Narcissistic bullies

I am not sure if all Narcissistics are bullies or all bullies are Narcissistics.  Or if it looks more like a Venn Diagram with parts over lapping.

Another theory I am working on is the possibility that malignant narcissistic are overt behavior bullies whereas an engulfing narcissistic use more covert behaviors to control others.  Why do I even bother to work it out?  One of the more freeing things I learned was that my mother's behavior was all about her.  I also accepted that she bullied me.  Standing up for myself was difficult.  My counselor was horrified when I told him I could count on one hand how many times I had stood up for myself.  From a young age, I felt I couldn't win.  I would always be beaten down or things would just get worse.  The fear instilled in me systematically over the years left me with very little belief that my thoughts, feelings or opinions stood for anything.  My self esteem played hide and seek down in the lower sub-regions of some dungeon.  To me, what is empowering is allowing my mother to own her behavior.  She did certain things to me because she choose to, not because I was bad or out of line.  She made choices to harm me.  Thanksgiving time is my best example.  I don't know what happened in her childhood that makes Thanksgiving miserable for her.  For many years, I believed her when things went wrong and I was blamed.  I didn't help my mother enough, I wasn't fast enough, I didn't do what she asked when she would give me contradictory commands.  The list went on and on of the infractions I did that would cause her to lash out yelling at me.  Over the years it was less yelling but more subtle put downs and slights and anxiety.  After recognizing my FOO was unhealthy and no matter how I behaved I was going to get crapped on, I chose to stop attending Thanksgiving dinner at their house.  The relief the first year was tremendous.  I hadn't realized how much I dreaded this yearly ordeal of ritual gorging.  Don't get me wrong, I love food and Thanksgiving is a food festival.  There in lay the key.  My mother made it an ordeal instead of a celebration of bounty.  Gluttonous mounds of food laced with dieting woes and lectures.  The meal was agony for me.  I stopped going.  I still enjoy Thanksgiving with my FOC but no more interaction with my mother on that day.  I felt like I dropped a boulder and watched it tumble away.  She could no longer heap her feelings of guilt for eating on to me.  I took myself out of the loop.  That is what I learned about in this class on bullying in school.  I learned the need to break the loop.  Scuttle the pattern of behaviors.  If you always do what you have always done, you always get what you always got.  I can observe the behaviors, analyze outcomes, and change the patterns of a lifetime.  I actually look forward to Thanksgiving, green bean casserole and chocolate pudding pie Here I Come.
   

Bully defined

I just came off of 3 weeks of way too much to do.  My week off from school was packed and busy but not much time to rest.  On top of all I was doing, I took another class.  This one on how to prevent school violence with emphasis on addressing bullying in the school.  I am extremely interested.  I listened to the Bullying policy last year in a staff meeting.  I was furious at how anemic their plan seemed to me.  I wanted more information.  The information I am sharing is from the Bully prevention presentation by Kris Bosworth, PhD and Maryann Judkins, MA University of Arizona. 

Definition: "A student is being bullied when he or she is exposed, repeatedly and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other students."  - Olweus (1993)

I followed up with a search and add this information from Wikipedia:

Bullying may be defined as the activity of repeated, aggressive behavior intended to hurt another person, physically or mentally. Bullying is characterized by an individual behaving in a certain way to gain power over another person.^[7]
Norwegian researcher Dan Olweus^[8] says bullying occurs when a person is:

'exposed, repeatedly and over time, to negative actions on the part of one or more other persons'. He says negative actions occur 'when a person intentionally inflicts injury or discomfort upon another person, through physical contact, through words or in other ways.'^{[citation needed]}

PDF by Dan Olweus http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CCYQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cobbk12.org%2Fpreventionintervention%2FBully%2FDefinition%2520of%2520Bullying.pdf&ei=dESXUKm8AaiziQLL9YCABQ&usg=AFQjCNGYhK652txJwarckwMxvw8MV6L_fQ&sig2=hsJho1aO9kgZy5NSEAZZsQ

Another link has this to say about bullying: 
http://www.stopbullying.gov/what-is-bullying/definition/index.html

Bullying is unwanted, aggressive behavior among school aged children that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. The behavior is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated, over time. Both kids who are bullied and who bully others may have serious, lasting problems.
In order to be considered bullying, the behavior must be aggressive and include:

• An Imbalance of Power: Kids who bully use their power—such as physical strength, access to embarrassing information, or popularity—to control or harm others. Power imbalances can change over time and in different situations, even if they involve the same people.
• Repetition: Bullying behaviors happen more than once or have the potential to happen more than once.

Bullying includes actions such as making threats, spreading rumors, attacking someone physically or verbally, and excluding someone from a group on purpose.

I learned that bullying is not just among school age children by experience.  I had a boss that was a bully so definitions are now expanding to include work place and other situations.   Two things became immediately apparent not all conflict is bullying and repetition with intent to harm was key to the definition. 

I especially appreciate the chart by Bosworth and Judkins:

Normal conflict                                      Bullying

Equal power; friends                             Imbalance of power; not friends
Occasional and accidental                     Repeated and purposeful
Equal emotional reaction                       Strong emotional reaction by target and
                                                                     often pleasure by the aggressor
Not seeking power or attention              Seeking power or control
Remorseful - takes responsibility           No remorse; blames target
Makes an effort to problem solve           No effort to problem solve

For the next while, I am sharing my exploration in understanding bullying.  My intent is to help me understand when a narcissistic uses bullying to control or harm.  I hope by this project I can wrap my mind around patterns that I saw in my life growing up. 

Taking it all in

Living is like tearing through a museum. Not until later do you really start absorbing what you saw, thinking about it, looking it up in a book, and remembering - because you can't take it in all at once. Audrey Hepburn

November is a month at the end of harvest in the northern hemisphere. Starting after Halloween with anticipation for Thanksgiving and the craziness of Black Friday.  So often this time of year is the start of my stress season and it doesn't abate until Valentines day.  I am hoping to tackle the month in a new way.  I am approaching this month with gratitude from the beginning.  I added a new page, over on the right under my list of pages labeled "Be Thankful."  A reminder to myself that I am in control of how I can choose to be thankful.  I am taking a little different approach.  I am adding one new thing each day of something I am grateful for.  Instead of planning ahead and listing things, people and events that I am thankful for, I am slowing down my mad dash through the holidays and choose one thing out of the day that I am thankful for.  I started on Nov. 1 with gratitude for Skype making face to face conversations with loved ones far away possible.  What a blessing this is for me since I am partially deaf and wear hearing aides.  The added video improves my ability to keep up on a conversation with loved ones far away.  Nov. 2 I am thankful for nurses. Friday was a field trip with high school nursing students to visit a local college with an excellent nursing program.  The day reminded me how incredibly important nurses are to the welfare of all medical patients.  Often unsung heroes that make a wonderful difference.  Several of the nurses that have taken care of me over the years I hope get bonuses in Heaven.  One of the videos we watched was put together by nurses on a pediatric cancer ward.  I watched these dedicated nurses share their view of the amazing patients in their care.  Tears were in my eyes when a bald headed 7 year-old cancer fighter declared, "That which does not kill you makes you stronger."  I polished off the day with my wonderful sister helping my daughter prepare for her wedding.  Nov 3.  I am thankful for my husband. DH knows I love taking pictures.  He arranged to take me to an area called Oak Creek Canyon where fall colors really happen.  Living in a desert I am accustomed to just a different shade of brown.  Fall colors were amazing.  I am posting this early morning so I won't add Nov. 4 until late evening.  I hope by slowing down to consider the blessings each day, I will change the Holiday season from one of stress and triggers to joy and fun.

I am inviting you, my readers, to post comments with the heading "thankful" or "gratitude" and I will add your blessing to the friend section of this new page, "Be Thankful".   

Connected

12. No Sense of Separation - Connect with all that is

http://www.purposefairy.com/6661/change-your-life-through-the-art-of-self-mastery/

PurposeFairy's last step through me for a loop. No separation, I thought of how hard I worked from being enmeshed. But the results of peace, joy and tranquility does not sound like the consequences of enmeshment.  Trying to think this through I considered my journey out of enmeshment with my FOO.  In order to survive enmeshment, I dissociated.  I put my emotions and opinion in cold storage and attempted to be the little girl they wanted me to be.  Counseling encouraged me to reconnect with my emotions and my thoughts.  Painful process, by the way.  Both counselors set me on a path to individuate (From Free Dictionary 2. To form into a separate, distinct entity.) I worked hard at separating myself.  I was not ready to have no sense of separation.  Then, I thought about NewCounselor explaining the process I went through.  He interlaced his fingers to demonstrate enmeshment.  Next, he pulled his two hands a part and making two separate fists for individuation.  Finally, he put his two fists together, each with individual boundaries but connected.  I saw with my eyes but couldn't quite grasp what he meant.  I came up with an image I understood....

Each flower in a bouquet is its own unique self, bunched together, and connected in a shared vase.

WYSIWYG Authentic living

11. Remove All your Masks

http://www.purposefairy.com/6661/change-your-life-through-the-art-of-self-mastery


In my opinion, the author was not raised by a narcissistic.  The last thing my narc parents wanted was for me to be myself.  They shaped and molded me.  My pedophile neighbor set out to destroy the essence of me.  KavinCoach finally succeeded in getting me white hot angry when he implied that the parts of myself were fake and where was my true self?  My separate personalities helped me to keep all emotion under powerful control and anger simply faded away.  I didn't think I had any masks.  The multiple me's gave the illusion of being 2 faced but the reality was one part of me was totally unaware and shielded from other parts.  To help illustrate this: WYSIWYG.  In the early ages of computers, a person would write text then write command line code created the information for how a print would look.  MS word still does not do WYSIWYG.  Just yesterday, a student was trying to print what they could see on the screen but what printed looked nothing like it.  The confusion I felt when I would watch my mother take on another mask when my father was around.  Tears would vanish, tone of voice would change, and conversation would abruptly alter like a mask coming down over reality.  I like Photoshop.  What-You-See-Is-What-You-Get if it prints out with a line in it, I can see it in the photograph on the monitor if I blow it up big enough.  Hiding behind a mask of politeness I learned to look a little closer when sarcasm or other passive /aggressive behaviors are present.  Look a little closer and behind their mask.  I was so accustomed to seeing someone else's mask I hadn't realized that I developed my own after integration.  Removing all your masks, taking the Red Pill, authentic living, being myself all phrases to step away from living the lies demanded by nparents to be an acceptable person.  I am not happy all the time.  I am not a reflection of their desire.  I am myself.  I like living my life that way.   I liked these quote:

"Be who you say you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter, don't mind." Dr. Seuss

Be your own kind of beautiful

Be-You-tiful

More "Be yourself quotes"  http://www.squidoo.com/be-yourself-quotes  

Mask to protect myself from flying debris.  Removing myself away from flying debris, I can remove the mask.

In this together

10. Let go of the thoughts of separation

http://www.purposefairy.com/6661/change-your-life-through-the-art-of-self-mastery/

"We are all in this together and it’s our responsibility to help one another grow and evolve, and “If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them.” Dalai Lama

This gave me plenty to think about.  One of the difficulties of depression is the overwhelming sense of isolation.  Alone in a dark cloud of hopelessness isolated in the world of deep depression I couldn't believe that anyone else felt as I did.  Counseling, healing and blogging taught me how interconnected everyone is, including me.  I was surprised by this since I felt what I did or did not do had little effect on those around me.  A few years ago, I learned how a brief encounter can have a profound affect.  I was walking through the grocery store when a young man approached me.  He started the conversation with, "You don't remember me..."  Good thing he started with that because I didn't remember him.  He went on to explain that in 8th grade he listened to me for 15 minutes on how to plan to become a computer animator on a career day.  I suggested to the students ways to plan high school classes and what they would need to do to be ready to enter an animation program in college.  He did as I suggested; he took the time to thank me because he was now in a college level animation course.  What I recommended helped him reach his goal.  I was stunned that 15 minutes of my time had such an impact.  I learned to be more careful as to what I say in 15 minutes.

I see you....