Question

[mudpuppy]

Is there anything inherently wrong with Narcissists besides their Narcissism?
By that I mean, absent their insane efforts to cover up what they perceive to be their fatally flawed inner self would they be "normal"?
Is even their lack of empathy a reaction to this irrational, overwhelming fear of exposure of their worthlessness, or if we could somehow eradicate their pathological dishonesty and manipulations and fears would they still be cold hearted creeps with no human feelings of love or human connection?

I guess if the lack of empathy is a reaction to their irrational fears then they are essentially "normal" people driven batty by a baseless fear.
If on the other hand they inherently lack empathy then their fears are entirely rational because they are fundamentally flawed, inherently worthless people, right?

mud

[BonesMS]

I'm not comprehending.........

[Hopalong]

I think that's pretty complicated Mud...but I hear the frustration in your question!
I am sorry if N-issues are rearing their ugly heads into your lives again.

I struggled for so long to figure out the Why, and after a while decided that there
just had to be a lot of nature (genes) as well as nurture (experience) in creating
this PD.

I think there's no telling how the genetic vulnerability will mix with experience and
in one person, produce somebody a little socially off but good-hearted, and in another
(same family) -- a ruthless, truly empathy free N.

I think there are a lot of people who don't have empathy who are still moral, decent people.
I was very surprised to learn about a rock-solid Good Person friend of mine, that she literally
doesn't experience empathy much. What she DOES do is concern herself with others' needs
and function in community-building with complete dedication. Not for recognition but because doing
the right thing is what she runs by.

I thought she was just being modest or something but after she told me that, I started
observing that she really doesn't have a "sympathy vibe" as most folks I know do...she really
isn't "feeling" empathy.

But she's not an N.

So the empathy-capacity is a big thing, but it's not the only thing. I think you're spot on
about the fear that drives Ns and how that clouds everything they do.

yers
Hops

[mudpuppy]

Thought I was being pretty clear. Doesn't seem like a complicated question although the answer may be.
Nor is it prompted by any new happenings, just something I was wondering. Let me try again.

Are the symptoms of narcissism, including the lack of empathy, wholly a reaction by the narcissist's mind and personality to protect their inner self, which they incorrectly perceive as hopelessly flawed, from outside trauma, or;

Are the symptoms of narcissism a more fundamental disorder in that the narcissist develops a lack of empathy as well as a complete disregard for the truth and manipulates others not as part of a pointless attempt to protect an inner self they incorrectly perceive as hopelessly flawed but rather as the very essence of a person who in fact is hopelessly flawed?

In other words, is narcissism a fear based reaction to protect an otherwise "normal" personality that merely has distorted perceptions of itself or is it an organic development in itself and constitutes a very real and flawed personality that rightly fears discovery by others.

As basically as I can put it;
Is narcissism a perverse blanket covering a profoundly insecure person who is otherwise just like you and me, or is it the very core of the person?

I guess it's kind of a question about what is personality or consciousness, so perhaps it's a little more complicated than I thought. .

[sKePTiKal]

I'll bite... but I'm not sure my answer will make any sense.

I think you've probably defined two ends of the N spectrum, Mud. The one - covering up "perceived" insecurities and fears about self - with this fabulous, aren't I the cat's meow personality... is what we see a lot of these days. These people are annoying, but harmless... and they might even be treatable. (Calling Dr. G....) I have a theory about why this type seems to be everywhere - it's linked to self-esteem. I'll save it.

The folks at the other extreme probably also have a high degree of overlap into sociopathic and psychopathic characteristics. And I'm beginning to wonder if what we call "lack of empathy" is really the "defining" characteristic we think it is. (Won't go into that right now). I think at this end of the spectrum, it's that the PD-person doesn't accept the reality of, believe that other people have feelings at all... Yet, they DO experience feelings of their own - and those are the only feelings that are real to them. But they don't call them feelings... they can't separate these from "self".

But I heard the rest of the question as being: are these folks born this way, or is their PD their "coping" strategy for what they experienced a world/environment that didn't accept them, "right out of the box"? Maybe I'm trying to over-simplify or generalize, but I kinda see these two questions linked to the two ends of the spectrum...

realizing, of course, that any given individual is going to be some "different shades of gray" on both those spectrums.

[Hopalong]

I don't know.

But if I had only those two choices, I think I'd pick this one:

...an organic development in itself and constitutes a very real and flawed personality that rightly fears discovery by others

I think I believe this because it seems so intractable.

And because of the enormous variability within animal personalities within species in nature. The "flaw" in the personality is only in relation to the pain that personality causes others. By itself, on a moonscape, or in a world populated only by other alpha-hyenas (or whatever fits) ... it would just be, what is. Who people are.

But because love and empathy and sensitivity DO exist, it's like a shock -- to encounter (much less get to know well) a person who looks like any other person, and then you realize ... different.

I think going waaaaaaaay back, the very real and flawed personality -- is largely genetic. And that takes a lot of the (blaming, judging) fun out of it. How angry can one be at genes? At nature expressing itself?

Once I finally began to see it that way, I developed compassion for Ns. Not trust. (Who trusts a tiger?) But compassion.

Hops

[mudpuppy]

  Hops,
  Even if one grants it is wholly genetic, something I profoundly doubt, the question of free will remains.
  Clearly these people know right from wrong because they go to insane lengths to cover up and/or justify their misdeeds. And when caught in the light of day will often act treacly sweet, in front of strangers and others, to people they ordinarily abuse.
  So if they know what is right and can do the right thing when it suits them but choose not to when it doesn't,  I still have very little compassion for them.
 They may not have chosen how they are but they consciously choose to harm others in a futile attempt to protect themselves from non existent threats.

 PR,
 I wasn't intentionally defining two ends of one spectrum. My question was posed about one hypothetical individual; is he either "a" or "b"?
 There may be something to what you say especially in this sense; what starts out in adolescence as merely a cover for insecurities eventually morphs into the core of their inner being.

  If that is what happens it raises another question I've always wondered about; is there a point, presumably in late adolescence where traits usually begin to appear in earnest, before which these people can alter the course of their lives and become "normal" and after which they are inevitably cast as nuts or is it baked in from early childhood/birth?

mud

[Hopalong]

I understand, Mud.

For me, compassion in no way means I'd therefore hold anyone with this "condition" less accountable -- morally, legally, ethically.

I am a person who could lock up somebody awful and throw away the key. Compassion for them is a separate choice.

I learned from some Buddhists (a week I spent unexpectedly in the course of my job with the Dalai Lama and some monks, way back before he was trendy) that this was a real emotion with a different kind of power than the notions of love I'd always recognized. It affected me in an unexpected way because I experienced it (in a powerful form) and I had literally never seen/felt such a huge, concentrated wave of compassion before. I knew what it meant, but had never encountered such a massive "amount" of it, if that makes sense. (It's hard to describe.)

I never "ate" the theology or became anything particular--but the presence of that compassion had a life-changing impact. In that moment I recognized I was feeling something new to me -- in its (how do I describe it) mass and volume and actuality -- and while it was clearly real, it was also different from any "feeling" I'd been around before (not saying I hadn't been loved, but that this huge compassion wave thing was NEW) and that it was being specifically emanated by the strange people I was with.

So, now I know what it feels like. I liked it. I emit my own little inconsistent dribble of it, and like myself better when I do. Pretty simple, really.

Don't gotta LIKE 'em. (The Ns.) Don't gotta APPROVE of them. And if one needs to JUDGE them, have at it. I don't think that affects them (but probably affects you).

love,
Hops

[lighter]

I think that the basic truth is that all humans do what they need to do to feel OK. 

In performing our daily ablutions of self soothing and coping strategies.......

 individual strategies are what they are. 

Can we select, pick and choose what works for us, any more than we can select our sexual preference?

COULD we/you change our sexual preferences if the norms of society dictated it, and if we could, would it carry the same difficulty as giving up whatever strategy we depend on to feel good?

In a way, we're all asked to conform to society's norms, but it's dreadful apparent that people aren't wired to strictly conform. 

What gets you off, gets you off.

Yogi must eat,and all that.

Even though society has consequences for failure to comply, our prisons are bursting (don't we have the highest rate of imprisonment in the world?)

It's not hard to imagine that destructive N's are going to do what makes them feel good, and I think we're lucky if what makes us feel good is what society considers acceptable.


This is where being a people pleasing, nice guy with an aversion to conflict comes in particularly handy, IME.  It might not suit us to be that, but it doesn't land us in prison, or require we assume a different identity to be OK, or have to fear being found out should our well honed mask of assertiveness "slip."

I have empathy for everyone saddled with self destructive coping strategies, and perhaps that's a simplistic way of looking at it, but it's how I make peace with it.  I don't have to figure it out, past that, and it's a blessing not to have to.
Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

If that is what happens it raises another question I've always wondered about; is there a point, presumably in late adolescence where traits usually begin to appear in earnest, before which these people can alter the course of their lives and become "normal" and after which they are inevitably cast as nuts or is it baked in from early childhood/birth?

Experts used to believe that there was such a "hardening" or settling in of traits, characteristics, personality in adolescence. But then, that phase of adolescence started expanding... being flexible chronologically, at least in society's frame of reference. The shift from an agri-based society to an industrial one helped spur changes. Used to be an 8th grade education was all someone needed (and the content of that education would be more intense than todays') to have the knowledge & skills to learn a trade. Then, society expected a high school diploma from everyone. So women who might've been married at 14 or 16 weren't; young men applied themselves to book learning -- instead of apprenticing in a skill trade. Then: everyone can go to college...

well, what's happened (from one way of looking at it) is that we've kept people in that juvenile societal "status role"... without the old societal expectations of working to contribute to the household, being responsible for and to society for one's existence, and most of all (just my opinion)... developing personal integrity and what used to be known as "character". My years in education persuaded me some time ago, that we don't allow kids to be kids when they're really at that developmental stage and then, later on cushion them from taking on the adult responsibilities and challenge them enough - when they're at that natural stage, so that in their 20s/early 30s they're STILL not sure "who they are". Maybe this duration of juvenile mindset is a consequence of robbing them of the intellectual freedom to play, fantasize, pretend, dream... to be children in other words. We start pushing "educational" toys earlier & earlier... trying to instill the idea that learning is "work" and big kids go to "work" or "school". They aren't developed enough - they resist and rebel - and hang on to being "dependent"... "liked"... "popular". Belonging & acceptance are the coin of the realm of these grown-up children. More important than having a unique "self" or skills or values. That kind of feeds the garden-variety N that's rampant, I think.

Some theories of psych started working with behavior vs nature... in other words, making behavior fit society's norms while the "inner" person was whatever it grew into. Some theories started wondering if, everything was acceptable - hey, we're all only human after all - then maybe it was society's "norms" that were out of whack, obsolete, needed to change. Then, there was "flavor of the month" psych... what we remember as the pop-psych phase. Now we have DNA and Neuroscience... removing responsibility for "how we are" and then saying that yes, with enough repetitions everything about a person can be "changed" (I think there are natural limits to that). The viewpoints that the answer to your question depend on are changing a lot.

I don't think there is agreement among the experts about the answer to your question, and so that leaves us with old "yes and no; both" answer.

is there a point, presumably in late adolescence where traits usually begin to appear in earnest, before which these people can alter the course of their lives and become "normal"

I would say YES. Many kinds of interventions, incidents, situations - even the most casual one-time experiences - CAN change the course of the their lives. If they're lucky or someone "sees" and CARES. Sometimes the interventions are intentional - as in teens in therapy. A whole lot of variables need to come together just right for this to happen, unintentionally... but it probably does, more than we know and less than we'd like it to.

is it baked in from early childhood/birth?
Most of the time - NO; some of the time - YES. I have this weird idea that babies are born as a perfectly balanced intellectual/emotional being; the pattern for a lot of their likes/dislikes is already "pre-programmed" in their DNA and brains. As they respond to experience in their physical environment, post-birth... adaptation and evolution - growth - occurs in that pattern. Even introverts who prefer to hold sensation and experience out at arm's length from themselves are still impacted by their immediate environment... and can be trained as to the rules, parameters, and expectations of that environment. Whether we want to admit it or not.

But there are anomalies. People who are born with a glitch - maybe a loose screw or switch; or a plug that's loose - in the "hardware"... or the "firmware" (DNA). No matter how nurturing or firm the limitations in the environment - it's not possible to "connect" with them; they are in their own bubble of reality and the ones who try to share the contents of that reality usually scare the bejesus out of the rest of us. Whatever the "ghost in the machine" that they were born with... what is inside that bubble is MORE real to them than what's outside of it and they can't be convinced otherwise (and no, they're not letting you in - if you were fool enough to want to).

But, ya know - I only play a "thinker" on TV... and yes, I have stayed in a Holiday Inn Express... LOL!! This ramble is how I would answer your question. It's been interesting to see how differently we all come to (and where we come "from" in the old hippie-lingo) our answers.

[mudpuppy]

  Thanks PR.
   I agree about disorders not being destiny because I've seen late adolescents who were obviously trending toward disorder but who, whether through willpower, support from others, serendipity, patience, blind luck or some other factor I'm not aware of return back to a healthy mindset and seemingly grow out of it.
  Others seem to almost dive into the pool of craziness eagerly or at least they seem to offer little or no resistance and turn utterly inward and are permanently lost in crazytown.

  Lighter,
  Thanks for your perspective, although it isn't mine. Apart from someone who is simply bat s*** crazy with an organic brain disease and doesn't know right from wrong I still believe everyone who does know right from wrong has not just a legal a duty to "cope" in a manner which doesn't, for instance destroy other people's lives, but a moral one as well.
  And because empathy is not a limitless resource I tend to save my supply for the victims of the animals who refuse to cope without harming others, although it's difficult to think of an animal species that tries to make itself feel better by defaming and driving other animals insane. Maybe comparing them to animals is a little unfair....to the animals.
  
  Hops,
  Thanks also. I have compassion for Ns to the extent I feel sorry for them, but don't consider feeling sorry for their plight the same as extending them empathy as Lighter said she does. As I understand empathy it is the understanding of or ability to identify with or vicariously experience others feelings. I can't do any of that with an N. All I can do is pity them a bit for being such miserable arseholes, but then in a very short time I consider all the lives they destroy and my compassion is short lived.
   I'd argue compassion does me even less good than judging does, because part of judging is seeking justice. The world seems chock full of compassion for people who don't deserve it but woefully short of justice. I'll stick to the J word for now. Maybe compassion is easier after one receives a little justice.

  In any event my original questions weren't really about the extent to which we hold these people accountable or judging or empathy or any of that; more of a cogitation on the nature of who they are and how they get that way, questions I doubt there are definitive answers to. Thanks for the input guys.

mud

[Overcomer]

I'll try to weave an answer based on the biggest N in my life, my Mother.

I know one of the traits an N has is an over inflated view of themselves without anything to back it up.  However, in my mom's case, a sudden rise in status fueled her narcissism.

She was born in the depression and lived in a small town.  She wasn't really pretty and her parents took every opportunity to make sure she shouldn't aspire for too much because she was just an average girl.  She screwed up her life until she was on a train to go visit my dad (who was stationed in Labrador) when she met a professor who told her she was still young and could go to school.

She bit on that like a wild women.  Went to school and finished 4 years in 3 (with me, 3 years old and my brother 8, left without much of a mom.)  Then she joined a new company that sold decorative accessories out of the home.  She got in at the right time, she was in the right place and the next thing you know, my average small town mom was rich!!

Then came plastic surgery.  Then came importance.  People flocked to her.  She enjoyed being a big wig in her company.  I believe all THAT made her an N.  She knows deep down that she's just an average girl born during the depression who wasn't that attractive.  She will NEVER give that up - no one knows THAT girl - now she is beautiful and rich and successful (and lonely - my brother cannot stand her and she my brother.  My relationship with her has always been rocky.  She is only nice to me now because I have cancer and it wouldn't look good if she was mean to me.)

So take away all that luck and ambition and she would be normal, I guess.  But now she can walk around with her nose in the air thinking she's got all the answers.  Meanwhile with her aging, people are taking advantage of her at every turn.

No turning back.  So many people blew smoke up her *ss that she thinks she is special!!!

[sKePTiKal]

Thank you mud, back atcha.

Your descriptions of how you think about N-situations are quite helpful to me. I think the difference between teens who "get it together" and those who make a bee-line for crazytown... is that inner self and whether that self has decided: hey - I matter to ME, at least; I know right from wrong and I don't want to be doing wrong. The crazy-town groupies have decided that they do NOT matter to anyone... and that's a wound that's quite deep... so they stop mattering to themselves. It can be quite difficult - it's like the task of a zen master - to be in the right place, at the right time, to reach into beneath all the mystery, fear, defensive bunkers to that hidden, hurting self - to gently say: It's OK. C'mere - you need a hug. You matter to me.

It's your responses to Lighter & Hops, though, that helps me out with something I've been wrestling with: values and morality. Obviously, when you're a teen who gets stuck in crazytown, you're a tad confused about values and morality... what your own self believes, rather than what others tell you is "correct" and validation from others isn't really required for individual beliefs. There seems to be a lot to choose from these days. And I know I went through a period of experimentation with different "systems". I've hung on to bits and pieces of each that touched me; that felt "right" and "true".

I've observed a societal confusion over the shades of meaning between sympathy|empathy, empathy|compassion, empathy|expectations for personal responsibility... and personally experienced, once again, the cognitive dissonance between something that's totally faked, compassion used like a club to beat up on someone else... that kind of thing. That kind of personal observation/experience is... well, it certainly wakes up the old lizard brain!    So, I've been researching... coming at the problem with a dictionary, reading from as many different angles & perspectives as I can, talking to a lot of different and different kinds of people... collecting enough "frame of reference" to make a decision. And I think sometimes values and morality are always a "work in progress" - they can contract toward the more absolute... or expand, becoming more flexible, mutable... breathing, sort of... within the world and times we live. It's curious and fascinating.

I do have to say, I've also experienced the same kind of compassion that Hops has described. It's like a force that's around us all the time, but that we aren't always aware of - because we can only tune in our "receivers" to one wavelength at a time. Sometimes, it makes itself known to people in extreme distress... and we can learn to tweak the knob on the receiver just right to get it to "come in". But there's also a "popular" form of compassion - that alters the meaning - that's artificial and fake (the one that makes the pit of my stomach drop recognizing the cognitive dissonance). And I've found that judgement - in the form of discernment first, then a moral judgement - is my best "tool" for walking those fine lines between the two. There is nothing wrong, in my book, with moral judgement when it's a personal dictionary of how to behave... that's not imposed on others.

There's been a trend lately to adopt these changing definitions of values and morality - and hesitation or doubt about accepting this, is grounds for being branded a threat to society. Any form of "judging" - this is good, this is bad - that doesn't match up with the flavor of the month, is verboten. Where've we heard this kind of thing before??   SIGHHHHH.....

What I'm noticing is that people are becoming confused about this, in our society. And some of those artificial forms of compassion are being offered up as "better than" the originals - new & improved, you know? Re-invented for the 21st century -- like human nature evolves that fast (HA!). Narcissism is swapped in for self-respect, self-esteem that's earned through good deeds & earning it... another moral shell game.

But that's a topic for another thread. Carry on...

[Dr. Richard Grossman]

Is there anything inherently wrong with Narcissists besides their Narcissism?
By that I mean, absent their insane efforts to cover up what they perceive to be their fatally flawed inner self would they be "normal"?
Is even their lack of empathy a reaction to this irrational, overwhelming fear of exposure of their worthlessness, or if we could somehow eradicate their pathological dishonesty and manipulations and fears would they still be cold hearted creeps with no human feelings of love or human connection?

I guess if the lack of empathy is a reaction to their irrational fears then they are essentially "normal" people driven batty by a baseless fear.
If on the other hand they inherently lack empathy then their fears are entirely rational because they are fundamentally flawed, inherently worthless people, right?

mud

Hi mud,

IMO, if somehow one was able to excise most “narcissists’” underlying sense of worthlessness and fear of being exposed, one would not find a “normal” person.  For example, the predisposition to manipulate (without self-awareness) for one’s own good would still be there.  So, a person with NPD, in my view, is predisposed to certain brain patterns/circuitry which lead to a particular way of seeing and responding to the world.    This is why only a small percentage of people who have an underlying sense of worthlessness become “narcissists” (as opposed to chronically depressed, etc.) 

The fact that so many different brain circuits are all pointing in the same direction—a narcissistic view of and response to the world—makes most in this group impossible to treat.

Richard

[mudpuppy]

Hi Doc,

This is why only a small percentage of people who have an underlying sense of worthlessness become “narcissists” (as opposed to chronically depressed, etc.)

That makes a lot of sense.

IMO, if somehow one was able to excise most “narcissists’” underlying sense of worthlessness and fear of being exposed, one would not find a “normal” person.

They might not be normal but would they be pathological? IOW absent a perceived fatally flawed inner self to protect by any means necessary would they just be kind of self centered and perhaps a little devious?
If so then that would indicate there are no narcissists who do not have that sense of worthlessness and it might also mean your garden variety self-centered, slightly N person is only prevented from being a pathological N by having developed a more healthy self image.
Where does that inner sense of total worthlessness and fear of it being exposed come from? The old abandonment at a young age thing? Not all Ns are abandoned or ignored are they?

Also I wonder if you put any credence in my "tipping point" idea that sometime, presumably in late adolescence, many people reach a point where they will go one way or the other. Not that there is a conscious decision, only that some take a path which leads to relative normalcy even if they are still affected while others surrender to their fears and end up clinically disordered. Or is it not that these people might have, given different decisions or circumstances, not gone either way but that the only mildly affected were never going to become disordered despite their environment while the severely affected ones were inevitably destined for severe nuttiness (I hope armchair readers don't mind my technical jargon) 

Kelly,
Do you think maybe your mom was just as messed up prior to "making it" as she was afterword but the money and attention just let her manifest it in a different way? When you're plain and poor you can hide your worthless self by disappearing even if you still have grandiose fantasies. Once you have money you can indulge them.

PR,
Lots of stuff there so I'll just note one thing; re judgement. I agree judgement is fine if we don't impose it on others. If we impose it on others we've gone beyond judgment to condemnation. Condemnation is reserved in our system to the state. That's the concept Jesus was expressing with the woman caught in adultery. He didn't tell anyone adultery was OK, in fact He told her go and sin no more but He also asked her "where are your accusers" after the others had left. When she acknowledged they were gone He told her " neither do I condemn you".
Brings to mind the old saw that "justice is getting what we deserve, mercy is not getting what we deserve and grace is getting what we don't deserve". I like grace.

mud