In the session’s climactic moment, Joe asks the woman to find the most narcissistic-looking person on screen and give them everything — all her love, joy, pleasure, and grief. Don’t hold back. Don’t protect yourself. Give the whole thing.
She does. And she quickly loses interest.
“They can’t stop your joy.”
This is the paradox: the defense against narcissists is not walls but full openness. When you’re fully open — all your grief processed, all your joy accessible, all your love flowing — a narcissist simply cannot hook you. Their game requires something to hook into: a need for validation, unprocessed pain, a closed heart looking for someone to open it. When you’re already open, there’s nothing to exploit.
The woman discovers this somatically, not intellectually. She sends all her love toward the narcissistic person and finds herself losing interest — not through effort or defense, but naturally. The fullness of her own experience makes the narcissist’s offering irrelevant.
Related Concepts
- Boundaries and openness are the same thing
- Vulnerability protects against exploitation
- Open heart with strong boundaries
- Heartbreak is the mechanism of healthy boundaries
- Dissolution of self is what love requires
- Surrender into love prevents self-betrayal
- Grief unlocks joy after narcissistic abuse
- The expansiveness underneath resistance to love is overwhelming and amazing