PREFACE: I wanted to write the following article because Narcissism is a term that I feel is really overused - and used in a way that gives people the wrong impression about it... My experience with Narcissistic Personality Disorder comes from having lived with someone who suffered from the condition... and er... from working in the media... Where you won't be surprised to learn, it crops up here and there... Thanks a lot for reading!
Narcissism — often attributed to millenials, often slapped on the heads of middle aged men — this is a common insult of choice for all kinds of people, often from those aggrieved about the actions of another, but without any clear mode of retribution. The incessant misuse of this term has led to a misunderstanding of the condition so that many people, accused, are exactly what Narcissism isn’t.
In a way, Narcissism is the opposite of someone being selfish — it is instead, the complete obliteration of the self in pursuit of approval. It’s essentially a preoccupation with one’s acceptability to others or rather — one’s ability to impress them. If we could read the mind of Narcissus, as he gazes into the water — we’d discover that he isn’t viewing himself through his own eyes, but through the imagined eyes of his desired audience… “I love myself because I must be so beautiful to the others.” I don’t actually believe it’s the reflection of himself he falls in love with — but the false reflection he sees of a world in which he’s truly loved.
Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho — watches himself having sex because he wants a visual affirmation of the quality with which he hopes to enslave women — his sexuality is thus a perverse marriage of one, and in real life, some Narcissists are said to prefer masturbation to sex — because, I presume, this allows one to fully embody the approval and excitement of an imagined other, where the same is more difficult with a pesky real person…
So the Narcissist is really about other people. He doesn’t mind if he hurts them or helps them — but he wants to be wanted and enjoys that experience more than is usual. In the face of disapproval, he will tarry with those who accept him the most, whilst secretly disrespecting them for “being taken in” by his falsely projected persona. And in the complete absence of admirers, he will retreat fully from society and create in his mind an imagined audience to “live to”, be they online, within future generations, or perhaps even deceased friends and relatives.
Far from being self obsessed, he has no self, he has no needs — he only exists to himself through the lens of other people… He cannot imagine the freedom of lying out in the grass on a sunny afternoon without the framing of “what kind of person does this make me look like?” The Narcissist is the victim of a subtle kind of abuse, he has been raised to “be successful” in the eyes of others, rather than to experience joy for himself, on his own terms. He doesn’t necessarily know he’s a victim because he thinks that having no rooted identity is the common human experience — and increasingly, it is.
But like I say — “what you make, takes” — so that the greater the facade one feels one has to fabricate — the less room there is in the self for anything genuine to exist. And herein lies the paradox — that the Narcissist is essentially caught up, to the detriment of himself and others, in pursuit of the acceptance he’d like from these parties. Because the way he’s been brought up to seek approval is essentially convoluted, he can only achieve partial success from this teaching — and in fact often alienates the very people whose affection he’s attempting to cultivate. After all, true affection can’t really be cultivated — it either is or it isn’t…
Consider social media — who looks at a happy person on there and says “Oh, how wonderful, I’m really pleased he’s so successful” instead of “What a smug motherfucker. Let’s unfollow this bastard.”? And yet that same friend in real life, is endearingly real, as they talk about their challenges, alongside their successes. A Narcissist reads this and thinks “Great! I must cultivate the appearance of being vulnerable to win favour!” instead of — I must be genuinely vulnerable because it’s the price of true intimacy — and not just because it’s a way I could manipulate people into liking me.
Psychiatrists say — Narcissism can result from a childhood with too much or too little attention — and what I see as a catalyst, is an upbringing in which there was one clearly prescribed mode of gaining familial acceptance and any deviation from that was either condemned — or ignored, as though it wasn’t happening at all. Functioning parental love accepts a child unconditionally — and whilst parents try to regulate their child’s behaviour, their approval and protection of the infant should be a given. Well this is not so in many modern families — appearances are the unconscious priority — so that a child will be taken to a psychiatrist if they’re creating a scene… but ignored if they’re suffering quieter, fashionable or more commonplace types of mental illness that don’t threaten the family image.
Acceptance within a tribe is crucial to human survival at every stage of life and our primal desperation to tune into consensus reality is what makes for a cohesive community. BUT… With the inception of language, technology, and later capitalistic forces — false needs and desires have been introduced into this dynamic, creating an adaptive advantage for the Narcissist’s knack of adopting and perfecting an arbitrary set of preferred behaviours as one’s own defining traits. Therefore the selves we become today, often lack any biological reward structure — making our lives feel false and void of any true emotion. Nonetheless, a rejection of self, and an ignorance of one’s own genuine needs — is now being genetically selected for through the behaviour of those rejecting at the top (parents, CEOs, politicians) — and those whose modes of rejection, they’re curating, further down the chain (children, workers, creatives).
One reason an individual might struggle to defeat his or her Narcissism, is that to others, such an attempt will actually APPEAR Narcissistic, since the person will have to stop being solely interested in what’s popular, in pursuit of their actual self. To add to this, the narcissist’s experience of life has forged a network of synaptic pathways such that he gains neurological rewards for perfecting accepted behaviours. The result is that he will quite like the company of those who, like his parents, or like the parent culture, require him to embody an arbitrary set of traits before they offer acceptance — because it gives him a chance to pursue the thrill of reworking that cultivated approval. Those who like him for himself deprive him of that excitement, whilst those who like him for his talents, disgust him in their inability to see the real him. Those who hate him… well… they’re the ones who he knows, at least have the measure of his true significance…
Without awareness, he is destined to remain disassociated in sex, since what part of sex is actually for him — it’s simply a performance with which to impress… His genuine tastes in art and music will remain vague and mysterious… since what are art and music but different kinds of social currency? He’ll feel a kind of romantic affection in pursuit of those whose public image he finds agreeable to others — because what else really matters? On the plus side, he will excell beyond all expectation in his chosen profession, so intense is his need to impress — but for this, of course, he’ll make great sacrifices. There’s an artistry and intelligence to the way a narcissistic person paints his persona — in fact, a bit of Narcissism, is REQUIRED for a modern human’s success — but deep down it’s clear — too much success in this domain — will keep a person ill.
Stopping the cycle results in the loss of some approval — and accepting this is very difficult as it also means breaking — literally — the habit of a lifetime. It requires the kind of change that’s more akin to a complete reinvention as the former Narcissist rebuilds and rediscovers the healthy pathways to bio-chemical feelings of contentment. I have a close friend who was officially diagnosed with the condition as a teenager — and some years ago, we worked together to find his true likes and dislikes in a process that was a bit like an adult relearning to walk and talk after a brain injury. In short, it’s an absolute fucking ‘mare, mate — and yet with the profit driven evolution of increasingly false norms — we’re pushing this onto an ENTIRE GENERATION!
Narcissism to me… and I know it well, from the inside and out… is a full blown emotional disability… A radical narrowing of focus and even perception — to that which potentially benefits a person’s social status. You see it in comedy shows where people share their therapy sessions with the audience so as not to waste the material, merely on their own recovery. You see it in this blog — I just try to use mine as responsbily as I can. Narcissism tars the roads and builds the bridges — it drives many men to genuine greatness — to some extent we all have it. But it’s also extremely short sighted — and grasps depserately for survival within an environment, wrongly perceived as hostile — and this comes at the expense of personal fulfilment in the more comfortable reality of life.
When you see the wall of posters at an arts festival, and they’re pictures of young, vibrant people — who society should adore, simply for being so innocent and enthusiastic and energetic about life — but who are instead advertising themselves in the way they’d like you to like them — you can see, we’re imposing this condition onto the next generation. And in the world of entertainment — critics also tend to give them a score out of five to reinforce the validity of this unending pursuit. Like the likes, like the thumbs up, like the subscribers, like the views, like the followers.
So what will adulthood be like for the youngsters born into this popularity panopticon? With its media and social media and blogs and vlogs and tinder and grinder and everyone being taught that they need to lead a cult of personality? Well I don’t think they’ll have feelings, essentially. There’ll be no selves for these nippers and no capacity for individual pleasure — their lives will be about artifice, self delusion, conformity and pretension. Because that’s what we’re teaching — not how to live fully, but how to pretend…