Social Skills are for Survival

Here's what happened.  It is embarrassing and I should have known better.  I was at church and a couple I know there is moving far away, and I probably will never see them again.  He is a very knowledgeable a retired high school teacher, very formal, kinda dry, but very delightful.  And as solid as the day is long.  She, on the other hand is vibrant, sweet, radiant and has this way that I admire, and find she has been a great influence on me.  Not that I talk to them much.  We talk and leave and that is all there is to it.  They are moving away and I am upset, and I don't know when they will be gone from my life forever.

Well, I asked them how the sale of their house is going, how the packing is going etc. questions like that.  I started to get this look from her that I knew I was intruding and I just shouldn't be asking these questions.  Then I suddenly said, "Oh, I was just wondering when you are moving, so I know how long you'll be here.  I'll miss you guys so much."  She smiled and said maybe a little over a month.

See what I'm getting at here?  Stupid, stupid of me.  I just wanted to know how much longer they were going to be around, and instead of asking that simple little question, I asked a bunch of stupid questions instead.  One quick question was all I needed to ask, and instead I asked about things I really didn't care about and crossed their boundaries.  Why would I want to know how the sale of their house is going?  Seriously?  And I didn't know them well enough to be asking that question.

Oh boy.  Am I ever embarrassed.  Have you ever wished for a time machine that would go back for just a few minutes?  I did that day and I wish that all the time.  I make so many mistakes in social skills.  It's because of my nerves.

I got a powerful lesson though.  I discovered I made the mistake.  In the past, I would make these mistakes never knowing what I did wrong.  Why did I offend someone?  I don't know, I just thought I was one hell of an offensive, evil person.  It kept me from going out in public, and isolated me some more.

They are a very nice couple, and wouldn't ever hurt me.  There are times in my life when I have been hurt.  When I was in high school, I was trying to get along with the others by participating in some joking, I got punched in the face by a boy.  I can't explain how that happened, I wasn't aware at the time, but if I were to experience it again, I would know.  So many painful moments.

And to this day, it screws me over.  I can't work in my field of science, I get pushed out, because of my extreme anxiety.  I don't even like to call it anxiety anymore, I need to address that in another post of hyper vigilance, that I am writing simultaneously to this one.  Tough stuff.  But it is important to open this thing up.  I know my past and how and why this is happened.  I can't get my needs met, and I get lost in the world.  Even in my relationship, his ex has been chasing him with emails and phonecalls even after all these years.  He ignores that and I can't help but get this feeling that she is doing this to target me.  I can't say for sure that she is an MN, but so far what I can see, she is.  But I have my relationship site.  So this shouldn't be a problem.  Just that I don't do well with aggressive people, my hyper vigilance is up, so this is a process.

I'll give you another example of how I've grown.  We have an MN in our bible study group.  She only comes in the winter.  I've only met her because I didn't join up till this winter.  This part is a little strange, but she seems to keep everyone on edge.  I can now see that.  She sits beside me all the time. I try to sit somewhere else and she comes along and sits beside me.  She says she likes me.  Of course she does, of course.  Narcs love me.  Then she gets all this praise from everyone.  Everyone calls her nice.  Nice?  Are they lying?  No, they are doing this as some kind of mind meld.  I don't know if I can explain that. When I had a big cyst on my cheek, that turned out to be a cancer, everyone was sympathetic.  She mentions a bowl cancer, everyone is quiet, seemingly unable to even communicate. And even, I've noticed everyone seems to be avoiding any direct talk with her, and avoid eye contact if they have to answer back to her.  She always initiates any conversations.  They tell her her doctor is doing his best.  The room goes quiet.  She continues talking.  Soon someone said, "Ok,". I can hear movement, body language changing, it looks like they try to turn away from her.  They acknowledged it then the subject got changed.  A big sigh of relief. And its like I can see everyone is smiling over at the one who changed the topic.  Everyone seems to avoid her, then they call her this nice sweet lady. :/

She gets downright nasty at times.  She is practically putting others down during the bible study because, "I knows more about the bible than you  or you or you."  She sits next to me and it feels like sitting next to a rattlesnake.  I hear these weird clicking sound.  Do all narcs do that?  I know she is in her 70's, probably normally raspy, but its different somehow.  I can't explain it.  Just a lifetime of hyper vigilance I guess.  I wish someday to peel out of these nerves and actually explain it.  If I have a question, I usually direct it over to the men, I'm a little old fashioned that way.  She answers, and I try to avoid eye contact.  No, my own husband doesn't come to the bible study.

It has been taught by our wonderful Q1605, that anyone can throw you under the bus, narc or not. And I get that now.  All these people in the room will toss me under the bus if need be to save this frail old woman.  If need be.  But I know they don't like her.  This is strange.  It's like a science that needs to be explored.  I can see this now for the first time in my life.  I remember as a child thinking I would have supporters, but it turned out I had none, and I would be wondering why.  No on seems to care for a narc, but they jump to their side regardless.  Even in high school, the bullies would triumph with "love and adoration" of others.

And I can now see in my bible study, how this "sweet little old lady", could have an army of people after me, even if they don't seem to like her.  I see that now.

There is one narcissistic trait that I desperately need right now for survival.  I can't survive without the ability to make mistakes and still praise myself. If things blow up in my face, I still need to tell myself I did a wonderful job.  We don't really praise someone for screwing up, but oh well, I need that. I am not going to survive without it.  No way.   The abuse has ingrained in me too well.  One screw up and I would pay through the nose when I was growing up.  So I need this all to be good. When you are a hollowed out husk, the tendency is to retreat back into yourself, to hide.  To stay safe, to stay alive.

I know it is painful sometimes to make mistakes. It can feel downright deadly.  I know that.  It is ok to feel that way, and if you are going to feel it, feel it deeply.  Feel it down into your bones, because it is only then that the feeling can go away.

As for trying?  I never try.  I just do.  And if it blows up in my face, I will accept it as a real life lesson.  I will believe I did a wonderful job.  I would have learned something.  Mistakes are a teaching lesson, for mistakes might not be a mistake at all but a needed step in the process.

But what about taking responsibility for my bad behaviour or bad decisions?  That thought is what makes me think its narcissistic to not own up to something.  That's where I would get screwed up. My last ex-husband was a firm believer in taking personal responsibility.  I can't remember a time when he did even do that himself.  Unless of course, you can call the fact he wasn't working as a way of being responsible.  He said it wasn't fair to an employer to have him on board because he was "sick".  He thought he was being responsible by sleeping, eating, and masturbating all day on pornography sites.  And I believed him.  At the time, I know I didn't have emotional resources either, because my life was always in a panic state.  So I do understand somewhat, but in learning, I've grasped the fact that he wasn't the type of guy to be all that.  He never would have been my protector. He should have been rooted out int the dating process.  That's a separate story.  But important to social skills regardless.

I don't ever not take responsibility.  I was always trying so hard.  In fact, I came on board the ACON community because of the internal resources I had cultivated for a recovery that I didn't know what I was recovering from.  My mind could not realize I had a bad parasite that screwed me over from my formative years.  I still saw mother as a good person, I couldn't entertain anything else. I had to work hard to get here.  I had to earn my awakening.  I had to even earn my current relationship, because I went into it as a way of escaping a horrible narcissistic family.  We didn't develop from a point of passion.  That had to come later.

Every single thing has been work.  Hard work.

That is so painful.  I can never get over it.  during the most severe abuse, my child mind had to retreat, to survive to stay alive.  I needed to be hollow to live.  I need God, this painful sore spot hits me to the core.  I find myself saying over and over again, "Oh God, Oh God," screaming out to him over what has happened.  Not only that but for Him for safety.  It kind of spins around that my childhood was abusive, and I need God for me to even accept that.  I get so angry.  I'm not liking the anger.  I need Him for direction, for leadership and on my own I feel I need to try to fix all this stuff that has went wrong.

He is now leading me to explore and I'm not trying to fix things.  Things can fix themselves, I am just to practice being alive, that is all.  I mean really being alive, not a carved out husk.  So that is what I'm doing.

Everything at this point is a learning curve.  I need people around me that can understand that and allow me a place to be where I'm at in my mind.  It's not always going to be pretty.  When I express myself these days, it is not like a normal person.  It looks crazy, because I have to swing the pendulum hard and it goes way over.  But its ok.  I've only existed to be fed off of by a giant parasite. I struggle with social skills.  There will be more hollowed out husks coming onboard.  This is a hard endeavour.  If you have awakened to the truth about your narcissistic family, you can congratulate yourself, because I heard that most don't.  I can't imagine how horrible that is, but it happens.  Most of my life was spent in pure horror.  Beaten down, smacked around, left to die even.  I can't say it enough.  It was your family that set you up in life to surely die.  But you didn't die, you stayed alive.

Its weird it is social skills that the non-parents rooted out of us, but this comes to me as no surprise.

Social skills are an absolute survival trait.  Our ancestors would have died without it.  They depended on eachother for survival.  The man protected his family, and I can tell you none of our ancestor ladies could have lived without a good protector and one who would not only provide but be willing to provide, for her and her children would have died for sure.  He would also need to work well with the other men in a tribe.  The women too.  I'm sure I had at least some good ancestors, otherwise I could not be here right now.  We require it too, but the problem is that we live in little boxes, drive to work in little boxes, then work in little boxes etc. Stab eachother in the back.  Life has changed.

With my studies, I have come to believe that narcissists are slated for extinction.  If we just let them be they will be gone.  But oh no, we give them the highest towers in society, feed them supply because we're scared, then, take special care to take care of the bullies, and oh my gosh, we breed with them.  Then they proliferate.

I'll tell you a secret.  I wrote a little phrase just before my awakening.  Here it is - I really like people.  I'm curious about them and I forget about myself and get interested in them.  A conversation is fun, a chance to learn about somebody.  I made that one up all by myself.  I wanted that.  Or at least I felt this would be good.

So what shall I say about social skills?  They are for survival plain and simple.  During my studies on relationships I have discovered this.  But being raised by a narcissist, I had none.  Now I'm growing some.  I can use logic for it, but place me in a room with a bunch of people and I am a mess.  I need my comfort and it doesn't include people.  I wish it did but I must be realistic.  I wonder about people who have that natural want to be around others.  What does that even feel like.

Narcs seem to like people?  They don't.  They are parasites, just unable to exist alone.

Well anyway I have done a tad of research on social skills and I found myself overwhelmed by my panic.  It doesn't fit me, its hard.  It's too painful.  Sometimes things reach a point where it's too damn hard to even get started.  So much of it relies on positive thinking, and I just can't.  I had to turn off the computer and walk away.

Well anyway, just to let you know, I have some things I have been using to socialize and are very calming and relaxing. And easy peasy.  For me, I felt no triggering reactions from this.  When you have PTSD anything can trigger an attack, anything.  From my own experience, I feel I can say that. So in my opinion, anyone can feel safe and these feel like a nice long bubblebath and hot chocolate.

When I get panicky it is not pretty.  Hypervigillance turns me into someone else.  It is so scary.  That is why I think I can tell you that this actually feels good.  Going from my perspective.

It's comfy to look at this from the failing side.  I have all these plaguey thoughts about failure, so I try to see what would happen when I don't get everything exactly right. As soon as I can see the failing side to things, I'm ok.  It is only easier for me, and I think it will be easy for anyone always on the edge of painful panic.  So go ahead, make mistakes, make lots of mistakes.  Let it blow up in your face if need be.  And congratulate yourself when it does.  I think I have enough experience from my own ACON life to say these are comfy, comfy, comfy.

When I'm meeting someone, I should be concerned about my own image, and not worry about the person I'm talking to.  I will worry about saying or doing the right thing.  Or I can actually value the person I'm with, even though I might have my shirt on backwards.

I will absolutely be concerned only with being in sync with someone.  When I was in counselling, the therapist told me that in social interactions there is an exchange between the two, and I am to remain always trying to figure out what that is.  Even if that takes my attention away.  Or I will realize that the very nature of connecting with humans is that it is not perfect.  There will be times I will say and do the wrong things, and that is great.

I will need to look our sound smart.  I won't worry about being fully present with someone, I won't care about that, I must sound cool.  Or I can just be fully present with someone.  If a friend needs to talk, I'll just put on the tea, and stay in the moment with them.  Because here is the cool thing that is actually scientific.  If you are fully present with someone you'll be able to respond, connect, and be in tune with what is needed in that situation, rather than doing what makes you look good or sound smart.  

The best example of being present is when a friend comes over and she is hurt over her marriage breaking up.  Not present means that you'll tell her to get over it, and take her to the bar to meet some new men.  Ever have a friend do that to you?  Ugh.  Or you can put on the kettle and settle into the hurt and pain and anguish she is feeling.  This might take hours.  It's ok, you are getting your needs met too.  This is social interaction.  This is presence.  I've seen this in movies, and the women were eating ice cream out of cartons.  Isn't that great?  But be careful, food might mask pain we should really be feeling.

I know these are really just one on one social situations.  I am currently trying to extrapolate for actual group social situations.  This one is hard.  I can only get along in groups if I feel no aggression and the group is kind and inviting.  Otherwise I'm screwed over.  I remember work situations, where I could have voiced myself and got my needs met, but I can't do that.  Even if it is in my best interests to do so, I'm afraid.  That will take more growth and I hope to get there.

But I know last week I was with a group of women in my quilting class and I finally got things together in my head.  I said to myself that even if my shirt is on backwards, I will use the one on one social skills for what I'll do in groups.  I'll be present and I may have made a fool of myself, but I'm not focusing on that any longer.

And yes, there is an MN in my bible study group, and I choose to not socially interact with her.  No one else seems to, and I know from my mother, that even if she says something that is good, not to take for granted that she is a good person.  Otherwise I'm fine in that group, and I work on getting my needs met regardless of anything.  (even if I have a booger hanging out of my nose, which is not going to happen, that is just the MN mother that raised me, that loved to tease me about being stupid, whatever, so it has no basis in reality.)  That was narc supply, plain and simple.

As far as me asking intrusive questions of that couple who are moving?  Well, when we are second guessing ourselves and our actions, and not being fully present that will happen.  What do we know what to ask?  Just go by your gut, your authentic and true self.  I just wanted to know how long I'll have them in my life because I'll miss them.  There is nothing wrong with that, that is lovely.  It is sentimentality, but that is not what would help me while growing up in the vortex of a narc.  I might treat all people like narcs if I don't become authentic.  Just do it whatever.  If you feel like you would like a raise at work, just ask for it.  I'm sure your boss won't hate you for it.  Unless he is a narc, he might drive you into the ground.  But if he is hateful, its not your fault its because he is a narc, and that is what narcs do.  Don't blame yourself.  Your boss might give you some feedback on your work. See that as a positive thing, it will help you grow.  But take his advice with a grain of salt, this is just a person with an opinion, but he has the experience, he can help.  See yourself for who you truly are, you are a good person.  It's this feeling of being vulnerable we hate.  I know as ACON's this feels deadly.  See this as a reality of how you were raised.

I don't think I've covered the reality of what we feel while all this is going on.  I hope to get to that in my next post of hyper vigilance.  Maybe I should publish that one first, but for some reason this was easier for me.  I didn't want to put them together because I wanted to keep this one sweet and easy, but I will talk about the real feeling that death is imminent really soon.