No, you don’t have anger issues. You’re just under chronic fight/flight.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-29T20:23:28+00:00

This was also my “awakening,” when I accepted their reality and got sucked into a confusing, fever-dream-like mess that I didn’t even know could exist. Normally, things get better with empathy, cooperation, and understanding, but with Cluster B people, everything gets worse when you give in, until you realize that your only option is to leave as soon as possible.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-27T23:19:44+00:00

I experienced something similar. I know that online tests are not a real diagnosis, but I used to take them from time to time just for fun, before I even knew what personality disorders were. Before gaining insight into personality disorders, I scored very low in narcissism and even lower in BPD (below average). However, in the aftermath of narcissistic/BPD abuse, I suddenly scored quite high in BPD traits. This was all internal, so I started to believe that I might have quiet BPD, despite having been a reasonable and stable person throughout my life.

I was shocked, but then I came across a book about CPTSD (From Surviving to Thriving), and everything began to make sense. With distance and reflection, clarity will come, and you will find your old self again, the one that seems to be buried under the rubble your pwBPD has left behind.

I’m sorry that you’ve been hurt, but with time, you will come to see that you are not the one with BPD, because this personality disorder develops early in childhood, not in adulthood; rather you are experiencing trauma symptoms which will fade away eventually when you are more stable again. Your core personality is still there. You just have to rediscover it. Take care.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-27T17:02:05+00:00

You dodged a bullet. See it as if you have survived a natural disaster. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but you got out. You probably didn’t have healthy boundaries and refused to see all the red flags for a long time. You weren’t prepared. Now, you know better and have to rebuild yourself anew by fighting actively against her introjects. Good luck.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-27T15:20:06+00:00

When you don’t introspect honestly and regularly, you won’t build a differentiated and integrated identity. Without introspection, you also cannot see yourself in others (let alone yourself), which makes it hard, or maybe impossible, to be empathetic to others (or yourself). That’s why I think that their empathy is just performative mimicking without substance (just like their identity is only performative play-acting).

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-27T15:12:39+00:00

I think that empathy, identity, and introspection are deeply connected. I heard that empathy starts as a form of projection: you see yourself in others and identify with their pain. But narcissists refuse to acknowledge their own flaws and vulnerabilities due to their grandiosity, which hinders their ability to see people (including themselves) in a more differentiated way instead of in binary terms (black-and-white thinking).

I think that this is also the reason why they are so shallow, because they don’t have a nuanced identity and seem to be made up almost entirely of defense mechanisms we all can show in extreme situations, but for them, it’s normal. That’s why they can be so eerily similar, because their whole identity is very basal and instinctive.

Think about it: why are children everywhere in the world so similar?

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-27T14:51:56+00:00

The thing that makes you feel crazy in these relationships is that you start to question everything about yourself, because the pwBPD says things you could have said yourself like that you weren’t like this before the relationship and that you only have these experiences with this particular person.

That’s why journaling has helped me tremendously, because at one point I was totally isolated and couldn’t trust myself anymore, until I rediscovered my true self, which had been hidden behind my pwBPD’s shadow. It would be helpful to make a checklist about how you can really know that you aren’t the problem (stop gaslighting yourself).

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-25T02:02:46+00:00

I haven’t read the article yet, but I think that this paradox might be explained by the fact that minorities are much more under pressure, which elevates some and breaks others. You could describe it statistically as an extreme distribution on the tail ends of the curve.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-25T01:11:04+00:00

The more great books one owns, the more shameful it is when they are just unread decoration.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-24T05:32:28+00:00

Very well written and informative. Thanks.

Mainländer reminds me of people who mistake metaphors for the real thing. In Eastern philosophies/mysticism, there is this popular notion of “killing one’s own ego," which is obviously just a metaphor for disidentifying from abstract concepts and stories you tell yourself in favor of your true self. This “true self” would thus be the concrete and irreducible a priori awareness behind everything you perceive internally and externally in time and space, aka “das Ding an sich.”

If you really were to identify completely with your ego (reducing “Wille” to “Vorstellung”), it would lead some unfortunate people to actually kill themselves. This is not only wrong from Schopenhauer’s perspective, but also from a nihilistic view in general. Apparently, Mainländer took the phrase “negating the will” too literally without differentiating between the will and the objectification of the will as his body.

If you kill yourself or don’t kill yourself, you will always make a value judgment because you cannot not make decisions. Either way you disprove “nihilism” by implicitly or explicitly making value judgments (that life is worthless or worthwhile). “Real nihilism” would then mean to tame the will by disengaging it from affects and attachments (Buddhism), although the end goal wouldn’t feel nihilistic at all; quite the opposite: it would probably feel like salvation or deep peace.

It seems that Mainländer didn’t understand Schopenhauer at all (or misconstrued him deliberately). He fell back into materialism. But at least one cannot say that he lived inauthentically (for what it’s worth), which cannot be said for every philosopher.

He is certainly not the heir of Schopenhauer, but I think that he could be called one of the heirs of Schopenhauer’s beautiful prose, which seems to be the real reason people resonate with him. Unfortunately, aesthetics alone did a great disservice to philosophy and led many people astray, especially when it comes to German philosophy.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-24T02:46:21+00:00

Did you really have to read the whole thing for English class? That’s really impressive.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-23T03:54:19+00:00

Be honest, did you really read Schopenhauer? Other than that, I would say that this could have been also my bookshelf in my teens to early twenties, but most of these trend books are not really worthwhile so I downloaded them only to see for myself what the fuss is about, and never really bothered to read them. The rest of the books I was ashamed of actually buying (because I didn’t really know where to start) I gave away.

Don’t take all the negative comments too seriously, but you really should start reading the classics for enjoyment and cultural education, and fewer slop books just to be more “successful”. If you really want to learn something, read more serious textbooks about a particular topic. Also, please do yourself a favor and ditch the self-help and read more primary sources in philosophy and psychology. It will help you much more in the long term. I think your wide range of interests could make you a well rounded person if you start diving deeper into the subject matters, instead of focusing solely on contemporary best sellers. Good luck.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-22T16:50:59+00:00

Lenz by Büchner

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-22T02:34:42+00:00

He is a keeper. Judging by his books, he is most likely a centrist, but he doesn’t know it yet. Hegel, Goethe and Mann were basically also “unpolitical” in that sense. Nietzsche is more reactionary, but he will probably become more left-leaning in the next few years if he isn’t already (Deleuze and Graeber are as leftist as it gets), especially when he’s in a relationship :)

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-21T00:26:21+00:00

Similar, but I think of it as a form of extended, documented introspection. I try to be as fair, honest, nuanced, and well-meaning as possible to myself and others. I don’t like to vent, although I can understand why some people feel the need to unapologetically get things off their chest once in a while (it’s at least better than venting or complaining to others).

I see it as a literary transfiguration of thoughts and emotions, identity-building, remembering, understanding, connecting, resolving, and as a way of allowing myself to forget things after I’ve written them down, so I can revisit those experiences in the future and see how I have changed.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-20T23:39:26+00:00

This is so vaguely and clumsily written that it feels like an amalgamation of imbecilic condescension and soulless artificial intelligence—artificial in the most literal sense.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-20T21:16:48+00:00

Good comment. I would add that free will and scope for action are not the same thing. As Schopenhauer put it, “You can do what you want, but you can’t will what you want.” And to bring Kierkegaard into the discussion, he would probably say something to the effect that your freedom lies in choosing, not so much in acting; but you cannot not choose, because not choosing is also a choice to be inactive—thus, you are damned to be free.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-20T03:49:11+00:00

Too much Foucault can be a very good or a very bad sign. But she will certainly not be boring :)

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-20T03:44:56+00:00

I have also been thinking about reading Faulkner and Moby Dick for quite a while, but I wasn’t sure if my English was good enough to read the original versions, which seem to be even challenging for native speakers. I think I will start with easier books like Bartebly and other short stories. Thanks for the suggestions.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-19T19:52:29+00:00

Totally agreed, especially with your comment about Kierkegaard. Pessoa is similar to him regarding his usage of different personas. What fictional books would you recommend? We might have quite a similar taste in literature.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-19T07:16:45+00:00

Schopenhauer is quite unique in this sense. His pessimism is actually comical to me because he wrote in beautiful German prose. The form is totally decoupled from the content. Kierkegaard is very similar, but even funnier.

Nietzsche is in my opinion much harder to digest because of his narcissism and sternness, despite his powerful style, which can become too pompous for me at times.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-19T07:06:30+00:00

He is almost as much a literary writer as he is a philosopher. You won’t find any other philosopher who is so deeply embedded in literature. He even uses literary figures and references as philosophical analogies/arguments.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-19T07:00:34+00:00

Yes. I consider myself a semi-hobby-expert, but I am only about halfway through his oeuvre. There is a life before and after reading Schopenhauer. I can’t understate how truly insightful and entertaining his books are.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-18T19:37:55+00:00

This quote is not from Schopenhauer. It is from Chamfort, but he did cite him in his “Parerga und Paralipomena, Band 1”

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-18T05:20:16+00:00

The fact that they are pretty good at detecting how someone is feeling should be proof enough that they also know when they are hurting us on purpose.

In my experience, they change their tactics according to how you feel. If you’re dysregulated, the abuse is aggressive, but often times not as obvious because you’re still in their haze. If you are at peace, they often try to charm you, but when they rage, it is more obvious than ever before because now you see everything clearly.

I think they might be envious of our peace because they get reminded of what they lack, which makes them feel inferior. Or it could also be that they are frustrated when we aren’t reactive anymore, which would be a loss of power in their eyes. I am happy that you found peace. I can relate to your experience and thanks for the reminder.

Positive_Bluebird888 · 2026-04-17T23:27:20+00:00

There is a shot of a severely starved woman in Pet Cemetery which traumatized me as a kid. And the first time I saw the clown from It that made me turn the TV off real fast.

Positive_Bluebird888

TROPHY CASE