How Nostalgia Becomes a Weapon in a Narcissistic Relationship
Nostalgia is an important weapon for narcissists, because they want to control their targets’ memories. It’s one of the reasons they act out so much during the holidays, etc. — there are nostalgic forces at work that are much more powerful than theirs. Narcissists tactically create memories with their targets that make them look good and intermittently reinforce them. When they have a gang of collaborators to help them orchestrate and recall these moments, it puts immense pressure on targets. The group dynamics also strengthen the gaslighting campaigns that reshape the target’s perception of reality. Sharing nostalgic moments to reinforce an idealized or phony reality is a reason social media is so important to many narcissists. If you look closely at the events they choose to highlight, you’ll notice the narcissist and their gang nearly always received status, etc. from them, and the target was compliant. That’s what they’re reinforcing — a hierarchy. The group reliably appearing in “remember when we were happy” moments (e.g., they’re included or tagged on social media) are important to the narcissist’s plans and will have key roles in their pathological narcissistic spaces (places where a narcissist can reliably receive narcissistic supply (attention and validation) and exert control.
