Narcissism: dealing with flying monkeys

A narcissist is a person who tends to bring all things to themselves and their own interests.  In communication with them, we find that our interests are always second to theirs.  It is almost as if they cannot see us and our feelings.  We feel trodden on.  When we are helping them, we are the best thing since sliced bread.  But when we cross them, they can make our lives a misery.

Flying monkeys are the people narcissists recruit to fight for their cause, and against anyone who gets in the way of their interests.  Most narcissists have a small group of people surrounding them whom they can enlist to do their communication for them.  These flying monkeys can become profoundly loyal, because the narcissist knows how to generate that loyalty.

For example, a woman who has just got out of an abusive marriage to a narcissist may find that not only do they have the ex himself to deal with, but also a negative PR campaign via flying monkeys, friends of the family whom the narcissist has enlisted to spread bad things about them and make their life difficult.

The question is: how can a victim of a narcissist handle the flying monkeys sent to do the narcissist’s bidding?

Here are four suggestions:

1. PUT DOWN A BOUNDARY – If a flying monkey asks to speak with us, we can say we are happy to speak, but that we won’t speak about the narcissist.  If they insist on bringing the subject up, we can emphasise that we won’t go there.  If necessary, cut the conversation short.
2. THINK ABOUT NOT ENGAGING – If it seems that the flying monkey is being negative towards us, or is collecting information for the narcissist, then we can choose not to speak with them for a while.
3. GET BUSY WITH OTHER FRIENDSHIPS – If we don’t want to waste time getting into complications associated with the narcissist, it may be best, for a time, to move to other friendships that have nothing to do with the situation.
4. LIMIT INFORMATION – For a while, we can say very little, and change the subject whenever the narcissist comes up in conversation.  Eventually, the flying monkey may see that we are not going to respond to anything about the narcissist’s situation.

In general, the advice is to get on with life separately from a narcissist. In order to do this, it may also be necessary to mute our response to communications from those they enlist to fight their battles. If it is not a battle we want to fight, and we want to have a healthy emotional life away from all that, then we may have to limit our engagement and get on with other more healthy parts of our lives.