Many people commenting on this blog have expressed the hope that sociopaths/psychopaths will pay in this lifetime for their evil deeds. Well, I am writing to tell you that if this is your wish, statistics are in your favor. You likely just need to wait it out because psychopathy is associated with life failure, as I will explain.
In a recent study, Psychopathic personality traits and life-success, Dr. Simone Ullrich and colleagues examined relationship success and life success in more than 300 men, they have followed for many years, these men are now 48 years old. In their study, psychopathy was not associated with success in any of life’s domains. When they examined symptoms of psychopathy the interpersonal domain (being charming and manipulative) was not related to ”˜”˜status and wealth” or ”˜”˜successful intimate relationships”. Impulsiveness and antisocial behavior reduced ”˜”˜status and wealth.” The authors state “ It is concluded that psychopathic traits do not contribute to a successful life and that the findings cast doubt on the existence of the successful psychopath.”
You may be asking, What about all the “successful psychopaths” we hear about? First of all, I believe that these are a very tiny minority. Remember that the disorder sociopathy or psychopathy is a group of impairments that I relate to an inability to love, poor impulse control and deficient moral reasoning. Confusion arises because some narcissistic individuals have impaired ability to love accompanied by grandiosity, but their impulse control and moral reasoning are not as impaired. These individuals may achieve some life success (Journal of Personality Disorders, Vol 21(6), Dec 2007. pp. 657-663). So if a person is unable to love and grandiose but not excessively impulsive or immoral, that individual may achieve some career success. But still an inability to love prevents any real relationship success.
So now you can move on. Fate and Karma will get that psychopath/sociopath. You can go about your life working as I do, on trying to love more and live better.
Hi OxyD
I had fun. I’ve never been to an Indiana Jones movie before – really action-packed and sort of campy at times.
Hope you’re feeling fierce today!
Hey Eyes Opened I really did like the movie! When my 2 son’s were young I bought them the first 3 indiana jones movies. Harrison Ford still looks good to me!!! It was good but a little farfetched with the alien’s and all. I think the the originals are better, if you havent seen them you should rent them. Thanks for the date eyesopened I was thinking of you too, you helped me through a difficult day thanks again.
OXY you crack me up, made me laugh, thanks, yeah I need someone to follow me around with an iron skillit and knock some sence into me at least once a day lol
Henry
You’re welcome. I had fun. Those red ants, waterfalls, car chases and sword/chain/gun fights and disappearing ways-out left me breathless.
Have a good rest of the weekend.
Dear eyesopened,
Well, you can see I am back more or less to my fiesty self today. I really am feeling better–I think I am finally going through the last (gosh I hope) of the throws of the “labor” of healing. Draining the last abscess and cleaning the wound.
My son D called and he will be home in a couple of hours for a week and will be good to see him.
In thinking about mom today I don’t seem to have the “knot” in my stomach or the choking feeling in my throat.
My therapist does “rapid eye movement therapy” which though I have read about it, does’t totally make sense to me, but it does seem to work at overcoming the PTSD symptoms, and make it easier to work through the other just normal “stuff” of grief etc. Has to do with left brain/right brain stuff. Hey I don’t care if he shakes rattles covered with rattle snake skin over my head if it works, it’s great! ha ha I don’t have to udnerstand exactly how it works! If he gives me a placebo and it works, that’s fine with me! ha ha
Even though our work focused mostly on the physical and emotional manifestations of the aircraft crash it seemed to have helped me with dealing with the grief of the past year as well. What it does, like I said, I really don’t know, but I can literally FEEL a physical difference in the pit of my stomach when I am feeling painful emotions attached to memories of anything.
I’ve been exposed to a lot of various theories of therapy and this one was a new one for me, but it seemed to work FASTER than anything else, even behavioral cognative therapy. I don’t think though, it would work for everyone the same, as it doesn’t give you the TOOLS to over come various dysfunctional behavioral patterns that you have repeated for a life time. I already had those TOOLS (I just wasn’t using them enough) so maybe it helped me faster because it dampened down the painful memories/emotions that were attached to all the trauma of various kinds. I’m just not sure, but I am so GRATEFUL that anything has helped with the pain. I can actually “look at” the pictures in my mind of the crash and I can SEE them but I don’t feel the attached panic, pain, fear, etc that used to go with them.
Ditto in thinking about my P-son. The only way I can describe it is if I went to see a movie andit was a very exciting or scary movie that evoked all kinds of emotions and shock, but afterwards I could tell you detail by detail about the movie, but I wouldn’t “feel” those same shocks and emotions when I was telling you about it, even thoug I did at the time I saw the movie. The DETAILS are still there, but the emotions are not attached. I can’t explain it any better than that.
I was talking to my friend F today about the movie “Jaws” that we both saw in the 70s (though not together) and how it effected us at the time we saw it, it really got to us (he is a skin diver too) and I had worked editing films so usually picked a film apart on technical things rather than “got into” it like I did with Jaws, but that one I GOT INTO—I could’n’t help it and neither could he. I can still describe that movie almost scene by scene, but there isn’t any excitement, fear, or terror attached now. Maybe that is “HEALING”—???—I’m not sure, but it sure is less painful to think about the “movie” of my life and not feel the pain. Sort of like thinking about labor with my kids’ births, I remember I was “uncomfortable” and scared etc. but I can’t conjure up the FEELINGS I had then, just the details of the day and night. I think oif we really “remembered” it no one would ever have the second child! LOL
I like Indiana Jones movies, they are fun, and you are right, campy too.
Have a good weekend, I’m off to read til my son comes home.
yes I am making progress, I am digging deeper into my life than I ever have before. I think it is time. And thank you New World View, your right, your all right, this new guy, he has beautiful steele blue eyes that are so empty and I get anxious when he comes around and can’t wait for him to leave. But I have no desire to be with or try to meet anyone right now, and that is ok with me…thanks to all of you your special people….
Henry,
“I get anxious when he comes around” Henry, that is your instinct telling you that there is a predator near by and that you are in DANGER. Just like a rabbit can sense a fox (at least the ones that stay in the gene pool had better sense the fox!) in the vacinity and hops under a thorn bush, you need to LISTEN TO YOUR GUT and stay away from this guy or anyone else that makes you feel like that.
I think if there were ONE thing that is almost ALWAYS the same with US is that we all had a “sense” that there was something wrong, and brushed that sense aside and didn’t listen to our guts.
Glad you had fun on your cyber date yesterday to the movies!
ox
i am happy to hear you are doing the emdr (or mdrd )…. i forget which it is …i am a HUGE skeptic, but my therapist used it with me on some things that had been upsetting for yrs and i had to go back and tell her that no matter how skeptical i want to be, for over three months, it has actually made a HUGE difference for the first time ever…i am now a believer it is not a placebo…i had a neurologist and neuroscientist explanation of how it retrains the pathways that we have made in association with a certain trauma and desensitizes us to them…we can actually make new pathways associated with a certain trauma…i couldnt do the rem, so we did nature sounds that would alt to both ears(hence left ear,right ear and rebuild new neuronal pathway) pretty freaking awesome…..she taught me how to do it at home, but of course ive not taken the time or energy to do it….im so glad it gave you some relief….its for real
and henry…….im so happy you are listening to your gut…these great folks here allow us to be strong…like angels sitting on our shoulders….truly with no ulterior motive..just our desire for the best and safest for each other…”do unto others”…unconditional love in its purest form…
lily …your a wise gal…and anyone who wants to visit….yes i have room , am on the water and have a pool..a necessity in the florida sun…take care
it’s a rainy morning here today…
henry & OxD –
your validation of my view of this helps tremendously. i don’t care what he is – P, N, S, Borderline – I could care less. I just need to know one thing – he is dangerous.
I am lucky because I know his history with other women, I sought it out. It is a continuing pattern, and as gut wretching as this is to know, it is comforting to know that some other woman is not going to be “good enough” to share in his carrots.
He just will keep beating her with the stick every time she goes to share one with him.
And as for the dark moments, they didn’t come because life wasn’t worth living, they came because of his relentless attacks on my self-worth –
like a lazer beam, he targeted my strengths specifically to destroy them. he would constantly tell me that my understanding of what i did well was skewed.
the first time, it got worse when i sought help and the counselor said – what is it about you that makes him do this to you?
HUH?
I got even lower. Anti-depressants.
This time I knew better. I began exposing him. I called one of his good friends when I was feeling suicidal. I didn’t even think, I just did it. The creep had cut me off from everyone, even our mutual friends, telling me that no one could stand me but him.
I called his friend. His friend (who was also still MY friend but I didn’t know it) spent a few hours on the phone with me, telling me that he had looked forward to seeing me (the opposite of what the creep told me) and that even he couldn’t stand to see what the creep was doing to me.
I think when the creep saw that I was beginning to expose him, and that he couldn’t abuse me in the dark anymore, he had to close up his briefcase full of counterfeit watches and move to another street corner.
I have not heard from him since early April, which is not the usual pattern. He used to go 14 days before he would start calling and preying on me again.
i am comforted in the knowledge now, that it was his deficiency, not mine.
but also it is kind of disgusting to feel like he dumped me. now i feel rejected because he isn’t calling and begging me back. i won’t go back but how screwed up is that?
i understand there are all logical psychological processes at work here, but geez, this is seriously screwed up.
it just shows me how insidious and dangerous this guy is. he put thoughts into my mind that now i have to work hard to undo. deprogram. and why do i have to do all of this? because he LOVED me? no. i get that now.
it took me nearly five years to get to understand what he was doing to me, and i think am at peace now. i can breathe again anyway.
but i live in fear that at any time, he could start this crap again. all his new girl has to do is scratch her ear wrong and he will start his yearning for me again…oh, she was SO perfect and I lost her…
he has done it to women his whole life.
idealize. devalue.
i hope i can be ready for this battle in time.