Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

To put it simply, as related to humans, a family is a group of people who are connected in some way. We have birth families who are connected by genetics. We also have our group of connected friends or neighbors or communities such as Yourlifelifter that are our “families.” We all create and become part of “families” separate from our birth family all the time.

Whichever the case, this I know for sure. The rules of emotional health apply to ALL families and all relationships and moreso:

• A family of birth is not exempt from these rules because they are genetically related. Invisible genetics do not entitle people to abuse, ignore, neglect, degrade, denigrate, betray, abandon, and crap on others.

Read more how intergenerational abuse is perpetuated here.

• Our rights and authorities as humans and citizens do not change because we are related by birth. It does not give people a right to profess to love you and habitually betray you, abuse you, single you out, and abandon you in your time of need.

• A “family” is not entitled to habitually violate each other’s personal boundaries and disrespect and dishonor their personal rights and feed off of the personal power they take from others to feed the gaps in their psyches.

• A “family” is not a bunch of people who selectively choose to put the undeserving Golden Children on pedestals and scapegoat, crap on, and exploit the kind-hearted, empathetic, smart, bright, talented, and compassionate ones.

• A “family” does not choose who stays and whom they target, betray and abandon because they did not suit them.

Read more on how intergenerational abuse is perpetuated here.

A position in a loving family is a role of honor that is earned by showing the members love, honor and respect in the same way we do them. That is what emotionally healthy mutually beneficial relationships are. That is what love is. And we ALL deserve that –  every darn single one of us! That is a universal right as a human being that we are all born with.

So rid yourself of the toxic people in your life and go out and choose your loving family and selectively allow in only those who love, honor and respect you in the same way you do them. And start creating your own customs, joy, and memories with those who deserve your love and respect.

And when you find your family, those whose truth aligns with yours, THAT is real LOVE and when the magic starts.

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

Maladaptive behaviors do not spontaneously develop. They are learned in childhood where we are growing rapidly and learning to become integrated functioning human beings. These vulnerabilities are the result of the legacy toxic shame that we are left with from years of betrayal from those who professed to love us and who were supposed to help us feel safe and teach us to rely on our own emotions and selves to sustain our joy, maintain healthy relationships, and thrive. Betrayal includes neglect and invalidation and coddling and even expecting children to grow up too fast and be “mini-adults” and take care of the other children.

Even parents with the best of intentions can betray their children by not nurturing them and not validating them and not teaching them to rely comfortably on their own emotions. So folks who may not have been overtly abused and believe they were raised in the best of families can also experience the effects of betrayal and become pain addicted and dependent on others to regulate their pain and define their worth. Survivors of childhood “abuse” bring these “bad habits” with them into adulthood. We go on to teach the skewed unhealthy thinking to our children who mirror us. Narcissists also use these vulnerabilities against us and target us.

Abuse Survivors Readily Let Their Boundaries Down

Abuse survivors typically were exposed to constant boundary violation and disrespect of their emotional and physical rights and authority. The results? They are not accustomed to honoring their personal rights and authority. As they move into adulthood, they openly offer way too much information related to their personal lives and feelings to others that while “honest,” can advertise their vulnerabilities to narcissists, bullies and other abusers and make them susceptible to their attacks. Abuse survivors who are empaths, can also be too trusting.

According to Dr. Jane McGregor, empaths are ordinary people who are highly perceptive and insightful and belong to the 40% of human beings who sense when something’s not right, who respond to their gut instinct, and who take action and speak up. They frequently like the child in the “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” will tell the truth and expose lies and wrong doing. A particular attribute in empaths is that they have trouble comprehending a closed mind and lack of compassion in others. This inability to see the “bad” in others also significantly enhances their vulnerability to attacks from emotional vampires throughout their lives.  Read more here on how narcissists target empaths. Empaths, to appease their need to “make things right,” may also “speak too much too soon” without scoping out the landscape first. Read more on empaths here. Trusting others before you have evaluated whether they are “on your side” or not is simply not a wise thing to do. Would you let your money hang out of your wallet while you walked down the street? I think not. Well, the same applies to your own personal emotional health and well-being that hold much more worth to your long term survival than money!

How Do Narcissists Know We are Vulnerable

Well, they learned how to recognize their potential victims in the same place you were abused – by watching the abusers in their own families. They are very slick and have spent years studying their prey, other humans no different than a mother lion teaches its cubs to stealthily hunt for a gazelle. They lack emotional empathy but have developed and learned “cognitive empathy” so they can recognize what triggers your emotions and what does not. As they get older, they hone those abilities and, for example, learn to target empaths, sensitive, compassionate people with high emotional intelligence and actively plan and plot how to “steal” their power from them by manipulating it from them. They also learn to target conscientious hard working and generous people who bring much value to the family, group, job or organization.

How Do We Learn to Protect Ourselves

The good news? We can heal. When we take our power back and build our self-esteem through self-care and self-compassion and better understand our personal rights and boundaries, we learn to release the shame and honor our personal divinity and share our truth when it is in our own best interest to do so and only with those we consciously recognize as equally deserving. We can learn to identify emotional vampires in our lives. We can also learn to assertively protect our boundaries and learn to protect ourselves from toxic people.

Read more and get many more healing lessons, tip and tools in my book, Take Your Power Back. 

Take Your Power Back is a step-by-step “How To” guide to teach you to regain and use your personal power to turn your pain-based life to one that is joy filled. It will help you discover that the source of truth-based healing resides in each and every one of you and how to tap into that infinite power.

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

Reprinted from September 15, 2013

I have been puzzled for many years with the answers to these questions:

“Why would any decent person get involved with a jerk, Why do bullies target certain people?” And “What do you do to prevent getting hooked up with these idiots in the future?” After researching for over 20 years, I have summarized the answers below: You can get much more detailed information in my book, Take Your Power Back: Healing Lessons, Tips, and Tools for Abuse Survivors.

The Jerks Find You – You Did Not Find Them

1. Accept that you did not intentionally get hooked up with these monsters or deserve it and you did nothing wrong or provoked them in ANY way. Read more here.
2. They hunted for and found you because they perceive you as a threat or you have something they want and they know they cannot acquire on their own and simply do not want to work for it. You did not find them and they stalked you as their prey. They interpret your kindness and differences as weaknesses and are jealous and envious of your successes. After you, they will go on to their next victim.
3. You were victimized as you were as a child. If you do not think you were a victim as a
   child, you are in denial. So think again because you would not be in this situation.
4. They are masters of charm and manipulation, lack compassion, are eaten alive by jealousy and envy, and feel they are entitled to whatever they WANT AND NEED as Ted Bundy, Hitler and Mao Tsetung were without working for and earning it. They will steal your soul in front of an audience of 10,000, while eating a ham sandwich, deny it, and convince everyone that you are crazy and made it up and they were eating lasagna.
5. You believe (falsely) this is what you deserve and you do not deserve better.
6. You do not know what better is because you had and have no good role models or examples of healthy harmonious personal or family relationships (see list of characteristics of healthy harmonious relationships below). You lived in a family that consistently violated your and each other’s emotional, physical and personal boundaries.
7. Growing up as a defenseless child in critical stages of emotional development, you had no choice but to learn how to love in a manner that was defined by another narcissistic abusive jerk’s reality and denial where he/she/they forced you to fit into a role he/she/they CHOSE for you so they could feed off of your soul and energy to fill the gaps in theirs. If you wonder why they targeted you, see Number 2 above.
8. Your core truths about who you really are were damaged from growing up in the narcissist’s reality described in Number 7 above. This treatment and betrayal damaged your core beliefs and sense of self-worth and your sense of lovability since you were victimized by those you trusted with your heart to love you and keep you safe unconditionally.
9. Your damaged invisible core belief (that you desperately and immediately need to challenge and change) is that you have to feel pain and suffer to be lovable and to be good.

Distorted Thinking Patterns Make Us Vulnerable to Jerks

Remember, folks, we move in the direction of, create in reality, and do what we believe to be true EVEN IF it is a lie. Your filters for screening out narcissistic jerks were damaged in the process. The problem being, that if you meet someone who is really a good person and you are not feeling pain, you are at risk of feeling unloved and unworthy and then sabotage the “good” relationship. Relationships with jerks bring you pain that you associate with being lovable and a good person and believe you are powerless to and you do not believe you deserve better. You also most likely are an empath with codependent tendencies, self-sacrifice for other people, and believe you must fix their problems before you take care of yourself.

What You Can Do About It

To heal and recover from a relationship with a jerk and not get hooked up with one again, you need to break these distorted thinking patterns. Truly understand 1 through 9 above and bring them into your conscious awareness and challenge and change these ridiculous false core beliefs, lies you were taught to believe. Reprogram your thinking and redefine your self-worth to understand who you truly are through untainted filters. To accomplish this:

1. Bring the broken core beliefs (I deserve to feel pain to be lovable and to be a good person and I am powerless to my emotional pain) into your consciousness and change them by using self-talk. You can help to do this by repeating the following to yourself several times a day: Add to this list as you see fit.
   • I have the personal power, right and authority to regulate my emotions including my pain-based ones which exist to protect me, not harm me.
   • I deserve and have a right to be treated with dignity and respect in any relationship.
   • I deserve and have a right to be happy and pain-free in any relationship.
   • I was born lovable and am lovable ALL the time and anytime.
   • I deserve and have a right to be in a healthy harmonious relationship (see characteristics of one below)
   • I deserve all my personal, emotional, and physical boundaries to be respected and needs to be met first. Take assertive classes to learn how to say “no” in constructive ways to help you protect and manage your personal, emotional, and physical boundaries.
2. Surround yourself with only positive loving supportive people and preferably those who have survived similar personal and family relationships who will listen, care, understand where you are coming from and provide constructive feedback in a safe environment. Join a support group, blog, or Facebook page of survivors of narcissistic abuse or any type of abuse. Seek counseling only from competent professionals who are experienced in narcissistic personality disorder, trauma bonding, post traumatic stress, and addictive behaviors. Many say they are but are not so get recommendations from reputable sources.
3. Practice self-care, self-compassion, and assertiveness. Learn how to not say yes when you mean no. Most of us were punished for even taking care of our basic needs so this will be a tough one to learn but is CRITICAL to your healing AND rebuilding your self-worth and honoring your personal rights, authorities, and boundaries.
4. Learn about narcissistic personality disorder and the manipulation tactics of covert aggressive personalities. This is the worst of the personality disorders and once you educate yourself, you can tell right away if the one you were or are with is one and can recognize another one from a mile away.
5. Eliminate toxic people from your life and ALL contact with the jerks or learn how to maintain your self-preservation when dealing with them. 
6. Stay by yourself until you come into your own truth and fully heal and recover. Read more on how living alone can support emotional health.
7. Learn the characteristics of healthy relationships and families. Gauge your interactions and feelings using these traits and set these as targets and what to aspire to in your relationships. If you are in a relationship or even a job and you answer no to one or more in the following list, then you better reconsider or run for the hills. Why would you settle for anything less than what is healthy and harmonious and that you are deserving of? The opposite is unhealthy, toxic, and chaotic! Life is too short, folks. For example, I deserve and want personal, family, and professional relationships where:
   • Individual human rights are valued and encouraged and empathy and compassion are shown in all dealings.
   • Tolerance and acceptance of everyone’s differences are encouraged and are the norm.
   • Unity, loyalty, respect, and consideration are communicated routinely as taking precedence over ANY individual’s narcissistic self-serving concerns. There are no favorites or golden ones, including children, spouses, siblings, parents, partners, co-workers, bosses, etc.
   • There are no scapegoats or self-serving rules, lies, labels, or myths about anyone!
   • Feelings and dissenting views are tolerated and others do what they can to sooth, validate, and understand each other’s pain, feelings, and opinions.
   • Members do not make fun of each other or use others at their expense.
   • Warmth, generosity, and affection are the norm and coldness and iciness and greed are discouraged and frowned upon.
   • Independence is fostered and members are encouraged to develop their own codes of conduct and governance and interests and to validate each other’s thoughts and decisions.
   • Independence of thought and action is permitted and members feel free to make their own decisions without undue fear of punishment, criticism and withdrawal of love or affection.
   • Distinctiveness and uniqueness are valued and accepted as a human right and are not criticized or frowned upon.
   • Members are not scapegoated or bullied or verbally, physically or emotionally abused or neglected for any reason.
   • Communications and open discussions are valued and differing opinions are accepted and tolerated.
   • Other’s feelings are regarded as important and are heard, validated, and valued.
   • Members are treated respectfully and politely and say please, thank you, and excuse me and apologize openly.
   • Members respect others’ personal, physical, and emotional boundaries.
   • Members support each other in times of STRUGGLE and TRIUMPH and are not jealous or envious of each other or a chosen targeted few.
   • Special occasions are acknowledged equally for and by all.
   • Tolerance is shown for growth, mistakes and development.
   • Members are supported in the achievement of their personal and if at work, their professional goals.

For more healing lessons, tips and tools, I invite you to learn more in my book Take Your Power Back: Healing Lessons, Tips and Tools for Abuse Survivors. 

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

Years ago my cousin Louisa told me that I had the natural ability to make people feel good. Well, I had to think about that for a moment. My first response was, “Well, I guess that is not so bad a quality to have.” It took me years of unnecessary pain, grief, and anger to understand the true value of what I now realize is a “gift” that I should not have taken for granted for a second. All that angst? For what?

 

Learning the Truth about Yourself

It also took me years to learn that this “gift” and my intelligence, compassion, and integrity made and continue to make me a target of bullies, scapegoaters, narcissists, and other emotional vampires. In short, it took years to learn the truth about myself. Does this story sound even a little bit familiar to the other folks out there? I would bet you a $100.00 it does and this is why.

We are human. We are fallible and we learn through our successful and our, well, not so successful, endeavors. This is how our characters and personalities and belief systems evolve and mature. This is how we learn what nourishes our soul.

Learn more on how work and obligation contribute to emotional health and building character.

It’s that simple. Learning how our minds work and what causes the invisible barriers such as fears, anger, angst, phobias we possess can set all of us on a pathway to understanding the truth about ourselves. Once you have clarity, you have freedom to choose and put in place the steps to deal with these invisible barriers. Once you do that, the pathway to happiness is cleared of the obstacles that prevented you from getting there all along. Look at anger, for example. Here is a quote from Dr. Lynne Namka’s book, How To Let Go of Your Mad Baggage.

“Life is full of multidimensional possibilities… Remember, you don’t have to keep on doing the same-o, same-o. Choices. Life is about choices. …One great thing about being a Human Being is that you do get choices. We can use our choices…to become gentle, loving people. What better option do you have to do with your lifetime? Choose wisely.”

I agree totally. We have the choice to break the cycles once we know the truth. Let’s discuss our upbringing for a moment and how it affected us. Do you have a history of being a victim of abuse, degradation, bullying, scapegoating? Then, most likely you were abused, degraded, bullied and scapegoated as a child. And most likely you are an empath since bullies target empaths.

Read more on the McGregor Studies showing how narcissists, bullies, and psychopaths target empaths.

We repeat the same patterns we were conditioned to accept and be familiar with as children and even become the abusers! Personally, I think anyone who was the target of abuse can achieve clarity by understanding the abuser and why you were you targeted to begin with. These truths can set you free to wise choices.

Is Abuse about the Abuser

The truth is that the abusers, shadowed their pain and inadequacies on others they perceive as a threat, a threat that is entirely in their mind. What a revelation, right Yes. They are the broken ones yet other innocent victims are made to suffer, the perfect definition of a scapegoat. I will discuss more “facts” about the innocent victims a little later.

According to http://www.bullyonline.org “Bullies are seething with resentment, bitterness, hatred and anger, and often have wide-ranging prejudices as a vehicle for dumping their anger onto others. Bullies are driven by jealousy and envy. Rejection (which cannot be assuaged) is another powerful motivator of bullying.” But why don’t bullies seek help? The answer is simple. They lack the abilities to do so. They are emotionally weak and fragile. They are the ones with abominably low levels of self-esteem who never seek or deal with the truth or make any efforts to improve because they do not have the abilities to self analyze or self sooth.

Read more on how much we need to know about narcissists to heal.

Since childhood, bullies learned to avoid the unpleasant consequences through denial, blame, and pretending victimhood. They are psychologically deficient and most likely personality disordered and are not able to see any fault in themselves. They also lack compassion and, frankly, do not think what they are doing is wrong. Frequently they are energy vampires and cannot generate their own energy. So they seek out and find targets from whom they can easily steal energy.

Bullies also gang up on victims. They like to recruit other broken ones, the proverbial “flying monkeys,” most like them and frequently make them the golden children or “favorites,” partners in crime of a sort. So now they, the other family bullies, and the golden children rally against the selected black sheep and collectively dump their emotional garbage to obtain psychological relief, what I refer to as “psychological burping.“ In a sense, the black sheep role keeps the dysfunctional family, that routinely violates family members’ personal boundaries, intact. The family “normalizes’ dysfunction and the children grow to repeat the family roles that were chosen for them in their families.

Read more about dysfunctional families and intergenerational abuse here.

The black sheep then live pain-based lives they were conditioned to believe were their destiny, frequently ones of pain, drugs and alcohol abuse, emotional abuse, low self-esteem, and low sense of self-worth throughout their lives. They can go on to become the abusers and/or marry abusers or self-sacrifice for others and become codependents while neglecting their own needs.

Why are We Targeted?

Why are the “black sheep” targeted to begin with? Do they deserve this treatment? Do they taunt the abusers? Why are some folks bullied while others are not? This selection has really nothing to do with you personally. But it has lots to do with the type of person you are, your vulnerability, and your personality and character. Here is a list of qualities in people who are typically bullied or scapegoated and how they are perceived by the abuser:

Learn more on why narcissists target empaths.

Note:   These are all characteristics of highly productive emotionally intelligent empathetic people with high integrity, qualities the bullies and scapegoaters do not possess and most likely never will. They also include characteristics that make us vulnerable.

• Uniqueness. Stand out in some way (Qualities the bully envies or can pick on)
• Independent and refuse to be subservient (Qualities that make it harder for the bullies to control so you are singled out as threat)
• Highly competent or talented (Bullies are jealous, can’t stand to share credit and view this as competition)
• Better liked and possess greater emotional intelligence (Bullies are jealous and perceive these as a threat)
• Possess a good sense of humor (Bullies are envious of attention you receive and perceive you as a threat)
• Ethical, generous, and honest with a desire to help, heal, teach, develop, and nurture others (Bullies are envious and they perceive this as submissiveness and a threat)
• Non-confrontational (Bullies interpret this as submissiveness).
• Empathetic; natural rescuers and healers with exaggerated compassion (Bullies interpret this as weakness and vulnerability)

Bullied individuals are frequently highly talented intelligent and people of the highest character. This list reflects the insipid and insidious nature of abuse, neglect, and scapegoating. The pain bullied individuals hold is the pain shadowed upon them by those who they trusted to love and protect them. The immeasurable damage is invisible and the patterns of destruction repeat themselves until, that is, you learn the truth, select other options, and break the cycles.

The point is, folks, that you have the free will to choose to parent yourself, treat yourself well, nourish your soul, and decide with whom you want to associate. You have the freedom and power to heal and replace the toxic beliefs and fears you are familiar and comfortable with with emotionally healthy ones founded on your personal truth, not lies you were conditioned to believe. You have the choice to remove toxic people from your life and surround yourself with loving people with whom you have reciprocal balanced mutually respectful relationships. You have the choice to live the life you choose and the one you deserve. You have the power to learn to monitor and manage boundaries and stop violating boundaries of others and stop others from violating yours. These choices and skills are all free for the taking once you take your power back and learn the truth about your real self-worth and the blessed person you truly are.

Learn more on becoming your authentic self.

I explore these issues in much more detail in my book Take Your Power Back: Healing Lessons, Tips, and Tools for Abuse Survivors.

 

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

The short answer? They are aggressive covert parasites with charm.

The long answer? They are character disordered. They want to and that is their intention and that is just what they do. They do it to everyone, but they needed you the most to provide them narcissistic supply for a long period of time and you came along at an opportune time for them. You were convenient. They wanted all the benefits you could supply them without any of the work so they targeted you. They found you. You did not find them.

Now, they could not tell you this, could they, because you would say, “who is this lunatic (which is what they really are)” and run for the hills if you knew the illusion and grooming was all a ploy, a con, a lie and they used love as their camouflage.

READ MORE ON THIS PROVOCATIVE TOPIC in Evelyn Ryan’s Book, Take Your Power Back: Healing Lessons, Tips, and Tools for Abuse Survivors.

It is exhausting for them to pretend because it takes work and they do not like to work so, in time, their true colors emerge and you get to see who they REALLY are….covert aggressive weak uncompassionate emotional vampires who would sell their own mother and children for a nickel if it served them. But your cognitive dissonance, your inner belief system that keeps you safe, causes you to doubt what you are seeing and feeling. Why? Because they insert an element of doubt into our reality and trigger our pain from childhood and we start to feel uncomfortable in our own bodies, unsafe and defenseless in the same way we were made to feel defenseless in childhood.

This, folks, is the core to what causes the highs and lows of trauma bonding and we think the narcissists, the abusers, are the only ones with the power to alleviate it (like we thought in childhood) when in reality they are so weak they have to parasitically feed off the energy of other people. This creates an addictive dooloop of uncertainty and pain that we think WE are the cause of and are deserving of.

This is the core to any abuse but the primary core to the harm caused from aggressive long term invalidation from narcissistic abuse. Narcissists intentionally and premeditatedly take all they can from us that they cannot supply themselves and that will serve them long term and help feed an illusion of “normalcy” to the world and then proceed to deplete us. That was their plan from the beginning. They turn us figuratively into them and then destroy us. THAT is how much they loathe themselves and the magnitude of THEIR personal shame.

Divorce or breaking up with them is like acid on their skin to them because they have lost their camouflage of normalcy and fear being exposed to the world for who they really are….you are seeing the magnitude of the evil wrath, inability to love, lack of compassion, and aggression triggered by their TOXIC fear of shame. You are seeing the wolf who has taken off his or her sheep’s clothing, the snake who has taken off its suit!

It also demonstrates how much that WE are the opposite and the magnitude of our own personal power and value. They target the best of the best because they know we are, they pathologically envy us, and we are vulnerable to power imbalanced relationships due to the damage done to our core belief system and self-worth in our childhood.

The good news?

We are merely wounded and we will heal. We can love. We will create long lasting memories and mutually respectful relationships.

The evil emotional parasites cannot. They are parasites with charm.

I write in much more detail about this provocative subject and much more in Take Your Power Back: Healing Lessons, Tips and Tools for Abuse Survivors.

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

As the owner and founder of Yourlifelifter, a healing page on Facebook and website that serve as “A Truth-Based Healing and Information Center for Narcissistic Abuse Survivors and Others Seeking Emotional Freedom,” I have witnessed first hand the miraculous healing power of social media.

 Facebook and the World Wide Web have allowed me to provide a haven for the good folks to rest, heal and thrive, a family, if you will, for the authentic ones with heart, compassion, caring and who want to help other people and who also have been exploited by the narcissists and other character disordered covert aggressors who manipulated their power from them. Many of us seeking to heal have been alienated from our families of birth. The souls of many are starving for truth and Yourlifelifter is showing folks where to look and what to look for to nourish their souls.

Facebook and the World Wide Web also afforded all of us the opportunity to feel as well as experience our personal healing power first hand. How? By the magnitude of reach of the healing energy and truth: The almost daily letters of thanks I receive from folks collectively from 45 countries and who speak 21 languages who are healing and have healed…A post that reaches 40,000 people from around the world…Posts that reach over 500,000 people weekly around the world because abuse victims share those posts with others who share with others who share with others until the message of healing truth spreads like a virus across the seas!

This demonstrates the power of truth, goodness, compassion, authenticity, integrity of character and righteousness that is not only vast beyond human comprehension but is truly humbling in its beauty. It also indicates a rise in the collective consciousness of healing, need for truth-based nourishment that our souls long for as well as the real power generated by authentically good people, the empaths, the compassionate energy receivers and healers.

Do the evil target us? Will they continue to target us?

Of course. Evil is just part of humanity. Because there will always be people who lack compassion and who want all the benefits that the truly good and virtuous people can supply them without having to earn them. And, yes, there is currently a pandemic of narcissism across the world that is also causing the rise in terrorism that we see.

However, we of the healing community will rise above and together we will change the world and return the balance of goodness where it should be: front and center in the minds of the politicians, parents, teachers, presidents, CEOs, our children and every other person in this world. And we will set examples, continue to spread truth and also educate people on narcissism and its causes in the same way we will educate the abused (including those predisposed to narcissism) on the causes of their abuse and start addressing trauma in their youth and focus on the elements of virtue that will help them build characters of personal integrity. We will educate the parents and help them heal so their children heal through them. And Facebook and the World Wide Web are allowing us to do so, to reach out and touch the lives of millions and, soon, billions from across the globe.

In this way, we can put a stop to the pain-based and faulty thinking and pain addictions that are at the core of intergenerational abuse and keep the narcissists’s depravity at the lower end of the continuum where they will do the least amount of damage as they get older and move into adulthood. We, the good folks, will then not be vulnerable to them and no longer fear them and even if they continue to target us, the harm they inflict will not be as serious.

This is how good overpowers evil!

Together we heal! Together we thrive!

January 2016 Edition brought to you by Yourlifelifter

This free newsletter made with Smilebox

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

Happy New Year!!

As we enter the New Year, this is what’s on my mind.

When times get rough or complicated and for sure, they will, here are the twenty fundamental truths I remember:

1. Live in the moment. Be grateful for what you have and not long for what you don’t. If you have a roof over your head, food to eat, people who love you, and your health, you have everything. Thanks, Mom.
2. You were born lovable and do not have to suffer or self sacrifice to be lovable or worthy of love. There will not be another you in the history of the universe. Live in your own truth and do not live others’ lies that make them happy and leave you lacking and miserable.
3. Happiness is a state of mind that comes and goes. But we are happiest when our lives are in balance, and living our personal truth, when we are achieving our financial, spiritual, community, relationship, and health goals. If you are not where you want to be, research how to get there, set a goal, make a plan and go and get it. Accept that this takes hard work and does not come for free and that you deserve it. These are the differences between dreamers and doers, between those who are content and those who are not.
4. No one is immune from being evil. Financial success or lack of it has nothing to do with emotional health or personal integrity. Millionaires as well as poor people can be serial killers, evil, narcissists, and psychopaths too.
5. Just because someone says they love you, does not mean they do in a way you deserve to be loved or in a healthy manner.
6. Understand that in emotionally healthy relationships, boundaries are respected including your privacy, feelings, beliefs, needs and emotions and you should never have to defend these to anyone or have them habitually violated.
7. Emotionally unhealthy people cannot handle the truth and shadow their brokenness on unwilling targets as a coping mechanism because they lack self coping skills and the level of compassion that would prevent them from using others for self-serving ways.
8. If you are a compassionate empathetic person, BEWARE. Manipulators target compassionate empathetic people who themselves typically were also survivors of childhood abuse. To stop the cycle of abuse you must understand this in order to take the steps to stop being a victim.
9. To prevent being a target of the emotionally unhealthy people including abusers, be careful advertising too much of your personal business freely, and being overly honest….emotionally unhealthy people interpret this as permission to violate your personal boundaries and you are setting yourself up to being scapegoated, lied about and targeted for others’ personal gain. Don’t lie…just don’t say anything.
10. Never settle for less than what you want and deserve…if you do settle and end up being used, taken advantage of or neglected, it is because you have self worth issues that 99% of the time were the result of your upbringing.
11. Don’t misinterpret drama or lack of it with emotional health or happiness. Environments without drama can be filled with covert aggressives and closet addicts just like drama filled ones can be ripe with overt aggressors, boundary violators, abusers, and addicts.
12. You are paid for the value of the services you provide. This is why when you are young it is important to pick a career that will pay you to live a lifestyle you are accustomed to. If you are not paid enough, increase your skills, knowledge and abilities in the field you are in or pick a different career.
13. Never stop learning. Stay relevant and never stop exploring or stop moving.
14. Always look your best for yourself first but remember you also only have one time to make a first impression.
15. Make sure you save enough money to live a comfortable life and have medical coverage in your old age. Start saving EARLY and learn how to invest wisely because your accounts will go up exponentially with interest on interest.
16. Take charge of your physical and mental health. Take good care of yourself all your life!! Do not become an ailment or link your identify to it or let it stop you from enjoying a fulfilling life. You are larger that that! You do have the divine ability to heal yourself and alleviate your aches and pains. Don’t rely solely on a pill to take care of your ailments. If you do not know how, take stress and pain management classes and learn biofeedback classes, yoga anything that will teach you to connect to, use and hone your cognitive skills and to the metaphysical part of yourself and life.
17. Do what you can, accept what is, and turn the rest over to your spiritual father or source. Understand that you, we all have personal limitations and tolerance levels. When you have exhausted everything within your power, pray, meditate, appeal to higher powers.
18. When people we love pass on, their souls live on through us, in our thoughts, in our feelings, in our dreams, when we miss them. Find ways to keep their spirits alive so others can benefit from them as well.
19. Evil people “go to hell” because when they leave this earth, they are gone for good. No one misses them. They leave memories people quickly forget.

Happy New Year!

Evelyn Ryan, Yourlifelifter

Listen to this mesmerizing discussion on narcissism with Evelyn Ryan on “Breaking It Down with Frank MacKay.”

Evelyn and Frank discuss an array of provocative subjects from empaths being targeted by narcissists, to her aunt’s suicide from abuse, to her new book, Take Your Power Back, to how narcissism impacts terrorism.

Hope you love the show!!