Hard to Starboard!!
Recognizing and Navigating Fog
While writing my last installment, “The Ghosts of the Not-so-dearly Departed,” my editor left a note, asking me to provide context on FOG. At first, I didn’t quite understand what she meant; it then occurred to me, some people do not know what FOG is!?
We are all familiar with regular fog; an atmospheric phenomenon that often occludes vision and can be hazardous for anyone operating heavy machinery. For seafaring vessels, lighthouses became a necessity so that in the dark of night, through challenging oceanic topographical terrain, or, when fog prevents us from seeing the dangers ahead, the lighthouse provides a beacon, a point of reference. I will explain a little later about finding a proverbial lighthouse as a reference point.
What is FOG?
FOG is an acronym used within the community of those recovering from narcissistic abuse. FOG stands for Fear, Obligation, and Guilt. FOG is used to maintain subliminal or coercive control over a target of abuse.
Manifestations of FOG
Fear
In a relationship with a narcissist, fear could look like fear of punishment in the full gamut of abuse including physical, psychological, emotional, verbal, and sexual abuse. Alternatively, fear can be used as a tool if you fear what the narcissist will do to themselves or others, to indirectly inflict harm upon you, ultimately blaming you for the behavior, despite the fault belonging entirely to them. It will start with a threat, comment, or ultimatum of expectation from you with no nuance or room for negotiation or mutual understanding. When you fail to perform, they will condition you to expect punishment, whether direct or indirect and over time you will be entrenched in a stranglehold; in the position of fawning to keep yourself safe.
Obligation
Have you ever felt that you had an obligation or responsibility to fulfill certain expectations, or do special favors for someone due to the nature of the relationship? I’ll give you a great example. When I was going to college, I was expected to continue paying rent to my parents to live in their house. While attending college, I also worked at a grocery store. My mother got the idea in her head that she could simply just expect me to pick up things from the store and not have to pay me back for them, despite the fact that I was paying to live in their house and providing my own meals consistently. My mother was horrified and angry when I told her I could no longer pay rent and also for her purchases. She thought it was inconsiderate given the fact that I was her son and that the ‘privilege’ alone of living in their house should be justification enough for me to do acquiesce to her demands. But I held the line. And she hated it.
Guilt
While I understand why people include guilt in this acronym, there are times where it starts veering quickly into shame. For the purposes of this article, I will include shame later, amending the acronym to FOGS, but I’ll focus on guilt for a second. Guilt is the concept of doing something you believe to be bad or inconsistent with your behavior but you do not identify the action with your character or value. Shame conversely is the propensity to assign value statements to self as a result of a poor choice or action. Brene Brown provides an excellent example of this:
I got wasted on Thursday night and have to be to work on Friday early in the morning. Friday morning comes, you are super hungover, and one of two scripts can play out:
Guilt: That was a really stupid choice. I should not have done that.
Shame: I am a really stupid person. I should not have done that. I am worthless.
Now imagine the voice of guilting comes from outside yourself initially, not unlike the fear conditioning, to become an interior voice as a conditioned response to appease a narcissistic abuser. You can wind up feeling guilty but not shamed for your behaviors without even hearing so much as a comment from a narcissist due to prolonged conditioning, resulting in sometimes unnecessary self-flagellation but not nearly as bad as that obtained through shame.
Shame
Unlike guilt, which assigns value-statements to actions, shame assigns value to the person based on value-statements regarding what certain actions or qualities say about them as individuals. An example that is controversial for me to bring up with other Christians is the use of the bible by narcissistic and well-meaning parents alike to shame children into righteousness.
The most pervasive usage is the bible verse regarding children honoring their parents and its necessity to stay in God’s good graces. Perhaps secondary to this is the propensity to identify and bully one child for acting within the parent’s myopic, misinformed understanding of pridefulness.
Using these two references from scripture, indoctrinated children are continually reminded of their intrinsic evilness and are informed of that fact on a regular basis. And if you put a single toe out of line, you are reminded of this innate wickedness in your heart, not the supposedly unconditional and gracious love that you grow up believing you should receive because the bible fucking says so!
You can see how shame, particularly in a religious community, is a weapon of conditioning for conformity and control, despite shame’s incompatibility with the story of Jesus. The conditioning lasts years after deconstructing one’s faith and is among the more toxic components that must be healed in the journey toward integrated, healthy self-conception.
For those who did not experience religious indoctrination but do resonate with the concepts discussed herein, the parallels in personal growth when shedding the shackles of this conditioning are undeniable. Where there’s a kid raised by drug-addled parents that demonstrated these behaviors, there’s also another person, raised in a pious tradition that can relate. It’s eerie, but these two groups can help each other.
Lighthouses and Anchors
I recommend to everyone doing this kind of personal work to find two people; the lighthouse and the anchor. The lighthouse is who you go to when you feel utterly lost. Imagine you are the brave, tired, terrified captain of a ship. You cannot see the night sky, waves are crashing all around, lighting jaggedly chases clouds across the sky, while somehow not striking the barely visible quarter moon in the heavens. The wind is howling through the sails, and you have to save the ship. Rain and hale are pelting down upon you as you grasp the helm, white-knuckled with desperation. But then you see an orbing, centrifugal light in the distance. You know there’s land. And you guide your ship toward that light to get yourself home safe, and the lighthouse has once again brought you back to a feeling of safety. A storm is still furious raging outside but you’re no longer subject to its dangers aboard the ship. Got that person? Okay.
The anchor is slightly different. Imagine every single reckless behavior you have and how you feel about those behaviors. Now, imagine that you are in a mood. You know the mood. The mood to cast everything off, give no fucks, and fuck shit up. The anchor will act as a voice of reason, not a bully or someone to shame you but to remind you of the end consequences, remind you of your value, and sometimes tell you off. They do not shame you, they anchor you back to earth gently but securely. If you are in the middle of the ocean and the lighthouse is not getting you where you need to be, the anchor holds you tightly in place until the storm passes.
May you know both lighthouses and anchors. May you one day be them.
Blessed be.
