When the Problem Is Made to Feel Like You: Understanding Gaslighting and Narcissistic Behaviour
Scroll through social media for five minutes and you'll likely come across the word gaslighting. It's everywhere right now — in comment threads, in self-help podcasts, in conversations between friends over coffee. And while some might dismiss it as a buzzword that's been overused into meaninglessness, I want to say something clearly: the fact that people finally have a name for what they've been experiencing is not a trend. It's a reckoning.
Over more than two decades in educational leadership, I have worked alongside hundreds of people — colleagues, staff, managers, and peers across institutions. I have had the privilege of leading teams, mentoring professionals, and building something I'm genuinely proud of. But I have also sat across the table from people who, I eventually understood, were not operating in good faith. People who, when confronted with a difficult truth, found a way to make the truth about me instead.
That's what gaslighting does. And it usually comes packaged inside a particular kind of personality.
So What Exactly Is Narcissism?
Narcissism, in the clinical sense, is not simply vanity or self-confidence taken too far. Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a recognised psychological condition characterised by an inflated sense of self-importance, a deep need for admiration, and — critically — a significant lack of empathy for others.
But here's the part that often surprises people: narcissists are not always the loudest person in the room. Some are. But many are quietly calculating, charming in public and punishing in private, skilled at presenting one face to the world and another to the people who work closely with them.
What they share is a fundamental inability to tolerate anything that threatens their self-image. Criticism, accountability, transparency — these are not just inconveniences to a narcissist. They are perceived as attacks. And when a narcissist feels attacked, they don't reflect. They redirect.
Recognising the Behaviour
In leadership contexts especially, narcissistic behaviour can be difficult to name because it often hides behind the language of authority, professionalism, or even concern. Here are some patterns that, with experience, become recognisable:
They rewrite history. Meetings you were both present for get described differently — and always in a version that favours them. Documents get misrepresented. Conversations get denied. Over time, you start to wonder whether your memory can be trusted.
They isolate. Slowly, and sometimes without you noticing, they begin to position themselves between you and others — your team, your peers, those above you. Information gets filtered. Your relationships become mediated through them.
They weaponise your strengths. Your directness becomes aggression. Your clarity becomes arrogance. Your loyalty becomes naivety. Every quality that makes you effective gets reframed as a flaw when it suits them.
They make accountability about feelings. Raise a legitimate concern and somehow the conversation ends with you apologising for raising it. Their discomfort at being challenged becomes the problem — not the behaviour that prompted the challenge.
I have experienced versions of every one of these. And for a period, I did what many people do: I worked harder, communicated more carefully, and assumed the gap between my intention and the other person's interpretation was something I needed to fix.
The Empathy Deficit — and Why It Matters
The thread that runs through all of these behaviours is the absence of genuine empathy. Not the performed kind — narcissists can be extraordinarily warm and attentive when it serves them. I mean the real kind: the capacity to hold someone else's experience as valid, even when it's inconvenient.
When empathy is absent in someone with influence or authority over others, the harm extends far beyond personal discomfort. Teams become cautious. Honest feedback disappears. People learn to manage the narcissist rather than do their best work. The culture quietly shifts — often without anyone being able to point to exactly when it happened or why.
This is the part that kept me up at night, not what was being done to me, but what was happening to the people around me who didn't yet have the language for it either.
Managing Your Feelings When You're in the Thick of It
This is the part people most want to know, because once you recognise what's happening, the question becomes: what do you do?
First, trust what you experienced. Gaslighting works by eroding your confidence in your own perception. One of the most powerful things you can do is write things down — dates, conversations, outcomes. Not obsessively, but accurately. Evidence grounds you when your sense of reality is being contested.
Second, find your anchors. These are the people — a trusted colleague, a mentor, a friend outside the situation — who know you well enough to give you honest perspective. Not to validate everything you think, but to offer a clear reflection when you're losing yours. I have had a few of these people in my professional life, and I cannot overstate how important they were.
Third, regulate before you respond. Narcissists are skilled at provoking emotional reactions and then using those reactions against you. The discipline of pausing — genuinely pausing, not just waiting for your turn to speak — changes the dynamic. It's not about being passive. It's about choosing when and how you engage.
Fourth, know what you can and cannot change. You cannot fix a narcissist. You cannot out-explain them, out-document them, or shame them into self-awareness. What you can control is your own behaviour, your own record, and ultimately your own decision about whether this environment is sustainable.
Practical Tips for Dealing With Narcissistic People — At Work and in Life
Recognising the behaviour is essential, but recognising it is only the beginning. The next step is equally important: understanding, at a visceral level, that it is not you. The moment you feel yourself shrinking, doubting, or scrambling to explain yourself — pause. Step back from that feeling. Your feelings are real and they matter. The other person's inability to see that does not make it less true.
Here is what I have learned, sometimes the hard way:
Don't share your good news with them. This one took me time to fully accept, because it runs against our instinct to be open with people we work alongside. But a narcissist cannot genuinely celebrate another person's success. Their sense of importance requires everything to orbit around them — and your wins disrupt that orbit. They will find a way to minimise what you've achieved, reframe it, take partial credit for it, or simply use it as an opportunity to remind you of your limitations. Protect your joy. It doesn't belong in that conversation.
Don't share your struggles with them either. You might hope for empathy. You won't find it. What you're more likely to find is that your vulnerability becomes information — quietly filed away and occasionally used to destabilise you at a moment when they need leverage. A narcissist who knows your difficulties is not a support. They are an additional weight.
Do not seek their validation. This is perhaps the hardest one, especially in workplace relationships where their opinion carries professional weight. But seeking a narcissist's approval is a trap with no exit — because the goalposts will always move. Their sense of importance depends on others needing them. The moment you stop needing their validation is the moment you reclaim your power.
Keep your interactions transactional where possible. This doesn't mean being cold or unprofessional. It means being deliberate. Stick to what is relevant to the task at hand. The less personal material you offer, the less they have to work with. Brevity is a boundary.
Invest your energy elsewhere. Every moment you spend trying to make sense of a narcissist, manage their reactions, or earn their genuine regard is a moment taken from the people and work that actually deserve you. Direct your energy toward your team, your goals, and the relationships that are built on mutual respect. That is where growth lives.
You Are Not Alone — and You Are Not the Problem
If you've read this far and recognised something of your own experience in these words, I want to say this directly: what happened to you was real. Your confusion was not weakness. Your self-doubt was not irrationality. It was a predictable, documented response to a specific and harmful pattern of behaviour.
The reason gaslighting has become a household word is not because people have become too sensitive. It's because people are finally describing something that was always there, that too many carried alone, and that now — because of language — they no longer have to.
Leadership, at its best, is built on trust, honesty, and a genuine investment in the growth of others. When those values are absent — replaced instead by manipulation, image-management, and the quiet erosion of other people's confidence — that is not leadership. It is the imitation of it.
Knowing the difference is the first step. And now, at least, you have words for what you're seeing.
Engin Yenidogan is an educational leader with over 20 years of experience in adult and tertiary education.
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