcissist will manipulate this behavior and however long you can wait, the narcissist will make you wait even longer or they will often make you beg or grovel for what you want also.