Above all, a narcissistic relationship is a realm of illusory potential. The narcissist, who lives in a state of detachment, is skilled at awakening the target’s magical thinking. From the outset, the narcissist tells his target that he is going on an amazing adventure. Maybe travel around the world. Achieving the perfect love, or creating the perfect family. Be protected or taken care of forever. Find riches and attain immense prestige, or pursue a mission that will change the world. Narcissists and their purpose will transcend reality, creating something the world has never seen before.
The narcissist’s world is abundant. It promises endless money, sex, power, status, fame, wonder, belonging, or love. It is detached from the “limits” of reality, and capable of assimilating any vision. The narcissist’s world is also dreamlike and mobile, and can be moved to another location at any time.
The washing away of reality and fueling this world is a luxury, whereby a person becomes infatuated and obsessed with another person, and feels their heart explode with joy and amazement at the mere thought of them.
Limerence is characterized by:
Intrusive thoughts: the person is on your mind when you wake up, and when you fall asleep. Like it or not, you think about them constantly throughout the day, and feel an irresistible need to be with them when they’re not around.
Radical change in priorities: You put aside your hobbies, friends, and even long-term plans in order to align your life with this person.
Emotional dependence: You do everything you can to maintain the person’s approval, and you worry so much about “doing something wrong” that it might upset them. You read into every communication, decision, boundary, or facial expression, and are terrified that this “perfect” relationship might suddenly fall apart.
In a romantic relationship, flirtation is often confused with love, because we think we’ve finally found “the right one.” But what we fail to realize is that flirtation is a powerful relic of childhood; An immature form of dichotomous love. When fused with trauma, grandiosity carries over into adulthood, where we divide people into divine beings and ignore their flaws. The basic difference between love and luxury is that love comes from abundance, whereas luxury comes from lack. That is, when we meet a person who seems to possess traits that we ourselves lack, grandeur appears to compel us to blend in with him. This can be in romance, friendship, work, or in our personal development. In all of these cases, we feel lukewarm because we believe that this person is going to make us whole somehow, and we do everything we can to maintain that feeling.
When the narcissist sees his goal in this situation, he becomes emboldened, knowing that he has the goal exactly where he wants it. The narcissist then nurtures the target’s enthusiasm, carefully playing the ideal lover, mentor, savior, or whatever role the target throws at him. Engulfed in fantasy, the target enters a trance-like state where boundaries and doubts are washed away. There are no rules to be concerned with in this field, and above all, no outsiders to deal with. The narcissist’s fantasy is safe, content, and exciting. It is timeless and worry-free, and it will be forever–or so the target believes.
Sadness of imagination
The narcissist sold us a fantasy, and we embraced it because we wanted it somewhere deep down. We like it. The perfect sexy partner, and thus the perfect happy home. We especially long for this reality if we are deprived of the good in our lives. Coming from a dysfunctional home makes a person want a perfect and happy home as compensation. The emotional absence of a parent makes the idea of a harmonious, loving partner seem irresistible. We forget that in reality, all people are wounded and imperfect, and forming and maintaining relationships is hard work. Each person has unique desires, beliefs and values which will conflict with our own beliefs and values. All relationships go through stages of stress and pain, followed by routine and boredom. Not all rainbow. How quickly we were to forget this as the imagination ran away from us.
When the narcissist arrived, we saw the beginning of a perfect union that we hoped would lead to a happy future. The narcissist sold this to us because we, too, will only tolerate perfection. Narcissists see themselves as perfect, and because they are so selfish, they see their relationships as an extension of that perfection. They never accept that they are limited or flawed, so as reality eventually sets in and flaws in the relationship surface, they attack. I did it wrong. You did it wrong. The goal seems to be that they are always striving for a higher level, which continues to rise as they become more and more exhausted. However, we tolerate this.
For the traumatized soul, imagination is the ultimate medicine. By striving for the perfect relationship, we are denying the pain of our past. Most importantly, we reject the potential flaws in our present. Ordinary people who display flaws worry us, because their flaws show that they might let us down or leave us. They associate us with our shame, and our shame has proven to be painful and irreparable. What remains when imagination dies? Life can seem bleak when it’s realistic and “normal”. And by denying it, we were masking a hidden greatness. Ordinary will never fly for us.
The reality is pain. Accepting this means seeing that the world is not what we hoped it would be. Coming to reality reveals our shock. Our pain. Our tragedy. It exposes our flaws, our broken dreams, our hurt and longing. Our broken past. What could have been, but never happened. We needed to escape.
