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You may find the possibility that narcissists and co-dependents share similarities an offensive concept.

But I can assure you that there is something much deeper going on as to why co-dependents and narcissists attract.

It’s a hard pill to swallow I know … this may even trigger you, yet … give me a chance to explain because this knowledge will give you so much clarity.

It will allow you to move another step closer to ending the cycle of abuse and dissatisfying relationships in your life forever.

Myself, and thousands of narcissistically abused members of this community, have stepped into our Thriver lives by deeply understanding the similarities that create powerful binds with our tormentors.

And the truths you’re going to learn in today’s Thriver TV episode are not about blaming and shaming, they’re about granting you the ability to take your power back. We all need to take our power back so join me in today’s video or read the transcript so you can take this step towards your liberation now.

 

 

Video Transcript

Today, I’m going to talk about the similarities that bring narcissists and co-dependents together. The narcissistic co-dependent marriage is the one made in hell. We’re going to talk about what it is and why they’re so drawn to each other.

Now, I know you may be offended by me saying that narcissists and co-dependents have very strong similarities, because so much of the public and many experts and therapists believe that it’s the differences between narcissists and their targets, which bring them together. But I’m going to argue this point.

Now, I know you may not even like the term co-dependent, but hang in there, because I dearly hope that you’re going to learn something really powerful today, which could change everything for you. A little later in this video, I’m going to grant you my true belief of what being a co-dependent really means.

Now, you may already be triggered. Before you get upset with me, because I’m going to be talking about our similarities with narcissists that create powerful binds, please know in no way am I saying that you’re a bad person like a narcissist, not at all. You’re going to need to watch this so that you fully understand what I’m talking about.

On the surface, the theory that opposites attract appears to be 100% accurate. Narcissists like to take. Their victims like to give. Narcissists have no conscience and they take in really good hearted people. But this is only a tiny part of the truth. It’s only looking at the surface.

There is something much deeper going on as to why co-dependents and narcissists attract. In this video, I’m going to explain why it’s not our differences, but it’s actually our similarities that bring us together.

By understanding this vital concept, you’re going to be able to identify the parts of yourself that unconsciously are making you a target for a narcissist. You’re going to move another step closer to ending the cycle of abuse and dissatisfying relationships in your life forever.

The truth you’re going to learn today is not about blaming and shaming, it’s actually about granting you the ability to take your power back.

Let’s start off by looking at the narcissistic side of the coin. Let’s call this the dark side of the coin. And then after we do this, we’re going to look at the other side of the coin, the light side of the coin, and bear with me with these explanations because they’re very important frameworks for where we’re going.

 

The Narcissistic Side Of The Coin

Narcissists are amoral. They do pathological things in order to secure narcissistic supply, which is attention and energy. Now, they know they do this. That’s why they’re amoral. They know they’re doing the wrong thing.

According to the narcissist, the means justifies the end results. It gets them the payoff that they want. A narcissist already knows they’re bad. At a deep inner level, there is an intense self-loathing and self-rejection.

If an individual essentially believes they’re a bad person, that’s exactly how they’re going to behave. And then the trick is to try to hide that from the world so as not to be punished, rejected or abandoned because of being defective and unlovable and unacceptable whilst trying to get their needs met.

This is a narcissistic formula, “I am not acceptable as being me – I’m bad.” That’s actually what they really feel about themselves on an inner level. And, “My life doesn’t work for me being myself. Therefore, I need to be someone else.”

So this is the malignant killing off, or at least completely abandoning, the narcissist’s Inner Being and placing a fictitious character in its place, which is the version of themselves that they want to be. This creates an even more distorted and twisted life view of not only Self, but of others as well.

You need to understand this – the narcissist can’t create any real relationship with his or her False Self, their Inner Being, because it’s not real. The only relationship the narcissist could ever have with him or herself is with that true Inner Being, and it’s not there. It’s been killed off. It’s been rejected. It’s been replaced. It’s obsolete. It’s frightful but true.

Now you can understand why the narcissist chases energy from outside him or herself so desperately because there’s no real Inner Energy in there. Because the narcissist doesn’t have a healthy relationship with Self, there’s no Self to have a relationship with. There’s no ability to trust anybody else either – people relate to others the way they relate to themselves.

For this reason, narcissists feel terribly vulnerable and they feel really susceptible to being controlled by others. If they’re forced to operate like a decent, honest person, they feel incredibly unsafe and terribly inferior. They feel like everybody else, which is going to cause him or her to not be able to have the vital upper hand that they feel they need to have. They need to be above the game. They need to be in control. The narcissistic motto is, “If I operate within decency and teamwork and cooperation, you’re going to destroy me.”

So therefore, to summarize, hang in there, because this is really important. On the narcissistic dark side of the coin, we have the character defect of purposeful – they know they’re doing it – purposeful pathological behavior in order to get their needs met and they don’t have remorse about it. They don’t have a conscience about it. They feel they have to do it and they do it. So you’ve got that part of it.

 

The Light Side Of The Coin

Now, let’s look at the co-dependent side of the coin. We’re going to call this the light side of the coin.

Co-dependents don’t roll like narcissists. Co-dependents do have a conscience. They have a moral compass and in their normal operations, they’re dismayed with the feelings or the guilt of, “I’ve done the wrong thing.”

Co-dependents can fess up. They can be remorseful. They can take responsibility. A co-dependent will naturally gravitate towards the truth when possible, because they just know it’s the most healthy place to operate from and it feels right.

A co-dependent is going to feel really knocked around when they’re not operating in the truth. So when you feel like you’re acting like a narcissist or you’re out of integrity, it feels shocking. You really don’t like being like this. So he or she feels like – when they’re not being honest – they feel really unstable and it’s just a horrible place to be.

Co-dependents absolutely have times of insecurity, fear and self-doubt, and they can really feel terrible as a result of external events. But fundamentally, at their core is the desire to be a good person and know that being good is the most healthy way to be.

The co-dependent may judge and criticize and be hard on his or her Inner Being, asking, “Why am I like this? Why am I so defective? Why am I unlovable? You’re no good and all this.” But they have not fully discarded or killed off their Inner Being and replaced it with some fictitious pathological character. The Inner Self still exists, and the co-dependent does have access to a connection with it and does have the ability to heal it, if the effort is taken to do so.

In summary, the co-dependent side of the coin is this ­– they possess a conscience and they want to operate within humanity as a good person. So they want the teamwork and the unity and the dark side of the coin is, “I don’t want that and I have to position myself in a way to stay out of that to get my needs met.”

Now that we’ve examined both surfaces of the coin, which do seem different, we need to deeply go into the actual coin itself, the similarities, and the glue that has brought both sides of the coin together. But before I do, let’s touch on my definition of a co-dependent, because this is going to grant you a much bigger picture meaning of co-dependent than the old definitions, which were kind of like, “Well, you grew up in a substance abuse family and that meant that you had trauma and you’re co-dependent.”

I believe it’s so much more than that. Also it’s going to help you understand what’s really going on within the coin – the foundation.

 

What Is Co-dependency Really?

Co-dependency is this: trying to source Self from outside of Self.

When we look at the human model, we can understand that the entire world is co-dependent to varying degrees and absolutely as children we were co-dependent because we needed love, approval, survival, and security from our parents. We were really co-dependent and hopefully we grow and heal beyond that.

Every person on the planet, before raising their consciousness, is living the egoic mind illusion that we’re only lovable and worthy for what we’re doing and what we have from the outside, instead of who we are on the inside.

The more ingrained this solution is within us, the more separation we suffer from our essential True Selves, which is the truth that we are connected to and we are adored unconditionally by True Source, which is Source, life, God, consciousness, energy, love, whatever your understanding of a higher power and the field of Life Force is – knowing that we are supported and we are connected to that simply because we exist, because we already are that.

So the ego does everything it can to keep you away from that truth. Because in that truth, the ego, the pain body, exists if you separate it from the truth. In that truth, it can’t exist. Until we know that connection to Source, life, God, we can’t accept our own basic goodness, worthiness or wholesomeness and we can’t truly love and accept ourselves unconditionally, because we exist.

Everything that hurts comes from the illusion of separation. So living this human illusion is co-dependency. It means that we feel separated, we’re on our own, we’re not lovable. We’re not approved of. We don’t have security. We don’t have survival. We’re always trying to find it from outside of ourselves. That separation illusion has nothing to do with whether or not you’re a good person with morals. There are bad and good people living this illusion.

Now, I want you to think about this. Narcissists, sociopaths and psychopaths are an enormous manifestation of humans. Maybe they’re not human people – not knowing that Source, life, God loves them and accepts them unconditionally. They’re not at peace. They don’t have inner wholeness and solidness. They’re in perpetual trauma and anxiety. Hence, the horrific need to try and gain a sense of self through desperate and horrifying means from outside of themselves. Narcissists are monstrously co-dependent.

The real truth of this is none of us can have a relationship with ourselves, life and others that is healthy, fulfilling, and wholesome until we clean up the only true relationship, which is a relationship we’re having with our Inner Being connected to Source / life / God. This gives us the ability to self-soothe and be whole, be at peace and be self-generative, because all of our relationships come from how healthy that relationship is or isn’t established.

So again, simply put, co-dependency is the state of trying to source ourselves from outside of ourselves. It’s trying to create relationships to substitute the only true relationship that really exists and experiencing the painful self-defeating results of that. It truly is like trying to tape sandwiches onto yourself to satiate your hunger. It just doesn’t work.

 

The Coin Itself

Now finally, with that groundwork, we’re ready to investigate the coin. Let’s have a look at the coin itself.

There is a truth I know about people who heal from narcissistic abuse. It was true for myself and it’s been true for every real recovery I’ve seen over the last 14 or so years amongst thousands of people. Healing our wounds, up leveling our life and expanding into new realities that work requires 100% radical personal responsibility.

Keep with me. Now we know the narcissist abusive part. We know that they’re awful, that they’re conscienceless and they do horrific things to try to control people and they hurt people. We know that. We have no power over that, no responsibility for that.

When we keep our focus on the narcissist part, it separates us from focusing on healing, evolving and expanding ourselves back to True Source. So if we were to go back to the common belief amongst the majority of the population regarding the victim model, that abusers are the baddies, that we’re the good people, and it was a senseless act that caused us to be victimized, where on earth is the evolution, growth and healing in that for us? There is none. In fact, it’s impossible.

Because the best that we’re ever going to extract from that is people’s empathy, which again is like a bottomless pit. It’s like taping on the sandwiches and we never get fulfilled. And we’re stuck with the label of being a survivor of abuse. We could join groups and connect with other victims who understand what we’ve been through and that keeps our story of victimization going without ever feeling durably free of the painful story. We’re trying to share the story, but it’s not purging the pain. It actually keeps reinforcing it, that we’re a victim, that they did this to us and that we’re a victim.

We are a powerless victim of what happened to us. Then we hope from that point, we really do, that something’s going to come into our life that can fix it for us one day. Maybe there’s going to be a lucky break from the outside to take away the wounds and give us relief and wholeness.

And you think, maybe somebody’s going to come into my life that’s going to fix it and it doesn’t work, because we are still trying to rely on some sort of repair from outside of ourselves. We’re still stuck in the co-dependent model and we hope and we pray that that’s going to come, but it doesn’t, because nobody’s coming from the outside to give us our inside, to give us our true connection with Source.

Or we could take 100% personal responsibility by turning inwards, self-partnering with love and we heal ourselves back to wholeness. We release the trauma, we bring in true Source, and then we can claim the glorious gift and joy of expansion and evolution.

We can work hard at claiming and releasing what was in us, what were the traumas to open up to our true connection with Source / life / God, which is our natural state without our traumas. When we do that, we leave way, way behind being a victim and being co-dependent on getting something from the outside and we shift from being powerless into powerful, which is filled with Source.

What we’ve been playing out as the coin, the similarity, is that emptiness. I’m going to go into some real reasons below that make us have those similarities with narcissists. Before I do that, I want you to breathe deeply, relax your shoulders, open your body, and don’t go into resistance … to be able to really take this on.

So what is the coin? What is the similarity? What is the foundation of the attraction of like attracts like, at the powerful, subconscious true level?

It’s a disconnection from sourcing life from true Source – it’s the separation, pain, fear, anxiety and the painful energy. It’s the trauma that’s created the bond, because this completely matches the trauma of the narcissist’s disconnection.

The only difference is that the co-dependent is dealing with it differently than the narcissist. The co-dependent is saying, “I will try to love you and give to you what you need so that you will give me love, approval, survival, and security.”

Whereas the narcissist is saying, “I’m going to control you and manipulate you to get you to give me what I want (which is narcissistic supply) and the significance to allow me to know that I exist.” Because that’s what an ego run amok does.

Additionally, because co-dependents are not sourcing Self authentically through true Source, they show up in life, as we all did and I did, in ways that make us easily fall prey to narcissists. Co-dependents struggle with self-love and self-acceptance. They believe that their worthiness has to be earned.

Narcissists love that because you’re going to jump through the hoops and give them more and more and more to try to make it right with them. Co-dependents are over functioning and often obsessive, “I should be doing this or that.” They’re terrified about not doing what is expected of them and not pulling their weight and not holding up their end of the bargain. We over give. We over function. Narcissists easily steer co-dependents in handing over effort, loyalty, attention, and resources because of these weak spots.

Additionally, co-dependents seek approval from others in order to feel whole, rather than knowing their own wholeness. This is why they don’t lay effective boundaries on limits. Co-dependents would rather keep the peace than risk losing somebody who they believe is helping them feel whole.

Narcissists come in as the answer to the “wholeness” because codependence was our normal. We feel anxiety and we feel like we’re always hyper vigilant and waiting for the other shoe to drop … and there’s more that we have to do – I’ve got to dot my I’s and I’ve got to cross my T’s. We have this anxiety all the time, and we’ve wanted to feel at peace and whole and safe.

Narcissists show up in our life pretending to be all of that – everything we’ve always wanted to feel safe. The narcissist knows how to identify those gaps and pretend to be the savior of them and then what happens is the narcissist comes in, starts testing the waters, pushing limits and boundaries, and discovers how he or she can easily cave in the co-dependents boundaries, which is the struggle to say no, honor self and leave.

 

Co-dependents Focus On Other People’s Needs

This point is so interesting. Co-dependents opt to focus on other people’s needs and overlook the importance of healing themselves and taking full responsibility for their own existing wounds and gaps.

As a co-dependent, we can be pretty righteous, “I’m a really good person and you’re bad. And it’s all because of you. And I don’t want to go within. I don’t want to look within.” Rather than going in to love and evolve inner wounding, co-dependents often check out. I used to do it all the time. Making everything and everybody else more important is a classic form of codependence self-avoidance.

Now, here it is, this completely matches the narcissist’s terminal self-avoidance. A narcissist is not going to turn in and take responsibility for their wounds because they don’t believe there’s anything wrong with themselves and they have completely divorced that Inner Being. They want nothing to do with it. That’s why narcissists don’t change.

So if we stay stuck in our codependence, this means like the narcissist that we’re not conscious, we’re not waking up out of the trance, the trance is this, “It’s happening to me outside of me, and I’m going to fix it outside of me. I’m going to try and change and monitor and lecture and prescribe and control.”

Codependents can be very controlling as well, and we can hide it in a sense of “I’m doing the right thing by you,” but it’s a lack of self-awareness, self-development and it’s a lack of the understanding of Quantum healing. That if I’m going to change my life, I have to change what’s going on inside of myself.

The co-dependent struggles to take responsibility for his or her inner wounds. Then of course, what option is there left other than to point the finger and blame and shame. And it’s so easy to righteously declare that the narcissist is bad, crazy, and abusive, and that the co-dependent is a good person and the victim.

We have a toxic relationship, dancing a painful destructive dance on this same coin – blame, shame, pain, no consciousness, and no growth. Both parties are trying to force that person into another version of themselves in order to get something.

I hope you made it this far. I hope you held your heart open enough to feel and hear this truth. I hope you are connecting to what you really need to do to get well and how incredible your life can be when you do evolve out of this trance.

This liberation is about turning inside to heal and transforming yourself back to a true relationship with true Source and yourself. Then you will never be asleep and unconscious connected to a False Self again, because of trying to seek Self from outside of Self.

 

In Conclusion

Years ago, when I first wrote about this topic (there’s a full article I did on exactly this) so many of you related to it powerfully, and I would love to hear from you again, if you understand what I’m talking about with this video.

Can you see it now, the glue that has stuck you together with a narcissist? Do you feel that there is a way out of this by understanding a truth that can set you free? I’m going to put a link up with this video and that is to my free webinar. Because I explain this so much deeper, our unconscious wounds that have tied us into this toxic bind about the coin and how to truly break free from it.

I also grant you a free Quanta Freedom Healing™ in the webinar that is going to start undoing those binds and returning you back to your power and true source, but you have to start feeling it at a deep level to understand it. It’s going to help you a lot.

So check out that link. If you can’t get to the webinar in person, you can do it as a recorded version at any time that you want. I highly, highly recommend it to start setting you free.

I’m looking forward to your comments and your questions. Make sure you like and share this video with somebody who you know it could help.

 

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53 thoughts on “The Narcissist And Co-dependent – Two Sides Of The Same Coin (Updated 2021)

  1. Amazing subject and perfectly explained, thanks again.
    Left my narcissist in 2018 after 20 years due to watching Melanie and helped me all the way through to recovery, accurate every step of the way.
    I’m just closing each side of the box 1 by 1 until its sealed and disposed of….important life lessons and especially now I’m aware its seems to be a NPD pandemic.
    Thanks for the information and help to change my life Melanie, all the best🙏🏾😁

      1. I’ve been asking myself what I did to ruin this relationship because I never once failed to agree with him on anything. I did the things he liked to do, watched the programs he liked and read the books he found interesting and never once let him know that I didn’t really find them interesting. It didn’t make any difference and he became cruel and disrespectful. I couldn’t understand why! When I read this I gasped! I have been a total codependent and hid my own true feelings lest I appear less than perfect in his eyes. I obviously have a lot to think about but this has certainly hit me between the eyes.

    1. Thank you for this guidance… it really hit home when you said that codependent people try to change the other person into a different version so that they can get their needs met… I left my ex three years ago… but every time I meet someone new I fall into the same situation.. trying to change the other person… I’m getting better at getting myself out of these situations… realising quickly what I’m doing… but obviously I haven’t resolved the core problem or otherwise I wouldn’t keep attracting the same kind of person again and again

  2. Hi Melanie,
    A number of years ago, before I started exploring narcissism and discovered NARP, a therapist who was helping me with my personal PTSD, mostly as a result of trauma I went through in the military, asked me who do I place first in terms of care, self or otherwise…. I told her that I felt it was important to be concerned with others, including my wife and my children first, and then me secondly. She, point blank, told me “than you’re not taking care of yourself”…. she tried to explain to me how I can do both and not lose ground in terms of my own healing…. I didn’t understand it then. After listening to and reading everything you had to say today I might be finally “getting” what she meant that day! 🙏🙏Co dependency, as you talked about today, and doing “selfish” inner work has always been a conflicting subject for me. 🤔
    I hope I’m making sense here, Melanie! I do understand that it’s necessary to do the inner work but if we shut ourselves off to others what is the point of the inner work if it only validates me or helps me?
    I’ve been plagued by this question many times…. I can’t think of a particular module to use for a question like this. Maybe someone has an idea out there. I would certainly appreciate the help.
    thank you Melanie for this topic today, even though it’s a bit unsettling….Lots of love and lots of appreciation for everything that you are doing! ❤️🦋❤️

    1. It’s the same as you’re instructed to do in an emergency on a plane… “Put YOUR mask on FIRST. Then put the mask on your child.” It’s that simple, but not easy until you “get it”.

        1. I love the topic today! It’s funny but I talked with my therapist yesterday about the topic of codependency, and today Melanie came out with this amazing video. I had to stop the video mid-point and I cried. It truly hit home for me. It’s so hard to believe that I have been looking for someone to validate who I am and seek approval from outside of myself. I realize I have been detached for a long time from my True Self and Source. I am so ready to do this work just to feel whole and know who I really am again. If I’m not whole and connected to Source and my True Self then what can I possibly bring to other relationships. I have been working on my connection again with Source (God) and I have been reading my daily devotions book, Jesus Calling. It brings me so much peace and understanding.
          Thank You Melanie
          I think you are wonderful!

    2. Hi, When you go inside to heal yourself you’re not shutting yourself off from your loved ones. You are adding taking care of yourself. You still take care of them too. :). And it is like they always tell people in an airplane. Put the oxygen mask on yourself first or no one will be safe. Xo

    3. Think of being on an airplane. The masks drop from the ceiling. Place a mask over your own face first, then assist others, is the instruction we receive.

      Taking care of yourself is the first priority. It gives you more energy and a clearer perspective to share a higher quality of personal energy to share with others.

      Plus, I’m sure you are a fascinating person that you will enjoy getting to know better.

      Take good care.

      1. Thank you Amy! Each time I got to read one of the comments from today I was more assured that putting “the mask on first” is what I need to do….. thank you, all of you, for your input….💞

    4. I get what you mean about seeing inner work as translating as being “selfish” and “but if we shut ourselves off to others what is the point of the inner work if it only validates me or helps me? What you said is the self-doubt and fear that had been implanted by others/experiences that disrespected our boundaries, opinions, choices we have made! Yes, I have been stuck at this same place again and again. I get guilt and confused. But I am working through it! Yes do the HARD self work! Find the REAL me and have a real life. I want real people and relationships that fit me and I fit them. I am done Fixing. For me I am grieving the past and trying to stop the “what if’s”. This is helping me move forward.

    5. Hi. I found it useful to reflect on the advice at Matthew 22:37-39. Note the order of things. First: Love Source Second: Love Others AS Yourself (note: not MORE THAN yourself)

    6. If everyone took great care of themselves, it would put therapists out of work and solve most problems. Then, we would each share our healthy, authentic, satisfied, developed, well cared for self with each other. Bliss! Codependents get in other people’s way, too, by caretaking. We over function, over help, intrude, shortchanging others’ chances for healthy self development. I was in Alanon years ago. Alanon is for the codependents in an alcoholic relationship. i got it where my husband needed to make amends and do the Twelve Steps. But I couldn’t see how that applied to ME. i only did good and helpful things for everyone day in and out. Little Miss Perfect. Then by listening to others in my group, I realized. I was doing other people’s work for them. I was neglecting my own work on myself. i was keeping other people stuck and me too. So I went and apologized to my husband and my children and a brother I’d been ‘rescuing’. I told them I was sorry for getting in their way, doing things it was their responsibility to do for themselves so they could grow and develop as strong people. And I put my focus on myself and what I needed to do to develop my own character and personality and gifts and talents and intersts. So simple, really. A friend taught me to say when tempted to rescue one of the three follwoing things: “It’s up to you. You’ll figure it out. Go for it.” Also, Alanon has the ‘three C’s’ to help codependents disengage from unhelpful rescuing: ‘You didn’t cause it. You can’t cure it. You can’t control it.’ Be well.

      1. Hi Shirley.Your input into these replies was very deep and helpful.It opened my own eyes to a lot about my own situation.Thank you.

  3. Melanie, I have followed you for some time and this article with the narcissist and co-dependent is so true. While I’ve done a good bit of self work, my circumstances today are leading me to this next step. I’ve paid the price and believe this is my time to finally and hopefully heal and move forward but that will also come at a possible cost of having to give up the little remaining and completely start anew.

  4. I always said my parents had a marriage “Made in hell”! Dad was the psychopath, Mom was the codependent. Both struggling to make the other what they wanted them to be. Verbal fights for 60+ years. It was a sick, symbiotic relationship. An example of how to not be, how to not live. I once dabbled with a man very much like my father. Dumped him within 2 years of our first meeting. I’m happy on my own, with enforced boundaries and friends who want to learn and grow. Your material has supported my healing and growth, and it never grows old. Keep up the great work, Mel. Millions need this! Cheers…

  5. You continue to blow me away with your insight. I especially valued the perspective that most of the world is in a state of codependency. I have always felt the paper thin difference between our wounding and the narcissist’s. Source brought us in to all of this for a very important reason. This has been shown to me in many different dreams and Melanie has talked about this many times. It may be hard to see depending on where each person is at, but God is healing us through these experiences. Or we at least are being given the golden opportunity to heal and progress along our spiritual journeys if we do this work.

  6. This was so spot on that I feel thunderstruck by listening to it. It has helped me put my finger on something that has been holding me back—the narcissist annihilated my trust & belief in God. I can see how deeply I have gone my own way and rejected both the narc and the version of God that was in our life. But now HOW do I build a new, trusted relationship with a God, Source, life that I’ve never known in truth?

    1. Hi Nancy, I thought I’d share this…A few years ago and in the process of exiting from a truly awful narcissistic relationship, I was gifted the use of an unwanted allotment – it was literally an old car and unwanted fridge cemetary at the time, plus the debris dumped by the people who built the houses in the surrounding terraces at least a hundred years ago. I had done most of the clearing and started on repairing the land itself before beginning to plant my veg and was sitting watching the sun going down.Then wham…I literally became one with nature. I’ve always loved nature – trees and flowers and stuff – but as a thing to look at. Something outside of myself. But that evening, here I was, and no longer seeing it as something outside of myself. All I can say is that I realised I was ‘of it’. It was a passing moment and it isnt something I feel in the same way every day, but I know it nevertheless because I’ve felt it that once and I think it was a life changing moment. I imagine we each have to find our own way to that feeling of connection – but I recommend being amongst trees and plants – increasingly research is evidencing how this supports mental wellbeing – I increasingly find myself falling in love with the world around me – quite nice feeling!

  7. Hi, Melanie
    Thank You for the clarity and the light that you have shed in covering “both-sides-of-the-coin In this informative video. I liken the clarity, wisdom and knowledge gained from this video to adjusting a zoom lens on a camera, identifying the subject matter, then, slowly making the right adjustments till everything is on point which ultimately becomes the snap-shop of the end result. I am just now beginning to feel the inner peace within me since the start of my healing process after ten years of not knowing what’s really been going on. Truly a grueling and challenging life lesson to have learned to have actually lived and been with a narcissist, nonetheless, yet, the outcome is a bitter sweet awakening!
    You’ve been a genuine blessing to me along my journey
    Sending Love & light your way; Always!💞

  8. Thank you for such a well written article. I never identified as a co-dependent until I read this. This explains so many of my relationships. I always put in so much effort with so little return. These are my new words to live by. I have been a faithful follower for the last couple of years. I see that I still have so much work to do.

  9. Great Post Melanie,
    Very insightful and I did not get triggered by the blog post at all it actually spoke even louder to me about my own ‘side of the coin’. My ego has kept me safe for most of my life in the primal mind as a defense because I came from much childhood abuse and trauma and even though I have connected the dots logically and get why I experienced horrific narcissistic abuse, it’s just simply not enough to heal it. I cognitively know that my defenses actually have been allowing more abuse into my life and have read every book under the sun on trauma and how the body remembers flight, freeze, and flight, etc…I could even start my own youtube channel because the mind needs to know to heal right? I have beliefs of feeling bad for my own behaviors but as a result of abuse, it’s just what battlefield you are on. I had it playout through my childhood with different family members ranging from all kinds of abuse and shame and I now know I don’t need to understand all of this information……..more self-avoidance more caregiving and get this I am a full time carer…….time to heal honey.

  10. This is all so true. I had never met a narcissist before my last boyfriend. I met him at work and unfortunately now have to meet him again unexpectedly through work. I am so unsure of how to handle the situation. It has been 18 months since I saw him and I was hoping to have got to the inner healing stage by now but I am nowhere near..any advice would be amazing. We will be working closely together and I can’t avoid the situation unfortunately. It is making me feel ill. Has anyone else had to do this??

    1. I am in family court, dealing with my ex who has taken our child hostage for two years and is grooming her to hate me as he does. It means I have to see/deal with him direct in court as he lies and makes out our daughter is terrified and has been abused by me rather than him. The court has refused to do a fact finding, so his lies are treated as credible, whilst my abuse is regarded as unfounded accusations. I would try and avoid working with him privately as much as possible, always have people around so he has to keep his false self on. I would also ensure everything you do/say is documented and recorded, even to taping things by phone. Or I would leave the job or ask to be reassigned. In the end, it is about taking care of yourself. I would tell your boss that he was abusive in your relationship and you don’t think working with him will be appropriate.

  11. This issue was beautifully explained. Thank you. It is very empowering when you realise that the abuse you encountered was not something done to you but something that you colluded with in order to get your own needs of being loved and validated, met. Narcissists and co dependants are not so very different in this regard but we codependent types retain the ability to reflect, take responsibility and work on ourselves to look within and rewrite the program.
    Regarding the thread about oxygen masks, it’s a good analogy. Another way of looking at it is to consider yourself a member of a sports team. Spending time on yourself getting fit in the gym, planning a healthy diet and making sure you sleeping well isn’t selfish, it’s the only way you can be a valued and effective sport team member. If you only care for and look after the other team members you actually won’t be any use at all.
    So there is no contradiction in giving priority to your own mental health/spiritual needs so that you can become a valued and effective partner in any future relationship.

  12. As a female, our whole identity is formed round taking care of others. It has been very difficult to recover from this intensive grooming as it is so pervasive in society. Through feminism and your videos I am resetting my internal framework to value myself more, but it would be helpful if you did some videos on the wider patterns of socialisation within the church/male/white/heterosexual/ able bodied domination/ to show that co dependency is largely groomed behaviour.

  13. Melanie,
    Thank you for this video and transcript. I had never heard of you until two months ago, when I began reading everything I could get my hands on about narcissism and abuse that accompanies that. I purchased your book along with other authors, but your thoughts really resonated, and especially, about getting to work on ourselves and that it is an inside job. I’ve always been great and reading and researching the problem but would very off when it came time to get “down and dirty”, face myself, and do the work.

    Today’s article again feels totally right on…I have known I am a co-dependent but kept reading about it, would go to therapy but not much changed. I am in your newest Thriver group and it is helping me tremendously to see my part and to work on my issues from the inside and to get them out, with the help of Source.

    Listening to you has helped me let go of the “story” that I was constantly unburdening on my friends and family, asking often, ” Who would do this to someone they loved?” And, then, when my savvy friends would say, “That’s abuse…” I wouldn’t, couldn’t accept that, at the time.

    Thank you for the work you are doing and for all the brave people willing to work to heal, including me.

  14. Very spot on article. I have been aware for years that I put other people before myself. I try not to do it. But sometimes it is hard to find the balance between “what is good for me” and “duty to family” particularly when dealing with aging parents and children with special needs. There have been times when I was so over run with needy family members that I wasn’t even able to get sleep for over 24 hours at a clip or even be able to maintain a job. At one point I had three going at once – an aging mother with alzheimers, a schizophrenic son and a narcissistic/alcoholic ex-husband that was there to “help”. I tried to put myself in a position where I took care of things but distanced myself at the same time. Right now I am down to only one – the narcissistic ex. Mother eventually got committed to an assisted living facility and my son got better with time and now has a full, independent life of his own. Currently I have the Narc parked in a country property I own. Along with the alcoholism he has various health problems. Once again – thank you for your insight and wisdom.

  15. Hi Melanie, BEST VIDEO ever! It hit the nail right on the head. It the bottom line of what is REALLY going on and what I need to to “heal for real”. I FINALLY GET IT!!! I took many notes because what you have said is the truth of the matter. As you say: “the truth shall set you free”. In the end, (as you said in a previous video) the narcissist is a gift as they exposed my unhealed childhood wounds. The only way out is in. So within, so without. I have been doing NARP everyday since January 2021 and I am currently doing Module 6. So funny as this module is about healing my codependent traits lol 😆. So your video was perfect timing. I also did your first THRIVE program which was also extremely valuable because I got clear on what my truths and values were. And then there is the invaluable information in all of your ebooks, especially the ones on codependency and boundaries. As you say: “boundaries are EVERYTHING”. I get stronger and more peaceful everyday. Thanks for all the time, effort, honesty and authenticity you put into everything you do to support all of us that have suffered from narcissistic abuse. It is a life saver and a LIFE GIVER! Love and hugs, Susanne ❤️

  16. As always, thank you Mel. You have brought clarity to a mind that just whirled and whirled from the continuing injustices dealt out to me. Finally I can stand back and observe without the gut wrenching emotion that I thought I would never recover from. You continue to provide information that I identify with but am now quite detached about. You continue to remind me that it is far from over but I can now see that as I get stronger I’m able to think more clearly to navigate my way through it and often around it! My desire for recognition for what I have gone through and continue to go through has completely left me. I understand fully now that my tiny moments of triumph actually just made the punishments so much worse and I can laugh at myself for having thought any of them were a good idea. I no longer provide any supply to these blood sucking parasites and this alone is such a triumph for me but I am not sitting on my laurels. I want everything you say we can achieve so my quest is far from over. This video was awesome. I was able to watch it and acknowledge all you said. I recognise my behaviours as a massive codependent throughout my life but finally I am taking charge of my behaviours and thoughts and actions. I am removing compulsive actions which was basically me 100% and replacing them with balanced thought and decisions. I am enjoying my new found abilities to act instead of react. I am enjoying my new found abilities to identify people with strong narcissistic tendencies before they can do me any damage and I just move away from them in the most satisfying way. Without drama. Without drawing attention to my actions. Patting myself silently on my back for gaining this new insight and standing strong on my gut instincts where this is concerned. I have already said so much but could say so much more – you have given me hope, strength and a way to find the life I deserve. Thank you ❤️

  17. I have always felt that a person cannot just live for themselves alone. That a life of service was important. But not in a way that violates my boundaries, and not to change anyone into who I want them to be. The time and loving care I gave to my family and friends was because I loved them and they needed me. I never regretted the moments I gave to them, and I never expected anything back. However, this video touched on the narcissists in my family, my father and sister, for whom nothing was ever enough, and the co-dependent, my mother, who gave what she perceived they wanted and abandoned her needs and life interests. Watching this dysfunction play out has always made me fearful of close relationships because I cannot allow this to manifest in my own life. But since NARP, I have begun to understand my fears and have started to release the constraints that bind me from being who I am with my family and others. I’m able to strengthen my boundaries with people in a firm, more healthy way, instead of pulling away from people. I have started sharing more of my inner joys with friends and coworkers. I have lost a couple of long-term relationships, which is scary, but I feel freer to be me. I have this relatively new feeling, that I want to share the real me with people while I have time on this earth to do so. The response from people is so positive that I am amazed. It’s like waking up from being in a kind of living coma to now be able to trust Source and myself. I remember the first feeling I had as a very young child that life is an amazing adventure. I’m starting to connect with that feeling again. Thank you Melanie for this life-changing work that you do.

  18. Within toxic marital “couples” relationships, is it more of the “embedded” misogyny supported by both rule of law (to be fair, slowly changing) and social laws combined with an upbringing in religious fundamentalism that encourages this “two-sides” of the same coin? How are marital responsibilities and social roles that bring major consequences to that marriage different from the traits of a toxic relationship between these personalities different? Can either/both ever change or heal without legally ending a toxic relationship? I’m feeling I “stayed too long at the fair” of co-dependency devoid of physical violence, but now, as a senior citizen, without adequate external and internal resources to legally stop playing these games without even worse legal and social consequences considering the way things now stand on Earth, phooey on the way they are in Heaven. (I’ve had the counseling; I got the label, the hospitalization, the meds).

  19. Thank you for this amazingly insightful article, Melanie. I acknowledge now that I was, and possibly still am a co-dependent person, but working with your help to become my true self. Even after 30 years, the attachment and the glimmers of hope in past relationship with a narcissist still rear their head. This is to say that it is true that the narcissist cannot change, however. I made the mistake of sending a sympathy card and spiritually helpful book to my ex partner on hearing he had lost his last partner. This was met with an abusive response, which sent me hurtling back into illness and despair, reminding me of the past. So much to learn, so much growing to do, so much gratefulness to you and your team.

  20. Hi Melanie,I am really confused if my husband is a narcissistic or not.I saw some of your videos ,but still confused.
    I am not happy in my marriage,he wants to control everything,he hurts me with his words and he sometimes do not seems to care even regards health matters I have.
    He is a hoarder and workaholic,making money is most important for him.
    I have been married for 30 years,but I never thought it was his problem I always thought I am not good enough,these last few years I realized it’s not me ,I wish I could leave ,but so afraid,I never worked so I am dependent on him and I am not so young either.I wish to gain more confidence in myself and be able to leave.

  21. Thank you Melanie. This video was an eye opener. I agree and do admit that there are inner wounds of my own that brought the many narcissists I have dealt with into my life. I knew on a gut level that there was a part of me that was perpetuating my experiences. I am no longer ashamed to own that, because in my owning it I can change it. Thank you for presenting it in a non judgmental way.

  22. I knew there were many similarities between my partner and I, and until now I thought I too was a narcissist or sociopath. But I always had a feeling that there was something about me that made me different from him. You’ve just clarified SO SO much for me! I cannot thank you enough. You explained perfectly

  23. Thank you for changing my life… and all the hundreds and thousands of others. YOU are AMAZING! A GODSEND to the world. Thank you. Love you and your team and our family 🤩😍🙏❤️🥰

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