You may have heard of using positive affirmations to help reframe your thoughts so that you can think more positively, but negative affirmations can have the opposite effect.
This is what narcissists do to people they are in relationships with, especially romantic ones. Self-talk affirmations can change your subconscious thoughts. Repeating something over and over gives it power because hearing something over and over again makes it more likely that you will start to believe it. In turn, these beliefs make it more likely that you will act in ways that confirm these beliefs.
This is basic neuroplasticity, which is your brain’s ability to change throughout your life – of course, depending on your habitual habits and thought processes. The truth is that your brain often cannot distinguish between the thing you are imagining and the thing that is happening in real life. Sometimes this can be incredibly helpful if you are trying to train your mind to think more positive thoughts and take a more encouraging view of your future.
But when it comes to narcissists, this is where things get dark. Whether they realize what they are doing by repeating these affirmations to you is irrelevant…the result is that you eventually start to believe what they say. This is because the regular repetition of certain statements about yourself can encourage your brain to take these affirmations as true. And when you believe something, your actions often follow it. This is why people start to fall into a deep depression and develop various health conditions when they are in relationships with narcissistic people.
Let’s dive into…
10 Lies narcissists want you to believe
Lie #1 – They are no longer attractive
During the love bombing phase, the narcissist will likely make you feel extremely attractive and desirable. But over time, they start making small digs about your appearance. It can be anything from the way you wear your makeup, to your hairstyle, to your clothes. Over time, they start making little statements to you to make you feel like you don’t look good anymore, that you don’t know how to dress, or that you don’t know how to do your makeup anymore. Even though you do things the same way you always have.
This is no accident. They want you to believe that you’re not attractive because once they start to devalue and dump you, it makes it easier for them to keep you hooked. After all, you might have a feeling that it’s better to have bad love than love. Absolutely.
Lie #2 – You are mentally unstable
I work with a lot of smart people who either contact me for training or contact me via email. These people are often doctors, lawyers, and therapists, and they’re very smart, but somehow the narcissists in their lives can convince them that they’re not.
In turn, what often happens is that this person’s performance on the job starts to decline. They begin to feel less able to perform their job duties. Often, they end up being fired either because 1) their performance starts to deteriorate or, 2) the narcissist won’t stop contacting them while they’re on the job.
If this is happening to you, I recommend that you put your phone on silent while you work and make a concerted effort not to answer narcissists’ calls, texts, or emails while you work.
Furthermore, if your romantic partner is saying things to you to make you feel like you’re no good at your job, that’s a burning red sign that you’re in the wrong relationship.
Lie #3 – No one else will want you
I work with people who are not only smart but also attractive. I look at pictures of these people (if I have any) and think, “Oh, it’s so sad that this person has such low self-esteem.” This is because the narcissist has made them feel that way. Nobody ever wants them.
My response to that is that there are a lot of people in the world who definitely care about you. Besides, if you have a partner who says this kind of thing to you, it’s really time to evaluate if the relationship is worth staying in. Because the person who says these kinds of things to you is not at all concerned about your emotional well-being.
Lie #4 – You’re a liar
Two main reasons a narcissist calls you a liar is 1) they want to give you the impression that you are more like them than you think, and 2) if they can spark your need to prove yourself, and you react to that by spending hours a day, sending lots of emails and tons of texts, And you call your friends and family and worry about it, then you’ll be less focused on the fact that the narcissist is a liar.
Lie #5 – Your friends and family talk about you behind your back
They might say things like, “Your friends told me not to trust you. I should have listened to them,” or “Your brother told me you would start doing that eventually.”
Narcissists do this because they want you to believe that they have allied with your friends and family so that you are less likely to turn to them when you have relationship problems or need advice on what to do.
However, there are times during a breakup when your friends or family may side with the narcissist, and this is a very painful time for a lot of people because during this time you will have to decide whether to keep these people around. life. However, there is also a high chance that your friends and family will never say these things and the narcissist just wants you to feel lonely and isolated. Because if they can keep you feeling lonely and isolated, they have more influence over your thoughts and actions.
Lie #6 – You wouldn’t make it without them
I encourage you… If the narcissist is making any suggestions about you leaving your job to move with them or to work for their company, don’t.
If you are already supporting yourself, you should continue to support yourself. I have not successfully witnessed this transformation when someone leaves their job to move on to a narcissist or to work for the narcissist’s company. It always ends in disaster. If you are in charge of your livelihood, it is best to keep it that way.
Lie #7 – You are no longer desirable
This lie is related to the first lie where they say you are no longer attractive.
I don’t think that way, but I’ve heard other people say things like, “Well, they’re kind of cute, but they’re not sexy.”
If your partner is making these kinds of statements to you, it means that they don’t care about your emotional well-being or your feelings in general. They don’t care about hurting your feelings. Someone who cares about you wouldn’t want to hurt your feelings. They will try to preserve your dignity at any cost.
Preserving your dignity is not something narcissists care about. Furthermore, it is not normal for a partner to say these kinds of things as offensive.
Lie #8 – They cheated on you because…
This could be for several reasons including some we have already covered. Narcissists never run out of (what they think) valid reasons to cheat on you. And you can rest assured that every reason he comes up with is just another lie.
Again, if this is happening to you in your relationship, you must understand that not all partners or spouses cheat. It is not normal, and it is not as common as the narcissist would have you believe. There are people in this world who are completely devoted to their partners and spouses. And you deserve that too.
Lie #9 – Everyone wants them
In this case, two camps want the narcissist. The first camp includes people who simply don’t know who or what a narcissist is. The second camp, of course, is people who are still traumatically attached…ex-partners, ex-spouses, and ex-lovers. All the people the narcissist has been involved with, unless they are tough enough to get out and stay out.
Understand, though, that people are in the first camp, not as severe as the narcissist might think. Usually what happens is that someone may smile at the narcissist or say hello politely. Suddenly, the narcissist decides in their mind that this person wants them. In fact, he may find this narcissistic person annoying, cocky, or conceited. They may not like them at all, but the narcissist has already made up a story. But even more than that, they just want to make you jealous because they love to triangulate and make people jealous.
In short, not many people want a narcissist as they say.
Lie #10 – The new show has changed them
This may be the biggest lie of all because no one ever changes a narcissist, not even their children. And if the narcissist’s children can’t change them, you can rest assured that no other sources of supply will change them either.
This is why it is so important not to follow narcissists, not to check their social media because the things a narcissist puts out on social media are designed specifically for you.
Furthermore, we covered neuroplasticity earlier in the article and the effect of repeating things so often that you start to believe them. This is basically what you do to yourself when you hop on narcissists’ social media, and you believe the pictures they post there.
All of these pictures are just an illusion. They are props that make you think the narcissist has finally changed. It’s just that they won’t change for you.
I can talk about this all day until I’m blue in the face, but people still persist in believing that the narcissist changed for the new show. I promise you if you stop looking at their social media and stop asking friends and family about the narcissist or doing cars or whatever they do, you will stop believing this lie.
By the way, I’ve done all of those things too, so I’m not judging you, but I’m here to say that as long as you do all of that, you won’t be able to move forward. What’s more, all of these things cut off any contact…when you go on their social media, when you do drive-ins, when you ask friends and family about the narcissist – you’re not cutting off any contact.
If you do that, you won’t be able to change your neural pathways. You will not be able to change your thought processes, which means the narcissist will keep you trapped in their reign of terror.