If you’re wondering how to make a narcissist miserable, the surface-level solution is really quite simple. Don’t give them what they want.
The whole crux of narcissism is, “I am special, and I am superior because I’m a God.”
With the narcissist’s mantra comes extreme entitlement and superiority. They genuinely believe (in their false reality) that they are better than everybody else and deserve nothing less than a royal approach.
As we well know, narcissists do absolutely nothing to warrant such grand treatment and gestures, however they believe that they are worthy just for merely existing.
It’s all rather infuriating to be around, especially when you fall prey to their behaviour.
The trick is in looking right through their false charade and refusing (without saying a word) to play along.
Here’s how to make a narcissist miserable and retain your power.
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NPD the Spiritual Disease
To understand how to make a narcissist miserable, it’s important to actually understand what’s behind their mask.
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a spiritual disease, which is quite often felt rather than seen. This is how they manage to get away with their abusive behaviours over and over again, right under the noses of intelligent and empathetic people.
How Was the Narcissist Created?
The narcissist was born as a regular human being, just like you and I. But somewhere in their earlier years, they were either neglected (emotionally or physically), abused or aggrandised in an unhealthy way.
What resulted from their experience was inner trauma and wounding. It was through this trauma that the narcissist was left feeling deeply ashamed, unworthy, rejected and/ or abandoned.
The narcissist felt that the trauma was just too incredibly painful, to the point where they completely discarded that aspect of themselves, in order to avoid acknowledging its existence.
What really happened on a spiritual level is that the narcissist severed the connection with their own inner being (True Self).
The True Self is what connects us with the divine life force of all that is. It provides us with the ability to experience life here in the full expression of what it means to be a human. With this comes empathy, compassion, kindness and love.
By disowning their True Self, the narcissist left themselves with a big, gaping black hole in its place. The only things that the empty void can offer the narcissist now are misery, self-loathing, contempt and utter disgust with themselves.
However, the whole point of their soul fracture was to discard the part of themselves, which was making them feel such awful things.
So, to override all of that pain and despair, they subconsciously put their ego-self in full control. The ego exists to protect the narcissist from the very truth in which they seek to avoid – that they are a flawed human being, just like everybody else.
In order for the ego to do this, it has constructed a False Self, complete with a false reality to go along with it.
Their False Self doesn’t have the ability to see itself as both ‘good’ and ‘bad,’ so it opts for superiority and entitlement as its version of existence. With this comes the utter inability (or desire) to ever self-reflect, be in the wrong or take responsibility for their behaviour.
“I am perfect. I am a God. I can do no wrong.”
The real problem is that for the narcissist’s false reality to remain tangible for them, it needs to be constantly validated by the outside world. It’s not enough for just the narcissist to believe their own delusion, they need the people around them to also be confirming it for them to really make it ‘real.’
Along with that, they will not tolerate anyone who questions their false reality in any way because that difference in perception actively threatens their entire illusion.
Narcissistic Personality Disorder is an affliction whereby they live in a completely different reality to you and me. For their psychological survival, they absolutely cannot allow their house of cards to fall, otherwise, they will be left with nothing but the black hole that sits deep inside.
| READ: Spiritual Meaning of Narcissism → |
The Need for Narcissistic Supply
No matter how much the narcissist avoids their deep inner wounding, that massive empty void still very much exists inside of them.
The way in which they seek to abate that pain and keep their false reality inflated is through narcissistic supply.
Narcissistic supply is basically attention that is directed towards them, which serves to boost their ego. Any attention is useful, whether it be positive or negative, because it all validates to the narcissist that they are extremely powerful and important.
Examples of Narcissistic Supply:
- Admiration
- Compliments and flattery
- Arguments, chaos and drama
- Fame and infamy
- Controlling others
- Sex
- Playing the victim
You’ll notice that when a narcissist is high on supply, they can be loads of fun to be around.
However, when a narcissist is getting low on supply, they will begin to fall into themselves, resulting in lashing out, devaluation, rage, contempt and other awful behaviours. Ultimately, they need supply so that they can relieve the pain of themselves. However, any supply they procure can only temporarily alleviate the agony.
In the world of a narcissist, other people are merely props for them to use in order to gain energy and resources (which inadvertently bring them attention to feed their ego).
Underneath it all, the narcissist needs to extract the life force energy from others because they do not have access to it themselves. Think of a vampire feeding from the life of others, so that they can sustain themselves.
Some say that the vampire myth is based on narcissism…
Narcissists are energetic drug addicts who have imprisoned themselves to a lifetime of pilfering the life force energy from other beings who are still whole and intact. They are a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
It’s important to note that narcissists have no conscience. They can put on a good show and fake it like they’re up for an Oscar, but it will always be for the purpose of manipulation.
One of the best ways to extract Grade A narcissistic supply from their victim is to open up that person’s wounds and trigger them so horrifically that they respond with the heaviest of reactions.
Think yelling, screaming, tears, wailing, shutting down etc. This all makes the narc feel incredibly powerful to be able to control your emotions in such a way as to incite such huge reactions out of you. Your highly-charged emotions funnel an absolute tonne of life-force energy into the narcissist and they get high off your pain.
When looking at how to make a narcissist miserable, you essentially need to stop feeding their addiction so that they’re starved and have no choice but to find supply elsewhere.
How to Make a Narcissist Miserable
Don’t Give Them Any Attention
As we know, narcissists absolutely thrive on attention. It’s their lifeblood.
Positive attention is when people shower them with admiration, gift them with compliments and are fully focused on them when they’re talking (about themselves). It makes them feel like they’re the absolute centre of the universe, which is where they think their rightful position is.
Negative attention comes in the form of chaos, drama and arguments. The narcissist loves this type of attention just as much because it makes them feel incredibly powerful. If they can cause such emotional reactions in others, they must be extremely important and worthy. It makes them feel alive and confirms that they truly do exist.
Narcissists will often create chaos out of thin air when they’re low on supply because they cannot stand sinking back into themselves. It’s an uncomfortable reminder of their deep shame and self-loathing.
So, in an instant, they’ll explode that energy outwards and dump all of the things they do not wish to feel, onto somebody else. As a result, they’ll be rewarded with a hit of their drug (supply) and be the full focus of someone else’s time, energy and headspace.
A great tactic for how to make a narcissist miserable is to not give them an ounce of attention.
- No compliments or flattery
- No listening to the dribble that comes out of their mouth
- No reacting to their gaslighting
- No engaging in their confusing word salad conversations
Go ‘Grey Rock’
The best way to stop giving the narcissist any attention, if you still have to deal with them in any capacity, is to ‘grey rock’ them.
Grey rock is where you appear as dull and boring as a grey rock. You become so uninteresting and forgettable to the narcissist, that they’ll grow bored of trying to extract anything from you. Then they should move on to another source and leave you alone.
That’s not to say that they might not come back around for another shot at hoovering you in the future. But again, channel the energy of the grey rock and they’ll have nothing to work with.
Hold Firm Boundaries
Remember the God-like superiority that narcissists have? Well, because of that, they despise the boundaries of others.
In fact, they think that all of the rules and laws on planet Earth do not apply to them. Since they’re the centre of the universe and sit above us peasants, they believe that all of those rules exist for us and not them.
The only clear way to not have a narcissist railroad you and disrespect all of your boundaries is to set them and hold firm with them.
Narcissists are used to manipulating their way through life and getting people to drop their boundaries, just through sheer exhaustion. Giving in to the narcissist ends up being far easier than holding the fort.
You can expect absolutely no respect from a narcissist, particularly when it comes to your needs and limits. They will test your limits like no other, just to conquer you and your boundaries as a power play.
Here’s how narcissists break through boundaries:
- Gaslight and manipulate to mess with your perspective, memories and version of events
- Shame you for not giving everything to them
- Guilt-trip you, by using your empathy and compassion against you
- Threaten you into submission
- Slander you publicly
- Throw false accusations at you
So, it’s easy to see why narcissists manage to shoulder their way through life, getting whatever they want. When they’re treating people in such horrific ways, people tend to fall into the fear of what the narcissist will do, then acquiesce in order to protect themselves.
However, when you focus on healing up your traumas, the fear of what the narcissist may say or do will begin to fade as you become stronger within yourself.
Even when the narcissist does try to gaslight or threaten you, when you’re in a place of self-love, rather than fear, they can stand there and throw the biggest adult tantrum on the planet. It simply won’t work on you any more.
How to make a narcissist miserable is to set boundaries from self-love and hold them firm. The narcissist will be left spitting fire!
Use ‘No’ as a Complete Sentence
Following on from the setting of boundaries, narcissists do not like the word “No.” It only exists in their vocabulary for them to use, not for anybody else.
They are accustomed to everyone walking on eggshells around them and bending to their will. Not because of the truth (that they’re horrendous), but because they believe they’re a God who deserves to be worshipped.
Why would anybody refuse to do what they want, go where they want and tag along to be their servant? After all, they are amazing just for existing, so why shouldn’t others fall at their feet?
A really powerful way, when it comes to making a narcissist miserable is to not go along with their false reality. Get used to saying, “No thanks,” without the need to defend or explain yourself.
You are well within your rights to follow your own guidance and not that of the controlling narcissist.
However, be prepared for them to pull out every tactic in the book so they can manipulate you into doing what they want. The stronger you are in your decision, the madder the narcissist will get.
Defeat Them
Narcissists are the absolute worst losers on the planet. Their ego is extremely competitive and is constantly whispering in the narc’s ear that they must win at everything to retain their throne.
On top of that, narcissists are completely entitled and cannot fathom that there is anyone else out there who’s better than them at anything. They are simply the best!
Their superiority complex oozes out of them whenever they are in a position of going head-to-head with someone else. Whether it be a board game, sporting match, trivia night or a task at work.
In fact, narcissists are so competitive, they’ll even be competing with you in everyday life, without you ever realising there was a competition to be had. Everything is one big comp to the narcissist.
Examples of narcissists competing in everyday life:
- Who can get the best carpark at the shopping centre
- Who has the best family
- Who had the best childhood
- Who can eat their food the quickest
- Who’s the best cook
- Who makes the most money
- Who’s kids are the best looking/ academic/ sporty etc.
- Who’s got the biggest house
- Who lives in the best postcode
- Who has the most interaction on social media
- Who has the most expensive car
- Who wears the most expensive/ trendy clothing
- Who has the most house plants (I’m not even kidding – this is directly from my own narcissistic ex!)
How to make a narcissist miserable is to beat them at something. Whether it’s a game, hobby, social status, financial success, appearances, popularity, career achievements or material wealth.
Anything that you do better at than the narcissist, will make them miserable.
How a narcissist will react when they lose:
- Devalue and belittle the other person
- Pretend like they were never playing anyway
- Fly into a rage
- Demand a do-over because others were obviously cheating
- Twist the rules to suit themselves
- Still claim the title despite not winning
The narcissist cannot accept losing on any level because that goes against their whole reality of being amazing, special and perfect. If they admit defeat, they are effectively admitting that their entire False Self is not real – which is a fate worse than death.
Something that’s even more satisfying is when you’re just naturally living your life and succeeding all of your volition, with the narcissist being completely irrelevant to you.
The narcissist always made you feel like you needed them and that you’d be nothing without them. However, the truth is the exact opposite.
When people completely rid themselves of the narcissist, their lives typically flow better and fill will more abundance and opportunities.
They realise that the narcissist was actually bringing them down and holding them back. The amazing things that can come to you once you’re free never would have been possible while you had a narcissist sucking the life out of you.
Completely Cut Them out
The narcissist assumes that if they’ve been able to love bomb you into their web and control you once, they believe you’re theirs forever.
Even if the narcissist discards you, they never deem you to be completely gone. They’ve just placed you up on a shelf for later use and abuse.
But, if you go No Contact and totally cut them out forever, that’s a surefire way to make a narcissist miserable.
You see, they don’t think you really mean to eliminate them for good. They believe they’ll be able to manipulate you into letting them back in. Not that their behaviour will change for the better or that they’ve learnt any lessons. In fact, if you did allow them back into your life, they’d punish you even harder for daring to let your loyalty towards them waver.
But when it becomes obvious that you’re not breaking No Contact and you’ll never again put up with their bs, that’s when they’ll really freak out at their complete loss of control.
Refusing the narcissist’s hoover attempts will drive them wild.
| READ: Blocking a Narcissist → |
Make Them Irrelevant
Narcissists need attention and validation to feed their False Selves. They need others to be consistently focussing on them so that they can feel worthy, special and powerful.
As we’ve established, they don’t care if it’s good attention or bad attention, it all works for them. As long as they’re constantly monopolising your headspace and energy, they’ll be getting supply from you.
My absolute favourite tactic for how to make a narcissist miserable is by making them completely irrelevant in your world.
A narcissist’s worst nightmare is to become irrelevant.
This will actually start to happen naturally as you stop ruminating over all of the narcissist’s behaviours and shift the focus onto yourself.
As you pull your energy back from the narc, they’ll most likely feel it on a psychic level and probably lash out at you harder or up the ante by attempting to hoover you back into their abuse cycle.
I personally found that energetic healing with a spiritual medium is an amazing way to focus on shifting each trauma out of your body, no matter what the narcissist tries to throw at you. The more you shift, the higher you elevate and the smaller the narcissist becomes (see below)
It’s like the wicked witch melting away as you take your power away from them and become your own source of love, approval and validation.
The narcissist cannot function in a higher vibrational frequency than the one in which they reside. That’s why they need to bring others down to their level because that’s their game field.
Without your attention and life force energy, narcissists become irrelevant and will be left with no choice but to prey on someone else.
Your Happiness and Success
It’s crazy how much narcissists genuinely think that they are the reason for the success and happiness of other people.
They will not hesitate to tell you…
- “You’d be nothing without me.”
- “I’m the reason you have everything you’ve got.”
- “Good luck making things work without me.”
The even crazier truth is the complete opposite. When you’ve got a narcissist in your life, draining your life force energy, invalidating your every move and crushing your self-worth, your limits are pretty slim.
However, once you’ve removed the leech, you have so much more energy, time, resources, strength, confidence and motivation to achieve many of the things you only ever previously dreamed of.
A fantastic way to make a narcissist miserable is to move forward in your life and be really, genuinely happy and successful in whatever you decide to do.
They cannot stand it because deep inside, they know that they need others for their own survival. And they resent you for that!
Without having a connection with their own inner being, they will never be able to feel the happiness that you can experience. They will never be authentically successful, because they are an empty soul, with nothing real to offer.
Set Consequences for their Actions
Narcissists do not like to be caged or held to account in any shape or form. In their reality, they don’t play by the rules, they write them… then change them constantly to suit their ever-changing agenda.
If you really want to know how to make a narcissist miserable, rageful and smoking at the ears, set consequences for their actions.
They will work to wear you down and gaslight you, so that you fold under their pressure and lift the consequences, but do not budge!
The idea of the consequence isn’t to actually punish the narcissist, but to stand in your own power and self-worth to show them that you’re not sacrificing yourself to play their games.
Examples of consequences:
- If they continue to talk to you disrespectfully, you will walk away or hang up the phone.
- If they choose to not pull their weight around the house and leave everything for you, you’ll no longer cook for them/ do their washing etc.
- If they can’t engage in a two-way friendship/ relationship, you will choose to walk away.
Narcissists cannot conceive that there’s anything wrong with their behaviour. They lack the conscience and empathy to have any understanding or care about how you feel.
In their world, everything revolves around them, therefore the end goal is always to get what they want, regardless of you or anybody else. After all, people are not living breathing souls with their own needs and desires – they’re merely tools for the narcissist to use to get what they want.
Mental Health Check-in
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Use Facts
Let’s be honest, narcissists do not deal in the world of facts. Their entire existence is established through false perspectives, lies and trickery.
You’ll notice that when you’re having a conversation with a narcissist, they spend a lot of time painting elaborate images and convincing people of their version of events. They’ll get you caught up in rambling communication, seamlessly bouncing between incongruent topics to create confusion.
The narcissist’s game is built on delusion, there’s nothing truthful about any of it. An almost entertaining angle for how to make a narcissist miserable is to use facts, which cannot be denied.
When you approach a conversation with a narcissist armed with cold, hard facts that are unable to be twisted or manipulated, they actually crumble. They do not know how to work in that world and their toddler tactics and tantrums hold no credence.
Be Spontaneous
Narcissists can thrive on spontaneous behaviour for themselves if there’s something in it for them. However, they fully expect everyone else around them to stick to their roles and not deviate from them.
Maybe it’s become the thing that you make a roast every Sunday, even though it was never an agreed-upon event. Then one week you decide to do something else or go out with your friends instead.
The narcissist will totally have their nose out of joint because the role they’ve painted for you is enmeshed with, “Every Sunday you cook me a roast.”
They won’t like this spontaneous behaviour because they will feel like they’re losing their grip on control. So, they’ll make you feel ashamed or guilty for doing something different and coerce you back into submission.
This is a big piece of the puzzle when we look back on a narcissistic relationship and think, “How did they end up having so much control over me?”
Because in all of those little moments, it was often easier to give in to the narc than it was to go against the grain. Their control was tightening on you without you even realising it.
How to make a narcissist miserable is to be spontaneous and not give a *#@! what they think about it!
| READ: What is a Trauma Bond? → |
Public Humiliation
Despite appearances, narcissists have incredibly fragile egos. Their whole false reality dictates that they must be seen as being the best, most knowledgable, most skilled, most adored etc. in the world.
To publicly lose, be called out or be made a mockery of (even if it’s just a perception in their mind) is utterly humiliating for them.
Public humiliation causes a massive narcissistic injury, which is the trigger of a deep inner wound, probably around shame and rejection in this case.
The narcissist’s biggest unconscious fear is being found out and having their whole charade come undone. Being humiliated in a public setting is a direct threat towards their entire False Self.
Don’t expect the narcissist to take humiliation lightly. They may lash out, devalue others, make a scene or laugh it off as though they’re not phased. However, they will quite often rage at and punish their partner/ family after the event, in retaliation.
Pit Them Against Authority
Have you ever noticed how quickly a narcissist will get their back up when they think they’re being told what to do? That’s because they absolutely despise authority.
The narcissist does not believe that they need to answer to anyone outside of themselves, because they are the ultimate authority.
Narcissists will often have conflicts at work, school and with the law, because having to follow a simple instruction from anyone else is utterly beneath them.
Narcs are the ones who are regularly quitting jobs because everyone else is being difficult. They cannot see that they are the common denominator. Then they’ll expect their partner to pick up the financial pieces from the loss of income.
They’ll struggle with the simplest of tasks in school and work situations because “How dare you tell me what to do! Don’t you know who I am!?”
They’re the ones always on the verge of losing their licence for speeding and traffic fines because the road rules are for mere mortals, not them.
Then, they’ll manage to manipulate someone else into taking the demerits for them using guilt tactics. “You know I need my points for work. How will I feed my family if I lose my licence?”
Again, the narcissist takes no responsibility for their behaviour and will continue to re-offend forever more.
If you really want to make a narcissist miserable, let them bear the full brunt of authority figures without bailing them out or playing into their pity parties.
| READ: Why Narcs Refuse Accountability → |
Call Them Out on Their Behaviour
The trick to calling a narcissist out isn’t by addressing the actual words they’re using, because that’s where they’ll win every time with their twisted rebukes.
You need to call them out on their actions (or lack thereof).
Examples of calling out narcissistic behaviour:
- “Why are you trying to manipulate me?”
- “Why do you keep interrupting me?”
- “Why do you keep bouncing onto different topics?”
- “Why do you refuse to let me speak?”
- “Why are you being verbally abusive?”
- “Why are you trying to emotionally blackmail me?”
The idea is to stay absolutely calm and show no emotion at all. This is about their behaviour and as long as you can keep your emotions out of it, they will have nothing to trigger you with.
I’m not leading you into any false illusions that the narcissist will ever admit or agree with what you’re saying. Their psychological state is wired to avoid self-acknowledgement at all costs.
However, you do get the chance to clearly state that, “I see your game and I’m not playing.”
You can expect them to continue to rant, rage, gaslight, manipulate, play the victim and accuse you of horrendous things, which you know you’re not guilty of.
This is when you pick up your bag and exit the conversation (or hang up the phone). You are under absolutely no obligation to listen to any more of their delusional lies.
However, their ego will feel under such extreme threat, that you will now become public enemy #1, so prepare for them to go to war. They will probably aim to smear your reputation to eliminate you from telling anyone any truth about them.
Keep focusing on your inner healing and releasing the traumas that the narcissist uses to trigger you. You’ll find that what the narcissist says and does will have less and less effect on you, rendering them powerless.
Don’t Validate Their False Reality
More than anything, narcissists need others to be constantly validating their reality for them. Whether they’re playing the victim or painting themselves as the amazing hero, they need people to go along with it.
This is where it’s important to hold on to your own truth and detach from their storyline.
Learning to disengage from the words coming out of their mouth is a very powerful tactic for how to make a narcissist miserable. Don’t ask questions that will lead you into their rabbit hole and don’t show any pity, concern or interest in their false reality.
This is highly relevant in this world of social media. Every reaction and comment a narcissist gets online is another confirmation for them that their false reality truly does exist. Their world has nothing to do with truth and everything to do with image and perception.
| READ: Self-love After Narc Abuse → |
▶️ VIDEO: 14 Ways to Make a Narcissist Miserable
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