Sam Vaknin’s Instagram Epigrams Page 35

Sam Vaknin’s Instagram Epigrams (archive only)

Narcissism with Vaknin on Instagram (active account)

Get too close to a narcissist and you get sucked into his/her absence, his/her black rabbit hole. Clip courtesy of @escapingmyfairytale

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Video dated 2012. The sadist and the bully regard themselves as artists of pain, craftsmen of intimidation.

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Nothing more pathetic and venomous than a collapsed histrionic drama queen way past her prime in a desperate hunt for elusive narcissistic supply.

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Full video on my YouTube channel. Narcissistic abuse forces the victims to develop their own reactive and defensive false selves.

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A good overview of my work on narcissism with one egregious mistake: my work is based on longitudinal interviews over 30 years with 2300 people diagnosed with NPD without any comorbidities or co-occurrences. By a huge margin, this is the largest sample ever studied. Another error: the discard phase is an ineluctable phase of the shared fantasy. It has nothing to do with narcissistic supply.

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3 lectures by psychology professor and narcissistic abuse study pioneer, Sam Vaknin . 26th Eurostar International Transpersonal Conference. October 2026. Greece. @2026eurotasconference

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Two dysfunctional reactions to hurt and rage: to suppress and repress them or to fixate on grudges and ruminate.

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We have all forgotten how to properly apologize for our misbehavior. It is a sign of rising narcissistic entitlement.

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30 years ago, I coined the phrase “malignant optimism” to describe the pathological hope that motivates victims to remain in abusive and toxic relationships.

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The narcissist believes himself to be omniscient (all-knowing) and infallible (never wrong). To buttress this counterfactual fantastic view, the narcissist is steeped in confirmation bias.

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I am not rejecting YOU or your intimacy. I am fleeing your ABSENCE.

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Narcissists hold everybody in undisguised contempt as vastly inferior lifeforms. Clip courtesy of @narc_destroyer_

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Postpartum dysphoria is very common and could lead to a dysfunctional pattern of childbearing.

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FREE Ohrid Seminar about the life cycle of the narcissist, May 21-24 2026. To reserve your seat, write now to: [email protected]

Ohrid is a world heritage site and one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Perched on a lake, it sports hundreds of exquisite churches, a fort, and amazing architecture. It is an undiscovered gem.

The Vaknin-Rangelovska Foundation is and the Commonwealth Institute (CIAPS) of Cambridge, UK are organizing a free seminar May 21-24, 2026. The topic: “Life Cycle of the Narcissist: Relationships with Parents, Intimate Partners, His/her Children: Progression from Self to Objects”.

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Psychopaths distort your perception of external reality (gaslighting) by manipulating your internal reality. Narcissists distort your perception of internal reality (entrainment) by manipulating your external reality (fantasy, impaired reality testing).

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Pathological narcissism checklist. Video courtesy of @jackgetz.1

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Věra Krincvajová, @verakrincvajova the renowned dramaturg from Czech TV, has just informed me that I will be interviewed as the sole international expert in their forthcoming series on dark personalities. Looking forward to working with the team (one of whom - Kupšovský Daniel Jan - is studying psychology).

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A Vice documentary: pathological narcissism as a positive adaptation to contemporary civilization.

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The breakup with the narcissist - even when initiated by them - feels like betrayal and abandonment. You somehow end up feeling guilty!

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The crisis in the Middle East and global geopolitics. Talk in Glasot na Narodot with Slobodan Tomik and Jean Stanoevski. My responses in English. Show recorded a week ago.

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One of the functions of Narcissistic Abuse is to test you: Will you continue to love the narcissist unconditionally despite his or her egregious misbehavior? Clip from the Skopje seminar, May 2025.

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Case Study

A mortified narcissist threatens and blackmails a victim and his associate via multiple WhatsApp chats. He then denies any of it. How come?

The Prosocial Narcissist is anxious about the crimes he has committed (blackmail being only one of them). He dissociates the events (selective amnesia), confabulates, DARVO reframes (claims to have been the real victim), and denies reality.

He splits (his victim is all bad, he is all good and moral) as a hero-savior.

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The narcissist has to be unique! “Look at me! No one is as grandiose as I am!” 🤣 Digital monument courtesy of @isadorduskin3

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When in the 1980s and 1990s I coined the phrase “narcissistic abuse” and was the first to describe it, I faced pushback from established experts and scholars: “There is no need to differentiate abuse by narcissist from any other type of abuse!”, they thundered. Four decades later, the very same people are capitalizing on the wave. Full video on my YouTube channel in the Abuse playlist.

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Full video in the Narcissistic Abuse Healing playlist on my YouTube channel. In the wake of narcissistic abuse, the grief is “archeological”: multi-layered and multifaceted. Clip from the Skopje Seminar, May 2025.

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Psychopaths possess superficial charm which they use to appear to be prosocial and empathic and to manipulate their marks. The narcissist’s charm is boyish, puerile, and age inappropriate. Ironically, narcissists are more likely to be perceived as smarmy, creepy, manipulative, and antisocial.

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Lecture on Narcissism: Failure of Othering, Becoming in IV Jornadas Internacionales de Cultura Audiovisual y Literaris May 14-15, 2026. Who said academe is not glamorous??? Iberostar is one palace of a hotel (from Tenerife to Gran Canaria just a short hop away).

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Full video on my YouTube channel. Nothing more pathetic and venomous than a collapsed histrionic drama queen or theater kid way past his or her prime in a desperate hunt for narcissistic supply, often casting herself as a victim or the target of some evildoers.
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The collapsed histrionic, exactly like the collapsed narcissist, develops hypervigilance and grandiose paranoid ideation (“I am so important and unique that I am surely targeted by my inferiors or by evil people and malevolent conspiracies”).

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Full video posted on my YouTube channel in July 2025.
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Victim develops a transient False Self as imaginary friend and transitional object to protect against the aggressor-abuser and to placate him.
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Unpredictability and Uncertainty (Intermittent Reinforcement)

The abuser acts unpredictably, capriciously, inconsistently and irrationally. This serves to render others dependent upon the next twist and turn of the abuser, his next inexplicable whim, upon his next outburst, denial, or smile.

Withholding (of sex, affection, care, and empathy) and other passive-aggressive behaviors (such as “silent treatment”) are integral to this variant of abusive conduct.

The abuser makes sure that HE is the only reliable element in the lives of his nearest and dearest – by shattering the rest of their world through his seemingly insane behaviour. He perpetuates his stable presence in their lives – by destabilizing their own.

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Idealization is widely misunderstood. Watch this video to get it right.

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You admire reality, you idealize fantasy.

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Search the shared fantasy playlist on my YouTube channel. The discard phase of the narcissist’s shared fantasy is unbearable because it appears to be abrupt and senseless. It is anything but. It is the culmination of an inexorable narrative.

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Splitting: the child assumes the bad object and internalizes it This induces shame and revictimization later in life. Unboundaried enmeshment and identification with the aggressor

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Full video on my YouTube channel. The narcissists speech is performative: not intended to communicate, but to signal, impress and manipulate.

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Swipe left for another short clip. Clip 1: Why you MUST expose the abuser Clip 2 The moment you have realized that you have been abused is both harrowing and liberating. With @adventuresinadversitypodcast

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Trying to make sense of a relationship with a narcissist can be mindbending. Courtesy of @escapingmyfairytale

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Mark Thmoas Beare gave a great presentation on his groundbreaking MPIT and ASR theories of narcissistic abuse in my Ohrid seminar @mirroredpsychicinversiontheory

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The first few minutes of the free seminar in Ohrid: “The Life Cycle of the Narcissist”.

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The narcissist forces you to become like the part of himself that s/he finds objectionable via projective identification. I call it projective resonance. Courtesy of @narc_destroyer_

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Unaware of WHY You Act the Way You Do? Want to know what your TRUE motivations are? Look no further than the consequences and outcomes of your actions.

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Every creative person triggers envy in less talented people. Every Mozart has a Salieri. We live in an age of imitation and piracy, intellectual theft (idearism), outright plagiarism, and the death of the auteur, when reproducible copies are indistinguishable from originals. It is a morality play or moral parable (good vs. evil) that plays on victimhood. Psychological obsession as spectacle. Clip courtesy of @danielmorad_1

LITERATURE

Mozart didn’t need a murderer. We gave him one anyway By David K. Israel, Washington Post Opinion, May 9, 2026

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Celebrated attorney Rebecca Zung (@rebeccazung ) sheds light on the multiple crimes involved in a smear campaign and how to fight back legally. Her YouTube channel:

https://m.youtube.com/@RebeccaZungEsq?ra=m

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