Whether it's a pushy person, a control freak, a bully, or an outright tyrant, the problem is the same: their goals and personal needs are always more important than yours. If it’s in a group setting there can be that one person who insists on making themselves the center of attention, taking time, energy and resources from the rest of the group without a clue of the vampirism and destruction they create. A difficult, pushy person has gone too far again pushing your boundaries to the edge, as you feel exhausted from their pushy demands upon you. They are attempting to boss you around, acting selfish and self-important, threatening you, making demands, barking orders, and potentially abusing their power. Control freaks, narcissists, emotional manipulators, impulsive people, and tyrants exercise their will power in a harsh, cruel, or destructive manner. They are oppressive, harsh, arbitrary people who make life difficult for too many of us. They are superimposing, inconsiderate, exhausting and demeaning even when one is skilled at being neutral. What are they thinking? How can we respond constructively?
First it is important to understand that control-oriented people as described here expect to control and/or manipulate the people and events around them. Exposing or challenging their tactics could provoke their anger and result in severe and possibly dangerous retaliation. Expect to be a target of their backlash. Protect yourself and others who could become targets before challenging a control-oriented or manipulative person. By understanding negative ego pathology rampant in our world today, one can be better informed to identify mental and emotional imbalances, that can result in behaviors across the gamut of egotism, narcissism and full blown psychopathy.
The more disconnected from the inner core and spirit, the more pathological, fragmented and destructive the thoughtforms and behaviors are exhibited in that person. When a person is severely fragmented mentally and emotionally, their lack of self (centered core) will exacerbate their lack of self-esteem. In many cases to make up for their lack of self-esteem, the person’s negative ego will create a defense mechanism which vacillates in the negative ego identities of the tyrant –bully – victim. This is especially amplified now as the Fallen Angelic and other material forces cross the threshold into the 3D earth plane, these collective forces are very volatile, chaotic and fragmented. Many people are psycho-emotionally influenced as a psychic sponge when these chaotic forces are more interspersed within the 3D realm during this time. This creates a collective field of chaos with many egotistic and difficult people, control freaks, imperative people, and bullies attempting to regain their control as they are pushing us around during our day-to-day encounters.
A profile of an egotistic control freak is a person that will go out of their way to turn every encounter into a dominance contest and often insist on getting the last word. They insist you do it their way, dominating so many trivial issues as well as the more important ones. If you do not succumb to their dominance contest then they resort to complex hidden deceptions as a form of manipulation to get what they want. As an example going out to dinner with a control freak can easily become an ordeal. Choosing the restaurant, deciding where to sit, what to order, what fork to use, how much to tip, how long to stay, who pays, how to pay, and what to do next all has to be done their way. Tyrants, dictators, despots, autocrats, authoritarians, imperialists, fascists, Czars, Nazis, and monarchs practice their tyranny, totalitarianism, absolute rule, and domination on a larger and more destructive scale in the collective consciousness.
The conceit of egotism describes a person who acts to gain values in an amount excessively greater than that which he or she gives to others. Egotism may be fulfilled by exploiting the sympathy, irrationality or ignorance of others, as well as utilizing coercive force and/or fraud. The egotist has an overwhelming sense of the centrality of the 'Me': of their personal qualities.
The purpose of promoting societal acceptance to levels to egotism and narcissism as a positive traits, is purposed to maintain low moral character, low self-esteem, and unethical standards as acceptable characteristic behavior in human beings. When this low moral character is accepted in society and reinforced by people around us, we are desensitized to what is being unconsciously shaped as a value system that we give to ourselves. Unconsciously we may promote these values to people around us, which becomes a self-enforced enslaving reality that spreads like a viral infection. This is an Archontic Deception (AD) Strategy to generate weak moral character through promoting narcissistic and psychopathic behavior which is easily used to enforce principles of control and Tyranny. When we are informed to be able to see this strategy working, both in our personal life and in the macrocosm, we can stop feeding into it and we can change its course of direction.
Without this larger understanding and bigger picture, we may inadvertently from our own confusion, be easily misled by the controlling and manipulative behaviors of very broken or sick minded people. Many controlling people are also very deceptive and manipulative in their strategies to get what they want at any cost. While we may hold compassionate witness and unconditional love towards the person who exhibits these behaviors, this does not mean we should allow them to run their manipulations and dramas into our life. For this we must set strong and clear boundaries.
To maintain our center, we will need to both understand the pathology of narcissism and how to better strengthen our own boundaries to stay connected to our spiritual path and inner source, when we are aggressively confronted by narcissistic people.
First, let’s review the profile of narcissistic behavior in the people around you, or maybe even one’s own tendencies which must be corrected back into right thinking and behaving. (See GSF Behaviors)
Narcissism is used to describe the pursuit of gratification from vanity, or egotistic admiration of one's own physical or mental attributes, that derive from arrogant pride.
The Seven Deadly Sins of Narcissism:
Shamelessness: Shame is the feeling that lurks beneath all unhealthy narcissism and the inability to process shame in healthy ways.
Magical thinking: Narcissists may see themselves as perfect, using distortion and illusion known as magical thinking. They also use projection to dump shame onto others.
Arrogance: A narcissist who is feeling deflated may reinflate by diminishing, debasing, or degrading somebody else.
Envy: A narcissist may secure a sense of superiority in the face of another person's ability by using contempt to minimize the other person.
Entitlement: Narcissists hold unreasonable expectations of particularly favorable treatment and automatic compliance because they consider themselves special. Failure to comply is considered an attack on their superiority, and the perpetrator is considered an "awkward" or "difficult" person. Defiance of their will is a narcissistic injury that can trigger narcissistic rage.
Exploitation: Can take many forms but always involves the exploitation of others without regard for their feelings or interests. Often the other is in a subservient position where resistance would be difficult or even impossible. Sometimes the subservience is not so much real as assumed.
Bad boundaries: Narcissists do not recognize that they have boundaries and that others are separate and are not extensions of themselves. Others either exist to meet their needs or may as well not exist at all. Those who provide narcissistic supply to the narcissist are treated as if they are part of the narcissist and are expected to live up to those expectations. In the mind of a narcissist there is no boundary between self and other.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism
One of the most important features to remember about egotists, narcissists and psychopaths is that they are people that do not recognize boundaries nor respect them in others. To these people, (whom are generally controlled by something outside of themselves) others exist to meet their needs and live up to their personal projections and expectations.
So when in the presence of a narcissistic personality it will be up to the individual to be responsible to maintain personal boundaries and to enforce those boundaries appropriately. This may be the time to explore how to set, maintain and enforce healthy and strong boundaries to feel more centered when confronting narcissistic or manipulative people, along with the vast quantities of chaos in the environment.
To maintain healthy boundaries to feel more centered, these three steps will be a good start:
1. Check your personal dashboard and energy reserves.
Think about how you feel when you’re around a person who drains you and pushes buttons to upset you, someone with whom you feel you may easily lose your center. Sometimes this happens when people are controlling, pushy or demanding of our time and energy. How does this feel in your body? How does it feel in your mind? How does the presence of this person affect you?
Now look at this list of feelings and sensations you’ve made, and imagine that your body is like a car, with a dashboard full of warning lights.
You’ve just identified what I like to call the “check engine light” for your personal boundary system. It’s a security system warning that your personal energy field has been breached, and you’re letting in stuff that isn’t yours.
This is really important. When our boundaries are weak, unguarded, or unclear, we let in all sorts of debris that isn’t actually our debris, and we give away our own personal energy unconsciously. This essentially defines the emotional vampire relationship that is created from imbalanced energy exchanges between the parties involved.
This sensation of feeling drained and depleted may mean that one is dealing with a breach of our energetic security system and a leak of our own personal energy that is feeding into someone or something else. When you detect this kind of energy vampirism, one is looking at warning signs indicating that some inner work needs to be done, cords need to be cut, some boundaries need to be shored up, and one needs to take steps to return back into one’s spiritual center. This is the main purpose of the 12D shield exercise to help maintain personal energies and personal boundaries, especially when facing an person or environment that is using dominating and controlling strategies. This is our act of personal responsibility to maintain healthy boundaries and to exert our right to have them, even when narcissistic people may tell you otherwise.
2. Grounding oneself as preparation for maintaining strong inner core and healthy boundaries.
Grounding oneself is similar as the way a tree sinks her roots deeply in the earth to stay secure in a storm. It’s the first tool in creating healthy boundaries. Finding the inner stillness is what allows peace to nurture the inner connection within ourselves, finding our centers or spiritual core.
Our grounding root system is both our anchor and supports the maintenance of a strong boundary system. It keeps us from being blown about in other people’s winds. We must learn to better compassionately witness other people’s emotional dramas without allowing their pain and chaos to impact our own energies or direction. Learning to identify escalating emotional dramas and narcissistic behavior gives us a way to disengage from the external chaos from impacting us. Thus we are inwardly focused and become still within in order to connect with our heart and access our deeper intuition. This is the process that keeps one steady, inner connected and focused.
Finding the inner core to ground oneself with strong boundaries can happen in many ways. Here in ES we suggest acclimating to a daily exercise of the 12 D Shield and working the tools of the ES Core Triad as a dedicated practice. Here are some other ideas:
Meditating
Saying a prayer, setting positive intentions, or mantra in the shower in the morning
Offering a blessing over your morning meal or beverage
Chanting or repeating positive affirmations in your head as you walk to work or school
Try different ways—you’ll find the one that works for you!
3. Take notice of the people and places that tend to drain you. Find the neutrality in that situation by intending to connect with the inner compassionate witness. Just observe without judgment or reaction. Do not engage, yet, set appropriate boundaries.
Before entering those places or exposing yourself to people whom you have had draining or vampiric sensations, take a few minutes to fortify and amplify your personal 12 D shield. Think of it as your inner energy space that will only allow love and positivity inside it, deflecting anything else. Focus on the Spirits of Christos as being inside your shield and personal space protecting you and guiding you. Really see it and really feel the force of it around you. Then recognize what action or non-action you are required to be responsible to maintain that peaceful inner space by setting boundaries.
These three steps will help one to create and maintain healthy boundaries. Building boundaries is like any muscle or spiritual practice, the more consistently one works with building healthy boundaries, the better it will serve you.
Blessings, Lisa
(Source adapted from the Assessing Trustworthiness section, psychologytoday.com, emotionalcompetency.org and thank yous to the blog at http://tinybuddha.com/blog/how-to-set-healthy-boundaries-3-crucial-first-steps)