With any level of impressiveness comes the unimpressed narcissistic help seekers.

When a narcissist sees a person who they find impressive or a threat to their idea of reality (they are the best), their first instinct is two-fold: a) prove to themselves that this person is not impressive at all and b) if they find them impressive, to make them a part of their court, their “servants.”

Therefore, your IMs will be filled with messages from these people, and their first play is asking for your help in something you’re an expert at. The reason? Denying help is callous, and they can always attack you later with it if they need to.

Obviously, not everyone who contacts you is going to be a narcissist. Still, the fact is, it will take a lot more courage from a normal person to approach anyone who seems busy than it takes a narcissist to do, at least out of the blue, with little to no previous contact. A narcissist wants you to know they are more important than your other readers/listeners/fans, and therefore, they deserve your help, assistance, and personal attention more than anyone else.

You should take it as a compliment if you get a lot of attention from narcissists but do not respond to it at the risk of feeling you’re rude. Just pretend you didn’t see it or got distracted and then forgot about it (to make it OK with yourself). Narcissists** are fishing for pin-lapel people; the more famous you are, the better lapel-pin you’ll make.

The next time someone approaches you (me) without the offer of payment for your extra effort, asking for your (my) expertise (I’m totally writing a note to self), ignore them. However, if someone approaches you offering their help, insight, humor, a compliment, a thank you, or a gift of reasonable value (an overly expensive gift is a prepayment for something a narcissist hasn’t named yet), that would be fine. Do not let a person in, lest they come bearing a gift of some description, good humor, compliment, something. And if the next thing they do is to ask a favor… Remember to be terribly busy.

Subscribe to get a Daily Message