Want Doesn’t Get…

What does want not get?

What does Want lack in the way of understanding?

Or am I misunderstanding what this – Want doesn’t get – means?

I heard this the other day while minding my own business, but it was said so loudly and emphatically that it made itself my business whether I wanted it to be or not. But did I get it?

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A mother was wheeling her small child (who was seated in that prison known as the child seat of a shopping trolley) around a supermarket, driving the cart down an isle filled with ‘wants’, bursting with things designed and arranged to make adults and children want them… yeah… I felt for her, and I also felt for the child. It’s not an easy situation whichever side of the perspective you are on.

The child was not screaming, throwing a tantrum, or anything which made me notice it at all, I only paid attention when the mother spoke those words because she raised her voice, and since she was rather close to me at that time, I felt her every word and the emotion within echoing in my ear.

That was it. No drama ensued. The child didn’t remonstrate, kick up a fuss. The mother didn’t say anything else, not that I could hear anyway.

But, for the rest of my visit to the supermarket those words kept playing over and over in my mind, and my mind played with them, perceiving them from many different angles.

• I saw a mother who had been a child having those same things said to her by her mother. She was repeating a motherly wisdom. Was it repeated by rote or did she understand those words, but had she understood them when she was a child as she expected her child to understand them.
• I saw a person who felt disappointed with life. She wanted things, she didn’t get them. She was passing her disappointment on to her child, perhaps in an attempt to stop her child from being hopeful and therefore ultimately disappointed.
• I saw a child learning a life lesson which would disable its ability to go after what it wanted. I wasn’t sure if this was a good thing or a bad thing, it was just a thing which could go either way.
• I saw a child getting used to a situation which it had been in before. This was probably not the first time its mother had said that, and it wouldn’t be the last. When would it believe her?
• I saw how that mother and child, that big persona and small person in a relationship of human to human, power dynamics and such, related to me.
• I had once been pushed around, trapped in a trolley. I’d been pushed around as an adult too. Told I couldn’t have what I wanted because… that’s not how things work.
• I have been an adult who has been told, especially by law of attraction snake oil salesmen, that wanting something is exactly how you get it.
• And on and on… perspectives lining up to be noticed.

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The irony (if it is irony) was that as those words played over and over in my mind, as I cruised the isles… I felt detached from want… disinterested in getting… I didn’t want anything, but I got things nonetheless.

Things I figured I might want later on in the day, the night, the week to come, things I’d wanted in the past, for practical reasons… maybe. I’ll get those, I might not want them now, but I might want them later so I’ll get them now to fulfill the wants of later… if I don’t do that now then I’ll have to deal with needs I can’t meet later… when it will be too late, and late, and… I don’t want to deal with that now or later so…

Overall though, as I browsed the isles, my eyes were more focused on browsing the perspectives my mind was listing as it cogitated – Want doesn’t get.

I felt fed up. Not in a particularly negative manner, just in a sated way.

That sense of being sated isn’t one of having everything I want, it’s more a case of accepting that you can’t always get what you want, but you get what you need (I’d embed the Rolling Stones version of that, but the intro gets on my nerves and I don’t want that).

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or we overvalue the negatives of ourselves, and can’t see the positives because of it.

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Over the years I’ve learned to cope with not getting anything I wanted… or getting everything that I didn’t want.

Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without – was something my mother repeated to me, as it had been told to her when she was a child.

My parents fought with each other about everything. Including having a child, and what to do with it once they had it – neither of them really wanted what they got. But one thing they almost agreed on, while still arguing, was that I would get what they didn’t want of themselves, and they would get what they wanted from me.

As time passed in my journey through life, I grew to fear wanting things, and getting things… especially something I wanted because it always came with strings attached which invariably made me regret wanting it and being happy I got what I wanted.

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I also grew to fear wanting anything because the moment I wanted something was the moment I created some sort of paradox, a vortex, a schism, which meant that what I wanted was sucked as far away from me as possible, and what I got often seemed to be the exact opposite.

I wanted to love and be loved… and found myself caught up in hatred and being hated.

I wanted a place to call home, where I could finally plant my roots and be nourished by that… and instead I moved from place to place, roots always uprooted, nourishment bled out of me rather than absorbed into me.

I wanted to belong… I experienced belonging nowhere, not even within myself, in my body.

But… the moment I gave up wanting those things, those things materialised… in some form which was recognisable.

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this is my entry for – From Every Angle – I know it’s just one shot but for me it reflects several different angles, including the one behind the camera. It’s not what the Photo Challenge wants, but…

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So… Want doesn’t get, but not wanting does…!?!

So… if I don’t want anything… will I get everything…!?!

No.

Not if not wanting anything is a manipulation to get everything.

You may be able to fool yourself, others, society, etc, but you can’t fool the universe and whatever universal laws play a part in your experience of life.

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I’ve watched narcissists being ‘good’ to get what they want, then turning bad when being good hasn’t had the immediate results they were expecting.

They were told by reliable sources that behaving a certain way would get them what they wanted, so they did it and they didn’t get their want met. They’re so done with that kind of misinformation and forcing themselves to be good if good isn’t going to get them what they want.

They people-pleased – those people they pleased now owe them!

If they’re nice to you (and this is hard work for them), then you have to be nice in return = you have to give them what they want to get from you.

If they ‘Follow’ you on Social Media, you’d better ‘Follow’ them back, and if they ‘Unfollow’ you after you’ve ‘Followed’ them because they ‘Followed’ you, you still have to ‘Follow’ them or you”l be outed as an a-hole while they portray themselves as a goody-two-shoes victim of your villainy.

The same applies to the ‘Like’ button. They ‘Like’ your shit, you’d better ‘Like’ their brilliance (even if a lot of what they post as theirs is ‘borrowed’ from others, it’s theirs now, and they don’t like crediting the sources from which they ‘borrow’ heavily, but they will credit sources they’re sucking up to for online traffic).

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For them being good, being kind, is a business agreement. If they give you what you want then you have to give them what they want because the only reason they’re giving you what you want is to get what they want.

The IOU you owe them will always be more important, bigger than what they owe you – they gave you stuff, now you owe them for life, and you should be grateful about that because they’re special, and you’re special now too by proxy. Owing them makes you very special, they need what you’ve got because they want it.

They have expectations – don’t disappoint them!

If they disappoint you – you should not have had expectations!

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Narcissists aren’t the only ones who do that, they’re just more obvious about it as they lack the patience to play the long con.

If you feel that narcissists play the long con really well, your narcissist may be a sociopath with narcissistic tendencies (like big corporations), or you may be the one playing the long con on yourself – the way I did with my parents.

A large portion of my anger at them and what they did to me… is more anger at myself at what I did to me. Sure they encouraged me to con myself, but I kept that con going even after I’d become aware that this was a major part of our relationship.

I was the one doing the long con, their cons were short compared to mine… they were quick to let me know something was over, but I just kept hanging in there hoping that it wasn’t over even when it was.

I just wanted them to love me… I didn’t accept the fact that it was never going to happen, they couldn’t provide that service, I was never going to get it no matter how much I paid… and that wanting it, hoping to get it, was what kept me a prisoner of their narcissistic hell.

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Narcissists are basically Snake Oil salesmen.

They create a product designed to induce desire – this product could be their love, their attention, their knowledge which they say they know – its ingredients include their own insatiable desires which may be ones that you, the public, may also have – to be loved, accepted, paid attention, noticed, be rich, famous, special, etc.

They then offer you a free sample, more if need be, until they get you hooked (getting people hooked on a product is entrepreneurship 101).

If they can get you hooked based on a fear being alleviated (protect yourself from hackers, buy this online safety device, pay extra for extra, keep your privacy secure from bad people with bad intentions), then you’ll grab on tightly and never let go, and they will be kings and queens of you (their privacy app or system requires access to your privacy and system), and you accept their rulership and superiority (you’re addicted now, so what choice do you have, your wants which want to get rule you).

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As one article I read on this whole Ashley Madison debacle said – if we could just for one minute stop being all outraged, judgmental, holier than thou, frightened and distracted by all the flashing lights, and consider it from a point of view that is detached, seeing the bigger picture of the smaller details, we would see a pervasive pattern which we can all relate to… even if we don’t want to and because we don’t want to we don’t get it.

We’re never safe when we put our safety into the hands of others no matter what they promise us.

They might even be trustworthy, may want to live up to their promises and the expectations those promises create in us, and disappointing us, our expectations for them to live up to our ideal, may be the last thing they ever want to do.

But… who are they trusting?

If those we trust can’t trust who they trust… what’s the knock on effect of that?

Hacktivist manifestos and noble intentions proclaimed aside, what was the real reason the hackers who hacked that site did what they did? Why do people do that kind of shit to people? And yes, that site was riddled with people doing shit to people… why do people do that kind of shit to people?

Why?

Is it because we want something which we can’t get? And this is how we get it or how we stop others from getting it – If we can’t get what we want we’ll be damned if others are going to get what they want!

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Don’t get me wrong (or do if that’s what you want to get)… I’m not making excuses for narcissists, I’m not shifting the blame – they’re very guilty of what they do, even when they haven’t a clue about how it affects others, who they are, what they’re doing…

It’s just that having grown up with narcissists, having been conned by them, I have come to see how much of their conning me relied on my conning myself.

If I want to stop being conned… to get that I have to be honest with myself. Which hurts, and in my want to get pain avoidance, to get pleasure instead, I may keep leaving myself open to be fooled, by me, by others, because of me, and so on.

Narcissists have caused me a lot of pain…

And in my quest to eradicate my pain I have bought into miracle cures for it… sold by others who… may have been narcissists.

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via Scientists get a little too Honest

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I bought into cures to fix what I thought was wrong with me.

How did I know I needed fixing and that something was wrong with me? How do we know these sort of things?

The cures I bought into… I really bought them (but even then they never belonged to me) because they came at a price, offered by Snake Oil salesmen of the spiritual, emotionally, psychological kind…

They’d give me a taste of pleasure, get me hooked, then make me pay through every pore in my body for something which… had I been thinking more rationally would have made me run the other way from it.

Did they cure me miraculously of my pain?

No, but they did quick fix my ability to buy more of those kind of cures in 3 easy steps (or mistakes).

• Check their bio – Their bios often sound like made-for-TV based-on-a-true-story mind-numbing nonsense… which I wanted to believe so I told (sold) myself that it wasn’t nonsense. They’d really lived the hell I’d lived and was still living but they weren’t still living it due to their miraculous system. Unlike me they’d been cured by magic… the kind of magic they’d got for free but which they’d bottled and were now selling to me at a price because they have to pay the rent too (on their megamansion in a megarich neighbourhood).
• Check those they work with – all gurus of magic and the miraculous have minions to do those ordinary things which they can no longer do because they’re too special to do them. Once at a New Age fair I went to a workshop given by a very loved and popular life guru… in the break this guru treated their assistant to a very special tantrum. I happened to witness this because I’d strayed from the path I was supposed to take which all other participants has dutifully taken (told you I needed fixing and that there was somethign wrong with me), and the guru gave me the kind of look which wanted to hypnotise what I’d seen out of me or turn me into dust (definitely this option) which another minion could clean up and get rid of.
• Check their sources – Not those elusive, mysterious sources which they claim saved them, which are so fuzzy and hard to pin down, and which will now save you too through them but only through by buying into their cure and better-than-you attitude, and even then, that shit only works when you pay premium for the premium services. Check their actual sources… these gurus are people, people leave footprints even when they claim to float nowadays several inches above the ground.

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via Scientists get a little too Honest

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If you think there aren’t narcissists selling magical potions to cure you of the pain of being the victim of a narcissist… check again.

They’re always where it’s at… keeping up with trends, what is popular, what will make them popular (as fast as possible, they’re in a rush, get out of their way – you’re either helping them or a hindrance), how to make their mark, get what they want… which is us buying into the cult of them.

It never ceases to amaze me (maybe because I’m a fool) when I come across articles or posts or comments on NPD forums wherein someone seems surprised, and deeply hurt, by having been ‘conned’ by Sam Vaknin, Mr. Narcissist.

I get being fooled by a narcissist whom you don’t know is a narcissist, but one who tells you he is a narcissist and writes about how he thinks, behaves, is…

He is open and honest about being a narcissist, about his behaviour and traits… yet people, people who mostly only are aware of him because they’ve been in a relationship with a narcissist and have done a search online wanting to know more, still expect a self-confessed narcissist (which is rare but which happens occasionally) to not be a narcissist.

You will get from a narcissist what you get from every narcissist, and it will never be what you want… even if they seem to be a want fulfillment machine at first… first impressions… aren’t the lasting ones.

If someone say to you – I’m a narcissist – why expect them not to be one with you…?

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Who is fooling who?

The answer to that can be very complex, complicated, and convoluted…

We’re all a bit of a mess even when we look tidy.

And sometimes we’re all intertwined in a Gordian knot waiting for Alexander the Great to cut us free…

Want doesn’t get…

What…!?!