Dr. Carter's Best Advice About Narcissists That Every Survivor Needs to Know

Kerry: [00:00:00] In honor of the national holiday today, I'm going to do a throwback on one of my favorite interviews with Dr. Les Carter. This may have been an episode that you missed last year, which Dr. Carter explains why narcissists behave the way they do and how they see the world.

So I'll let you introduce yourself, Dr. Carter. Tell us a little bit about what you do, how you got into this and sort of your specialty.

Dr. Les Carter: Well, first, Carrie, let me say thank you for allowing me to be on your program with you. I'm living in Waco, Texas now. I retired here a little over two years ago and I had maintained a very active counseling practice in the Dallas, Texas area, which is about an hour and 40 minutes north of here for 41 years.

And I've graduated from Baylor University. Then I got my doctorate at the University of North Texas and stayed in the Dallas area, which is where North Texas, just barely north of that. And wound up being for 25 years with the Minerth Meyer clinic. Some people might still [00:01:00] remember that we did a lot of radio and writing and things like that.

And then I set up my own practice with a colleague of mine and we wound up having a clinic with seven therapists for the last 16 years of my, of my practice there. I started out doing a lot of anger management work, and that comes a lot from trying to figure out the old Carter family system and, uh, you know, what was going on way back when with all the men in the Carter family.

And then it began morphing as I began developing a deeper appreciation for how narcissistic patterns. Play into the way that we deal with conflict and friction and things like that. And so I've written both on anger management as well as narcissism. And of course, as you mentioned, I have my YouTube channel now with their surviving narcissism, and it's just, you know, I, I just, I love my work.

I love the, uh, the career that I've had and, and just to be able to speak out about this now. On platforms that I have and people like you are gracious enough to allow me to be honest. It's just, it's just an honor to be able to speak into this and hopefully be a help to somebody. 

Tara: Yeah. Thank you so much [00:02:00] for being here, Dr.

Carter. So here's our first question for you. What do you think people get wrong about narcissists or being in narcissistic relationships or those of us with narcissistic patterns, as you mentioned? 

Dr. Les Carter: You know, one of the, the, the, the biggest questions, it's a simple question that people will ask whenever they are encountering narcissistic individuals is why are you doing this to me?

You know, and they, they begin just seeing narcissists as having them in their scopes thinking you're just taking target practice on me. And one of the things I try to remind people of is narcissists are going to be narcissists. You just happen to be a player on the stage. What they want to do is they, they bring their drama to you and they, they have a real high attitude of entitlement and control and manipulation.

And they have all, they operate with what I call alternate reality. And when you say this doesn't work for me. Or I don't understand quite why [00:03:00] you're treating me in the way that you are. Then they'll come along and say, well, that's because you're dysfunctional. And so we, uh, we think, well, then you're just, you're just taking all of your problems out on me and obviously in a sense they are.

But then the, when you ask, why are you doing this to me? Yeah, just drop the, to me and ask, why are you doing this? You know, when you say, why are you so argumentative when I'm with you? Just drop the, when I'm with you, why are you so argumentative? And, and, you know, we can just go on and on with that, but we tend to, to, they want us to take responsibility for their garbage because they don't do that well themselves.

And sometimes we can fall into the pattern of thinking that, you know, we've got to convince them otherwise. And then what they do is they just take you down that little rabbit hole and have fun with you when that begins to happen. 

Kerry: Do you think that they consciously are doing this or how do you understand the makeup of a narcissist?

Because I know that. I see people get caught up in really trying to understand their behavior, as if [00:04:00] understanding the behavior is going to lead to change or at least lead to relationship improvement. 

Dr. Les Carter: Well, let's, let's, let's kind of pull back. One of the things that's so necessary to understand about narcissists is they live behind the shield of their false self.

Okay. Now to make it real simple, you and I, hopefully, as we engage with one another would buy into that old saying, honesty is the best policy. You know, I just want to be straight up with you. You'd be straight up with me. We have a word for that. It's called authenticity. Narcissists, they're thinking, no, honesty is not necessarily the best policy here for me.

They want to be in control and, but beneath it, they tend to be very fear based and shame based. Now, almost never will a narcissist come out and say what I just said, but what you'll hear is a lot of defensiveness. When you say, Hey, we have a conflict between the two of us. Let's talk about that. Their defenses are part of their fear of [00:05:00] base, a way of thinking.

And so they can throw their walls up very quickly. They rationalize, they justify, and then they do the classic projection. They see in you what they won't come to terms with on the inside of themselves. And then when we say they're shame based, narcissists started out, just like you and I probably did as well, knowing that there's a judgment system out there, that people are going to grade you, and they're going to see if you measure up to their schemes or not.

Healthy individuals begin realizing, you know, I don't really feel like I need to live according to someone else's judgments. But narcissists don't have the confidence to think that way. What they've done, if they, they've decided, okay, I'm not going to let you see the, the real me, honesty is not always the best policy.

What I'm going to do though, is I'm going to pronounce shame on you. And so, uh, they, and that's their projection. They see in you what they don't want to have to come to terms with. On the inside of themselves. And so when you're dealing with narcissists, you're dealing with people who [00:06:00] are playing this smoke and mirrors game with you constantly.

And if they twist you around and bring frustration out of you, or then you say something or do something that. It has an anger element to, uh, to it. They can point to you and say, see, look how, look how dysfunctional you are. I love playing those kinds of games. Do you know what I'm talking about? Ever been on the receiving end of that one?

I wish I could say that's never happened to me, but. 

Tara: So as a clinician or clinician, Dr. Carter, how was it for you working with these types of individuals? Was it easy for you to sort of point them out? You're like, Oh, this, this person definitely is. Or did you find it difficult even working with them to see through that false facade that you talked about?

Dr. Les Carter: Well, you know, I mentioned that I did a lot of work in anger management. And in fact, as a young therapist, way back when I finished my doctorate in 1980, and there's not a real high demand for 26 year old therapists. But what I did back then is I began conducting [00:07:00] workshops and that really helped out and folks began realizing maybe this young fella knows what he's talking about.

And so what I did is I began realizing that these individuals carry a great deal of anger on the inside of themselves. And over time, as these individuals would, would come into my office, I began seeing all sorts of patterns that were repetitive. And We go back to that defensiveness. They could be pathologically justifying.

And then with those walls up, they had to be in the superior position. These are individuals who, who, who wanted to, uh, to superimpose their thoughts on other individuals that they didn't want to hear anyone else. Low empathy, high need for control. And then the longer I was working in that, uh, rim, the more I realized.

This is narcissism, and this, that's what we're dealing with. We're dealing with individuals who have concluded that there's really only one person in this world whose opinion matters. And when you know it's me, and so they, they want to [00:08:00] fill other individuals with who they are, but in doing so, they, they need to empty you of who you are.

And it becomes one big control game to them. And it becomes one big effort to try to, uh, to rob you of you. And the longer you're with these individuals, it just wears you out. And before you know it, you're responding in ways that you wish that you had not. They want to establish all sorts of priorities on your behalf that you don't want to.

Be involved with and so it becomes one big, huge circle and, and that being the case, then, you know, you're, you're going to have to know what you're dealing with so that you can extricate, extricate yourself because they'll just keep coming after you for as long as they feel like they can get away with it.

Kerry: This is what I find. I mean, I understand it's we're always interpersonal. We're always involved with other people. But what intriguing to me is how narcissists need relationships in a way that's different than an average person. We want [00:09:00] relationships. Yeah, we most of us don't really want to be alone.

Maybe we've had fear of being alone, but There's something even more compulsive about a narcissistic's use of a relationship. Can you talk about more about that, how it's almost kind of a parasitic experience? 

Dr. Les Carter: Yeah, it's, it's not wrong at all to say, I like being in a relationship or when someone is kind to me, I appreciate that.

Or when I have someone that's loving or friendly or helpful. That really makes my day. That's all that's great. Narcissists, however, are basically empty on the inside. One of the things that they lack is introspection. They lack a sense of trying to know and understand who they are from the inside out.

And because of that, they don't really have an inner strength to draw upon. So guess what that means when they latch on to you, it's like, you're going to become my strength. And if I can get you to think this way, which is why they're so pushy, [00:10:00] or if I can get you to, uh, to do my bidding, which is why they're so manipulative, if I can get you to defer to me, which is why they have to be in that superior position, then I'm going to feel great about who I am.

And so their sense of well being is very externally based. And so when they say they want a relationship, it's like, I need somebody to feed me. Feed me, feed me, feed me, tell me how wonderful I am, prove that I'm better than, better than you, starting with you, and then everyone else, and so there's this seemingly high opinion of oneself that they bring to the equation, when in fact, Beneath the surface, what we're drawing upon is just raw emptiness.

And, and that's, that's something that we need to see on the inside of them because they can't see that. And I just mentioned, they don't have enough self reflection or even if they do say, yeah, I know sometimes I do things wrong. Well, then they eventually circle around and say, but it's your fault. [00:11:00] Or it was my mother's fault or it was my ex's fault.

You know, something like that. They, they just have a very difficult time taking responsibility for all of the many difficulties they generate. 

Tara: So a lot of our listeners are usually in that place of sort of discovering that they may be in a relationship with a narcissist or they realize or recognize that something's at least unhealthy or toxic about their relationship.

What do you think are the signs that someone can start to look at or point at and be like, I'm absolutely in a relationship with a narcissist and these, I see these things and you've said a few, like lack of responsibility, that defensiveness, likely that anger, what, what other things might they look for 

Dr. Les Carter: going back to the, there need to be in control.

How many times have you thought. This person just continues to nitpick at me. That would be a sign or this person has a pretty loose temper. In other words, all I have to do one false move and I'm going to catch it. That's a sign. It may be that [00:12:00] they're just super stubborn. And it's like, if I have something to say to that narcissistic person, it's like, why would I listen to you?

That's low empathy. That's part of narcissism. These individuals might be secret keepers. And it's, it's like, I want to know as much as I can about you, because that allows me to have an upper hand. or hand, but there's certain things you're not going to know about me. So that's a sign. Or it may be that, that they are real good about talking to other individuals about how wonderful they are.

But you see behind the scenes that they struggle. And you realize, you know, you're there's, there's this lack of consistency that they have. It's your inner self and your outer self doesn't really match pitch. And the more of an insider you are with them, the more you're going to see, there's a whole lot of that.

And, and as they can argue easily, they're easily critical and negative. I mean, there are so many things that, that if you see one or two of those kinds of things that I just mentioned, occasionally, don't we all have [00:13:00] some of our own blind spots or our moments where we're not really on top of our game.

But with narcissists, the more you see them, you realize, man, this is persistent. And probably one of the biggest things is they absolutely won't take responsibility for relationship problems. So, you know, let's say that you and I have a conflict and a difficulty. And so I might say something like, Hey, Tara, or Hey, Carrie, there's something that's bothering me.

In our healthiness, we would say something, it doesn't surprise us that we differ in our healthiness. Uh, we would say, well, let's, let's just sit down and talk about it. What, what were you expecting and what did you receive instead? And what would you like for me to know? And then I would sit down and listen to your concerns.

And we would have a sense of mutual regard in the way that we would talk with each other. Narcissists. I mean, that kind of thinking just is completely lost on them. They see relationships as a competition. And guess who's the designated loser, by the way, uh, and they're, they're constantly [00:14:00] wanting to one up and it's like, no, if there's a problem here, it can't possibly be me.

So something's going on with you and we've got to fix that. And so that's where they come with their bossiness and criticism and all the rest that goes along with it. And it's frustrating, but going back to my opening comments, one of the things you can think, what did I do here to warrant this? You have to remind yourself, uh, this isn't about you.

This is about their dysfunction. And they happen to be bringing it to you. You're a player on their stage with them. But this is about who they are and it's so important to be able to make that distinction and develop the objectivity there that they're not going to bring to the equation. 

Kerry: Yeah, that really leads me great to my next question because I see people get stuck there so profoundly.

When somebody's in a relationship with this type of individual and the problematic person makes it about the partner, the problem we're having is because you bring up the problems. We wouldn't have a problem if you didn't bring the problems up. But then [00:15:00] they end up struggling about what do we do? Do we, do we get more help?

Do we stay? Do we go see our pastor? Do I just need to suffer this out? I mean, what do you recommend people do when they recognize, you know what? This is habitual. I'm seeing the signs that Dr. Carter just outlined. What do you, what do you think they should do? Because I know people stay there stuck and then they do a lot of work trying to change the problematic person.

Dr. Les Carter: Yeah. Yeah. Bingo. Right there. What you said right there at the very end. I'm trying to change that problematic person. And my, my alternative to that would be go find a brick wall. And bang your head on it, you'll get the same results, you know, sure enough. And by the way, one of the things that you'll hear people saying is just, if you have a narcissist in your life, go no contact, well, wouldn't that be nice?

But some, and sometimes that's exactly what you need to do. And sometimes you can do it because you don't have, you know, people hanging on with you and, and you can just move on down the road. And if that's possible, that's a, that's a great [00:16:00] possibility. Other times though, it's not quite that simplistic.

And when you hear my videos or my writing and all, I tend not to put these one size fits all kind of solutions on individuals, but you want to remind yourself, again, I'm dealing with somebody who's not reflective. They don't want to take responsibility. And so I can talk with them perhaps about strategies that might be more helpful than what we've been doing here in our relationship so far.

But by and large, if there's going to be any kind of healthiness. Well, being healthy means you have to have a certain healthy interior, and narcissists don't have that. They've got that emptiness I mentioned, the shame base, the fear base, the false self, the entitlement, the selfishness, all that goes with it.

So we go to the use of a word that's very popular and has been quite some time in the field of psychology, and that's the word boundaries. And a lot of times people think boundaries means just tell everybody no, and that'll solve the problem. [00:17:00] But boundaries is something much, much bigger than that. Uh, boundaries begins with you defining within yourself who you want to be.

And that's no small kind of a task that individuals are required to maintain. I would, when I was in my counseling practice, I would ask people, uh, let me know what, tell, tell me what kind of characteristics that you want to have dominate who you are and how you want to be known. And so, Typically people come up with two or three, they'll say, well, I want to be patient and I want to be understanding and I want to be friendly.

It's like, okay, let's come up with about 17 or 18 more. And let's just kind of come up with a real good, well rounded notion of who you want to be. And sometimes that would be a homework assignment. And then the next question that I would want to then ask them to ponder is. In what circumstances are you least inclined to be what you just described to me?

And, you know, well, when that person is argumentative, there goes my patience out the window. Or when that person [00:18:00] discounts me, there goes my sense of inner well being and calmness. And before you know it, you begin realizing that we wind up in this codependent dance. With the narcissist and make no mistake, they're the ultimate codependence.

They're feeding off of you, which is what the narcissism, or excuse me, codependency is all about just playing off of one another, as opposed to operating on your own initiative. And then the question becomes, well, can we be in a position here where I can go ahead and live and act upon the ingredients?

The, the traits, the qualities that I want to be, and if that person joins me, that would be wonderful. And if they don't join me, I'm still going to stick with my initiatives anyway. And that's hard because it does require a certain, you know, a moving off or moving away from them emotionally, even though physically you may have to still be in their presence.

That's a pretty long answer to that question there, Carrie. But I mean, it's just. That's, that's the stuff that therapy is, is consists of and [00:19:00] breaking that down into, you know, the, the theoretical parts, but then breaking it down into real life circumstances with individuals. 

Tara: So Les, or Dr. Carter, as a result of my narcissistic partner's defensiveness, lack of responsibility, lack of accountability, that projection, I thought that I was the problem.

You know, I thought I might be the narcissist that I needed help. I was doing all the self help, self help, going to therapists, all that kind of stuff to try to fix me, because clearly I must be the problem in my relationship. Because here's this person that I love, who I should, I believe I should trust telling me that.

Which I imagine is the issue of a lot of us that we think it's our fault. What do we do in those kinds of scenarios? 

Dr. Les Carter: Well, and what you just described here is so, so commonplace. And I, I think it's a matter of, of recognizing when, for example, when you say, well, maybe I'm the narcissist, let's keep in mind that narcissism is a pattern on a spectrum and some people, and I try to put it like, let's say you're on [00:20:00] a scale of zero to 100, 100 to be that totally malignant narcissist, the person that's just got no conscience and they, they would, you know, shove their grandmother aside to get whatever they want.

If that's what was required. You have some people that are at the 70 percent level. It's, it's pretty prominent. You have some people that are at the 45 percent level. Healthy individuals never get to the place where they have zero ingredients. You know, sometimes we can be a little too controlling or I wasn't as empathetic as I probably needed to be in that moment, but healthy individuals can keep it down to about, let's call it the 20 percent level.

And, and, and again, this is not technical, but you understand what I'm saying. And so narcissists though. They'll take that little 20 percent now, most of the time you're doing pretty good, but they'll take that those moments where maybe you were a less than sensitive or you were too agitated and it's like, see, this proves it.

You are screwed up from through and through from head to toe. And, you know, they, they do this all or nothing black and [00:21:00] white. And, you know, when you've been exposed to that kind of communication over and over and over, then it's like, maybe they're right. Maybe I am as messed up as they say. And then they're over there thinking, Oh, I so have you going.

And so I, am I right? Yeah. And, and then at some point it's like, wait, just a minute, I'm dealing with a master manipulator here. That's what they do. And then when you begin examining, it's like, I really don't have this strong need to tell people how to live. I mean, yes, I like to coordinate, but I don't really see myself as being that highly controlling or take another central ingredient to narcissism.

I don't really feel like I want to be superior over other individuals. Or I like taking responsibility for myself, or I really enjoy, it's not as though I'm supposed to, but I enjoy showing empathy and learning about people from their angle and their vantage point. And, you know, I want to see myself as [00:22:00] equal to another individual, no one up, one down.

When you begin realizing that's what my core is, I'm hoping you can remind yourself that, you know, those kind of characteristics do require. A certain amount of reciprocity for it to be full, but the narcissist, you know, they're so into the competition. They want to beat you down that the way I put it is they become thieves and they want to rob you of the real you.

And so that's why it's so necessary. Once you see that they take the initiative of the control and they take the initiative of invalidation and they're, they're pathologically defensive. It's like, wait a minute, this may not be bringing out the best in me, but this is not about all about me either. I have to remind myself that I'm dealing with somebody who's been living.

Behind the, that false front portrayal that they do pretty much their entire lives and typically as they get deeper into their adult years, unless they get some sort of therapy or have some sort of [00:23:00] major crisis, it tends to just become that much more entrenched with them. And that's when it's like, you know, I need to pull back and go back to my bearings.

Who am I? What do I stand for? What are my core beliefs and my values? When I say that, am I just giving a correct answer to a quiz or do I really mean that and how would I live that out with more healthy individuals? And, and so it, uh, and sometimes it takes. Outsiders to help you see that, which is why I'm so appreciative when people say, well, I found a good therapist or I had a support group or I went up going into recovery or whatever it may be, because the narcissist wants to make themselves.

You know, king or queen. And by the way, one of the things they love to do is they love to whittle away with you at your support system. Oh yeah. You've got this friend over here that says that you're nice, but they don't know what I know, you know, that kind of thing. And so they'll just continue to, uh, to wear you down.

So you've got to remind [00:24:00] yourself that person has an agenda and they, they don't know life. In a, in a good way beyond just me getting my narcissistic supply from you. And so just developing an awareness of who they are and what they bring to the equation and then pulling back and going back to your basics is so, so essential.

Kerry: That's really wonderful advice because I find people when you're a more cooperative person, you're not, you're not a conflictual, you'd like to get along. You end up just thinking that you got to do more work. There's something that somehow there's a mismatch and it's something that. Somehow it's the failure of the relationship or maybe it's something you're doing wrong.

So I really appreciate your emphasis on the assessment of the other person, the assessment of the other person's behavior, because it's super hard to see that. So as we kind of wrap it up today, what is it you would love to have people sort of leave with is sort of the big piece of advice. Especially with this waking up because I think that's what we've really been talking about today is kind of waking up to the [00:25:00] problem that there is the problem may not be because I'm sure you hear all the time it takes two to tango and I found that not always sometimes it just takes one difficult person in the mix to create a whole Problem is anything you'd like to really leave people with about this?

Dr. Les Carter: Well, it, it, it, remember, I started by saying one of the things that in healthy people do, you know, we like to go with the notion that says honesty is the best policy and narcissists like, nah, I don't do that. I'll let you think that I do, but I don't. Honesty though, is, is so essential and you, you want to be willing to honestly assess yourself.

You know, what, what kind of things do I say and do that I wish that I hadn't or that I could do better on, be honest about that. But then also, as I mentioned just a moment ago, when you see that, you know, I do have a pretty decent track record of tuning into other individuals and I want to emphasize kindness and patience and humility and, and honor and respect.

You know, on my, uh, YouTube channel, [00:26:00] and I say, Dr. CDRC stands for Dignity, respect, and Civility. Uh, those are leading characteristics that I want to have. Uh, as you're able to objectively pull back, take the emotion out and ask, who am I? How can I improve narcissists? Don't ask that question. How can I improve?

They say, uh, they think, how can you improve so that my life's gonna be better? And so if, if you're willing to jump into that arena, then already. That, that indicates narcissism is not going to run away with you because like I say, they don't self reflect, but as you go down and do that hard work of defining yourself and knowing your whys and your origins and your roots and your, your better alternatives, then it's a wonderful process of discovery that each one of us can go into.

And, you know, with us being therapists here, how many of us can say, I've done everything right, I've made mistakes. So we all can look back and think, oh man, there's so many things that I could have done differently. [00:27:00] But the healthy person says, I'm going to own it and I'm going to examine it. And I'm going to make adjustments, I'm going to do the best that I can to connect with people who are also of that same way of thinking.

And that's when you know that the narcissist doesn't have to have the final word in your world, in your life. 

Kerry: Wow. 

Tara: Thank you so much for that. I really appreciate it. Uh, Dr. Carter, where can we find you? So you're on YouTube. What's the name of your YouTube channel? Do you have any other resources? Well, it's 

Dr. Les Carter: real complicated.

The YouTube channel is called Surviving Narcissism. The, uh, my website is called surviving narcissism dot TV on, on Facebook, surviving narcissism. So in other words, we've got a theme there. And so if you just look up surviving narcissism, you'll find it. And we have a whole host of, we have webinars that I've presented and classes that I've presented.

Online video classes. And of course we have the, uh, the, the videos themselves that we have on YouTube. And so there's lots of resources. And one of the things I try to do [00:28:00] is look at different angles about, you know, how to understand this, because there are so many different ways that we can become educated.

And the more you're onto that, then the more you can know that, you know, life's just an ongoing journey. And, and I consider myself a lifelong learner and those who want to come with me. I'm more than happy to, to welcome them onto the path. So that's what we're doing. 

Tara: Yeah. Thank you so much. 

Dr. Les Carter: Thank you so much for allowing me to be with you.

And I so appreciate the efforts that y'all are making as well. So it's mutual. 

Kerry: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much. Well, that's a wrap for this week's episode. Are you following me on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube? Find me @KerryMcAvoyPhD. And whether you're in or out, Consider leaving or have left a narcissistic relationship.

Find community support at my toxic free relationship club. You can learn about this resource as well as others at KerryMcAvoyPhD.com. And I'll see you back here next [00:29:00] week.