REBTOZ

It is my experience that no matter how competent, experienced, or well credentialed an educator might be if your face doesn't fit you may as well look elsewhere if you're a teacher dedicated to teaching students. I've heard of teachers targeted because of their teaching competency, their popularity with students and staff. I'm speaking of the jealous and vindictive narcissist other, who cannot accept nor appreciate those by whom they are threatened. A narcissist inclined person at a school I've heard of could not contemplate that a colleague could be so popular, vivacious, and highly respected amongst staff, students, and parents. They intentionally set out to undermine and besmirch the character of their target. How was this done? The narcissist protagonist surfed the internet to get background information on their quarry, downloaded pictures and passed them on to leadership. This information was used to bully and intimidate them. I'm told they were slut sh...

The narcissist has an approval need receptacle somewhere in their subconscious. It leaks like a sieve it seems, and the more its fed by admiring others, the need to be admired never diminishes, it just intensifies. No matter how much they are adored and revered, too much is never enough. They are constantly in ‘tell me how much you love me' mode .  If we were to suggest a rule that drives this kind of need it might be: ‘I need your approval for me to feel OK about myself.’ Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy, created by Albert Ellis, would suggest, that this kind of need is characterised by an attitude of demand , a belief that one must  get what one wants i.e., the approval of others because only then will one feel OK about themselves. This is what Ellis calls ‘musturbatory’ thinking, where the person believes they absolutely  must have the approval of others if they are to feel OK, to have and maintain positive self-worth. This need puts that person at considerab...

‘Half the harm that is done in this world is due to people who want to feel important. . .. They justify it because they are absorbed in the endless struggle to think well of themselves.’ T.S. Elliott The imagined side eyes and murmurings noticed in passing and the alleged corridor conversations fed the managers  paranoia that people were undermining his authority.  ‘There’s a conspiracy afoot! They must not do this to me it’s just not fair,’  he thought. He reflected on the demands he made of staff, seemingly all heaped upon them at once that he told himself had nothing to do with his lack of organisation or paucity of leadership skills, but more to do with the system. Yes, it was the system letting everyone down. How could it be his fault? And then there were his offsiders who were green around the gills and wasn’t he trying to get them up to speed, to develop their leadership capacities?  ‘No, it’s not me he thought.’  He would not dare to even contemplate t...

Why it is that some can’t acknowledge a mistake or oversight when a simple admission of ‘yes it was me’ would be quite the ordinary thing to do. Everyone would understand; don’t we all make mistakes? Remember the Fonz from Happy Days? He couldn’t say sorry because the Fonz was perfect so how could he ever make a mistake? There’s a person I knew once, who was a bit Fonz like in his estimation of himself, though nowhere near as endearing, who would not acknowledge any wrong doing or mistakes that he may have made and would cast aspersions elsewhere on others who were not ‘as fastidious’ as he! This person however was very vigilant and sensitive to the behaviours of others. Once, when a person ‘committed’ a minor, innocuous ‘infringement’ of expected norms, he said to the miscreant, ‘it was you who left the fridge door open in the kitchen! I know it was you! Just don’t do it!’ Now, you may be thinking, 'surely that can’t be true, so much fuss over a simple...

'There's enough there for an entire conference!' the psychiatrist guest was heard to say to another on witnessing the behaviour of hapless Basil of Fawlty Towers fame (BBC TV UK). 'There's enough there for an entire conference.' This quote comes to mind whenever I experience behaviour that is beyond the generally agreed norm of what constitutes civility in the workplace. A persons general demeanour and actions can have a positive effect on others; encouraging, supportive and respectful or they can have an otherwise entirely negative effect on them! Basil's behaviour invoked feelings of frustration and anger from others (how can anyone be so inept) but it was counter balanced by other more 'reasonable' characters like Sybil and Polly who would challenge Basil who it seemed was incapable of any insight in to how his behaviour effected work colleagues! Poor Manuel would cop it mercilessly from Basil who always remained loyal and respectful o...