Jealousy and Narcissism

[Certain Hope]

Interesting perspective here:


Jealousy & Narcissism
 
 
The previous articles in the chapter The Nature of Emotion dealt with general theory about emotion and unconscious ideas. In this chapter, I turn to the differences between emotions. If I detect self-pity as my present emotion, how do I know whether it is self-pity alone, or the self-pity mode of guilt or of jealousy ? . Emotions and their modes have definite characteristics which help to identify them.

These characteristics are beliefs and attitudes that ‘emanate’ from the motif of an emotion like an aura (this tangle of attributes is the reason that the definition of an emotion has been such a confusing issue).

I list those characteristics that I have discovered. These have been identified empirically, and not by using logical thought.

My method of investigation is quite simple. When I am aware of what the present emotion is that I am experiencing, I consider relationships, views of reality, of politics, of religion, ideas of morality, how I feel about my own needs, etc, and then note what influence the present emotion has on this inquiry. I was often surprised by what I found.

I start with jealousy.

 
Jealousy (= self-pity + love)

The self-pity mode of jealousy denigrates my achievements as an individual since it prefers to seek recognition and approval from other people ; social (or group) conformity is the norm. Only social achievements are valued. I have to rely on others ; if I have no support then I experience loneliness. Therefore this mode creates a dependency situation for me, so social ties are cemented by concepts of obligation and duty (in other words, concepts of obligation and duty are ways of handling this type of self-pity).

This mode of self-pity generates the need to be touched or to touch (in order to evoke a response from the other person) ; ultimately, this kind of touch becomes the need for sexual intercourse. This mode also makes one homely : I may feel like baking a cake (when it has a social nuance, such as having tea with the neighbours), or I may feel like redecorating the rooms in the house where I invite friends.

 
The love mode of jealousy produces social involvement and a sense of caring. It encompasses all ways of making other people dependent on oneself. It leads to paternalism in social relations, and to ‘enlightened despotism’ in politics, and to the crusading drive of evangelists. It generates sexual love, but not to the desire for sexual intercourse ; however, sexual intercourse may be engaged in as a way of fulfilling the needs of a partner. Touch is only used as a means of consolation.

 
Narcissism (= vanity + love)

Narcissism puts a gleam in my eyes : in love mode the gleam is of joy, whereas in vanity mode it is of excitement.

In the vanity mode of narcissism the quality of life is important, so I dramatise everything ; life is a drama! I attune to heroism and romanticism. I act from philanthropic motives and desire to help other people surmount their suffering ; I help others to help themselves. I do not impose my views on them. However, I am sensitive to ridicule.

 

In the love mode I feel good, good in myself and glad for my life as a whole, even for the bad and sorrowful aspects of it ; I am glad for life itself – life is exhilarating. I become self-absorbed. I dance to my favourite music. I do not pass judgements on anyone. I prefer co-operation rather than competition ; in fact, competitiveness switches off the love mode.

Copyright © 2002 Ian Heath
All Rights Reserved

The copyright is mine, and this book is free to use. It can be reproduced anywhere, so long as the source is acknowledged.

[teartracks]

Again Hope...Good information.  Thanks!   

teartracks

[Certain Hope]

Thanks, Tt 

By the way, I saw your picture on another of your posts and just wanted to compliment you on your dangly earrings....

like this:  j j         You look lovely! 

Re: this info on N and jealousy... what really struck me is the bit on the "gleam" in N's eye. I used to think of it as a leering look, yet knew there was more to it than lust, especially when I'd see the same gleam in the eye of a female, or hear that gleamy tone of voice.
Excitement.... anticipating conquest, I'd say... and utterly creepy.

Here's some more from the same author, Ian Heath, regarding emotions ~ ~ the portion about body symptoms and mental attitudes is revealing. Not sure I subscribe to all of his theories, but in the search for more effective means of handling emotions, every little bit of knowledge helps, I think.

Hope
 
 
Identifying emotions is very difficult. And what complicates the difficulty even more is that a person experiences two emotions at once, one being from his or her ordinary consciousness (what I usually call the surface consciousness) and one being from the subconscious mind. To these two we can add a third one that is often present as well, that being anxiety.

Note: Although emotions have their origin in the unconscious mind, they are used by both the surface consciousness and the subconscious mind.

My procedure for identifying my surface emotions had to be different from the procedure that I used to identify my subconscious emotions. The reason for this was that my subconscious emotions were hidden from my normal state of awareness. I usually had to become familiar with my surface emotions before I had much chance of pinpointing my subconscious ones.

 
My surface emotions:
 
To identify my surface emotions I read biographies and autobiographies. I would compare the reactions and motivations of the persons being described with my own reactions and motivations. Rather than try to identify many emotions at a time, I would pick just one and try to correlate responses that seemed to be relevant. I would try to pinpoint the emotion underlying dominant attitudes and beliefs in politics, religion, sexuality, morality, etc. I would puzzle over which emotion these responses sprang from. Then intuition would lead me eventually to the correct identification of that emotion. Then I would understand the various ways that that emotion could manifest itself.

Each intuition had to be checked and cross-checked in order to remove occasional errors. Then I would correlate the intuition against my own experience. In this procedure, empiricism backed up my intuitions.

When using biographies and autobiographies for the purpose of identifying emotional responses, it is essential to read about outstanding people, irrespective of whether they are good or bad. Such people have their emotional responses accentuated in their own particular speciality – this gives a ‘sharp edge’ to their personality, and reduces the choice of possible emotions that may be influencing them.
 
My subconscious emotions:
 
The procedure that I adopted to identify my subconscious emotions was to use a thesaurus or synonym dictionary. The subconscious mind would only let me get a vague approximation to what the present subconscious emotion was (after all, the contents of the subconscious mind are hidden ; easy identification is not to be expected). So I used the thesaurus to look up synonyms of the approximate emotion. An intuition would then enable me to pinpoint the exact emotion. In this procedure, my intuitions backed up my empiricism.

 
Body symptoms and mental attitudes :

Having identified an emotion I then looked for body symptoms and mental attitudes that are associated with that emotion. Once such correlations are found it becomes easy to determine my emotional responses when they are intense : I can identify the emotion direct, or indirectly through the symptom or attitude that is currently expressing itself. Low-intensity emotions can only be identified indirectly.

For example : my nose produced regular colds and catarrhs for most of my life, at any time of the year. By repeated observation I found that my left-side nostril produced a runny nose when I felt hate (usually as a mode of pride) ; the right-side nostril when I felt self-pity.                          [     anyone have any experience/ noticed this phenomenon?]

Other examples : headaches can have psychological origins, as well as physiological origins. Resentment increases blood pressure and usually causes a headache on the left side of the brain (when the resentment is very intense, the pain may be felt as a band of pain around the whole head), whilst fear causes a headache on the right side of the brain. Bitterness causes a headache at the rear of the brain, in the area where the skull joins the neck. Pride is one of the causes of neck pain, in the cervical vertebrae furthest from the skull.     [  The Bible refers to stubborn, prideful human beings as stiff-necked ~ amazing! ]

There is no short-cut to identifying emotions.

It is a long and hard process of becoming more and more aware of the influences that are associated with important beliefs, attitudes and behaviours (minor beliefs, attitudes and behaviours do not carry much emotional weight and so will be exceedingly hard to examine). Intuition is needed. And the development of intuition is a slow process, requiring perseverance and single-mindedness.

http://www.emotion.discover-your-mind.co.uk/E3-identifying-emotions/em3a-two-procedures.htm

[teartracks]

Hope,

Of  course, j's for jealousy! 

teartracks

[teartracks]

Hi Hope,

The article is an interesting read.  The author seems to have put a lot of thought and work into drawing his conclusions.  I respect that.  Honestly, though, my experience doesn't fit what he describes.  I'm a little in the dark about the anxiety part of what he says.  Will have to read the whole article and see I can identify parallels to my experience.  Of course, just because it doesn't fit with my experience doesn't mean that it isn't right on for others.  And I agree with you, every little bit of insight stands to help get the big picture.  Thanks so much.   


teartracks