5 Reasons Why People-Pleasers Attracted To A Narcissist

The strong attraction between narcissists and a people pleaser is not accidental. There is a magnetic tension between the two that is very difficult to break because each fulfills a deep need for the other. This is not one mistake over the other. Rather, it is an unhealthy union that generates dysfunction.

In many ways, narcissists and pleaders have similar relationship problems. However, it is expressed in very different ways. Narcissists can only see the relationship to what it offers them, focusing entirely on their own needs. A person who makes people equally happy skews their view of the relationship, but focuses only on the other person and does not care about their own needs.

At the same time, both types of people are trying to find a person who will fill an important role in their lives. The narcissist is only looking for someone to make them look better or give them a sense of superiority. A person who pleases people is looking for someone to save and someone to make him feel the need for. 

Extreme selfishness and extreme lack of self in a relationship creates a situation in which two parts, in each other, can find a connection that they lack with others. Selfishness and the need to feel needed create an attraction that attracts pleasurable people to the narcissist.

In addition to similar but opposite needs, there are other reasons why people-pleaser are attracted to narcissists and why narcissists seek out these types of personalities. 

Control: People who make people happy often find that the control a narcissist demands early on in a relationship is intoxicating. They mistake this control for the security and safety of the relationship by equating control with the desire to protect.

Challenge: People who are happy see their role in life as making others happy. The narcissist poses a challenge, constantly increasing his demands to please people. This challenge can become a task for someone who takes pleasure in trying to please the utterly selfish person.

Attraction: One of the hallmarks of a narcissist is their ability to shower a potential partner with praise, affection, and attention in the early stages of a relationship. For someone who pleases people, this is the reward they are looking for, even if it only lasts for a short time.

Validation: Also known as approval, the narcissist nurtures people-pleasers for approval and validation enough to get what they want. This type of conditional approval forces the people-pleasers to constantly seek validation.

ِAdmiration: This is the key to both personalities: the need to be admired by others. Narcissists believe that they should be loved because of their expertise, superiority, beauty, intelligence, or accomplishments. It doesn't matter if they have achieved anything special, narcissists believe that they are above others and deserve constant admiration.

What Makes People-Pleasers Attracted To A Narcissist?

1- People pleasers like to impress others, provide support, and feel needed by others in order to validate their self-worth. They constantly seek acceptance and validation from others that the narcissist is willing to provide as long as things are done their way.

2. The ultimate goal of boosting confidence for a people pleaser is to gain approval from a hard to please person such as a narcissist. There is a feeling that if a person can gain the narcissist's approval, then they can feel confident and at ease. Of course, the narcissist loves the attention and constant seeking of their approval because it feeds their ego.

3- People pleasers often take the blame. Rather than holding the narcissist accountable for their behavior, the people pleasers prefer to calm the situation down by accepting unnecessary responsibility. The narcissist needs to have someone else to be accountable for failures because their ego cannot handle being wrong.

4- People Pleasers tend to idealize other poeple in thier life, ignoring any distasteful characteristics. This validates the narcissists view of self because they dont see their own faults. People pleasers are willing to look past the negative aspects of narcissism in exchange for acceptance.

5- People-pleasers find it difficult to set boundaries, because they are often unaware of their own needs. They live life trying to predict what others want of them and fulfill those needs. Narcissists do not have their own boundaries and do not respect the boundaries of others. In the absence of preferences, needs, desires, rights, and opinions which help set boundaries a narcissist can completely take over a people pleaser’s sense of self.

Both these personality types fulfill each other's needs and reinforce the dysfunctional pattern. Getting out of this takes a lot of work and dedication. It starts with identifying your patterns as who makes people happy, working on listening to your intuition and communicating your own needs. Both narcissists and happy people are not aware of these patterns. Transferring it to conscious awareness can help happy people break this pattern.

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