If you want to cut to a narcissist's emotional core, make them look bad in public. Try challenging their opinions, ignoring their commands, or laughing at their misfortunes and they'll fly into a narcissistic rage.
The easiest way to do it is to give them attention (the thing they want the most) and then take it away. Start a conversation with them and then turn your focus to another friend or colleague—the narcissist will spiral and try desperately to get their supply of compliments and attention back.
Narcissists love attention, validation, and power. So what drives a narcissist crazy? Simply put, anything that jeopardizes their basic needs for superiority can quickly irritate them. If you want to know how to infuriate a narcissist, you can look no further than giving them nothing.
The best way to shut down a narcissist is to walk away from them. If all else fails, you can physically remove yourself from the conversation. Even if they keep talking, simply turn around and walk away. If they follow you, close the door.
Narcissists are frightened, fragile people.
Rejection, humiliation, and even the tiniest of defeats can shake them to their core. This leaves narcissists wholly focused on their image.
Although narcissists act superior, entitled and boastful, underneath their larger-than-life facade lies their greatest fear: That they are ordinary. For narcissists, attention is like oxygen. Narcissists believe only special people get attention.
Lack Of Admiration From Others
Without other people, they are nothing. That's why one of the biggest fears for narcissists is the complete lack of admiration from others. This is not quite as feared as being shamed by others, but it's very close. Some people don't mind feeling like they're invisible.
Offending a person with narcissism can lead to immediate, lasting, and perhaps irreparable fallout.
Tease, ridicule, and shame them mercilessly for not trying to figure out right from wrong, instead, pretending to have it all figured out. Stay calm, even friendly, to the person cowering inside their absolute narcissistic fake infallibility cloak. Stay light, even humorous. It's nothing personal.
You can expect grandiose narcissists to lash out when wounded. The more insulted they feel, the more rage they're likely to feel. And the more intense their rage, the more viciously they're likely to attack. The problem with them is as insidious as it is tragic.
At the end of a relationship, narcissists may become combative, passive-aggressive, hostile, and even more controlling. People with NPD often fail to understand other people's needs and values. They are hyper focused on their egos, but do not account for how their actions affect others.
The narcissist often engages in self-defeating and self-destructive behaviours.
If there's one thing narcissists hate, it's being told what to do. When you push them into a situation where they have to answer to someone else, it's like their own personal hell. Figure out a way where you can get the narcissist in your life to be underneath an authority figure to really watch them squirm.
Narcissistic rage can be triggered by various situations, such as criticism, perceived rejection, or being ignored. The reaction is often extreme and disproportionate to the event or comment, as the narcissist's fragile ego struggles to cope with the perceived attack on their self-image.
There's nothing a narcissist fears more than being left alone. Block their phone number, unfriend them on social media, and don't even acknowledge their presence if you're ever in the same room with one another. This won't just scare a narcissist—it will devastate them.
Does ignoring a narcissist work? First of all, narcissists hate being ignored, so ignoring them may be the best form of revenge. But, it should not be your primary motivation. The most essential thing here is to be mature enough to let go of toxic individuals in your life, no matter how difficult it is.