Editor’s note: The following essay was contributed to Lovefraud by Kenneth Royce at www.javelinpress.com. Ken discovered that a “friend” was a pathological liar, serial thief and con artist. “Though he made off with over $10,000 of my property in a very complicated scam,” Ken says, “it’s had the ironic benefit of outing him for the sociopath he is, and thus warning many other unsuspecting people.”
Autostereograms produce an illusion of depth using only a single image. The image is usually generated by computer, by repeating a narrow pattern from left to right. By decoupling eye convergence from focusing operations, a viewer is able to trick the brain into seeing a 3D scene.
How to see a 3D autostereogram
With your face about six inches from the image, look through it as though it were a window (and your trying to see something beyond it) and then move slowly back (keep the same beyond focus). You will see a 3D image come into view.
This is called “parallel viewing” because your eyes are unfocusing slightly (i.e., diverging towards parallel) as if seeing something beyond the 2D image. The muscles inside your eye that control the focusing lens relax. Various autostereograms are at www.vision3d.com.
The sociopath’s autostereogram
Sociopaths train the unsuspecting to see differently. They train us to see the autostereogram image of their story.
Of their lie.
The mind muscle that controls mental focus is coaxed into relaxing. In the hands of an experienced sociopath, we do this unknowingly. Their goal is for us to transpose reality (the flat 2D nature of their shallow lives) for a mirage (their fictitious 3D image of accomplishment, success, bravery, generosity, integrity, etc.).
We are taught to not only see their mirage, but transpose it for reality—and keep transposing it until we forget what the reality ever was. The more relaxed your focus, the more intense and real the mirage will become.
Another helpful parallel is that once you’ve seen a particular autostereogram several times, it is much quicker to see that image than any new autostereogram. You’ve conditioned your mind to expect what it has already seen, and you will almost instantly bypass the 2D for the 3D.
You now seek the lie. Over time, and without conscious effort, you will
routinely forsake reality for a mirage.
You can blink, or even close your eyes for several seconds, and not lose the mirage because”¦you’ve…retained…it…in…your…mind. Your focus has become so casually relaxed that you’ve lost focus altogether.
To act within this mirage as if it were reality will confuse your friends and family, and they will question your judgment, loyalty, and even sanity.
At that point, you are fully operating within the sociopath’s construct, a dreamworld created solely for his enjoyment and benefit. He controls the rules and pace of the game, and thus the outcome.
He takes. You give. He wins. You lose. That is the probable outcome, and you won’t figure out that you’ve even lost until long afterwards. It may take months or even years to fully realize the hugeness of the lie you lived in. Once you do, you will be ashamed at what you retrospectively see as your own foolish trust.
How do I avoid the sociopath’s mirage?
By knowing how it feels when your mind’s focus is being relaxed. It’s a brief odd sensation, like putting on somebody else’s glasses. If you comport yourself past that sensation, you will lose your own focus. Remember, “decoupling eye convergence from focusing operations” is the 3D trick.
This odd sensation is your B.S. detector, especially when they are acting.
The “Hey, wait a minute!” reaction is your subconscious trying to get your active attention that something is wrong, untruthful, contradictory, dangerous, or even evil. Whenever “something doesn’t add up”…trust it!
Whenever you feel it, immediately stop listening to the speaker, mentally step back and regain perspective. Instantly challenge the prima facie untruthful and exaggerated. Don’t be shy—cry Bullsh*t! Seek independent corroboration. Consult with his/her former friends, lovers, business partners, etc. Sociopaths usually have extremely bad credit.
Keep your eyes open. It is possible to spot them before they strike. Selective distrust is the parent of security.
Once you’ve confidently identified a likely sociopath, coolly disengage ALL contact, and quietly warn others to beware.
What if I’m already in the mirage? How do I get out?
The sociopath’s 3D lie can only be seen from only one vantage point—the one you’ve been slyly placed at (through trust and gullibility) and subsequently anchored to (through familiarity and loyalty). If you shift (even slightly) your perspective…the image will vanish.
Usually, somebody will say that one thing that finally jolts the return of your mental focus—if only momentarily. The mirage will then vanish, if only momentarily, and that is your chance to maintain your focus by piecing together the lies told to you.
These mirages are fragile things. They require constant vigilance by the sociopath to maintain the viewer’s limited perspective and relaxed focus. (This is the purpose of frequent pity-ploys. It is emotionally impossible to simultaneously pity yet suspect deceit. Your mind can do only one or the other.)
Escaping from the sociopath’s mirage and returning to reality is an uncomfortable process. It will take much time for your mind to reorient itself. This often engenders considerable confusion.
Time away from the sociopath can allow your mind to regain its focus, but usually that isn’t enough. You will need the surrogate focus of your friends and family who haven’t been fooled by the mirage. Give what they say (no matter how painful or embarrassing) a chance, and hear them out.
Contact others who have been conned by the same sociopath; you will validate each other and this is incredibly relieving and comforting. Soon, the mirage will no longer have any influence over you, and you’ll wonder how you ever believed it at all.
My hunch is that one’s opportunity of seeing through a sociopath is most keen at the very beginning. Once you’ve let your mind go “cross-eyed” in order to “see”/believe the lie, it’s too late. You’ve already reprogrammed your vision by then to see differently, which makes seeing the truth very difficult. A good jolt is usually required to “snap out of it,” but by then the damage has already been done.
The eyes see only what the mind has prepared itself to observe. “Hear hoof beats. Expect horses, not zebras,” as sci-fi author Robert Heinlein once wrote.
In short, people see clearly only at the very beginning, or at the very end—and very rarely during the middle.
You’ll avoid incalculable grief if you learn how to consistently see clearly from the beginning.
Common Law Copyright 2007, Kenneth Royce. All Rights Reserved.
EXCELLENT POST LL.
It’s perfect knowledge.
LL, Sky, Valley,
great discourse! have been reading posts for about an hour now; it never fails to amaze how these alien-pod-humanoids pick the best of the best when they glom on to a host.
after two and a half years of NC, i was missing the spath-hole today, too. i haven’t been on LF in a long time — but knowing it’s here for reinforcement can be life-saving. i’m in therapy, and now on anti-depressants … twenty years of being mind-effed certainly took its toll, and while i’m certainly getting better, i still have the sense of ‘apathy’ and non-movement that you were describing. i didn’t realize just how clinically depressed i was … it’s embarrassing that i couldn’t pull myself back together without ‘professional’ help, but please … if you’re still feeling overwhelmed by the healing process after a year, seek out whatever help you need. i wish i had gone on meds long ago … it’s made a huge difference in how i feel. the physical aches and pains are 80% resolved (the rest are just about gettin’ old!), and just having a focused mind again has been a godsend. i’ve recovered the old ‘me’ more than i thought i ever could.
the thought of dating is still a big NO; i don’t think my spathdar is strong enough yet. just being able to do for myself all that i did for ‘him’ is enough of a task. nothing seems to matter if there’s no one there to ‘perform’ for.
on the up-side, the mind fog has lifted and much of the confusion and my ability to think straight is back. thankfully. for a while i was certain i had a brain disease. guess i did. spathitis.
the main post here was brilliant: that 3-D illusion that was created for me had me mired in a mirage that lasted half my life. it’s hard as hell to readjust to reality, especially when that reality isn’t in technocolor. he created a world that was larger than life ever should be, complete with opti-sex, for which i was always a sucker.
there is so much strength on this site; amazing men and women who have made it through the unthinkable pretzeling of their very spirits.
i love you all, and so good to see many ‘old-timers’ (((Oxy, Hens, sky)))
peace be with us all.
SKY – on the subject of cussing, or rather, anger demanding to be expressed: read Kathy Hawk’s articles on anger, #5 + #6.
(and anger is better outside of you than inside. you write about not being able to do much for yourself – this is connected, i think, to the anger being inside. cuss away!)
there is a line when cussing, between expression of and courting anger. you’ll know it when you cross it.
i swore a lot for a long time. it was necessary. now i don’t swear much, because at THIS time swearing is more than likely giving her power over me. (big dogs don’t need to bark!)
Skylar – I really like your description of being unmotivated and your explanation of why. It makes sense – unconscious patterns of behaviour that are self defeating in reality, but in a spath situation are self protective mechanisms. Makes sense. I wasn’t always like this. I have to remember back a decade to remember my personality before this horrific experience and I wasn’t like this back then. I was so so positive and always optimistic.
I still can be – but I have to ‘make’ myself be optimistic. It doesn’t just ‘happen’ like it used to. My natural positivity flowed into motivation and action back then – I just didn’t question or doubt myself like I do now.
I call it a loss of self efficacy – I’ve lost the view of myself as being a person who can solve any challenge. I have lost reliance in myself. Because when I was with the spath no matter what I tried, I was thwarted.
Despite the criticism of the study, I am always drawn to the picture of dogs receiving random electric shocks in a cage and eventually developing learned helplessness and not moving at all.
I’ve described it before as a stuckness – if I think of what I want to do, then the thought comes into my head “What’s the point?” and the memory of being on my own because of the spath comes to mind. It all flashes through like a fast fast movie and I sigh. What is the point?
I also agree I can do for a significant other … I’ve also thought about finding someone who has similar needs/ wants to me so I can get some things for myself by doing for them. And I wonder why the hell it is I can do things for others but not for myself. Why don’t I come first and why am I putting strangers (in my mind’s eye) ahead of myself who I’ve known all my life?
It makes me sad to realise I’m still looking outside myself for my solutions. So I’ve started to think of myself – it’s not easy. But I’m thinking of my own future – just my own. For the first time that imagined future doesn’t involve a man who will come to the rescue. It’d be great if I met someone wonderful, but my imagined future and the actions I am taking towards it is finally what I would like rather than waiting for some man to come along and give me direction for my life.
Men I have met lately have been pretty unreliable – I don’t want to have all my hopes tied up in these coffee dates- it makes you too vulnerable and easy to hurt. It feels more grown up and realistic to give up the fantasy. Or maybe it’s just plain cynical lol If it happens it happens, but if it doesn’t then I’m going to make sure I’ve got a life I can love. I deserve that. That’s what lots of men go after so why shouldn’t women?
polly! how are you? are you safe?
Sky,
The not having any desires to do anything—just coasting, just floating, only doing what has to be done, in other words, not really wanting anything or caring about anything is a classic sign of clinical depression. Been there and done that.
After my husband died, I stayed that way, just doing the minimal things I had to do. Then my step father died and I quit doing ANYTHING except sitting and looking at the dirt pile up in my floor and I could have cared less. Went days without a bath or clothing change. About all son D or I did was to feed the dogs and the bird. We were CLINICALLY depressed, even with medication and visits to our psychiatrist. Then—got involved with the P Now-X BF and “snapped right out” of the depression into euphoria for a while, then back into DEPRESSION again when that went “south.”
Then, the chaos of the family psychopaths—-one trauma after another, one run in with tragedy, the next with psychopaths, then back to tragedy again and then more psychopaths–INSANITY SQUARED!
It has taken me quite some time to start to find my way out from under the load of bull crap and sorrow, grief and sadness and dig my way to the surface where I can even SEE the light.
Starting to CARE what my house looks like, to CARE if I have a bath or not, to CARE if my yard is mowed or CARE if I look nice. To CARE about taking care of my health and doing something about it.
Simple things, maybe, but important things—and doing what needs to be done to take care of myself, my environment both physical and emotional is what is allowing me to heal. Being AWARE that I didn’t care was the first step in learning what I needed to do to take care of myself.
It’s been a long haul as I worked on one thing at a time, sort of like we always talk about “peeling the onion”—one layer at a time. Boundaries, with others and with myself. Self esteem. Self care physically. Self care emotionally. Self care spiritually. What a pile of work I’ve had to do to take care of myself. Going back and cleaning up messes I made in the past. Learning to trust myself to keep me safe, not only from others, but from my own poor decisions. Learning to be more INDEPENDENT as well as inter-dependent.
Ox
Your post resonates so well with me right now. I”m able to care for myself physically, but just barely. Still working on getting the house up to speed. Trying to figure out what to do with school, still dealing with one class. Being able to take my kids where they need to go. Getting to therapy each week, taking my meds….
But frustrated with the apathy at the same time.
I’m having a hard time being where I’m at right now. There is something to that too. I’m finding that I’m not the “success” I wish I was or want to be, as if that makes a difference.
I have no idea what I want to do with my life now. I’ve spent ten years catering to this man, and avoiding ME.
NOw that i have to look at me, I have no idea what i’m looking AT>
Thanks for your post to Sky
LL
Good morning, everyone!
I wanted to back up and respond to the excellent coversation between LL, Skylar, and Oxy about security and survival. Oxy, I echo your thoughts.
First, LL, you say you have to feel differently to act differently. I have found this not to be the case at all for me, but I certainly have felt the way you feel. When my old bf of 3 years – the one I was in love with – discarded me over 10 years ago. I was numb and suicidal. I didn’t feel like doing anything but lying in bed. But I had no choice. I forced myself to get a temporary office job to pay my rent. I dressed up in office clothes and dealt with condescending doctors and judgmental co-workers because I HAD to. I made myself do it. It sucked and I hated it. 10 years later, I’m still at the same job (it was always a part-time job), and I actually like it a lot these days. I have grown so much in that job and learned how to be a professional. I learned how to just “show up” no matter how I was feeling, and to become part of a team. Now the job has morphed into something else. It is a way to finance my traveling, and has allowed me to have multiple streams of income, like my massage career and teaching dance lessons. It pays all my bills. I have decent medical benefits and 6 weeks of paid vacation a year. I am grateful for the office job.
15 years ago, I was a stripper. If any of you think I actually FELT like dressing in lingerie and stripping in front of total strangers, you are WAY off base. I did it because I HAD to in order to get out of a bad relationship. It worked, and I learned so much from that job. I have even written a short story about it. I believe that you don’t need to “feel” it to do it. Just do it. Just take the classes. Take the lessons. Whatever it is that you have an inkling to do. You will learn something from doing it, even if you learn that you’re not ready to be out in the world with people. Just do it.
In another vein, recently, I forced myself to exercise every day for 3 weeks. I hated exercising, but I just kept doing it because I want to get into a bikini in Costa Rica. After about 3 weeks, the endorphins kicked in and I started looking forward to exercising. I couldn’t wait to go to the gym. I think if you just act like what you want to be, eventually your emotions will follow.
Regarding security and the future: (Hope you don’t mind hearing the world according to Star – lol). There IS no such thing as real security. It is an illusion. At any time, anything could happen to us. With the economy crashing in recent years, millions of people have lost their retirement, their homes, and everything they called security. I think it is forcing people to redefine their idea of security. For me, I started living in the now, which means not worrying about the future. I have been putting money in an emergency fund for years, saving for the future. Well, the future is now! I started spending some of my hard-earned money in my tiny savings account to have fun. And the IRONY is that because I’m enjoying myself more, the universe is providing me with more income. I’m getting more massage clients. I started giving dance lessons. I have a client coming tomorrow who pre-pays for 10 sessions. That is half my trip to CR!
I’m waiting to read a book called “Die Broke”. It talks about a new paradigm of security for a new economy. This is not just for single people, but he also mentions teaching your children the philosophy. I can’t wait to read it.
I also used to seek out men who had money because I believed my security will come through a man. After dating a bunch of rich controlling assholes, like the one who discarded me all those years ago, I have come to look for totally different qualities in a man. I don’t need a man to support me any more. It’s about time – I’m 50!
Star,
I thank you SO MUCH for writing that! Could you come back from to time and kick my butt into gear? LOL!
I’ve decided to continue with school. Taking the term off was the right thing to do. I want to join the gym SO BAD, but I don’t have the money to do it right now. I have to BITE MY TONGUE everytime I pass the gym up the street and I’d give ANYTHING to join. ANYTHING. I have a lot of positive feeling about going and wanting to exercise to work through stress. I so so so SO SO wish I could do it! It’s one thing I think that would be positive and new for me that I could stay committed to to help me get through this. AND it’s just right up the street!! lol! 25 dollars a month doesn’t sound like much, but when you don’t have it, it’s a lot, unfortunately.
Yep, I’m doing this because I HAVE too. I don’t see choices in the matter other than sitting passively by. I’m not likely to do that. I really appreciate you sharing this Star. I really really really do. It means so much to me right now!!
LL
STAR, great post. LL—I agree with Star, you have to DO something, make yourself DO something, even if it is only get out of bed and take a bath.
“Security” is definitely an illusion—look at what the Jews before WWII had in Germany. They lost everything they had and their lives to boot many of them, so no matter how much money we have or land or people who love us we CAN lose it all in a heart beat or the change of a government. Or ill health or a lot of things.
That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have a “rainy day” fund or that we should spend every dollar as soon as we get it so we don’t “die with a bank account”—I am a frugal person but I do spend money on myself more now, but at the same time, I couldn’t sleep if I was at this stage in my life broke because I took a vacation and spent all of my “rainy day” funds.
In many ways I’m secure, I have a tiny retirement income and don’t owe anyone anything so I count my blessings every day. The REASON I have the retirement income and the paid for house etc. though is because I WORKED MY ARSE OFF and did without a lot of vacations that others took instead of them saving their money for a rainy day or paying off their house note, and now those people ARE LOSING their houses because they can’t pay the mortgage and I’m not in that shape.
So I do caution people to think before they spend money and watch the PENNIES and the dollars will take care of themselves.
I know plenty of people who spend $8 or $10 a day for lunches and Lattes, and I always carried my lunch to work…well $10 a day X 5 days=$50 a week x 52 weeks= $1100 per year just for lunch and a latte—and yea, I know, I smoked up a lot more $$$ than that! LOL And of course, each of us have to make CHOICES about how we spend our money that we earn but I chose to save some of mine rather than buy lunch out every day. That’s just one example, though.
LL as far as exercising—YOU DO NOT NEED A GYM MEMBERSHIP to exercise. You can make weights out of water bottles or cola bottles and you can make a Stair stepper step out of a couple of thick books, and you can dance to music on the radio and exercise for FREE at home. The free treadmill is right out side your door, it is called a SIDEWALK! LOL A guy membership isn’t a magic pill, it is the moving, so get moving!
BTW exercise is good for the spirit as well as the body as it raises our “feel good” hormones and gives us more energy which helps to decrease our depression.