Hi,

You may find these new resources of interest:

I Love You, I Hate You - Art Exhibition

http://www.michaelsouter.com/narcissist_intro.html

Faultless Nation by Cal Thomas

http://www.townhall.com/columnists/calthomas/ct20050615.shtml

Free Pint Workplace Bullying

http://www.freepint.com/issues/260505.htm

Is Your Cup Half Full or Is It Half Empty

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/archive/2005/April/24/style/stories/
06style.htm

It's All About Me - Narcissism in the High Tech Era

http://www.canada.com/technology/story.html?id=f785f0a1-b8ec-4b00-
87ff-7cf173ee2b53

Twelve Dialogs About Narcissism

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/dialogues.html

Narcissism and the Dynamics of Evil

http://learnv.ycdsb.edu.on.ca/lt/FMMC/hpteacher.nsf/Files/mcmanad/
$FILE/narc.html

Narcissism, Narcissists, and Abusive Relationships

http://spaces.msn.com/members/narcissist/

Abusive Relationships on Kathi's Mental Health Review

http://www.toddlertime.com/abuse/index.htm

Abusive Relationships Newsletter Archive

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/narcissisticabuse/

Narcissistic Personality Disorder Google Group

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/NARCISSISTIC-PERSONALITY-DISORDER

Open Site Personality Disorders

http://open-
site.org/Health/Conditions_and_Diseases/Psychiatric_Disorders/Persona
lity/

Survivors' Quotes

http://survivorquotes.bravehost.com/

The Infinite Mind - Narcissism

http://www.lcmedia.com/mind333.htm

Tips of All Sorts - Workplace Bully

http://www.tipsofallsorts.com/bully.html

Mirror, Mirror ...

http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/Lifestyle/2004/08/30/608650.
html

Celebrities Want to Be Alone - or Do They?

http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/life/20041130/d_bottomstrip30.ar
t.htm

Weekly Case Studies

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/drvakninsweekly
casestudies.msnw

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/drvakninsweekly
casestudies2.msnw

As Sam Vaknin about Narcissism and Abusive Partners

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=15404

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=45353

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=132787

Hope you find these useful!

Take care.

Sam

LINK #1

Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/

The Narcissistic Personality Disorder and abusive relationships with
narcissists described and analyzed. 82 frequently asked questions
(FAQs),
excerpts from the  archives of the Narcissism Revisited List, essay,
journal
entries and appendices.

LINK #2

A Primer on Narcissism

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php/type/doc/id/419

A psychodynamic study of pathological narcissism and the
developmental and
cultural roots of the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

LINK #3

HealthyPlace Narcissistic Personality Disorder Community

http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/narciss
ism/index.html

Narcissistic PD and abuse by narcissists - FAQs, essays, links, and
book
excerpts.

Transcript of the CHAT regarding abusive narcissists HERE:

http://healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/site/Transc
ripts/abusive_narcissists.htm

Transcript of the CHAT about the Narcissistic Personality Disorder
HERE:

http://www.healthyplace.com/Communities/Personality_Disorders/Site/Tr
anscripts/narcissism.htm

Transcript of the CHAT about narcissists in the workplace HERE:

http://healthyplace.com/Communities/personality_disorders/site/Transc
ripts/narcissism_workplace.htm

Radio Show regarding Relationships with Abusive Narcissists

http://www.healthyplace.com/Radio/archives/audio_narcissism_02-10-
12.htm

LINK #4

Narcissistic Personality Disorder Suite101 Topic

http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/npd

Discussions, journal entries and links regarding the Narcissistic
Personality Disorder and relationships with abusive narcissists.

The Suite101 Emotional and Verbal Abuse Web site

http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/verbal_emotional_abuse

Discussions, journal entries and links regarding emotional, verbal,
and
psychological abuse.

Spousal Abuse and Domestic Violence on Suite101

http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/spousal_domestic_abuse

Discussions, journal entries and links regarding spouse abuse and
domestic
violence.

LINK #5

Archives of the Narcissistic Abuse Study List

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/narcissisticabuse/messages/

The full archives of the Narcissistic Abuse Study List - links,
articles,
and resources regarding Pathological Narcissism, relationships with
abusive
narcissists, and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

LINK #6

Ask Sam Vaknin - Narcissistic Personality Disorder

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/indexqa.htm

Q&A regarding the Narcissistic Personality Disorder and
relationships with
abusive narcissists.

Read free excerpts from my book, "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism
Revisited" and download the Narcissism Book of Quotes (a
collaborative
effort of the Narcissistic Personality Disorder community on
Suite101)

http://www.suite101.com/files/topics/6514/files/MSL2excerpts.rtf

http://www.suite101.com/files/topics/6514/files/NPDQuotes.rtf

HealthyPlace Narcissistic Personality Disorder Community

http://www.healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/narcissism/index.h\
tml

Narcissistic PD and abuse by narcissists - FAQs, essays, links, and book
excerpts.

Transcript of the CHAT regarding abusive narcissists HERE:

http://healthyplace.com/communities/personality_disorders/site/Transcripts/abusi\
ve_narcissists.htm

Transcript of the CHAT about the Narcissistic Personality Disorder HERE:

http://www.healthyplace.com/Communities/Personality_Disorders/Site/Transcripts/n\
arcissism.htm

Transcript of the CHAT about narcissists in the workplace HERE:

http://healthyplace.com/Communities/personality_disorders/site/Transcripts/narci\
ssism_workplace.htm

Radio Show regarding Relationships with Abusive Narcissists

http://www.healthyplace.com/Radio/archives/audio_narcissism_02-10-12.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Are you wondering if you have depression. Go here to take an online
depression screening test.
http://clk.atdmt.com/IFR/go/hltchefr0070000047ifr/direct/01/

HERE ARE THIS WEEK'S STORIES:

Postpartum depression: a silent struggle
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#postpartum

Blogging: group therapy of the 21st century?
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#blogging

Prayer and scripture seen as depression antidote
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#prayer

Antidepressants may improve heart attack survival
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#depstories

FDA re-warns adults about antidepressants, suicide
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#depstories

***************************************************************
sponsor message:

SUFFERING FROM DEPRESSION?

There is a medication that may help you feel like yourself again.
Click here to find out about an effective treatment option.
http://clk.atdmt.com/IFR/go/hltchefr0070000047ifr/direct/01/

***************************************************************

Bipolar patients face stigma, globally
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#stigma

Drug therapy for manic and depressive phases of bipolar
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#bipolar

***************************************************************
sponsor message:

BIPOLAR TREATMENT
Know your options. Click here for more information.
http://clk.atdmt.com/OGI/go/abl0080000266ogi/direct/01/

***************************************************************

AUDIO: Mental illness in the African-American Community
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#illness

FDA told to delay ADHD drug labeling changes
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#ritalin

New ADHD book calls for new methods of teaching special needs kids
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#adhdkids

Diet makes an impact on ADHD
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#diet

Throat infection linked to ocd, tourettes
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#strep

***************************************************************

Visit the Lexapro Patient Orientation and Contact Center at HealthyPlace.com
for comprehensive information about this medication.
http://www.healthyplace.com/lexapro

***************************************************************

Hypochondriacs still need treatment
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#hypo

Marriage problems? Controlled separation may be answer
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#marriage

Self-Injury Bulletin Board
"I'm 50. I thought only young people self-injure."
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#bbs

Conquering eating disorders
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#ed

Eating disorders and older women
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#edwomen

Anorexia linked to overactive dopamine
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#anorexia

Surprising results for Schizophrenia and suicide risk factors
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#schizo

***************************************************************

sponsor message:

A TREATMENT FOR SCHIZOPHRENIA

Are you caring for someone with schizophrenia? Get help. Get information
about schizophrenia and treatment, including helpful tools and caregiver
support. Click here.
http://clk.atdmt.com/OGI/go/abl0090000306ogi/direct/01/

***************************************************************

- Brain Function in Schizophrenia Can Improve With Support
- Doctors Now Warning Patients About Medication Side-Effects
http://www.healthyplace.com/newsletters/7.11.05.asp#snews

All of us at HealthyPlace.com wish you a pleasant week.

If you know of anyone who can benefit from this newsletter
or the HealthyPlace.com site, I'll hope you'll pass this onto them.

Sincerely,
Deborah

Community Partner Team
HealthyPlace.com - Mental Health Communities
"When you're at HealthyPlace.com, you're never alone."
http://www.healthyplace.com

(You are on the personality disorders mail list. To unsubscribe:
http://www.healthyplace.com/site/list_unsubscribe_form.asp)

http://www.infidelity-help.us.com/

Narcissism - Miscellaneous Issues

Frequently Asked Questions # 7-9

Narcissism, Pathological Narcissism, The Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), the Narcissist,

and Relationships with Abusive Narcissists and Psychopaths

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Question:

In what type of narcissist is it worthwhile to invest emotionally?

Answer:

This, obviously, is a matter of value judgement. Narcissism is a powerful force, akin to the psychological element in drug addiction. The narcissist is sustained by ever increasing amounts of Narcissistic Supply. Adoration, approval, attention and the maintenance of an audience – are the nourishment without which the narcissist shrivels.

Depending on how talented the narcissist is, Narcissistic Supply could be the by-product of real achievements. The narcissist usually applies his skills and exploits his natural advantages where they provide him with the highest narcissistic rewards. For instance: he writes books to gain public acclaim – not because he has something to say or because he cannot contain his emotions or his message. Still, narcissists are, mostly, gifted and, therefore, are able to contribute to society at large. They become artists, authors, political leaders, business leaders, or entertainers – in order to bask in the limelight.

Some narcissists could be judged "worthy of sacrifice". They benefit their community "more" than they harm it. Those nearest and dearest pay a price – which is deemed more than amply compensated for by the contributions of the narcissist to the well-being of his community.

Question:

What is the reaction of a narcissist likely to be when confronted with your text?

Answer:

It takes a major life crisis to force the narcissist to face up to his False Self: a painful breakdown of a close (symbiotic) relationship, a failure (in business, in a career, in the pursuit of a goal), the death of a parent, imprisonment, or a disease.

Under normal circumstances, the narcissist denies that he is one (denial defence mechanism) and reacts with rage to any hint at being so diagnosed. The narcissist employs a host of intricate and interwoven defence mechanisms:  intellectualisation, projection, projective identification, splitting, repression and denial (to name but a few) – to sweep his narcissism under the psychological rug.

When at risk of getting in touch with the reality of his mental disorder (and, as a result, with his emotions) – the narcissist displays the whole spectrum of reactions usually associated with bereavement. At first he denies the facts, ignores them and distorts them to fit an alternative, coherent, "healthy", interpretation.

Then, he becomes enraged. Wrathful, he attacks the people and social institutions that are the constant reminders of his true state. Then he sinks into depression and sadness. This phase is, really, a transformation of the aggression that he harbours into self-destructive impulses.

Horrified by the potential consequences of being aggressive towards the sources of his Narcissistic Supply – the narcissist resorts to self-attack, or self-annihilation. Yet, if the evidence is hard and still coming, the narcissist accepts himself as such and tries to make the best of it (in other words, to use his very narcissism to obtain Narcissistic Supply).

The narcissist is a survivor and (while rigid in most parts of his personality) very inventive and flexible when it comes to securing Narcissistic Supply. The narcissist could, for instance, channel this force (of narcissism) positively – or defiantly caricature the main aspects of narcissism so as to attract attention (albeit negative).

But in most cases, the reflexes of avoidance prevail. The narcissist feels disenchanted with the person or persons who presented him with proof of his narcissism. He swiftly and cruelly parts ways with them, often without as much as an explanation (he does the same when he envies someone).

He then proceeds to develop paranoid theories to explain why people, events, institutions and circumstances tend to confront him with his narcissism and he, bitterly and cynically, opposes or avoids them. As anti-narcissistic agents they constitute a threat to the very coherence and continuity of his personality and this probably serves to explain the ferocity, malice, obduracy, consistency and exaggeration which characterise his reactions. Faced with the potential collapse or dysfunctioning of his False Self – the narcissist also faces the terrible consequences of being left alone and defenceless with his sadistic, maligned, self-destructive Superego.

Question:

When interacting with a narcissist, how can one tell, at any given moment, whether one is interacting with the IMAGE, or with the REAL PERSON? Or is it ALWAYS the image that is to the fore, and NEVER the real person?

Answer:

The short and the long of it is that one always interacts with the False Self (=the Image, in your question) and not with the True Self or (luckily) with the Superego (=the "real man", to use your coinage).

The latter emerge and become observable and discernible only in times of severe stress induced by life crises. The maintenance of the False Self is so demanding and takes up so much energy that it crumbles when that energy is used up by another situation.

A much more detailed analysis of these psychodynamics can be found in this essay: "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".

Also Read 

The Professions of the Narcissist

Narcissists, Disagreements and Criticism

The Dual Role of the False Self

The Stripped Ego

The Split Off Ego

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More FAQs

Excerpts from Archives of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

A Macedonian Encounter

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

Narcissists and Introspection

Frequently Asked Question # 49

Narcissism, Pathological Narcissism, The Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), the Narcissist,

and Relationships with Abusive Narcissists and Psychopaths

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Question:

Are narcissists capable of introspection? Can they distinguish their False Self from who they really are? Can this help them in the therapeutic process?

Answer:

A passage by Nathan Salant-Schwartz from "Narcissism and Character Transformation" [pp. 90-91. Inner City Books, 1985]:

"Psychologically, the shadow or reflection carries the image of the self – not the Ego. It is interesting and even psychotherapeutically useful to have persons suffering from NPD study their face in a mirror. Often they will see someone of great power and effectiveness, precisely the qualities they feel a lack of. For even though they may overwhelm others with their energy and personal qualities, they themselves feel ineffective.

Narcissus must possess his idealised image; he cannot allow its otherness for that would be too threatening to his basic design, to be mirrored himself. Hence, the sudden switch: 'Shall I be wooed or woo?'. Narcissus' libido quickly changes from an idealisation into a mirror form, showing how his unredeemed inflation, in psychoanalytic terms, his grandiose-exhibitionistic self, gains control."

Jungian parlance aside, the author seems to be describing – rather poetically – the basic relationship between the True Self and the False Self. No theoretician has ignored this dichotomy, most basic to malignant narcissism.

The True Self is synonymous with the [Freudian] Ego. It is shrivelled, dilapidated, stifled and marginalised by the False Self. The narcissist draws no distinction between his Ego and his Self. He is incapable of doing so. He relegates his Ego functions to the outside world. His False Self is an invention and the reflection of an invention.

Narcissists, therefore, do not "exist". The narcissist is a loose coalition, based on a balance of terror, between a sadistic, idealised Superego and a grandiose and manipulative False Ego. These two interact only mechanically. Narcissists are Narcissistic Supply seeking androids. No robot is capable of introspection, not even with the help of mirroring.

Narcissists often think of themselves as machines (the "automata metaphor"). They say things like "I have an amazing brain" or "I am not functioning today, my efficiency is low." They measure things, constantly compare performance. They are acutely aware of time and its use. There is a meter in the narcissist's head, it ticks and tocks, a metronome of self-reproach and grandiose, unattainable, fantasies.

The narcissist likes to think about himself in terms of automata because he finds them to be aesthetically compelling in their precision, in their impartiality, in their harmonious embodiment of the abstract. Machines are so powerful and so emotionless, not prone to be hurting weaklings.

The narcissist often talks to himself in third person singular. He feels that it lends objectivity to his thoughts, making them appear to be emanating from an external source. The narcissist's self-esteem is so low that, to be trusted, he has to disguise himself, to hide himself from himself. It is the narcissist's pernicious and all-pervasive art of un-being.

Thus, the narcissist carries within him his metal constitution, his robot countenance, his superhuman knowledge, his inner timekeeper, his theory of morality and his very own divinity – himself.

Sometimes the narcissist does gain self-awareness and knowledge of his predicament - typically in the wake of a life crisis (divorce, bankruptcy, incarceration, accident, serious illness, or the death of a loved one). But, in the absence of an emotional correlate, of feelings, such merely cognitive awakening is useless. It does not gel into an insight. The dry facts alone cannot bring about any transformation, let alone healing.

Narcissists often go through "soul searching". But they do so only in order to optimize their performance, to maximize the number of sources of narcissistic supply, and to better manipulate their environment. They regard introspection as an inevitable and intellectually enjoyable maintenance chore.

The introspection of the narcissist is emotionless, akin to an inventory of his "good" and "bad" sides and without any commitment to change. It does not enhance his ability to empathize, nor does it inhibit his propensity to exploit others and discard them when their usefulness is over. It does not tamper his overpowering and raging sense of entitlement, nor does it deflate his grandiose fantasies.

The narcissist's introspection is a futile and arid exercise at bookkeeping, a soulless bureaucracy of the psyche and, in its own way, even more chilling that the alternative: a narcissist blissfully unaware of his own disorder.

Also Read 

The Stripped Ego

The Split Off Ego

Narcissist, the Machine

The Dual Role of the False Self

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More FAQs

Excerpts from Archives of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

A Macedonian Encounter

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

Do you live in the United Kingdom?

Are you the victim of a narcissist or yourself  a narcissist?

Get interviewed for a TV documentary!

PLEASE RESPOND TO THIS EMAIL ADDRESS:

mailto:barnaby.peel@...

Please do not send your responses to me or to the list!

I'm very grateful to Sam Vaknin for forwarding these details to
you.  My name is Barnaby Peel.  I'm a documentary filmmaker based in
London.  We are hoping to produce a film about Narcissistic
Personality Disorder.  The aim is to produce a documentary that
provides an insight and understanding of what Narcissistic
Personality Disorder really is, from the point of view of people who
live with it.

I am interested in talking to two groups of people to help me with
my research and planning for the film:

- I would like to hear from colleagues, relatives, friends or
partners of a person who has been formally diagnosed with NPD.  I am
particularly keen to hear from people living in the UK.

- I would especially like to hear from individuals who have a formal
diagnosis of Narcissistic Personality Disorder themselves.  Maybe
you agree with the diagnosis.  Maybe you don't.  Either way it would
be very valuable to hear what you think.

Oxford Films is a respected production company with a strong
reputation for our serious factual filmmaking.  Even if you are not
sure you would like to be involved in the documentary, I would be
very interested to hear your views.  If you want to talk, in
confidence, please drop me an e-mail with details of how I can
contact you to

mailto:barnaby.peel@...

Many thanks.
Barnaby

July 12, 2005

"When you blame others, you give up your power to change."
           -- Douglas Noel Adams (b. 1952), British author

Today's Challenge:

    "If you're not learning while you're earning, you're cheating yourself
out of the better portion of your compensation." Who made this quote famous?
    View the choices and answer the challenge at
    http://www.quoteworld.org/ !

This letter constitutes a permission to reprint or mirror any and
all of the materials mentioned or linked to herein subject
to appropriate credit and linkback. Every article published MUST
include the  author bio, including the link to the author's Web site
(at the bottom of this message).

===============================================================
Why the Beatles Made More Money than Einstein

By Sam Vaknin
Author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"

Why did the Beatles generate more income in one year than Albert
Einstein did throughout his long career?

The reflexive answer is:

How many bands like the Beatles were there?

But, on second reflection, how many scientists like Einstein were
there?

Rarity or scarcity cannot, therefore, to explain the enormous
disparity in remuneration.

Then let's try this:

Music and football and films are more accessible to laymen than
physics. Very little effort is required in order to master the rules
of sports, for instance. Hence the mass appeal of entertainment -
and its disproportionate revenues. Mass appeal translates to media
exposure and the creation of marketable personal brands (think
Beckham, or Tiger Woods).

Yet, surely the Internet is as accessible as baseball. Why did none
of the scientists involved in its creation become a multi-
billionaire?

Because they are secretly hated by the multitudes.

People resent the elitism  and the arcane nature of modern science.
This pent-up resentment translates into anti-intellectualism,
Luddism, and ostentatious displays of proud ignorance. People prefer
the esoteric and pseudo-sciences to the real and daunting thing.

Consumers perceive entertainment and entertainers
as "good", "human", "like us". We feel that there is no reason, in
principle, why we can't become instant celebrities. Conversely,
there are numerous obstacles to becoming an Einstein.

Consequently, science has an austere, distant, inhuman, and
relentless image. The uncompromising pursuit of truth provokes
paranoia in the uninitiated. Science is invariably presented in pop
culture as evil, or, at the very least, dangerous (recall
genetically-modified foods, cloning, nuclear weapons, toxic waste,
and global warming).

Egghead intellectuals and scientists are treated as aliens. They are
not loved - they are feared. Underpaying them is one way of reducing
them to size and controlling their potentially pernicious or
subversive activities.

The penury of the intellect is guaranteed by the anti-capitalistic
ethos of science. Scientific knowledge and discoveries must be
instantly and selflessly shared with colleagues and the world at
large. The fruits of science belong to the community, not to the
scholar who labored to yield them. It is a self-interested corporate
sham, of course. Firms and universities own patents and benefit from
them financially - but these benefits rarely accrue to individual
researchers.

Additionally, modern technology has rendered intellectual property a
public good. Books, other texts, and scholarly papers are non-
rivalrous (can be consumed numerous time without diminishing or
altering) and non-exclusive. The concept of "original" or "one time
phenomenon" vanishes with reproducibility. After all, what is the
difference between the first copy of a treatise and the millionth
one?

Attempts to reverse these developments (for example, by extending
copyright laws or litigating against pirates) - usually come to
naught. Not only do scientists and intellectuals subsist on low
wages - they cannot even augment their income by selling books or
other forms of intellectual property.

Thus impoverished and lacking in future prospects, their numbers are
in steep decline. We are descending into a dark age of diminishing
innovation and pulp "culture". The media's attention is equally
divided between sports, politics, music, and films.

One is hard pressed to find even a mention of the sciences,
literature, or philosophy anywhere but on dedicated channels
and "supplements". Intellectually challenging programming is shunned
by both the print and the electronic media as a matter of policy.
Literacy has plummeted even in the industrial and rich West.

In the horror movie that our world had become, economic development
policy is decided by Bob Geldof, the US Presidency is entrusted to
the B-movies actor Ronald Reagan , our reading tastes are dictated
by Oprah, and California's future is steered by Arnold
Schwarzenegger.


==============================================================
AUTHOR BIO (must be included with the article)

Sam Vaknin ( http://samvak.tripod.com ) is the author of Malignant
Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West
Lost the East. He served as a columnist for Central Europe Review,
PopMatters, Bellaonline, and eBookWeb, a United Press International
(UPI) Senior Business Correspondent, and the editor of mental health
and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory and
Suite101.

Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com

Self Love and Narcissism

Frequently Asked Question # 23

Narcissism, Pathological Narcissism, The Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), the Narcissist,

and Relationships with Abusive Narcissists and Psychopaths

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Question:

What is the difference between self-love and narcissism and how does it affect the capacity to love others?

Answer:

There are two differences between healthy self-love and pathological narcissism: (a) in the ability to tell reality from fantasy, and (b) in the ability to empathise and, indeed, to fully and maturely love others. As we said, the narcissist does not love himself. It is because he has very little True Self to love. Instead, a monstrous, malignant construct – the False Self – encroaches upon his True Self and devours it.

The narcissist loves an image which he projects onto others who reflect it to the narcissist (the False Self). This process reassures the narcissist of both the objective existence of his False Self and of the boundaries of his Ego. It blurs all distinctions between reality and fantasy.

The False Self leads to false assumptions and to a contorted personal narrative, to a false worldview, and to a grandiose, inflated sense of being. The latter is rarely grounded in real achievements or merit. The narcissist's feeling of entitlement is all-pervasive, demanding and aggressive. It easily deteriorates into open verbal, psychological and physical abuse of others.

Maintaining a distinction between what we really are and what we dream of becoming, knowing our limits, our advantages and faults and having a sense of true, realistic accomplisments in our life are of paramount importance in the establishment and maintenance of our self-esteem, sense of self-worth and self-confidence.

Reliant as he is on outside judgement, the narcissist feels miserably inferior and dependent. He rebels against this degrading state of things by escaping into a world of make-belief, daydreaming, pretensions and delusions of grandeur. The narcissist knows little about himself and finds what he knows to be unacceptable.

Our experience of what it is like to be human – our very humanness – depends largely on our self-knowledge and on our experience of our selves. In other words: only through being himself and through experiencing his self – can a human being fully appreciate the humanness of others.

The narcissist has precious little experience of his self. Instead, he lives in an invented world, of his own design, where he is a fictitious figure in a grandiose script. He, therefore, possesses no tools to enable him to cope with other human beings, share their emotions, put himself in their place (empathise) and, of course, love them – the most demanding task of inter-relating.

The narcissist just does not know what it means to be human. He is a predator, rapaciously preying on others for the satisfaction of his narcissistic cravings and appetites for admiration, adoration, applause, affirmation and attention. Humans are Narcissistic Supply Sources and are (over- or de-) valued according to their contributions to this end.

Self-love is a precondition for the experience and expression of mature love. One cannot truly love someone else if one does not first love one's True Self. If we had never loved ourselves – we had never experienced unconditional love and, therefore, we do not know how to love.

If we keep living in a world of fantasy – how could we notice the very real people around us who ask for our love and who deserve it? The narcissist wants to love. In his rare moments of self-awareness, he feels ego-dystonic (unhappy with his situation and with his relationships with others). This is his predicament: he is sentenced to isolation precisely because his need of other people is so great.

Also Read

 The Dual Role of the False Self

The Stripped Ego

The Split Off Ego

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More FAQs

Excerpts from Archives of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

A Macedonian Encounter

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

Dear Members,

RESPOND TO THIS EMAIL ADDRESS - NOT TO ME!!!

September@...

A British television documentary maker is looking for people who are living
life with Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Whether it is you or your loved
ones, we want to hear first hand experiences of this condition. As a
relatively recently recognised disorder in the UK, we want to hear from
people living in Britain, their experiences of the health service, the
response of others and to find out how sufferers cope.

Please e-mail Zoë at September@... All e-mails will be
treated in confidence, this is the research and fact finding stage of the
documentary making process.

The dialogs are available here:

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/dialogues.html

http://www.narcissism101.com/

================================================
SIXTH EDITION From Barnes and Noble ($15 DISCOUNT)

http://barnesandnoble.bfast.com/booklink/click?ISBN=8023833847

Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited is now available from
Amazon Canada:

http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/tg/detail/offer-listing/-
/8023833847/new/

And from Amazon.com:

http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/ts/exchange-
glance/Y01Y4295422Y6845244/
===================================================

Please FORWARD this message to interested parties and relevant
discussion lists and groups

Phone and Email consultations with Sam Vaknin - write for details:

palma@...

Previous issues of this newsletter are available here:

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/narcissisticabuse

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/narcissisticabuse/messages

Abused? Stalked? Harassed? Victimized? Afraid? Confused? Need HELP?
Click on these links!

NEW, December 2004, EDITIONS of "Malignant Self Love - Narcisssm
Revisited"
And NEW, December 2004 EDITIONS of all our e-books JUST RELEASED!

Click on this link:

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html

NEW!!! Updated DAILY!!!

http://spaces.msn.com/members/narcissist/

http://www.suite101.com/welcome.cfm/being_kafka

==================================================
Tuesday, November 9, 2004, fifth letter to Sam

Dear Sam,

I am sorry if I sound accusatory in my letters. If I sound as if I
am blaming you personally as the penultimate or ultimate narcissist
and thus an easy target, please excuse me. (Rule no. 1 for victims:
never apologize to a narcissist, they take it as a sign of weakness,
unless you want something from them ;-) The majority of people who I
think are suffering from narcissist have never pardoned themselves
or asked for forgiveness. It is a fight to remain sane while in the
blender of a narcissist mad playhouse. Perhaps I owe narcissists a
debt for making me stronger and wiser. As Nietzsche said, "What does
not kill you makes you stronger."

As far as insisting on the dyad nature of narcissist, it takes two
to tango, and narcissist do not exist in a social vacuum. There are
two sides to the coin of a narcissist, the other side being the
victim. You speak eloquently of the narcissist, and seek attention
by doing so, but the victims suffer in silence. Until now. My site
is an attempt at filling those lacunae, and it is part of my self-
therapy, and it joins a wealth of other sites I have found that
speak for the victims.

Sam:

Just to put the record straight, of the 1019 pages on my narcissism
Web site, well over 400 are dedicated exclusively to the victims and
their plight. I also run large support groups for victims of
narcissists - on Yahoo Groups and Suite101. My work is based on
correspondence since 1996 with hundreds of people suffering from the
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (narcissists), and with thousands
of their family members, friends, therapists, and colleagues.

Stephen:

Why is that important? Why talk of the dyad and not just the
narcissist? Look at the memorials to the dead, to the tortured, to
the voiceless ones (I am being melodramatic here for effect) who
could not speak for themselves. The slaves will bear a lot of abuse,
but ever so often a 'Spartacus' or other hero throws off the yoke
and takes up the challenge. Why do we love going to see hero movies,
fighting the bad guys? narcissist bad guys versus the humble victim
good guy? So I will continue to hammer away at this theme, and not
glorify the narcissist. In my book a victim who is educated and
aware, is no longer a victim.

Sam:

What you are saying may have been true 5 or 6 years ago. It is no
longer the case. There are dozens of support groups for victims of
narcissists - and literally thousands of Web sites dedicated to the
victims' predicament. Victims definitely have a voice now. So much
so that narcissists banded together and formed their own support
groups to counterbalance the victims' lists!!! (laughing).

Stephen:

Yes the Stockholm syndrome is now recognized as a legitimate type of
defense/development between the aggressor and the victim. You can
check out the experiments that were carried out at Stanford at this
site to find out more about how people can be easily turned into
monsters and victims:

http://www.prisonexp.org/

In my last letter I described the narcissist as someone who invades
other people's personal "space". A more salient metaphor would be
the actions of a parasite or predator. The definition of a parasite
is:

1.A plant or animal that lives on or in another, usually larger,
host organism in a way that harms or is of no advantage to the host.

2.Somebody who lives off the generosity of others and does nothing
in return.

In other words a narcissist! In my last letter I also mentioned the
dyad that forms between the narcissist and the victim. It can also
be described as a co-dependency.

The two people involved develop a sort of self-supporting couple,
with one who is stronger. They do this because each has something
the other wants. In the case of a narcissist/victim dyad, the
narcissist is sucking out the admiration and support of the victim,
while the victim gets what? As a victim, from experience, I think
one can be raised by narcissists to feed them and other narcissists.
They tell you to never say anything aggressive, impolite nor
disturbing. In other words they blind you to your own pain and need
to be whole. They convince you, when young, that you are the person
at fault for all that happens to you.

Therefore the narcissist practices hypocrisy; where they can say
what they want, do what they want, while you are held to a higher
standard than they are. They shackle you with words and morality -
while they reserve the right to say whatever they want and to be
amoral. The victim has to turn a blind eye to this behavior, learns
how to, in order to survive the insanity that they are living in.

Only later do they realize the abuse they have put up with. In work
situations the narcissist sometimes has to toe the line, unless they
are high enough in the hierarchy or smart enough, to feel they are
untouchable.

Sam:

You raise the interesting subject of how narcissists make use of
language.

In the narcissist's surrealistic world, even language is
pathologized. It mutates into a weapon of self-defence, a verbal
fortification, a medium without a message, replacing words with
duplicitous and ambiguous vocables.

Narcissists (and, often, by contagion, their unfortunate victims)
don't talk, or communicate. They fend off. They hide and evade and
avoid and disguise. In their planet of capricious and arbitrary
unpredictability, of shifting semiotic and semantic dunes - they
perfect the ability to say nothing in lengthy, Castro-like speeches.

The ensuing convoluted sentences are arabesques of meaninglessness,
acrobatics of evasion, lack of commitment elevated to an ideology.
The narcissist prefers to wait and see what waiting brings. It is
the postponement of the inevitable that leads to the inevitability
of postponement as a strategy of survival.

It is often impossible to really understand a narcissist. The
evasive syntax fast deteriorates into ever more labyrinthine
structures. The grammar tortured to produce the verbal Doppler
shifts essential to disguise the source of the information, its
distance from reality, the speed of its degeneration into
rigid "official" versions.

Buried under the lush flora and fauna of idioms without an end, the
language erupts, like some exotic rash, an autoimmune reaction to
its infection and contamination. Like vile weeds it spread
throughout, strangling with absent minded persistence the ability to
understand, to feel, to agree, to disagree and to debate, to present
arguments, to compare notes, to learn and to teach.

Narcissists, therefore, never talk to others - rather, they talk at
others, or lecture them. They exchange subtexts, camouflage-wrapped
by elaborate, florid, texts. They read between the lines, spawning a
multitude of private languages, prejudices, superstitions,
conspiracy theories, rumors, phobias and hysterias. Theirs is a
solipsistic world - where communication is permitted only with
oneself and the aim of language is to throw others off the scent or
to obtain Narcissistic Supply.

This has profound implications. Communication through unequivocal,
unambiguous, information-rich symbol systems is such an integral and
crucial part of our world - that its absence is not postulated even
in the remotest galaxies which grace the skies of science fiction.
In this sense, narcissists are nothing short of aliens. It is not
that they employ a different language, a code to be deciphered by a
new Freud. It is also not the outcome of upbringing or socio-
cultural background.

It is the fact that language is put by narcissists to a different
use - not to communicate but to obscure, not to share but to
abstain, not to learn but to defend and resist, not to teach but to
preserve ever less tenable monopolies, to disagree without incurring
wrath, to criticize without commitment, to agree without appearing
to do so. Thus, an "agreement" with a narcissist is a vague
expression of intent at a given moment - rather than the clear
listing of long term, iron-cast and mutual commitments.

The rules that govern the narcissist's universe are loopholed
incomprehensibles, open to an exegesis so wide and so self-
contradictory that it renders them meaningless. The narcissist
often hangs himself by his own verbose Gordic knots, having stumbled
through a minefield of logical fallacies and endured self inflicted
inconsistencies. Unfinished sentences hover in the air, like vapor
above a semantic swamp.

In the case of the inverted narcissist, who was suppressed and
abused by overbearing caregivers, there is the strong urge not to
offend. Intimacy and inter-dependence are great. Parental or peer
pressures are irresistible and result in conformity and self-
deprecation. Aggressive tendencies, strongly repressed in the social
pressure cooker, teem under the veneer of forced civility and
violent politeness. Constructive ambiguity, a non-
committal "everyone is good and right", an atavistic variant of
moral relativism and tolerance bred of fear and of contempt - are
all at the service of this eternal vigilance against aggressive
drives, at the disposal of a never ending peacekeeping mission.

With the classic narcissist, language is used cruelly and ruthlessly
to ensnare one's enemies, to saw confusion and panic, to move others
to emulate the narcissist ("projective identification"), to leave
the listeners in doubt, in hesitation, in paralysis, to gain
control, or to punish. Language is enslaved and forced to lie. The
language is appropriated and expropriated. It is considered to be a
weapon, an asset, a piece of lethal property, a traitorous mistress
to be gang raped into submission.

With cerebral narcissists, language is a lover. The infatuation with
its very sound leads to a pyrotechnic type of speech which
sacrifices its meaning to its music. Its speakers pay more attention
to the composition than to the content. They are swept by it,
intoxicated by its perfection, inebriated by the spiraling
complexity of its forms. Here, language is an inflammatory process.
It attacks the very tissues of the narcissist's relationships with
artistic fierceness. It invades the healthy cells of reason and
logic, of cool headed argumentation and level headed debate.

Language is a leading indicator of the psychological and
institutional health of social units, such as the family, or the
workplace. Social capital can often be measured in cognitive (hence,
verbal-lingual) terms. To monitor the level of comprehensibility and
lucidity of texts is to study the degree of sanity of family
members, co-workers, friends, spouses, mates, and colleagues. There
can exist no hale society without unambiguous speech, without clear
communications, without the traffic of idioms and content that is an
inseparable part of every social contract. Our language determines
how we perceive our world. It IS our mind and our consciousness. The
narcissist, in this respect, is a great social menace.

Stephen:

The second way a narcissist operates, in the short term, is in the
predator mode. A predator is defined as:

1.A carnivorous animal that hunts, kills, and eats other animals in
order to survive, or any other organism that behaves in a similar
manner.

2.A person, group, company, or state that steals from others or
destroys others for gain.

3.Somebody who is extremely aggressive, determined, or persistent
(disapproving).

In the context of evolution, the narcissist predator will meet some
approval and success. In companies there is talk of crushing the
competition, and the market is considered a jungle where they have
to get to a customer before the competition does. On an individual
basis, the somatic and intellectual narcissist has the same idea,
find and latch onto narcissistic supply. They are constantly looking
for victims; in fact narcissists rarely keep friends for long,
because once they drain them dry of narcissistic supply, they look
for new victims. Of course this contradicts the former definition of
the parasitic narcissist. And it should, because I am talking of two
different modes of operation. In the firs mode I have described the
invading narcissist and in the second case, the hit and run
narcissist tactics of obtaining supply from victims. "I don't know
what hit me" exclaims the victim of a predator narcissist after
waking up alone after sleeping with one, describing the man or woman
who came onto them the night before at the bar, who seduced them and
slept with them and left them. Only afterwards when you get the test
back for STD do you realize what a mistake you have made. That is
long lasting pain, especially if you have a case of HIV from that
one night of passion.

In lesser degrees, the predator narcissist will give you pain, from
just a mild irritation of pinching your bottom to the boardroom back
stabber.

Now (you know what is coming Sam) I also believe that narcissist
can 'screw' other narcissists. In other words, in short or long term
relationships, two or more can band together. A case in point are
cliques. They are part of normal development and of our society, but
when the ringleader is a narcissist, watch out for a lot of pain
being inflicted on others. The case for two narcissist dyad is this;
a weaker narcissist will follow around the big narcissist to get the
morsels of supply that fall from his or his mouth. Think of the
pilot fish that follow around the shark! The smaller narcissist rubs
the big narcissist's ego, and also benefit from their reflected
glory.

Think of the handlers of the big stars and of their hanger on's. I
call such people "anal appendages" and you find them in work
situations, they are the brown nosers and office gossips. Not the
boss, but the boss narcissist's best buddies. A narcissist may need
a hatchet man or woman, so they find a smaller narcissist who they
use to do the dirty work (this person is not always a narcissist,
just gullible because they believe they are doing the right thing.)
By the way, if the hatchet man or women quits the position they will
get dumped on as well; a narcissist never forgets a slight and
rarely rewards others efforts.

So now that I have elucidated some of my previous comments, I hope,
now the DSM IV has listed the characteristics of a narcissist and I
think I can hang on the pain that each behavior elicits in victims.

The DSM IV diagnostic sets out the characteristics of Narcissistic
Personality Disorder and I will try to show how each one causes a
corresponding pain in the victim. Here are examples for each.

(1) Has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates
achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior
without commensurate achievements)

The reverse of this characteristics is the submerging of healthy
discussion, of more intelligent comments, and finally of common
sense. The man on the soapbox has his opinion, but when it drowns
out all others, then it becomes a diatribe. Narcissists are in
essence non-democratic because they do not care or do they need
other's opinions. They are the center of the world, and like all
dictators, they dictate. They make horrible team players, and
mediocre bosses only interested in advancing themselves.

Pain:

The self-important need excessive admiration. In a professional
capacity, if someone tells everyone he or she is capable of doing
something but is incapable of doing it, this may lead to dangerous
situations. The classic scene in the movie, Gone with the Wind,
where the maid tells Scarlet O'Hara that she knows all about
birthing babies, leads to the next scene where the maid is crying
that she knows nothing about birthing babies as the baby is born,
illustrates this point. If you get on board a private airplane and
the pilot takes off, saying he is qualified, then when night falls
and the weather turns bad, this pilot admits to being qualified at
instrument flying and soon plunges the airplane into the ocean
killing all aboard. The narcissist is always exaggerating their
abilities and knowledge. They are amusing at times, because people
enjoy hearing stories like this. The Baron Munchausen's was a well-
known figure of ancient times who told tall tales. He has received
the dubious honor of having a disease named after him. Munchausen's
syndrome is diagnosed in a parent or guardian of a child, or
children, who deliberately makes the child sick by administering
poison or other toxins, so to get the sympathy and admiration of the
emergency and hospital staff. Many children die. Now are people
suffering from Munchausen's syndrome also narcissists? I am not
qualified to say, but there are parallel behaviors; attention
seeking, lying, use and abuse of innocent victims.

(2) Is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power,
brilliance, beauty, or ideal love

Now it is your turn Sam, what can you see as the inverted side of
this characteristic? How does this narcissist characteristic cause
pain? You can also add the positive things that result from this as
well; great romantic novels, artwork, and love stories etc art.

Sam:

We discussed the narcissist's fantasies - and what is does to his
victims - in the third dialog. But I take this opportunity to
expound on the terminology and sharpen some of the observations I
made there.

As I repeatedly say, it is healthy to daydream and fantasise. It is
the antechamber of life and often anticipates its circumstances. It
is a process of preparing for eventualities. But healthy daydreaming
is different from grandiosity.

Grandiosity has four components.

Omnipotence

The narcissist believes in his omnipotence. "Believe" in this
context is a weak word. He knows. It is a cellular certainty, almost
biological, it flows in his blood and permeates every niche of his
being. The narcissist "knows" that he can do anything he chooses to
do and excel in it. What the narcissist does, what he excels at,
what he achieves, depends only on his volition. To his mind, there
is no other determinant.

Hence his rage when confronted with disagreement or opposition – not
only because of the audacity of his, evidently inferior,
adversaries. But because it threatens his world view, it endangers
his feeling of omnipotence. The narcissist is often fatuously
daring, adventurous, experimentative and curious precisely due to
this hidden assumption of "can-do". He is genuinely surprised and
devastated when he fails, when the "universe" does not arrange
itself, magically, to accommodate his unbounded fantasies, when it
(and people in it) does not comply with his whims and wishes.

He often denies away such discrepancies, deletes them from his
memory. As a result, he remembers his life as a patchy quilt of
unrelated events and people.

Omniscience

The narcissist often pretends to know everything, in every field of
human knowledge and endeavour. He lies and prevaricates to avoid the
exposure of his ignorance. He resorts to numerous subterfuges to
support his God-like omniscience.

Where his knowledge fails him – he feigns authority, fakes
superiority, quotes from non-existent sources, embeds threads of
truth in a canvass of falsehoods. He transforms himself into an
artist of intellectual prestidigitation. As he gets older, this
invidious quality may recede, or, rather, metamorphose. He may now
claim more confined expertise.

He may no longer be ashamed to admit his ignorance and his need to
learn things outside the fields of his real or self-proclaimed
expertise. But this "improvement" is merely optical. Within
his "territory", the narcissist is still as fiercely defensive and
possessive as ever.

Many narcissists are avowed autodidacts, unwilling to subject their
knowledge and insights to peer scrutiny, or, for that matter, to any
scrutiny. The narcissist keeps re-inventing himself, adding new
fields of knowledge as he goes. This creeping intellectual
annexation is a round about way of reverting to his erstwhile image
as the erudite "Renaissance man".

(continued below)

==================================================

Abused? Stalked? Harassed? Victimized? Afraid? Confused? Need HELP?

"The Narcissism Series" - (December 2004)

Six e-books regarding Pathological Narcissism, relationships with
abusive narcissists, and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_SERIES

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html

Weekly Case Studies

Case Studies in the Narcissistic Personality Disorder List

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/drvakninsweekly
casestudies.msnw

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/drvakninsweekly
casestudies2.msnw

Ask Sam on the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Support Group

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=15404

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=45353

http://groups.msn.com/NARCISSISTICPERSONALITYDISORDER/general.msnw?
action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=132787

======================================================

Omnipresence

Even the narcissist cannot pretend to actually be everywhere at once
in the PHYSICAL sense. Instead, he feels that he is the centre and
the axis of his "universe", that all things and happenstances
revolve around him and that cosmic disintegration would ensue if he
were to disappear or to lose interest in someone or in something.

He is convinced, for instance, that he is the main, if not the only,
topic of discussion in his absence. He is often surprised and
offended to learn that he was not even mentioned. When invited to a
meeting with many participants, he assumes the position of the sage,
the guru, or the teacher/guide whose words carry a special weight.
His creations (books, articles, works of art) are extensions of his
presence and, in this restricted sense, he does seem to exist
everywhere. In other words, he "stamps" his environment. He "leaves
his mark" upon it. He "stigmatises" it.

Narcissist the Omnivore (Perfectionism and Completeness)

There is another "omni" component in grandiosity. The narcissist is
an omnivore. He devours and digests experiences and people, sights
and smells, bodies and words, books and films, sounds and
achievements, his work and his leisure, his pleasure and his
possessions. The narcissist is incapable of ENJOYING anything
because he is in constant pursuit of perfection and completeness.

Classic narcissists interact with the world as predators do with
their prey. They want to own it all, be everywhere, experience
everything. They cannot delay gratification. They do not take "no"
for an answer. And they settle for nothing less than the ideal, the
sublime, the perfect, the all-inclusive, the all-encompassing, the
engulfing, the all-pervasive, the most beautiful, the cleverest, the
richest, and the most brilliant.

The narcissist is shattered when he discovers that a collection he
possesses is incomplete, that his colleague's wife is more
glamorous, that his son is better than he is in math, that his
neighbour has a new, flashy car, that his roommate got promoted,
that the "love of his life" signed a recording contract. It is not
plain old jealousy, not even pathological envy (though it is
definitely a part of the psychological make-up of the narcissist).
It is the discovery that the narcissist is NOT perfect, or ideal, or
complete that does him in.

Ask anyone who shared a life with a narcissist, or knew one and they
are likely to sigh: "What a waste". Waste of potential, waste of
opportunities, waste of emotions, a wasteland of arid addiction and
futile pursuit.

Narcissists are as gifted as they come. The problem is to
disentangle their tales of fantastic grandiosity from the reality of
their talents and skills. They always either over-estimate or
devalue their potency. They often emphasise the wrong traits and
invest in their mediocre or less than average capacities at the
expense of their true and promising potential. Thus, they squander
their advantages and under-rate their natural gifts.

The narcissist decides which aspects of his self to nurture and
which to neglect. He gravitates towards activities commensurate with
his pompous auto-portrait. He suppresses these tendencies and
aptitudes in him which don't conform to his inflated view of his
uniqueness, brilliance, might, sexual prowess, or standing in
society. He cultivates these flairs and predilections which he
regards as befitting his overweening self-image and ultimate
grandeur.

But, the narcissist, no matter how self-aware and well-meaning, is
accursed. His grandiosity, his fantasies, the compelling, overriding
urge to feel unique, invested with some cosmic significance,
unprecedentedly bestowed – these thwart his best intentions. These
structures of obsession and compulsion, these deposits of insecurity
and pain, the stalactites and stalagmites of years of abuse and then
abandonment – they all conspire to frustrate the gratification,
however circumspect, of the narcissist's true nature.

An utter lack of self-awareness is typical of the narcissist. He is
intimate only with his False Self, constructed meticulously from
years of lying and deceit. The narcissist's True Self is stashed,
dilapidated and dysfunctional, in the furthest recesses of his mind.
The False Self is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, creative,
ingenious, irresistible, and glowing. The narcissist often isn't.

Add combustible paranoia to the narcissist's divorce from himself –
and his constant and recurrent failure to assess reality fairly is
more understandable. The narcissist overpowering sense of
entitlement is rarely commensurate with his accomplishments in his
real life or with his traits. When the world fails to comply with
his demands and to support his grandiose fantasies, the narcissist
suspects a plot against him by his inferiors.

The narcissist rarely admits to a weakness, ignorance, or
deficiency. He filters out information to the contrary – a cognitive
impairment with serious consequences. Narcissistic are likely to
unflinchingly make inflated and inane claims about their sexual
prowess, wealth, connections, history, or achievements.

All this is mighty embarrassing to the narcissist's nearest,
dearest, colleagues, friends, neighbours, or even mere on-lookers.
The narcissist's tales are so patently absurd that he often catches
people off-guard. Behind his back, the narcissist is derided and
mockingly imitated. He fast makes a nuisance and an imposition of
himself in every company.

But the narcissist's failure of the reality test can have more
serious and irreversible consequences. Narcissists, unqualified to
make life-and-death decisions often insist on rendering them.
Narcissists pretend to be economists, engineers, or medical doctors –
  when they are not. But they are not con-artists in the classic,
premeditated sense. They firmly believe that, though self-taught at
best, they are more qualified than even the properly accredited
sort. Narcissists believe in magic and in fantasy. They are no
longer with us.

Let's consider one situation - the narcissist in the workplace - to
illustrate how the confluence of unbridled grandiosity, inane
fantasies, and incessant confabulation leads to pain and destruction.

Consider the perpetrators of the recent spate of financial frauds in
the USA.

They acted with callous disregard for both their employees and
shareholders - not to mention other stakeholders. Psychologists have
often remote-diagnosed them as "malignant, pathological narcissists".

Narcissists are driven by the need to uphold and maintain a false
self - a concocted, grandiose, and demanding psychological construct
typical of the narcissistic personality disorder. The false self is
projected to the world in order to garner "narcissistic supply" -
adulation, admiration, or even notoriety and infamy. Any kind of
attention is usually deemed by narcissists to be preferable to
obscurity.

The false self is suffused with fantasies of perfection, grandeur,
brilliance, infallibility, immunity, significance, omnipotence,
omnipresence, and omniscience. To be a narcissist is to be convinced
of a great, inevitable personal destiny. The narcissist is
preoccupied with ideal love, the construction of brilliant,
revolutionary scientific theories, the composition or authoring or
painting of the greatest work of art, the founding of a new school
of thought, the attainment of fabulous wealth, the reshaping of a
nation or a conglomerate, and so on. The narcissist never sets
realistic goals to himself. He is forever preoccupied with fantasies
of uniqueness, record breaking, or breathtaking achievements. His
verbosity reflects this propensity.

Reality is, naturally, quite different and this gives rise to
a "grandiosity gap". The demands of the false self are never
satisfied by the narcissist's accomplishments, standing, wealth,
clout, sexual prowess, or knowledge. The narcissist's grandiosity
and sense of entitlement are equally incommensurate with his
achievements.

To bridge the grandiosity gap, the malignant (pathological)
narcissist resorts to shortcuts. These very often lead to fraud.

The narcissist cares only about appearances. What matters to him are
the facade of wealth and its attendant social status and
narcissistic supply. Witness the travestied extravagance of Tyco's
Denis Kozlowski. Media attention only exacerbates the narcissist's
addiction and makes it incumbent on him to go to ever-wilder
extremes to secure uninterrupted supply from this source.

The narcissist lacks empathy - the ability to put himself in other
people's shoes. He does not recognize boundaries - personal,
corporate, or legal. Everything and everyone are to him mere
instruments, extensions, objects unconditionally and uncomplainingly
available in his pursuit of narcissistic gratification.

This makes the narcissist perniciously exploitative. He uses,
abuses, devalues, and discards even his nearest and dearest in the
most chilling manner. The narcissist is utility- driven, obsessed
with his overwhelming need to reduce his anxiety and regulate his
labile sense of self-worth by securing a constant supply of his
drug - attention. American executives acted without compunction when
they raided their employees' pension funds - as did Robert Maxwell a
generation earlier in Britain.

The narcissist is convinced of his superiority - cerebral or
physical. To his mind, he is a Gulliver hamstrung by a horde of
narrow-minded and envious Lilliputians. The dotcom "new economy" was
infested with "visionaries" with a contemptuous attitude towards the
mundane: profits, business cycles, conservative economists, doubtful
journalists, and cautious analysts.

Yet, deep inside, the narcissist is painfully aware of his addiction
to others - their attention, admiration, applause, and affirmation.
He despises himself for being thus dependent. He hates people the
same way a drug addict hates his pusher. He wishes to "put them in
their place", humiliate them, demonstrate to them how inadequate and
imperfect they are in comparison to his regal self and how little he
craves or needs them.

The narcissist regards himself as one would an expensive present, a
gift to his company, to his family, to his neighbours, to his
colleagues, to his country. This firm conviction of his inflated
importance makes him feel entitled to special treatment, special
favors, special outcomes, concessions, subservience, immediate
gratification, obsequiousness, and lenience. It also makes him feel
immune to mortal laws and somehow divinely protected and insulated
from the inevitable consequences of his deeds and misdeeds.

The self-destructive narcissist plays the role of the "bad guy"
(or "bad girl"). But even this is within the traditional social
roles cartoonishly exaggerated by the narcissist to attract
attention. Men are likely to emphasise intellect, power, aggression,
money, or social status. Narcissistic women are likely to emphasise
body, looks, charm, sexuality, feminine "traits", homemaking,
children and childrearing.

Punishing the wayward narcissist is a veritable catch-22.

A jail term is useless as a deterrent if it only serves to focus
attention on the narcissist. Being infamous is second best to being
famous - and far preferable to being ignored. The only way to
effectively punish a narcissist is to withhold narcissistic supply
from him and thus to prevent him from becoming a notorious celebrity.

Given a sufficient amount of media exposure, book contracts, talk
shows, lectures, and public attention - the narcissist may even
consider the whole grisly affair to be emotionally rewarding. To the
narcissist, freedom, wealth, social status, family, vocation - are
all means to an end. And the end is attention. If he can secure
attention by being the big bad wolf - the narcissist unhesitatingly
transforms himself into one. Lord Archer, for instance, seems to be
positively basking in the media circus provoked by his prison
diaries.

The narcissist does not victimise, plunder, terrorise and abuse
others in a cold, calculating manner. He does so offhandedly, as a
manifestation of his genuine character. To be truly "guilty" one
needs to intend, to deliberate, to contemplate one's choices and
then to choose one's acts. The narcissist does none of these.

Thus, punishment breeds in him surprise, hurt and seething anger.
The narcissist is stunned by society's insistence that he should be
held accountable for his deeds and penalized accordingly. He feels
wronged, baffled, injured, the victim of bias, discrimination and
injustice. He rebels and rages.

Depending upon the pervasiveness of his magical thinking, the
narcissist may feel besieged by overwhelming powers, forces cosmic
and intrinsically ominous. He may develop compulsive rites to fend
off this "bad", unwarranted, persecutory influences.

The narcissist, very much the infantile outcome of stunted personal
development, engages in magical thinking. He feels omnipotent, that
there is nothing he couldn't do or achieve if only he sets his mind
to it. He feels omniscient - he rarely admits to ignorance and
regards his intuitions and intellect as founts of objective data.

Thus, narcissists are haughtily convinced that introspection is a
more important and more efficient (not to mention easier to
accomplish) method of obtaining knowledge than the systematic study
of outside sources of information in accordance with strict and
tedious curricula. Narcissists are "inspired" and they despise
hamstrung technocrats.

To some extent, they feel omnipresent because they are either famous
or about to become famous or because their product is selling or is
being manufactured globally. Deeply immersed in their delusions of
grandeur, they firmly believe that their acts have - or will have -
a great influence not only on their firm, but on their country, or
even on Mankind. Having mastered the manipulation of their human
environment - they are convinced that they will always "get away
with it". They develop hubris and a false sense of immunity.

Narcissistic immunity is the (erroneous) feeling, harboured by the
narcissist, that he is impervious to the consequences of his
actions, that he will never be effected by the results of his own
decisions, opinions, beliefs, deeds and misdeeds, acts, inaction, or
membership of certain groups, that he is above reproach and
punishment, that, magically, he is protected and will miraculously
be saved at the last moment. Hence the audacity, simplicity, and
transparency of some of the fraud and corporate looting in the
1990's. Narcissists rarely bother to cover their traces, so great is
their disdain and conviction that they are above mortal laws and
wherewithal.

What are the sources of this unrealistic appraisal of situations and
events?

The false self is a childish response to abuse and trauma. Abuse is
not limited to sexual molestation or beatings. Smothering, doting,
pampering, over-indulgence, treating the child as an extension of
the parent, not respecting the child's boundaries, and burdening the
child with excessive expectations are also forms of abuse.

The child reacts by constructing false self that is possessed of
everything it needs in order to prevail: unlimited and
instantaneously available Harry Potter-like powers and wisdom. The
false self, this Superman, is indifferent to abuse and punishment.
This way, the child's true self is shielded from the toddler's harsh
reality.

This artificial, maladaptive separation between a vulnerable (but
not punishable) true self and a punishable (but invulnerable) false
self is an effective mechanism. It isolates the child from the
unjust, capricious, emotionally dangerous world that he occupies.
But, at the same time, it fosters in him a false sense of "nothing
can happen to me, because I am not here, I am not available to be
punished, hence I am immune to punishment".

The comfort of false immunity is also yielded by the narcissist's
sense of entitlement. In his grandiose delusions, the narcissist is
sui generis, a gift to humanity, a precious, fragile, object.
Moreover, the narcissist is convinced both that this uniqueness is
immediately discernible - and that it gives him special rights. The
narcissist feels that he is protected by some cosmological law
pertaining to "endangered species".

He is convinced that his future contribution to others - his firm,
his country, humanity - should and does exempt him from the mundane:
daily chores, boring jobs, recurrent tasks, personal exertion,
orderly investment of resources and efforts, laws and regulations,
social conventions, and so on.

The narcissist is entitled to a "special treatment": high living
standards, constant and immediate catering to his needs, the
eradication of any friction with the humdrum and the routine, an all-
engulfing absolution of his sins, fast track privileges (to higher
education, or in his encounters with bureaucracies, for instance).
Punishment, trusts the narcissist, is for ordinary people, where no
great loss to humanity is involved.

Narcissists are possessed of inordinate abilities to charm, to
convince, to seduce, and to persuade. Many of them are gifted
orators and intellectually endowed. Many of them work in in
politics, the media, fashion, show business, the arts, medicine, or
business, and serve as religious leaders.

By virtue of their standing in the community, their charisma, or
their ability to find the willing scapegoats, they do get exempted
many times. Having recurrently "got away with it" - they develop a
theory of personal immunity, founded upon some kind of societal and
even cosmic "order" in which certain people are above punishment.

But there is a fourth, simpler, explanation. The narcissist lacks
self-awareness. Divorced from his true self, unable to empathise (to
understand what it is like to be someone else), unwilling to
constrain his actions to cater to the feelings and needs of others -
the narcissist is in a constant dreamlike state.

To the narcissist, his life is unreal, like watching an autonomously
unfolding movie. The narcissist is a mere spectator, mildly
interested, greatly entertained at times. He does not "own" his
actions. He, therefore, cannot understand why he should be punished
and when he is, he feels grossly wronged.

So convinced is the narcissist that he is destined to great things -
that he refuses to accept setbacks, failures and punishments. He
regards them as temporary, as the outcomes of someone else's errors,
as part of the future mythology of his rise to
power/brilliance/wealth/ideal love, etc. Being punished is a
diversion of his precious energy and resources from the all-
important task of fulfilling his mission in life.

The narcissist is pathologically envious of people and believes that
they are equally envious of him. He is paranoid, on guard, ready to
fend off an imminent attack. A punishment to the narcissist is a
major surprise and a nuisance but it also validates his suspicion
that he is being persecuted. It proves to him that strong forces are
arrayed against him.

He tells himself that people, envious of his achievements and
humiliated by them, are out to get him. He constitutes a threat to
the accepted order. When required to pay for his misdeeds, the
narcissist is always disdainful and bitter and feels misunderstood
by his inferiors.

Cooked books, corporate fraud, bending the (GAAP or other) rules,
sweeping problems under the carpet, over-promising, making grandiose
claims (the "vision thing") - are hallmarks of a narcissist in
action. When social cues and norms encourage such behavior rather
than inhibit it - in other words, when such behavior elicits
abundant narcissistic supply - the pattern is reinforced and become
entrenched and rigid. Even when circumstances change, the narcissist
finds it difficult to adapt, shed his routines, and replace them
with new ones. He is trapped in his past success. He becomes a
swindler.

Let me now ask you a question:

Do you feel that narcissism has cultural and social components and
determinants - or is it the narcissist's way or shifting
responsibility to others, of exercising his alloplastic defenses
(narcissist: I am not to blame - it is the way I was brought up in
this narcissistic culture)?

My view is that pathological narcissism is not an isolated
phenomenon. It is embedded in our contemporary culture. The West's
is a narcissistic civilization. It upholds narcissistic values and
penalizes alternative value-systems. From an early age, children are
taught to avoid self-criticism, to deceive themselves regarding
their capacities and attainments, to feel entitled, and to exploit
others.

As Lillian Katz observed in her important paper, "Distinctions
between Self-Esteem and Narcissism: Implications for Practice",
published by the Educational Resources Information Center, the line
between enhancing self-esteem and fostering narcissism is often
blurred by educators and parents.

Both Christopher Lasch in "The Culture of Narcissism" and Theodore
Millon in his books about personality disorders, singled out
American society as narcissistic. Litigiousness may be the flip side
of an inane sense of entitlement. Consumerism is built on this
common and communal lie of "I can do anything I want and possess
everything I desire if I only apply myself to it" and on the
pathological envy it fosters.

Not surprisingly, narcissistic disorders are more common among men
than among women. This may be because narcissism conforms to
masculine social mores and to the prevailing ethos of capitalism.
Ambition, achievements, hierarchy, ruthlessness, drive - are both
social values and narcissistic male traits. Social thinkers like the
aforementioned Lasch speculated that modern American culture - a
self-centred one - increases the rate of incidence of the
narcissistic personality disorder.

Otto Kernberg, a notable scholar of personality disorders, confirmed
Lasch's intuition: "Society can make serious psychological
abnormalities, which already exist in some percentage of the
population, seem to be at least superficially appropriate."

In their book "Personality Disorders in Modern Life", Theodore
Millon and Roger Davis state, as a matter of fact, that pathological
narcissism was once the preserve of "the royal and the wealthy" and
that it "seems to have gained prominence only in the late twentieth
century". Narcissism, according to them, may be associated
with "higher levels of Maslow's hierarchy of needs ... Individuals
in less advantaged nations .. are too busy trying (to survive) ...
to be arrogant and grandiose".

They - like Lasch before them - attribute pathological narcissism
to "a society that stresses individualism and self-gratification at
the expense of community, namely the United States." They assert
that the disorder is more prevalent among certain professions
with "star power" or respect. "In an individualistic culture, the
narcissist is 'God's gift to the world'. In a collectivist society,
the narcissist is 'God's gift to the collective."

Millon quotes Warren and Caponi's "The Role of Culture in the
Development of Narcissistic Personality Disorders in America, Japan
and Denmark":

"Individualistic narcissistic structures of self-regard (in
individualistic societies) ... are rather self-contained and
independent ... (In collectivist cultures) narcissistic
configurations of the we-self ... denote self-esteem derived from
strong identification with the reputation and honor of the family,
groups, and others in hierarchical relationships."

Still, there are malignant narcissists among subsistence farmers in
Africa, nomads in the Sinai desert, day laborers in east Europe, and
intellectuals and socialites in Manhattan. Malignant narcissism is
all-pervasive and independent of culture and society. It is true,
though, that the way pathological narcissism manifests and is
experienced is dependent on the particulars of societies and
cultures.

In some cultures, it is encouraged, in others suppressed. In some
societies it is channeled against minorities - in others it is
tainted with paranoia. In collectivist societies, it may be
projected onto the collective, in individualistic societies, it is
an individual's trait.

Yet, can families, organizations, ethnic groups, churches, and even
whole nations be safely described as "narcissistic"
or "pathologically self-absorbed"? Can we talk about a "corporate
culture of narcissism"?

Human collectives - states, firms, households, institutions,
political parties, cliques, bands - acquire a life and a character
all their own. The longer the association or affiliation of the
members, the more cohesive and conformist the inner dynamics of the
group, the more persecutory or numerous its enemies, competitors, or
adversaries, the more intensive the physical and emotional
experiences of the individuals it is comprised of, the stronger the
bonds of locale, language, and history - the more rigorous might an
assertion of a common pathology be.

Such an all-pervasive and extensive pathology manifests itself in
the behavior of each and every member. It is a defining - though
often implicit or underlying - mental structure. It has explanatory
and predictive powers. It is recurrent and invariable - a pattern of
conduct melding distorted cognition and stunted emotions. And it is
often vehemently denied.

So, what says you, oh, modern-day Spartacus? (laughing)

=======================================================
AUTHOR BIO:

Sam Vaknin is the author of Malignant Self Love - Narcissism
Revisited and After the Rain - How the West Lost the East. He served
as a columnist for Central Europe Review, PopMatters, Bellaonline,
and eBookWeb, a United Press International (UPI) Senior Business
Correspondent, and the editor of mental health and Central East
Europe categories in The Open Directory and Suite101.

Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com

============================================================
Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited is now available from
Amazon Canada:

http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/tg/detail/offer-listing/-
/8023833847/new/

And from Amazon.com:

http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/ts/exchange-
glance/Y01Y4295422Y6845244/

=============================================================

Links of Interest

Open Site Personality Disorder

http://open-
site.org/Health/Conditions_and_Diseases/Psychiatric_Disorders/Persona
lity/

People Pleasers

http://guiltedgirls.tripod.com/

PlanetPsych Personality Disorders

http://www.planetpsych.com/zPsychology_101/Disorders/personality_diso
rders.htm

==============================================================

Refer journalists and editors to my media kit:

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/mediakit.html

BUY the NEW EDITION of my book - "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism
Revisited" ($12 DISCOUNT)

http://barnesandnoble.bfast.com/booklink/click?ISBN=8023833847

Other books about abusive relationships and how to cope with abusers

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html

==============================

Abused? Stalked? Harassed? Victimized? Afraid? Confused? Need HELP?

Click on these links to purchase the PRINT BOOK and SIX E-BOOKS:

I. NEW EDITION! "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"
(December 2004)

PRINT EDITION

SIXTH EDITION From Barnes and Noble ($15 DISCOUNT)

http://barnesandnoble.bfast.com/booklink/click?ISBN=8023833847

From the Publisher (FIFTH edition + Exclusive BONUS PACK)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_MSL

New Editions of ALL ELECTRONIC BOOKS!!!

I. "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" (December 2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_MSL-EBOOK

II. NEW!!! "Toxic Relationships - Abuse and its Aftermath" (December
2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_ABUSE

III. "Pathological Narcissism FAQs" (December 2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_FAQS

IV. "The World of the Narcissist" (December 2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_ESSAY

V. "Excerpts from the Archives of the Narcissism List" (May 2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_EXCERPTS

VI. "Diary of a Narcissist" (October 2004)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_JOURNAL

VII. "The Narcissism Series" - (December 2004)

Six e-books regarding Pathological Narcissism, relationships with
abusive narcissists, and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_SERIES

Malignant Self Love, Toxic Relationships - and MORE!!!

http://www.suite101.com/bulletin.cfm/6514/10182

http://malignantselflove.tripod.com/thebook.html

Free excerpts from the book are available here:

http://www.suite101.com/files/topics/6514/files/MSL2excerpts.rtf

The Narcissism Book of Quotes is available for free download here:

http://www.suite101.com/files/topics/6514/files/NPDQuotes.rtf

Have a safe and warm week!

Sam

Borderline personality characteristics aid bipolar depression diagnosis
Study findings suggest a role for borderline personality characteristics in
the diagnosis of bipolar, compared with unipolar, depression.
http://click2.psychiatrymatters.md/UM/T.asp?A12.106.20949.1.150804


Pharmacotherapy boosts psychotherapy for borderline personality disorder
Comparing the efficacy of psychotherapy alone with that of combined
psychotherapy and pharmacology for the treatment of borderline personality
disorder.
http://click2.psychiatrymatters.md/UM/T.asp?A12.106.20949.6.150804

Also see:

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/faq82.html

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/journal71.html

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/journal72.html

Tell Your Children the Truth

First published on Verbal and Emotional Abuse on Suite101

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Also Read:

How to Spot an Abuser on Your First Date

"Trauma Bonding" and the Psychology of Torture

Traumas as Social Interactions

Coping with Your Abuser

Spousal (Domestic) Abuse and Violence

Verbal and Emotional Abuse - Articles Menu

Case Studies in the Narcissistic Personality Disorder List - Click HERE!

Ask Sam on the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Support Group - Part I

Ask Sam on the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Support Group - Part II

Domestic Violence and Abuse statistics - Click here

Most victims attempt to present to their children a "balanced" picture of the relationship and of the abusive spouse. In a vain attempt to avoid the notorious (and controversial) Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), they do not besmirch the abusive parent and, on the contrary, encourage the semblance of a normal, functional, liaison. This is the wrong approach. Not only is it counterproductive – it sometimes proves outright dangerous.

Children have a right to know the overall state of affairs between their parents. They have a right not to be cheated and deluded into thinking that "everything is basically OK" – or that the separation is reversible. Both parents are under a moral obligation to tell their offspring the truth: the relationship is over for good.

Younger kids tend to believe that they are somehow responsible or guilty for the breakdown of the marriage. They must be disabused of this notion. Both parents would do best to explain to them, in straightforward terms, what led to the dissolution of the bond. If spousal abuse is wholly or partly to blame – it should be brought out to the open and discussed honestly.

In such conversations it is best not to allocate blame. But this does not mean that wrong behaviors should be condoned or whitewashed. The victimized parent should tell the child that abusive conduct is wrong and must be avoided. The child should be taught how to identify the warning signs of impending abuse – sexual, verbal, psychological, and physical.

Moreover, a responsible parent should teach the child how to resist inappropriate and hurtful actions. The child should be brought up to insist on being respected by the other parent, on having him or her observe the child's boundaries and accept the child's needs and emotions, choices, and preferences.

The child should learn to say "no" and to walk away from potentially compromising situations with the abusive parent. The child should be brought up not to feel guilty for protecting himself or herself and for demanding his or her rights.

Remember this: An abusive parent IS DANGEROUS TO THE CHILD.

Idealization – Devaluation Cycles

Most abusers accord the same treatment to children and adults. They regard both as Sources of Narcissistic Supply, mere instruments of gratification – idealize them at first and then devalue them in favour of alternative, safer and more subservient, sources. Such treatment – being idealized and then dumped and devalued – is traumatic and can have long-lasting emotional effects on the child.

Jealousy

Some abusers are jealous of their offspring. They envy them for being the center of attention and care. They treat their own kids as hostile competitors. Where the uninhibited expression of the aggression and hostility aroused by this predicament is illegitimate or impossible – the abuser prefers to stay away. Rather than attack his children, he sometimes immediately disconnects, detaches himself emotionally, becomes cold and uninterested, or directs transformed anger at his mate or at his parents (the more "legitimate" targets).

Objectification

Sometimes, the child is perceived to be a mere bargaining chip in a drawn out battle with the erstwhile victim of the abuser (read the previous article in this series – Leveraging the Children). This is an extension of the abuser's tendency to dehumanize people and treat them as objects.

Such abusive partners seek to manipulate their former mate by "taking over" and monopolizing their common children. They foster an atmosphere of emotional (and bodily) incest. The abusive parent encourages his kids to idolise him, to adore him, to be awed by him, to admire his deeds and capabilities, to learn to blindly trust and obey him, in short to surrender to his charisma and to become submerged in his follies-de-grandeur.

Breach of Personal Boundaries and Incest

It is at this stage that the risk of child abuse – up to and including outright incest – is heightened. Many abusers are auto-erotic. They are the preferred objects of their own sexual attentions. Molesting or having intercourse with one's children is as close as one gets to having sex with oneself.

Abusers often perceive sex in terms of annexation. The molested child is "assimilated" and becomes an extension of the offender, a fully controlled and manipulated object. Sex, to the abuser, is the ultimate act of depersonalization and objectification of the other. He actually masturbates with other people's bodies, his children's included.

The abuser's inability to acknowledge and abide by the personal boundaries set by others puts the child at heightened risk of abuse – verbal, emotional, physical, and, often, sexual. The abuser's possessiveness and panoply of indiscriminate negative emotions – transformations of aggression, such as rage and envy – hinder his ability to act as a "good enough" parent. His propensities for reckless behaviour, substance abuse, and sexual deviance endanger the child's welfare, or even his or her life.

Conflict

Minors pose little danger of criticizing the abuser or confronting him. They are perfect, malleable and abundant Sources of Narcissistic Supply. The narcissistic parent derives gratification from having incestuous relations with adulating, physically and mentally inferior, inexperienced and dependent "bodies".

Yet, the older the offspring, the more they become critical, even judgemental, of the abusive parent. They are better able to put into context and perspective his actions, to question his motives, to anticipate his moves. As they mature, they often refuse to continue to play the mindless pawns in his chess game. They hold grudges against him for what he has done to them in the past, when they were less capable of resistance. They can gauge his true stature, talents and achievements – which, usually, lag far behind the claims that he makes.

This brings the abusive parent back a full cycle. Again, he perceives his sons/daughters as threats. He quickly becomes disillusioned and devaluing. He loses all interest, becomes emotionally remote, absent and cold, rejects any effort to communicate with him, citing life pressures and the preciousness and scarceness of his time.

He feels burdened, cornered, besieged, suffocated, and claustrophobic. He wants to get away, to abandon his commitments to people who have become totally useless (or even damaging) to him. He does not understand why he has to support them, or to suffer their company and he believes himself to have been deliberately and ruthlessly trapped.

He rebels either passively-aggressively (by refusing to act or by intentionally sabotaging the relationships) or actively (by being overly critical, aggressive, unpleasant, verbally and psychologically abusive and so on). Slowly – to justify his acts to himself – he gets immersed in conspiracy theories with clear paranoid hues.

To his mind, the members of the family conspire against him, seek to belittle or humiliate or subordinate him, do not understand him, or stymie his growth. The abuser usually finally gets what he wants – his kids detach and abandon him to his great sorrow, but also to his great relief.

This is the subject of the next article.

Continue ...

Also Read

 The Narcissist and His Family

Leveraging the Children

The Roots of Pedophilia

The Incest Taboo

RESOURCES

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

Psychological and Verbal Abuse Resources

Verbal and Emotional Abuse on Suite101

Spousal (Domestic) Abuse and Violence on Suite101

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Additional Q&A's

Go Back to Home Page!

Journal Entries

Frequently Asked Questions about Pathological Narcissism

Excerpts from the Archive of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

After the Rain - How the West Lost the East

Narcissistic Personality Disorder - Suite101

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or abusericabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

The Narcissist and His Family

Frequently Asked Questions # 22

Narcissism, Pathological Narcissism, The Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD), the Narcissist,

and Relationships with Abusive Narcissists and Psychopaths

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Question:

Is there a "typical" relationship between the narcissist and his family?

Answer:

We are all members of a few families in our lifetime: the one that we are born to and the one(s) that we create. We all transfer hurts, attitudes, fears, hopes and desires – a whole emotional baggage – from the former to the latter. The narcissist is no exception.

The narcissist has a dichotomous view of humanity: humans are either Sources of Narcissistic Supply (and, then, idealised and over-valued) or do not fulfil this function (and, therefore, are valueless, devalued). The narcissist gets all the love that he needs from himself. From the outside he needs approval, affirmation, admiration, adoration, attention – in other words, externalised Ego boundary functions.

He does not require – nor does he seek – his parents' or his siblings' love, or to be loved by his children. He casts them as the audience in the theatre of his inflated grandiosity. He wishes to impress them, shock them, threaten them, infuse them with awe, inspire them, attract their attention, subjugate them, or manipulate them.

He emulates and simulates an entire range of emotions and employs every means to achieve these effects. He lies (narcissists are pathological liars – their very self is a false one). He acts the pitiful, or, its opposite, the resilient and reliable. He stuns and shines with outstanding intellectual, or physical capacities and achievements, or behaviour patterns appreciated by the members of the family. When confronted with (younger) siblings or with his own children, the narcissist is likely to go through three phases:

At first, he perceives his offspring or siblings as a threat to his Narcissistic Supply, such as the attention of his spouse, or mother, as the case may be. They intrude on his turf and invade the Pathological Narcissistic Space. The narcissist does his best to belittle them, hurt (even physically) and humiliate them and then, when these reactions prove ineffective or counter productive, he retreats into an imaginary world of omnipotence. A period of emotional absence and detachment ensues.

His aggression having failed to elicit Narcissistic Supply, the narcissist proceeds to indulge himself in daydreaming, delusions of grandeur, planning of future coups, nostalgia and hurt (the Lost Paradise Syndrome). The narcissist reacts this way to the birth of his children or to the introduction of new foci of attention to the family cell (even to a new pet!).

Whoever the narcissist perceives to be in competition for scarce Narcissistic Supply is relegated to the role of the enemy. Where the uninhibited expression of the aggression and hostility aroused by this predicament is illegitimate or impossible – the narcissist prefers to stay away. Rather than attack his offspring or siblings, he sometimes immediately disconnects, detaches himself emotionally, becomes cold and uninterested, or directs transformed anger at his mate or at his parents (the more "legitimate" targets).

Other narcissists see the opportunity in the "mishap". They seek to manipulate their parents (or their mate) by "taking over" the newcomer. Such narcissists monopolise their siblings or their newborn children. This way, indirectly, they benefit from the attention directed at the infants. The sibling or offspring become vicarious sources of Narcissistic Supply and proxies for the narcissist.

An example: by being closely identified with his offspring, a narcissistic father secures the grateful admiration of the mother ("What an outstanding father/brother he is"). He also assumes part of or all the credit for baby's/sibling's achievements. This is a process of annexation and assimilation of the other, a strategy that the narcissist makes use of in most of his relationships.

As siblings or progeny grow older, the narcissist begins to see their potential to be edifying, reliable and satisfactory Sources of Narcissistic Supply. His attitude, then, is completely transformed. The former threats have now become promising potentials. He cultivates those whom he trusts to be the most rewarding. He encourages them to idolise him, to adore him, to be awed by him, to admire his deeds and capabilities, to learn to blindly trust and obey him, in short to surrender to his charisma and to become submerged in his follies-de-grandeur.

It is at this stage that the risk of child abuse - up to and including outright incest - is heightened. The narcissist is auto-erotic. He is the preferred object of his own sexual attraction. His siblings and his children share his genetic material. Molesting or having intercourse with them is as close as the narcissist gets to having sex with himself.

Moreover, the narcissist perceives sex in terms of annexation. The partner is "assimilated" and becomes an extension of the narcissist, a fully controlled and manipulated object. Sex, to the narcissist, is the ultimate act of depersonalization and objectification of the other. He actually masturbates with other people's bodies.

Minors pose little danger of criticizing the narcissist or confronting him. They are perfect, malleable and abundant sources of Narcissistic Supply. The narcissist derives gratification from having coital relations with adulating, physically and mentally inferior, inexperienced and dependent "bodies".

These roles – allocated to them explicitly and demandingly or implicitly and perniciously by the narcissist – are best fulfilled by ones whose mind is not yet fully formed and independent. The older the siblings or offspring, the more they become critical, even judgemental, of the narcissist. They are better able to put into context and perspective his actions, to question his motives, to anticipate his moves.

As they mature, they often refuse to continue to play the mindless pawns in his chess game. They hold grudges against him for what he has done to them in the past, when they were less capable of resistance. They can gauge his true stature, talents and achievements – which, usually, lag far behind the claims that he makes.

This brings the narcissist a full cycle back to the first phase. Again, he perceives his siblings or sons/daughters as threats. He quickly becomes disillusioned and devaluing. He loses all interest, becomes emotionally remote, absent and cold, rejects any effort to communicate with him, citing life pressures and the preciousness and scarceness of his time.

He feels burdened, cornered, besieged, suffocated, and claustrophobic. He wants to get away, to abandon his commitments to people who have become totally useless (or even damaging) to him. He does not understand why he has to support them, or to suffer their company and he believes himself to have been deliberately and ruthlessly trapped.

He rebels either passively-aggressively (by refusing to act or by intentionally sabotaging the relationships) or actively (by being overly critical, aggressive, unpleasant, verbally and psychologically abusive and so on). Slowly – to justify his acts to himself – he gets immersed in conspiracy theories with clear paranoid hues.

To his mind, the members of the family conspire against him, seek to belittle or humiliate or subordinate him, do not understand him, or stymie his growth. The narcissist usually finally gets what he wants and the family that he has created disintegrates to his great sorrow (due to the loss of the Narcissistic Space) – but also to his great relief and surprise (how could they have let go someone as unique as he?).

This is the cycle: the narcissist feels threatened by arrival of new family members – he tries to assimilate or annex of siblings or offspring – he obtains Narcissistic Supply from them – he overvalues and idealizes these newfound sources – as sources grow older and independent, they adopt anti narcissistic behaviours – the narcissist devalues them – the narcissist feels stifled and trapped – the narcissist becomes paranoid – the narcissist rebels and the family disintegrates.

This cycle characterises not only the family life of the narcissist. It is to be found in other realms of his life (his career, for instance). At work, the narcissist, initially, feels threatened (no one knows him, he is a nobody). Then, he develops a circle of admirers, cronies and friends which he "nurtures and cultivates" in order to obtain Narcissistic Supply from them. He overvalues them (to him, they are the brightest, the most loyal, with the biggest chances to climb the corporate ladder and other superlatives).

But following some anti-narcissistic behaviours on their part (a critical remark, a disagreement, a refusal, however polite) – the narcissist devalues all these previously idealized individuals. Now that they have dared oppose him - they are judged by him to be stupid, cowardly, lacking in ambition, skills and talents, common (the worst expletive in the narcissist's vocabulary), with an unspectacular career ahead of them.

The narcissist feels that he is misallocating his scarce and invaluable resources (for instance, his time). He feels besieged and suffocated. He rebels and erupts in a serious of self-defeating and self-destructive behaviours, which lead to the disintegration of his life.

Doomed to build and ruin, attach and detach, appreciate and depreciate, the narcissist is predictable in his "death wish". What sets him apart from other suicidal types is that his wish is granted to him in small, tormenting doses throughout his anguished life.

Appendix - Custody and Visitation

A parent diagnosed with full-fledged Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) should be denied custody and be granted only restricted rights of visitation under supervision.

Narcissists accord the same treatment to children and adults. They regard both as sources of narcissistic supply, mere instruments of gratification - idealize them at first and then devalue them in favour of alternative, safer and more subservient, sources. Such treatment is traumatic and can have long-lasting emotional effects.

The narcissist's inability to acknowledge and abide by the personal boundaries set by others puts the child at heightened risk of abuse - verbal, emotional, physical, and, often, sexual. His possessiveness and panoply of indiscriminate negative emotions - transformations of aggression, such as rage and envy - hinder his ability to act as a "good enough" parent. His propensities for reckless behaviour, substance abuse, and sexual deviance endanger the child's welfare, or even his or her life.

Also read

Narcissistic Parents

Beware the Children

Leveraging the Children

Tell Your Children the Truth

The Roots of Pedophilia

The Incest Taboo

What is Abuse (series)

Abuse in the Family (series)

Parenthood - The Irrational Vocation

The Genetic Underpinnings of Narcissism

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More FAQs

Excerpts from Archives of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

A Macedonian Encounter

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

Leveraging the Children

First published on Verbal and Emotional Abuse on Suite101

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Also Read:

How to Spot an Abuser on Your First Date

"Trauma Bonding" and the Psychology of Torture

Traumas as Social Interactions

Coping with Your Abuser

Spousal (Domestic) Abuse and Violence

Verbal and Emotional Abuse - Articles Menu

Case Studies in the Narcissistic Personality Disorder List - Click HERE!

Ask Sam on the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Support Group - Part I

Ask Sam on the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Support Group - Part II

Domestic Violence and Abuse statistics - Click here

The abuser often recruits his children to do his bidding. He uses them to tempt, convince, communicate, threaten, and otherwise manipulate his target, the children's other parent or a devoted relative (e.g., grandparents). He controls his - often gullible and unsuspecting - offspring exactly as he plans to control his ultimate prey. He employs the same mechanisms and devices. And he dumps his props unceremoniously when the job is done - which causes tremendous (and, typically, irreversible) emotional hurt.

Co-opting

Some offenders - mainly in patriarchal and misogynist societies – co-opt their children into aiding and abetting their abusive conduct. The couple's children are used as bargaining chips or leverage. They are instructed and encouraged by the abuser to shun the victim, criticize and disagree with her, withhold their love or affection, and inflict on her various forms of ambient abuse.

As I wrote in Abuse by Proxy:

"Even the victim's (children) are amenable to the considerable charm, persuasiveness, and manipulativeness of the abuser and to his impressive thespian skills. The abuser offers a plausible rendition of the events and interprets them to his favor. The victims are often on the verge of a nervous breakdown: harassed, unkempt, irritable, impatient, abrasive, and hysterical.

Confronted with this contrast between a polished, self-controlled, and suave abuser and his harried casualties – it is easy to reach the conclusion that the real victim is the abuser, or that both parties abuse each other equally. The prey's acts of self-defense, assertiveness, or insistence on her rights are interpreted as aggression, lability, or a mental health problem."

This is especially true with young - and, therefore vulnerable - offspring, particularly if they live with the abuser. They are frequently emotionally blackmailed by him ("If you want daddy to love you, do this or refrain from doing that"). They lack life experience and adult defenses against manipulation. They may be dependent on the abuser economically and they always resent the abused for breaking up the family, for being unable to fully cater to their needs (she has to work for a living), and for "cheating" on her ex with a new boyfriend or husband.

Co-opting The System

The abuser perverts the system - therapists, marriage counselors, mediators, court-appointed guardians, police officers, and judges. He uses them to pathologize the victim and to separate her from her sources of emotional sustenance - notably, from her children. The abuser seeks custody to pain his ex and punish her.

Threatening

Abusers are insatiable and vindictive. They always feel deprived and unfairly treated. Some of them are paranoid and sadistic. If they fail to manipulate their common children into abandoning the other parent, they begin treat the kids as enemies. They are not above threatening the children, abducting them, abusing them (sexually, physically, or psychologically), or even outright harming them - in order to get back at the erstwhile partner or in order to make her do something.

Most victims attempt to present to their children a "balanced" picture of the relationship and of the abusive spouse. In a vain attempt to avoid the notorious (and controversial) Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS), they do not besmirch the abusive parent and, on the contrary, encourage the semblance of a normal, functional, liaison. This is the wrong approach. Not only is it counterproductive - it sometimes proves outright dangerous.

This is the subject of the next article.

Continue ...

Also Read

 The Narcissist and His Family

Tell Your Children the Truth

The Roots of Pedophilia

The Incest Taboo

RESOURCES

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists

Narcissistic Personality Disorder

Psychological and Verbal Abuse Resources

Verbal and Emotional Abuse on Suite101

Spousal (Domestic) Abuse and Violence on Suite101

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Additional Q&A's

Go Back to Home Page!

Journal Entries

Frequently Asked Questions about Pathological Narcissism

Excerpts from the Archive of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

After the Rain - How the West Lost the East

Narcissistic Personality Disorder - Suite101

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or abusericabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

The Narcissist's Confabulated Life

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

First published in my
"Narcissistic Personality Disorder"
Topic Page on Suite 101

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

Confabulations are an important part of life. They serve to heal emotional wounds or to prevent ones from being inflicted in the first place. They prop-up the confabulator's self-esteem, regulate his (or her) sense of self-worth, and buttress his (or her) self-image. They serve as organizing principles in social interactions.

Father's wartime heroism, mother's youthful good looks, one's oft-recounted exploits, erstwhile alleged brilliance, and past purported sexual irresistibility - are typical examples of white, fuzzy, heart-warming lies wrapped around a shriveled kernel of truth.

But the distinction between reality and fantasy is rarely completely lost. Deep inside, the healthy confabulator knows where facts end and wishful thinking takes over. Father acknowledges he was no war hero, though he did his share of fighting. Mother understands she was no ravishing beauty, though she may have been attractive. The confabulator realizes that his recounted exploits are overblown, his brilliance exaggerated, and his sexual irresistibility a myth.

Such distinctions never rise to the surface because everyone - the confabulator and his audience alike - have a common interest to maintain the confabulation. To challenge the integrity of the confabulator or the veracity of his confabulations is to threaten the very fabric of family and society. Human intercourse is built around such entertaining deviations from the truth.

This is where the narcissist differs from others (from "normal" people).

His very self is a piece of fiction concocted to fend off hurt and to nurture the narcissist's grandiosity. He fails in his "reality test" - the ability to distinguish the actual from the imagined. The narcissist fervently believes in his own infallibility, brilliance, omnipotence, heroism, and perfection. He doesn't dare confront the truth and admit it even to himself.

Moreover, he imposes his personal mythology on his nearest and dearest. Spouse, children, colleagues, friends, neighbors - sometimes even perfect strangers - must abide by the narcissist's narrative or face his wrath. The narcissist countenances no disagreement, alternative points of view, or criticism. To him, confabulation IS reality.

The coherence of the narcissist's dysfunctional and precariously-balanced personality depends on the plausibility of his stories and on their acceptance by his Sources of Narcissistic Supply. The narcissist invests an inordinate time in substantiating his tales, collecting "evidence", defending his version of events, and in re-interpreting reality to fit his scenario. As a result, most narcissists are self-delusional, obstinate, opinionated, and argumentative.

The narcissist's lies are not goal-orientated. This is what makes his constant dishonesty both disconcerting and incomprehensible. The narcissist lies at the drop of a hat, needlessly, and almost ceaselessly. He lies in order to avoid the Grandiosity Gap - when the abyss between fact and (narcissistic) fiction becomes too gaping to ignore.

The narcissist lies in order to preserve appearances, uphold fantasies, support the tall (and impossible) tales of his False Self and extract Narcissistic Supply from unsuspecting sources, who are not yet on to him. To the narcissist, confabulation is not merely a way of life - but life itself.

We are all conditioned to let other indulge in pet delusions and get away with white, not too egregious, lies. The narcissist makes use of our socialization. We dare not confront or expose him, despite the outlandishness of his claims, the improbability of his stories, the implausibility of his alleged accomplishments and conquests. We simply turn the other cheek, or meekly avert our eyes, often embarrassed.

Moreover, the narcissist makes clear, from the very beginning, that it is his way or the highway. His aggression - even violent streak - are close to the surface. He may be charming in a first encounter - but even then there are telltale signs of pent-up abuse. His interlocutors sense this impending threat and avoid conflict by acquiescing with the narcissist's fairy tales. Thus he imposes his private universe and virtual reality on his milieu - sometimes with disastrous consequences.

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More Journal Entries

Frequently Asked Questions about Pathological Narcissism

Excerpts from the Archive of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

After the Rain - How the West Lost the East

Narcissistic Personality Disorder - Suite101

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

The Cult of the Narcissist

By: Dr. Sam Vaknin

First published in my
"Narcissistic Personality Disorder"
Topic Page on Suite 101

Malignant Self Love - Buy the Book - Click HERE!!!

Relationships with Abusive Narcissists - Buy the e-Books - Click HERE!!!

READ THIS: Scroll down to review a complete list of the articles - Click on the blue-coloured text!
Bookmark this Page - and SHARE IT with Others!

The narcissist is the guru at the centre of a cult. Like other gurus, he demands complete obedience from his flock: his spouse, his offspring, other family members, friends, and colleagues. He feels entitled to adulation and special treatment by his followers. He punishes the wayward and the straying lambs. He enforces discipline, adherence to his teachings, and common goals. The less accomplished he is in reality – the more stringent his mastery and the more pervasive the brainwashing.

The – often involuntary – members of the narcissist's mini-cult inhabit a twilight zone of his own construction. He imposes on them a shared psychosis, replete with persecutory delusions, "enemies", mythical narratives, and apocalyptic scenarios if he is flouted.

The narcissist's control is based on ambiguity, unpredictability, fuzziness, and ambient abuse. His ever-shifting whims exclusively define right versus wrong, desirable and unwanted, what is to be pursued and what to be avoided. He alone determines the rights and obligations of his disciples and alters them at will.

The narcissist is a micro-manager. He exerts control over the minutest details and behaviours. He punishes severely and abuses withholders of information and those who fail to conform to his wishes and goals.

The narcissist does not respect the boundaries and privacy of his reluctant adherents. He ignores their wishes and treats them as objects or instruments of gratification. He seeks to control both situations and people compulsively.

He strongly disapproves of others' personal autonomy and independence. Even innocuous activities, such as meeting a friend or visiting one's family require his permission. Gradually, he isolates his nearest and dearest until they are fully dependent on him emotionally, sexually, financially, and socially.

He acts in a patronising and condescending manner and criticises often. He alternates between emphasising the minutest faults (devalues) and exaggerating the talents, traits, and skills (idealises) of the members of his cult. He is wildly unrealistic in his expectations – which legitimises his subsequent abusive conduct.

The narcissist claims to be infallible, superior, talented, skilful, omnipotent, and omniscient. He often lies and confabulates to support these unfounded claims. Within his cult, he expects awe, admiration, adulation, and constant attention commensurate with his outlandish stories and assertions. He reinterprets reality to fit his fantasies.

His thinking is dogmatic, rigid, and doctrinaire. He does not countenance free thought, pluralism, or free speech and doesn't brook criticism and disagreement. He demands – and often gets – complete trust and the relegation to his capable hands of all decision-making.

He forces the participants in his cult to be hostile to critics, the authorities, institutions, his personal enemies, or the media – if they try to uncover his actions and reveal the truth. He closely monitors and censors information from the outside, exposing his captive audience only to selective data and analyses.

The narcissist's cult is "missionary" and "imperialistic". He is always on the lookout for new recruits – his spouse's friends, his daughter's girlfriends, his neighbours, new colleagues at work. He immediately attempts to "convert" them to his "creed" – to convince them how wonderful and admirable he is. In other words, he tries to render them Sources of Narcissistic Supply.

Often, his behaviour on these "recruiting missions" is different to his conduct within the "cult". In the first phases of wooing new admirers and proselytising to potential "conscripts" – the narcissist is attentive, compassionate, empathic, flexible, self-effacing, and helpful. At home, among the "veterans" he is tyrannical, demanding, wilful, opinionated, aggressive, and exploitative.

As the leader of his congregation, the narcissist feels entitled to special amenities and benefits not accorded the "rank and file". He expects to be waited on hand and foot, to make free use of everyone's money and dispose of their assets liberally, and to be cynically exempt from the rules that he himself established (if such violation is pleasurable or gainful).

In extreme cases, the narcissist feels above the law – any kind of law. This grandiose and haughty conviction leads to criminal acts, incestuous or polygamous relationships, and recurrent friction with the authorities.

Hence the narcissist's panicky and sometimes violent reactions to "dropouts" from his cult. There's a lot going on that the narcissist wants kept under wraps. Moreover, the narcissist stabilises his fluctuating sense of self-worth by deriving Narcissistic Supply from his victims. Abandonment threatens the narcissist's precariously balanced personality.

Add to that the narcissist's paranoid and schizoid tendencies, his lack of introspective self-awareness, and his stunted sense of humour (lack of self-deprecation) and the risks to the grudging members of his cult are clear.

The narcissist sees enemies and conspiracies everywhere. He often casts himself as the heroic victim (martyr) of dark and stupendous forces. In every deviation from his tenets he espies malevolent and ominous subversion. He, therefore, is bent on disempowering his devotees. By any and all means.

The narcissist is dangerous.

Copyright Notice

This material is copyrighted. Free, unrestricted use is allowed on a non commercial basis.
The author's name and a link to this Website must be incorporated in any reproduction of the material for any use and by any means.

Go Back to Home Page!

More Journal Entries

Frequently Asked Questions about Pathological Narcissism

Excerpts from the Archive of the Narcissism List

The Narcissism List Home Page

Philosophical Musings

After the Rain - How the West Lost the East

Narcissistic Personality Disorder - Suite101

Internet: A Medium or a Message?

Write to me: palma@...  or narcissisticabuse-owner@yahoogroups.com

Michael Souter

I love how I love you I hate how I hate you

http://www.michaelsouter.com/narcissist_intro.html

Art exhibition online catalog regarding the triad of narcissism,
exhibitionism, and voyeurism.

July 05, 2005

"Real education should educate us out of self into something far finer; into
a selflessness which links us with all humanity."
           -- Lady Nancy Astor (1879-1964), English politician

Today's Challenge:

    "Laughter is nothing else but a sudden glory arising from some sudden
conception of some eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity
of others, or with our own formerly." Who made this quote famous?
    View the choices and answer the challenge at
    http://www.quoteworld.org/ !

This letter constitutes a permission to reprint or mirror any and
all of the materials mentioned or linked to herein subject
to appropriate credit and linkback. Every article published MUST
include the  author bio, including the link to the author's Web site
(at the bottom of this message).

===============================================================
Resolving Disputes - The Lost Art
By Sam Vaknin
Author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"

Wherever interests meet - they tend to clash. Disputes are an
inevitable and inseparable part of commercial life. Mankind invented
many ways to settle disputes. Each way relies on a different
underlying principle. Generally speaking, there are four such
principles: justice, law, logic and force.

Disputes can be resolved by resorting to force. One party can force
the other to accept his opinion and to comply by his conditions and
demands. Obeisance should not be confused with acceptance. The
coerced party is likely to at least sabotage the interests of the
coercing one. In due time, a mutiny is more likely than not. Force
is always met by force, as Newton discovered.

This revolution and counter-revolution has a devastating effect on
wealth formation. The use of force does ensure that the distribution
of wealth will be skewed and biased in favour of the forceful party.
But the cake to be divided grows smaller and smaller, wealth
diminishes and, in due course, there is almost nothing left to fight
over.

Another mechanism of dispute resolution involves the application of
the law. This mechanism also relies (ultimately) on enforcement
(therefore, on force). But it maintains the semblance of objectivity
and the fair (unbiased) treatment of the contestants ("level playing
field" and the "rule of Law"). It does so by relegating both
functions - of legislating and of adjudication - to third,
uninterested parties.

But this misses the crucial point. The problem is not "who makes the
laws" or "who administers them". The problem is "how are the laws
applied". If a bias exists, if a party is favoured, it is at the
stage of administering justice. The personal integrity of the
arbitrator (the judge) at this stage does not guarantee a fair
outcome.

Empirically, the results of trials have been shown to depend greatly
on the ethnic identity and social and economic standing of the
disputants as well as on the social background and ethnic
affiliation of the judge. Above all: the more money a party to a
trial has - the more the court is tilted in his or her favour.

The laws of procedure are such that wealthy applicants (represented
by wealthy lawyers) are more likely to win. The substantive law
contains preferences: ethnic, economic, ideological, historical,
social and so on. Applying such substantive law to the settlement of
disputes is tantamount to the application of force. The difference
is in style, rather than in substance. When law enforcement agencies
get involved - even this minor distinction tends to blur.

Perhaps a better system would be the application of the principles
of justice to disputes - had people been able to agree what these
are. Justice is an element in the legal system, but it is "tainted"
by ulterior and overriding considerations (social, economic, etc.)

In its purified form justice is associated with an impartial
administration of impartial principles of dispute resolution. The
promulgation and application of just principles is entrusted to
people who are thought to possess or to reify justice ("just"
or "honest" people). The system is not encumbered by laws of
procedure and the parties have no built-in advantages. Arbitration
is an example of a justice-based dispute resolution system.

Both the law and the principles of justice tend to preserve
accumulated wealth and, therefore, the social order. In many cases
they tend to help to increase it. No "right" or "just" distribution
is guaranteed by either system - but, at least, the destruction of
wealth is avoided.

This achievement is based on the principle of consent. Embedded in
both systems is the implicit agreement to abide by the rules, to
accept final judgments, to succumb to legal instructions, and not to
use force to try to ensure favorable outcomes. A revolution is, of
course, always an option. One can always ignore or violate decisions
or judgments rendered by competent, commonly accepted courts. But,
in these cases, we are merely back to dealing with the application
of the principle of force, rather than of law or justice.

Then there is logic. Not in its commonsensical rendition - but in
the form of natural laws. By "logic" we mean the immutable ways in
which the world is governed, in which forces are channeled, under
which circumstances arise or subside. Natural Law should (and in
many respects) does underlie all the human systems of law and order.
This is the meaning of "natural justice" in the most profound sense
of the phrase.

All human societies belong to either of these four categories.
Indeed, a civilization can easily be summed up and judged by its
adherence to one or the other of these systems and principles of
dispute resolution. It is when Mankind backtracks and slides from
system of Law or Justice to Force-based solutions that the end is
nigh.


==============================================================
AUTHOR BIO (must be included with the article)

Sam Vaknin ( http://samvak.tripod.com ) is the author of Malignant
Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West
Lost the East. He served as a columnist for Central Europe Review,
PopMatters, Bellaonline, and eBookWeb, a United Press International
(UPI) Senior Business Correspondent, and the editor of mental health
and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory and
Suite101.

Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com

This letter constitutes a permission to reprint or mirror any and
all of the materials mentioned or linked to herein subject
to appropriate credit and linkback. Every article published MUST
include the  author bio, including the link to the author's Web site
(at the bottom of this message).

===============================================================
  Purging vs. Co-opting Tyrants
By Sam Vaknin
Author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"

History teaches us that there are two types of tyrants. Those who
preserve the structures and forces that carry them to power - and
those who, once they have attained their goal of unbridled
domination, seek to destroy the organizations and people they had
used to get to where they are.

Adolf Hitler, Saddam Hussein, and Josip Broz Tito are examples of co-
opting tyrants. Though Hitler was forced to liquidate the rebellious
SA in 1934, he kept the Nazi party intact and virtually unchanged
until the end. He surrounded himself with fanatic (and self-serving)
loyalists and the composition of his retinue remained the same
throughout the life of his regime. The concept of Alte Kampfer
(veteran fighter) was hallowed and the mythology of Nazism extolled
loyalty and community (Gemeinschaft) above opportunistic expedience
and conspiratorial paranoia.

Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao are prime specimen of the purging
tyrant. Stalin spent the better part of 30 years eliminating not
only the opposition - but the entire Leninist-Bolshevik political
party that brought him to power in the first place. He then
proceeded to cold-bloodedly exterminate close to 20 million
professionals, intellectuals, army officers, and other achievers and
leaders on whose toil and talents his alleged successes rested.

Co-opting tyrants consolidate their power by continually expanding
the base of their supporters and the concomitant networks of
patronage. They encourage blind obedience (the Fuehrerprinzip) and
devotion. They thrive on personal interaction with sycophants and
adulators. They foster a cult-like shared psychosis in their
adherents.

Purging tyrants consolidate their power by removing all independent
thinkers and achievers from the scene, re-writing history in a self-
aggrandizing manner, and then raising a new generation of ambitious,
young acolytes who know only the tyrant and his reign and regard
both as a force of nature. They rule through terror and encourage
paranoia on all levels. They foster the atomization of society in a
form of micromanaged application of the tried and true rule
of "divide et impera".


==============================================================
AUTHOR BIO (must be included with the article)

Sam Vaknin ( http://samvak.tripod.com ) is the author of Malignant
Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West
Lost the East. He served as a columnist for Central Europe Review,
PopMatters, Bellaonline, and eBookWeb, a United Press International
(UPI) Senior Business Correspondent, and the editor of mental health
and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory and
Suite101.

Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com

Pathological Narcissism, Psychosis, and Delusions - NEW ARTICLE -
click on the link:

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/116835

"Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" (January 2005)

From Barnes and Noble (sixth edition)

http://barnesandnoble.bfast.com/booklink/click?ISBN=8023833847

From the Publisher (fifth edition with bonus pack)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_MSL


Dozens of additional articles about narcissism and abuse in
relationships - click on these links:


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/21-40

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/41-60

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/61-80

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/81-100

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/101-103

"Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited" (January 2005) -
ELECTRONIC book (e-book)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_MSL-EBOOK


DETAILED MENU OF ARTICLES


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/1-20

Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited is now available from
AMAZON
CANADA- click on this link:

http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/tg/detail/offer-listing/-
/8023833847/new/

Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited is now available from
AMAZON.COM - click on this link:

http://s1.amazon.com/exec/varzea/ts/exchange-
glance/Y01Y4295422Y6845244/


Articles 1 - 20
1 July 2005
Inner Dialog, Cognitive Deficits, and Introjects in Narcissism
The narcissist learns nothing because he regards himself as born
perfect. Even when he fails a thousand times, the narcissist still
feels the victim of happenstance. And someone else's repeated
outstanding accomplishments are never proof of mettle or merit.
People who disagree with the narcissist and try to teach him
differently are, to his mind, biased or morons or both.

1 June 2005
Indifference and Decompensation in Pathological Narcissism
Early on in life, the narcissist learns to disguise his socially-
unacceptable indifference as benevolence, equanimity, cool-
headedness, composure, or superiority. "It is not that I don't care
about others" - he shrugs off his critics - "I am simply more level-
headed, more resilient, more composed under pressure ... They
mistake my equanimity for apathy."

1 May 2005
The Prodigy as Narcissistic Injury
People are envious of the prodigy. The genius serves as a constant
reminder to others of their mediocrity, lack of creativity, and
mundane existence. Naturally, they try to "bring him down to their
level" and "cut him down to size". The gifted person's haughtiness
and high-handedness only exacerbate his strained relationships.

1 April 2005
The Narcissism of Differences Big and Small
We reserve our most virulent emotions - aggression, hatred, envy -
towards those who resemble us the most. We feel threatened not by
the Other with whom we have little in common - but by the "nearly-
we", who mirror and reflect us.

1 March 2005
The Roots of Pedophilia
Pedophiles are attracted to prepubescent children and act on their
sexual fantasies. It is a startling fact that the etiology of this
paraphilia is unknown. Pedophiles comes from all walks of life and
have no common socio-economic background. Contrary to media-
propagated myths, most of them had not been sexually abused in
childhood and the vast majority of pedophiles are also drawn to
adults of the opposite sex (are heterosexuals).

1 February 2005
The Intermittent Explosive Narcissist
It might be more accurate to say that the narcissist is expressing
(and experiencing) TWO layers of anger, simultaneously and always.
The first layer, of superficial ire, is indeed directed at an
identified target, the alleged cause of the eruption. The second
layer, however, incorporates the narcissist's self-aimed wrath.

1 January 2005
Codependence and Counterdependence in Pathological Narcissism
Most "classical" (overt) narcissists are counterdependent. Their
emotions and needs are buried under "scar tissue" which had formed,
coalesced, and hardened during years of one form of abuse or
another.

1 December 2004
In Defense of Psychoanalysis - Part I
No social theory has been more influential and, later, more reviled
than psychoanalysis. It burst upon the scene of modern thought, a
fresh breath of revolutionary and daring imagination, a Herculean
feat of model-construction, and a challenge to established morals
and manners.

1 November 2004
Dr. Watson and Mr. Hastings - The Narcissist and His Friends
"Who's the fairest of them all?" - asks the Bad Queen in the fairy
tale. Having provided the wrong answer, the mirror is smashed to
smithereens. Not a bad allegory for how the narcissist treats
his "friends".

1 October 2004
The Depressive Narcissist
Many scholars consider pathological narcissism to be a form of
depressive illness. This is the position of the authoritative
magazine "Psychology Today". The life of the typical narcissist is,
indeed, punctuated with recurrent bouts of dysphoria (ubiquitous
sadness and hopelessness), anhedonia (loss of the ability to feel
pleasure), and clinical forms of depression (cyclothymic, dysthymic,
or other).

1 September 2004
The Enigma of Normal People
I can't understand "normal" people. I don't know what makes them
tick. To me, they are an enigma, wrapped in mystery. I try hard not
to offend them, to act civil, to be helpful and forthcoming. I give
so much in my relationships that I often feel exploited. I make it a
point not to strain my contacts, not to demand too much, not to
impose. But it's not working.

1 August 2004
The Gullible Narcissist
The irony is that narcissists, who consider themselves worldly,
discerning, knowledgeable, shrewd, erudite, and astute - are
actually more gullible than the average person. This is because they
are fake.

1 July 2004
Grandiosity Bubbles
A Grandiosity Bubble is an imagined, self-aggrandizing, narrative
involving the narcissist and elements from his real life - people
around him, places he frequents, or conversations he is having. The
narcissist weaves a story incorporating these facts, inflating them
in the process and endowing them with bogus internal meaning and
consistency. In other words: he confabulates - but, this time, his
confabulation is loosely based on reality.

1 June 2004
The Misanthropic Altruist
In the narcissist's wasteland of a life, even his benevolence is
spiteful, sadistic, punitive, and distancing.

1 May 2004
The Cult of the Narcissist
The narcissist is the guru at the center of a cult. Like other
gurus, he demands complete obedience from his flock: his spouse, his
offspring, other family members, friends, and colleagues. He feels
entitled to adulation and special treatment by his followers. He
punishes the wayward and the straying lambs.

8 April 2004
Back to La-la Land
Relationships with narcissists peter out slowly and tortuously.
Narcissists do not provide closure. They stalk. They cajole, beg,
promise, persuade, and, ultimately, succeed in doing the impossible
yet again: sweep you off your feet, though you know better than to
succumb to their spurious and superficial charms.

1 April 2004
The Narcissist - From Abuse to Suicide - Part I
The concepts of "body" or "psyche" can easily be extended
to "family", or "home". Abuse – especially in familial settings - is
often applied to kin and kith, compatriots, or colleagues.

8 March 2004
The Narcissist's Object Constancy
The typical narcissist refrains from any meaningful discourse with
his spouse and children, friends and colleagues. Instead, he spins a
narrative in which these people - represented by mental avatars -
admire him, find him fascinating, fervently wish to oblige him, love
him, or fear him.

1 March 2004
The Narcissist's Confabulated Life
The narcissist lies in order to preserve appearances, uphold
fantasies, support the tall (and impossible) tales of his False Self
and extract narcissistic supply from unsuspecting sources, who are
not yet on to him. To the narcissist, confabulation is not merely a
way of life - but life itself.

1 February 2004
The Narcissist's Reality Substitutes
Pathological narcissism is a defense mechanism intended to isolate
the narcissist from his environment and to shield him from hurt and
injury, both real and imagined.

"The Narcissism Series" - (January 2005)

Six e-books regarding Pathological Narcissism, relationships with
abusive narcissists, and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_SERIES


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/21-40



Articles 21 - 40

1 January 2004
Acquired Situational Narcissism
Can narcissism be acquired or learned? Can it be provoked by
certain, well-defined, situations?

2 December 2003
Misdiagnosing Narcissism - The Bipolar I Disorder
The manic phase of Bipolar I Disorder is often misdiagnosed as
Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).

2 November 2003
Misdiagnosing Narcissism - Asperger's Disorder
Asperger's Disorder is often misdiagnosed as Narcissistic
Personality Disorder (NPD), though evident as early as age 3 (while
pathological narcissism cannot be safely diagnosed prior to early
adolescence).

4 October 2003
The Professions of the Narcissist
Narcissists are liars. They misrepresent their credentials,
knowledge, talents, skills, and achievements. A narcissist medical
doctor would rather let patients die than expose his ignorance. A
narcissistic therapist often traumatizes his clients with his acting
out, rage, exploitativeness, and lack of empathy. Narcissistic
businessmen bring ruin on their firms and employees.

1 September 2003
The Two Loves of the Narcissist
The narcissist's "love" is hate and fear disguised - fear of losing
control and hatred of the very people his precariously balanced
personality so depends on. The narcissist is egotistically committed
only to his own well-being. To him, the objects of his "love" are
interchangeable and lowly. He idealizes not because he is smitten by
emotion - and discards and devalues similarly cold-bloodedly. A
predator, always on the lookout, he debases the coin of "love" as he
corrupts everything else in himself and around him.

1 August 2003
Narcissism, Substance Abuse, and Reckless Behaviors
Pathological narcissism is an addiction to narcissistic supply, the
narcissist's drug of choice. It is, therefore, not surprising that
other addictive and reckless behaviors - workaholism, alcoholism,
drug abuse, pathological gambling, compulsory shopping - piggyback
on this primary dependence.

1 July 2003
Abusing the Narcissist
Narcissists attract abuse. Haughty, exploitative, demanding,
insensitive, and quarrelsome - they tend to draw opprobrium and
provoke anger and even hatred. Sorely lacking in interpersonal
skills, devoid of empathy, and steeped in irksome grandiose
fantasies - they invariably fail to mitigate the irritation and
revolt that they induce in others.

13 June 2003
The Cyber Narcissist
To the narcissist, the Internet is an alluring and irresistible
combination of playground and hunting grounds, the gathering place
of numerous potential sources of narcissistic supply, a world where
false identities are the norm and mind games the bon ton. And it is
beyond the reach of the law, the pale of social norms, the
strictures of civilized conduct.

1 June 2003
Narcissism and Evil
We are often shocked less by the actions of narcissist than by the
way he acts. In the absence of a vocabulary rich enough to capture
the subtle hues and gradations of the spectrum of narcissistic
depravity, we default to habitual adjectives such as "good"
and "evil". Such intellectual laziness does this pernicious
phenomenon and its victims little justice.

1 May 2003
The Adrenaline Junkie
Narcissistic supply is exciting. When it is available, the
narcissist feels elated, omnipotent, omniscient, handsome, sexy,
adventurous, invincible, and irresistible. When it is missing, the
narcissist first enters a manic phase of trying to replenish his
supply and, if he fails, the narcissist shrivels, withdraws and is
reduced to a zombie-like state of numbness.

1 April 2003
Portrait of the Narcissist as a Young Man
I am not preoccupied with my age, nor am I obsessed with my
dwindling, fat flapping body. I am no hypochondriac. But There is a
streak of sadness in me, like an undercurrent and a defiance of Time
itself. Like Dorian Gray, I want to remain as I was when I became
the centre of attention, the focus of adoration, the heart of a
twister of media attention. I know I can't. And I know that I have
failed not only at arresting Chronos - but on a more mundane,
degrading level. I failed as an adult.

1 March 2003
Telling Them Apart
Narcissists are an elusive breed, hard to spot, harder to pinpoint,
impossible to capture. Even an experienced mental health
diagnostician with unmitigated access to the record and to the
person examined would find it fiendishly difficult to determine with
any degree of certainty whether someone suffers from an impairment,
i.e., a mental health disorder – or merely possesses narcissistic
traits, a narcissistic personality structure ("character"), or a
narcissistic "overlay" superimposed on another mental health
problem.

1 February 2003
The Psychology of Torture
Torture robs the victim of the most basic modes of relating to
reality and, thus, is the equivalent of cognitive death. Space and
time are warped by sleep deprivation. The self ("I") is shattered.
The tortured have nothing familiar to hold on to: family, home,
personal belongings, loved ones, language, name. Gradually, they
lose their mental resilience and sense of freedom. They feel alien -
unable to communicate, relate, attach, or empathize with others.

20 January 2003
Facilitating Narcissism
We are surrounded by malignant narcissists. How come this disorder
has hitherto been largely ignored? How come there is such a dearth
of research and literature regarding this crucial family of
pathologies? Even mental health practitioners are woefully unaware
of it and unprepared to assist its victims.

1 January 2003
Losing for Granted
It is when loss is tangible - that the narcissist regains his former
zeal and erstwhile fervor. He courts a long neglected wife, invests
himself in a hated job, befriends spurned colleagues, engulfs with
unnatural warmth and empathy offended friends. It is very common,
for instance, for a narcissist to rediscover the joy of sex with an
adulterous partner. It is as though being cheated by his wife (or
husband) rekindles in the narcissist a competitive urge, a
possessive streak, and a perverted carnal pleasure.

1 December 2002
Narcissistic Leaders
The narcissistic leader fosters and encourages a personality cult
with all the hallmarks of an institutional religion: priesthood,
rites, rituals, temples, worship, catechism, mythology. The leader
is this religion's ascetic saint. He monastically denies himself
earthly pleasures (or so he claims) in order to be able to dedicate
himself fully to his calling.

21 November 2002
Grandiosity and Intimacy - The Roots of Paranoia
The paranoid narcissist ends life as an oddball recluse - derided,
feared, and loathed in equal measures. His paranoia - exacerbated by
repeated rejections and ageing - pervades his entire life and
diminishes his creativity, adaptability, and functioning. The
narcisstis personality, buffetted by paranoia, turns ossified and
brittle. Finally, atomized and useless, it succumbs and gives way to
a great void. The narcissist is consumed.

24 October 2002
The Embarrassing Narcissist
I was convinced that I possess an unerring sense of rhythm until my
wife told me I had none. I thought that my comments, observations,
and insights are original and pithy - until I discovered that I am
numbingly verbose, repetitive, and coarse. I attributed to myself a
great sense of humor until I re-read some of my writings and found
how convoluted and dull my pitiful efforts at being witty were. To
my mind, my prose was arabesque but lucid and incisive. I have since
learned that it is no such thing.

24 October 2002
Whistling in the Dark
The narcissist often strikes people are "laid back" - or, less
charitably: lazy, parasitic, spoiled, and self-indulgent. But, as
usual with narcissists, appearances deceive. Narcissists are either
compulsively driven over-achievers - or chronic under-achieving
wastrels. Most of them fail to make full and productive use of their
potential and capacities. Many avoid even the now standard path of
an academic degree, a career, or family life.

1 October 2002
The Energy of Self
Hence the narcissist's constant fatigue and ennui, his short
attention span, his tendency to devalue sources of supply, even his
transformed aggression. The narcissist can afford to dedicate
resources only to the most promising founts of narcissistic supply.
The "path of least investment" - criminal shortcuts, violence,
cheating, con-artistry, lies and confabulations - is always
preferred by the narcissist because his élan is so run down, his
vitality so drenched, and his verve so exhausted by the unusual need
to secure from the outside what most people effortlessly produce
internally and take for granted.

"Pathological Narcissism FAQs" (January 2005)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_FAQS


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/41-60

NEW!!! "Toxic Relationships - Abuse and its Aftermath" (January 2005)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_ABUSE

Articles 41 - 60

11 September 2002
The Psychology of Serial and Mass Killers
Serial killers often mutilate their victims and abscond with
trophies - usually, body parts. They treat their prey as a disturbed
child would treat her rag dolls. Some of them have been known to eat
the organs they have ripped - an act of merging with the dead and
assimilating them through digestion.

1 September 2002
Grandiosity Hangover and Narcissist Baiting
The balding, potbellied, narcissist still courts women aggressively.
The impoverished tycoon sinks deeper into debts, trying to maintain
an unsustainable and lavish lifestyle. The one-novel author or one-
discovery scholar still demands professional deference and expects
attention by media and superiors. The once-potent politician
maintains regal airs and holds court in great pomp. The wizened
actress demands special treatment and throws temper tantrums when
rebuffed. The ageing beauty wears her daughter's clothes and
regresses emotionally as she progresses chronologically.

1 August 2002
Discussions about Narcissism
Pathological narcissism pervades every facet of the personality,
every behavior, every cognition, and every emotion. This makes it
difficult to treat. Add to this the narcissist's unthinking and
deeply-ingrained resistance to authority figures, such as
therapists - and healing, or even mere behavior modification, are
rendered unattainable.

1 August 2002
Narcissism and Fraud
The Perpetrators of the recent financial frauds acted with disregard
of both their employees and shareholders - not to mention other
stakeholders - is a matter of fact, not of conjecture. Some - though
by no means all - perpetrators of fraud and con-artistry indeed
respond to the need to uphold and maintain a False Self - a
concocted, grandiose, and demanding psychological construct. What
fuels the False Self is known as "Narcissistic Supply" and consists
of adulation, admiration, and, more generally, attention - even of
the wrong kind. Thus, even notoriety and infamy are preferable to
obscurity.

12 July 2002
Culture, Society, and Narcissism
Can families, organizations, ethnic groups, churches, and even whole
nations be safely described as "narcissistic" or "pathologically
self-absorbed"? Wouldn't such generalizations be a trifle racist and
more than a trifle wrong? The answer is: it depends.

1 July 2002
To Age with Grace
The narcissist ages without mercy and without grace. His withered
body and his overwrought mind betray him all at once. He stares with
incredulity and rage at cruel mirrors. He refuses to accept his
growing fallibility. He rebels against his decrepitude and
mediocrity. Accustomed to being awe-inspiring and the recipient of
adulation - the narcissist cannot countenance his social isolation
and the pathetic figure that he cuts.

13 June 2002
The Objects of the Narcissist
The narcissist parades his objects, flaunts them, consumes them
conspicuously, praises them vocally, draws attention to them
compulsively, brags about them incessantly. When they fail to elicit
narcissistic supply - admiration, adulation, marvel - the narcissist
feels wounded, humiliated, deprived, discriminated against, the
victim of a conspiracy, unloved.

1 June 2002
The Labours of the Narcissist
I can't hold a job or even run my own business for very long.
People - co-workers, clients, suppliers - complain that I create
a "bad atmosphere", that I am a "difficult person", that they have
to walk on brittle eggshells lest I explode, humiliate them, expose
their errors and their weaknesses, or simply walk away.

10 May 2002
Chronos and Narcissus
It can never enjoy another person. It can never intertwine, or care,
or warm its heart, or hope. It can produce some poems but never
poetry. It is even deprived of the ability to feel lonely. And
though it may fully grasp its own deficiencies - try as it may, it
can never change. For it is artificial and synthetic - a fiction, a
two-dimensional creation, a part and not a whole. It is a
narcissist.

1 May 2002
Transformations of Aggression
The narcissist feels that he is worthy of special and immediate
treatment by the most qualified. His time is too precious to be
wasted by bureaucratic trifles, misunderstandings, underlings, and
social conventions. His mission is urgent. Other people are expected
both to share the narcissist's self-assessment - and to behave
accordingly: to accommodate his needs, instantly comply with his
wishes, and succumb to his whims.

12 April 2002
The Losses of the Narcissist
The narcissist cruises through his life as a tourist would through
an exotic island. He observes events and people, his own experiences
and loved ones - as a spectator would a movie that at times is
mildly exciting and at others mildly boring. He is never fully
there, entirely present, irreversibly committed. He is constantly
with one hand on his emotional escape hatch, ready to bail out, to
absent himself, to re-invent his life in another place, with other
people. The narcissist is a coward, terrified of his true self and
protective of the deceit that is his new existence. He feels no
pain. He feels no love. He feels no life.

1 April 2002
Pathological Narcissism - A Dysfunction or a Blessing?
The narcissist's enhanced performance is predicated on the existence
of a challenge (real or imaginary) and of an audience. Baumeister
usefully re-affirmed this linkage, known to theoreticians since
Freud.

14 March 2002
Narcissistic Routines
The behaviour of the narcissist is regulated by a series of routines
developed by rote learning and by repetitive patterns of experience.
The narcissist finds change extremely distasteful and unsettling. He
is a creature of habit. The function of these routines is to reduce
his anxiety by transforming a hostile and arbitrary world into a
hospitable and manageable one.

1 March 2002
The Opaque Mirror
I keep getting surprised when confronted with reality. My feelings
are hurt, my narcissism injured, my self esteem shaken, my rage
provoked.

10 February 2002
For the Love of God
God is everything the narcissist ever wants to be: omnipotent,
omniscient, omnipresent, admired, much discussed, and awe inspiring.
God is the narcissist's wet dream, his ultimate grandiose fantasy.
But God comes handy in other ways as well.

1 February 2002
Trauma and Abuse
Trauma is not always the result of abuse, of course. We are
traumatized by mishaps, setbacks, disasters, and death. Trauma
always entails grief and bereavement. Whether abuse translates to
trauma depends, to a large extent, on the intricate interaction
between victim and society.

10 January 2002
The Delusional Way Out
The narcissist resorts to self-delusion. Unable to completely ignore
contrarian opinion and data - he transmutes them. Unable to face the
dismal failure that he is, the narcissist partially withdraws from
reality. To soothe and salve the pain of disillusionment, he
administers to his aching soul a mixture of lies, distortions, half-
truths and outlandish interpretations of events around him.

1 January 2002
A Holiday Grudge
In times like that, in holidays and birthdays, I am reminded of this
fundamental truth: my voluptuous, virulent, spiteful, hissing and
spitting grudge is all I have. Those who threaten to take it away
from me - with their love, affection, compassion, or care - are my
mortal enemies indeed.

31 December 2001
Ideas of Reference
The narcissist is the centre of the world. He is not merely the
centre of HIS world - as far as he can tell, he is the centre of THE
world.

12 December 2001
The Silver Pieces of the Narcissist
Antagonizing and alienating my potential benefactors is a pleasure
that I cannot afford on an empty purse. When impoverished, I am
altruism embodied - the best of friends, the most caring of tutors,
a benevolent guide, a lover of humanity, and a fierce fighter
against narcissism, sadism, and abuse in all their myriad forms. I
adhere, I obey, I succumb, I agree wholeheartedly, I praise,
condone, idolize, and applaud. I am the perfect audience, an admirer
and an adulator, a worm and an amoeba - spineless, adaptable in
form, slithery flexibility itself. To behave so is unbearable for a
narcissist, hence my addiction to money (really, to freedom) in all
its forms. It is my evolutionary ladder from slime to the sublime -
to mastery.

"The World of the Narcissist" (January 2005)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_ESSAY


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/61-80

"Excerpts from the Archives of the Narcissism List"

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_EXCERPTS

Articles 61 - 80

1 December 2001
The Selfish Gene - The Genetic Underpinnings of Narcissism
Is pathological narcissism the outcome of inherited traits - or the
sad result of abusive and traumatizing upbringing? Or, maybe it is
the confluence of both? It is a common occurrence, after all, that,
in the same family, with the same set of parents and an identical
emotional environment - some siblings grow to be malignant
narcissists, while others are perfectly "normal". Surely, this
indicates a predisposition of some people to developing narcissism,
a part of one's genetic heritage.

14 November 2001
The Self-Deprecating Narcissist
I have a riotous, subtle, ironic, and sharpened sense of humour. I
can be self-deprecating and self-effacing. I do not recoil from
making my dilapidated ego the target of my own barbs. Yet, this is
true only when I have narcissistic supply aplenty. Narcissistic
supply - attention, adulation, admiration, applause, fame,
celebrity, notoriety - neuter the sting of my self-directed jokes.
In my more humorous moments I can present myself as the opposite of
what is widely known to be true. I can unfold a tale of fatuous
decisions followed by clumsy misbehaviour - yet, no one would take
me to be fatuous or clumsy. It is as though my reputation protects
me from the brunt of my own jocular modesty. I can afford to be
magnanimously forgiving of my own shortcomings because they are so
outweighed by my gifts and by my widely known achievements or
traits.

2 November 2001
Conspicuous Existence
Small wonder the narcissist is tired. His exhaustion is all-
pervasive and all-consuming. His mental energy depleted, the
narcissist can hardly empathize with others, love, or experience
emotions. "Conspicuous existence" malignantly replaces "real
existence". The myriad, ambivalent, forms of life are supplanted by
the single obsession-compulsion of being seen, being observed, being
reflected, being by proxy, through the gaze of others. The
narcissist ceases to exist when not in company. His being fades when
not discerned. Yet, he is unable to return the favour. He is a
captive, oblivious to everything but his preoccupation. Emptied from
within, devoured by his urge, the narcissist blindly stumbles from
one relationship to another, from one warm body to the next, forever
in search of that elusive creature - himself.

14 October 2001
It is My World, Who are You?
I belong. I am a narcissist. And you? You are deviants. You have mal-
adapted to my brave new world. The world of the Narcissist.

1 October 2001
Beware the Children
I see in children feigned innocence, relentless and ruthless
manipulation, the cunning of the weak. They are ageless. Their
narcissism is disarming in its directness, in its cruel and absolute
lack of empathy. They demand with insistence, punish absent-
mindedly, idealize and devalue capriciously.

15 September 2001
Studying My Death
I wouldn't mind to see it go. But I resent the farewell price -
those protracted, bilious, and bloody agonies we call "passing
away". Afflicted by death - I wish it only to be inflicted as
painlessly and swiftly as possible. I wish to die as I have lived -
detached, oblivious, absent minded, apathetic, and on my terms.

3 September 2001
The Weapon of Language
In the the narcissist's surrealistic world, even language is
pathologized. It mutates into a weapon of self defence, a verbal
fortification, a medium without a message, replacing words with
duplicitous and ambiguous vocables.

18 August 2001
Other People's Pain
The narcissist inflicts pain and abuse on others. He devalues
sources of supply, callously and off-handedly abandons them, and
discards people, places, partnerships, and friendships
unhesitatingly. Some narcissists - though by no means the majority -
actually ENJOY abusing, taunting, tormenting, and freakishly
controlling others ("gaslighting"). But most of them do these things
absentmindedly, automatically, and, often, even without good reason.

1 August 2001
Physique Dysmorphique
For most of my childhood and adolescence I believed that I had an
enormous, elephantine skull. I didn't. Actually, I am told that my
head is unusually small in comparison to my body. This is especially
true after I put on another 20 kilos in weight.

1 August 2001
Being There
My life is not a thread, it is a patchwork of chance encounters,
haphazard exams, and the drug of narcissistic supply consumed. I
feel like a series of still frames, somehow improperly animated. I
know the audience is there. I crave their adulation. I try to reach
out, to break the mould of the album of photographs that I became -
to no avail. I am trapped in there forever. And if none of you
chooses to inspect my image at a given moment, I fade, in sepia
colours. Until I am no longer.

18 July 2001
The Disappearance of the Witnesses
I live through others. I inhabit their memories of me. Bits and
pieces of Sam are strewn across continents, among hundreds of casual
acquaintances, friends, lovers, teachers, admirers, and despisers. I
exist by reflection. This is the essence of secondary narcissistic
supply - the secure knowledge that I am replicated in the minds of
many. I want to be remembered because without being remembered I am
not. I need to be discussed because I have no being except as a
topic of discussion.

4 July 2001
The Ubiquitous Narcissist
The narcissist feels omnipresent, all-pervasive, the prime mover and
shaker, the cause of all things. Hence his constant projection of
his own traits, fears, behaviour patterns, beliefs, and plans onto
others. The narcissist is firmly convinced that he is the generator
of other people's emotions, that they depend on him for their well-
being, that without him their lives will crumble into gray
mediocrity. He regards himself as the most important part in the
life of his nearest and dearest. To avoid painful contradictions
with reality, the narcissist aims to micromanage and control his
human environment.

23 June 2001
No One Counts to Ten
I am devoid of energy. I am denuded of defences. I stumble. I get
up. I stumble again. Floored, no one bothers to count to ten. I know
I will revive. I know I will survive. I just don't know what for.

3 June 2001
The Malignant Optimism of the Abused
People refuse to believe that some questions are unsolvable, some
diseases incurable, some disasters inevitable. They see a sign of
hope in every fluctuation. They read meaning and patterns into every
random occurrence, utterance, or slip. They are deceived by their
own pressing need to believe in the ultimate victory of good over
evil, health over sickness, order over disorder. Life appears
otherwise so meaningless, so unjust and so arbitrary... So, they
impose upon it a design, progress, aims, and paths. This is magical
thinking.

21 May 2001
That Thing between a Man and a Woman...
Most narcissists go through schizoid phases in their inexorable
orbits of gloom and mania. Sometimes the schizoid prevails. A
narcissist that is also a schizoid is an unnatural hybrid, a
chimera, a shattered personality. The push and pull, the approach
and the avoidance, the compulsive search for the drugs that only
humans can provide and the no less compulsive urge to avoid them
altogether... it is a sorry sight. The narcissist shrivels and
withers as the battle is prolonged. He becomes almost psychotic at
the tug of war inside him. Alienated even from his False Self by his
schizoid disorder, such a narcissist is turned into a gaping black
hole, out to suck the vitality of those around him.

7 May 2001
The Ghost in the Machine
In my mind, I am not human. I am a machine at the service of a
madman that snatched my body and invaded my being when I was very
young. Imagine the terror I live with, the horror of having an alien
within your own self. A shell, a nothingness, I keep producing
articles at an ever accelerating pace. I write maniacally, unable to
cease, unable to eat, or sleep, or bathe, or enjoy. I am possessed
by me. Where does one find refuge if one's very abode, one very soul
is compromised and dominated by one's mortal enemy - oneself?

6 May 2001
Narcissists, Violence and Abuse - Orientation Article
The narcissist has conflicting needs. On the one hand, he derives
his sense of self-worth and the regulation of his self-esteem from
others. On the other hand, he needs to feel superior and
contemptuous towards the very sources of his sustenance. Hence his
erratic unpredictability, callousness, cruelty and dangerous
capriciousness.

23 April 2001
I Cannot Forgive
I home in on the chinks in their laboriously constructed armours. I
spot their Achilles hill and attach to it. I prick the gasbags that
most people are. I deflate them. I force them to confront their
finiteness and helplessness and mediocrity. I negate their sense of
uniqueness. I reduce them to proportion and provide them with a
perspective. I do so cruelly and abrasively and sadistically and
lethally efficiently. I have no compassion. And I prey on their
vulnerabilities, however microscopic, however well-concealed.

2 April 2001
Pseudologica Fantastica
Pseudologica Fantastica is the compulsive need to lie consistently
and about everything, however inconsequential - even if it yields no
benefits to the liar. I am not that bad. But when I want to impress -
  I lie.

4 March 2001
Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hide
Narcissists are either cerebral or somatic. In other words, they
either generate their narcissistic supply by applying their bodies
or by applying their minds. The somatic narcissist flaunts his
sexual conquests, parades his possessions, exhibits his muscles,
brags about his physical aesthetics or sexual prowess or exploits,
is often a health freak and a hypochondriac. The cerebral narcissist
is a know-it-all, haughty and intelligent "computer". He uses his
awesome intelligence, or knowledge (real or pretended) to secure
adoration, adulation and admiration.

"Diary of a Narcissist" (January 2005)

http://www.ccnow.com/cgi-local/cart.cgi?vaksam_JOURNAL


http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/81-100



Articles 81 - 100

23 February 2001
The Discontinuous Narcissist
"But you hate kiwi!" - protests my girl - "How can anyone detest
kiwi and then eat it so eagerly?". She is baffled. She is hurt. To
some extent, she is even frightened to find herself with this kiwi-
guzzling stranger.

10 February 2001
The Green Eyed Narcissist
I am constantly envious of people. This is my way of interacting
with the world. I begrudge others their success, or brilliance, or
happiness, or good fortune. I am driven to excesses of paranoia and
guilt and fear that subside only after I "act out" or punish myself.
It is a vicious cycle in which I am entrapped.

28 January 2001
The Lonely Narcissist
The narcissistic landscape is fraught with contradictions. The
Narcissist depends on people - but hates and despises them. He wants
to control them unconditionally - but is also looking to punish
himself savagely. He is terrified of persecution ("persecutory
delusions") - but seek the company of his own "persecutors"
compulsively. The narcissist is the victim of incompatible inner
dynamics, ruled by numerous vicious circles, pushed and pulled
simultaneously by irresistible forces.

18 January 2001
The Sad Dreams of The Narcissist
Perhaps I choose narcissism, as I have been "accused". And if I do,
it is a rational choice of self-preservation and survival. The
paradox is that being a self-loathing narcissist may be the only act
of self-love I have ever committed.

6 January 2001
Why I Write Poetry
They say, with a knowing smile: "If he is really a narcissist - how
come he writes such beautiful poetry?". "Words are the sounds of
emotions" - they add - "and he claims to have none". They are smug
and comfortable in their well classified world, my doubters.

26 December 2000
The Happiness of Others
I spent this Christmas consumed by a paranoid delusion. They were
after me, I knew it. The persecutory images overwhelmed me. I had no
one to talk to. None of those I so gleefully abused, so mercilessly
exposed, so sadistically tormented and so meticulously avoided would
communicate with me any further. I finally entered the terminal
phase of narcissism: excruciating social isolation, the result of
schizoid, paranoid and sado-masochistic behaviours.

15 December 2000
The Narcissist in Love
The narcissist is emotionally attached to only one thing: his
disorder. The narcissist loves his disorder, desires it
passionately, cultivates it tenderly, is proud of its "achievements"
(and in my case, makes a living off it). His emotions are
misdirected. Where normal people love others and empathize with
them, the narcissist loves his False Self and identifies with it to
the exclusion of all else - his True Self included.

30 November 2000
A Great Admiration
To paraphrase what Henry James' once said of Louisa May Alcott, my
experience of genius is small but my admiration for it is,
nevertheless, great. When I visited the "Figarohaus" in Vienna -
where Mozart lived and worked for two crucial years - I experienced
a great fatigue, the sort that comes with HASHLAMA. In the presence
of real genius, I slumped into a chair and listened for one listless
hour to its fruits: symphonies, the divine Requiem, arias, a
cornucopia.

18 November 2000
When Victims Become Narcissists
Many people here - and on my mailing lists - adopt the role of a
professional victim. In doing so, they become self-centred, devoid
of empathy and, abusive and exploitative. In other words, they
become narcissists. The role of "professional victims" - ones whose
existence and very identity is defined solely and entirely by their
victimhood - is well researched in victimology. It doesn't make for
a nice reading. These victim "pros" are often more cruel, vengeful,
vitriolic, discompassionate and violent than their abuser. They make
a career of it. They identify with this role to the exclusion of all
else. It is a danger to be avoided. And this is precisely what I
called "Narcissistic Contagion" or "Narcissism by Proxy".

12 November 2000
The Anxiety of Boredom
I find myself most worried when I am bored. It goes like this: I am
aggressive. I channel my aggression and internalise it. I experience
my bottled wrath as boredom. I am bored. I feel threatened by it in
a vague, mysterious way. Anxiety ensues. I rush to construct an
intellectual edifice to accommodate all these primitive emotions and
their transubstantiations. I identify reasons, causes, effects and
possibilities in the outer world. I build scenarios. I spin
narratives. I feel no more anxiety. I know the enemy (or so I
think). And now I am worried. Or paranoid.

1 November 2000
The Split Narcissist
The Narcissist is our first encounter with carbon-based artificial
intelligence. Many wish it were the last.

13 October 2000
Wasted Lives
I think a lot about the desultory waste that is my biography. Ask
anyone who shared a life with a narcissist, or knew one and they are
likely to sigh: "What a waste". Waste of potential, waste of
opportunities, waste of emotions, a wasteland of arid addiction and
futile pursuit.

27 September 2000
The Entitlement of Routine
I hate routine. When I find myself doing the same things over and
over again, I get depressed. I oversleep, over-eat, over-drink and,
in general, engage in addictive, impulsive and compulsive
behaviours. This is my way of re-introducing risk and excitement
into what I (emotionally) perceive to be a barren life.

8 September 2000
Grandiosity Deconstructed
Sometimes I find myself bemused (though rarely amused) by my own
grandiosity. Not by my fantasies - they are common to many "normal
people". It is healthy to daydream and fantasize. It is the
antechamber of life and its circumstances. It is a process of
preparing for eventualities, embellished and decorated. No, I am
talking about feeling grandiose.

9 August 2000
I Love to be Hated
The persecution of the narcissist IS his uniqueness. He must be
different, for better or for worse. The streak of paranoia embedded
in him, makes the outcome inevitable. He is in constant conflict
with lesser beings: his spouse, his shrink, his boss, his
colleagues. Forced to stoop to their intellectual level, the
narcissist feels like Gulliver: a giant strapped by Lilliputians.
His life is a constant struggle against the self-contented
mediocrity of his surroundings. This is his fate which he accepts,
though never stoically. It is a calling, a mission and a recurrence
in his stormy life.

24 July 2000
The Glass House of the Narcissist
The Narcissist MUST control his environment - human and physical.
His (mental) life depends on it. His sources of supply depend on it.
His sanity depends on it. He cannot afford to lose control.

13 July 2000
The Music of My Emotions
Narcissists can feel - but their emotions are negative and reactive.
I feel sad, hate, anger. Above all, I feel envy.

29 June 2000
The Magic of My Thinking
Magical thinking - I believe that I am immune to the outcomes of my
own actions, that I shall always prevail, that good things will
always happen to me.

19 June 2000
Looking for a Family
The narcissist does not want to recreate the source of his own
disorder - his family. The echoes of his own sad childhood warn him
against having children. He remembers the abuse and hurt too
vividly. A string of broken relationships and a landscape of
emotional waste - constitute both the narcissist's past and his
future.

9 June 2000
Narcissist, the Machine
To be a narcissist is to lie to yourself constantly, to hide the
fact that you are lying to yourself from yourself and to conceal
this hiding mechanism as well. It is to feel superior and to treat
others as instruments.



http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/npd/101-103



Articles 101 - 103

26 May 2000
My Woman and I
No woman has ever wanted to have a child with me. It is very
telling. Women have children even with incarcerated murderers. I
know because I have been to jail with these people. But no woman has
ever felt the urge to perpetuate US - the we-ness of she and I.

12 May 2000
How I "Became" a Narcissist
A narcissist realizes that he is one usually only after a severe
life crisis and a narcissistic injury.

21 April 2000
Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited
What is narcissism - rather, what is pathological narcissism? And
why is it important to learn about it?

Two new articles - click on the links:

Domestic Violence Shelters

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/116825

How Victims are Affected by Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/116826


LIST OF ARTICLES ABOUT ABUSE in my three topic areas

VERBAL AND EMOTIONAL ABUSE

Articles by Sam Vaknin

What is Abuse?

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/110026

Intimacy and Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/108355

The Gradations of Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/101393

The Guilt of the Abused - Pathologizing the Victim

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/101953

Coping with Your Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/102151

The Abuser in Denial

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/102519

Avoiding Your Abuser - The Submissive Posture

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/103326

Avoiding Your Abuser - The Conflictive Posture

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/103895

How to Spot an Abuser on Your First Date

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/104161

The Abuser's Body Language

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/104415

The Path to Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/104898

Ambient Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/105821

Abuse by Proxy

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/106364

Leveraging the Children

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/107024

Tell Your Children the Truth

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/107670

The Relief of Being Abandoned

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/109284

How to Cope with Your Paranoid Ex

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/110544

Avoiding Your Paranoid Ex

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/111292

The Three Forms of Closure

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/111451

Coping with Stalking and Stalkers

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/113235

Coping with Stalking and Stalkers - Getting Help

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/113906

Domestic Violence Shelters

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/9128/116825

Articles by Laura Wilkinson

http://www.suite101.com/articles.cfm/verbal_emotional_abuse

SPOUSAL ABUSE and DOMESTIC VIOLENCE

Danse Macabre - The Dynamics of Spousal Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/spousal_domestic_abuse/101460

The Mind of the Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/101757

Condoning Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/102112

The Anomaly of Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/102629

Reconditioning Your Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/103325

Reforming the Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/104000

Contracting with Your Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/104159

Your Abuser in Therapy

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/104429

Testing the Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/104900

Conning the System

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/105820

Befriending the System

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/106363

Working with Professionals

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/107025

Interacting with Your Abuser

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/107671

Coping with Your Stalker

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/109287

Statistics of Abuse and Stalking

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/110025

The Stalker as Antisocial Bully

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/110543

Coping with Various Types of Stalkers

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/111291

The Erotomaniac Stalker

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/111878

Coping with Various Types of Stalkers - The Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/113236

Coping with Various Types of Stalkers - The Psychopath (Antisocial)

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/113905

How Victims are Affected by Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/18046/116826

NARCISSISTIC PERSONALITY DISORDER (Narcissistic Abuse)

Frequently Asked Questions about Abusive Relationships with
Narcissists

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/faq1.html

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/indexqa.html

The Intermittent Explosive Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/113234

Dr. Watson and Mr. Hastings - The Narcissist and His Friends

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/111450

The Enigma of Normal People

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/110683

The Gullible Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/110024

The Misanthropic Altruist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/109040

Back to La-la Land

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/107786

The Cult of the Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/107809

The Narcissist - From Abuse to Suicide - Part I

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/6514/107114

The Two Loves of the Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/102824

Abusing the Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/101693

The Cyber Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/101392

Narcissism, Substance Abuse, and Reckless Behaviors

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/101146

Narcissism and Evil

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/100724

The Adrenaline Junkie

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/99584

The Psychology of Torture

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/98124

The Psychology of Serial and Mass Killers

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/95690

The Labours of the Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/91841

Transformations of Aggression

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/91044

For the Love of God

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/89115

Trauma and Abuse

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/88487

A Holiday Grudge

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/87094

It is My World, Who are You?

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/81535

Beware the Children

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/80494

The Weapon of Language

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/77822

Other People's Pain

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/76632

The Malignant Optimism of the Abused

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/68862

Narcissists, Violence and Abuse - Orientation Article

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/49236

I Cannot Forgive

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/65193

Pseudologica Fantastica

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/63886

Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hide

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/62072

The Happiness of Others

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/55909

When Victims Become Narcissists (MODIFIED)

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/52776

I Love to be Hated

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/43815

The Glass House of the Narcissist

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/npd/42842

=========================================

Based on my book "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"

(c) 2005 Lidija Rangelovska Narcissus Publications

http://www.narcissistic-abuse.com/thebook.html
===================================