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1.Grandiose false self At the core of the malignant narcissism syndrome is the individual’s creation of a grandiose false self in compensation for his unacceptable real self and as a way to cope with the external world. Like its namesake, the mythic Narcissus fell in love with his reflected image, the self that the narcissist loves is not his true self, but a counterfeit version that is superior and perfect. This is due to the self-loathing that is at the root of pathological narcissism . And so the narcissist rejects his real self and, instead, invests excessive love in an illusion. To call narcissists self-loving, therefore, is something of a misnomer because at the root of their narcissism is actually a kind of self-loathing. The paradox only seems, for it is his real self that the narcissist loathes, and it is his aggrandized and exalted fantasy self with which he is loves. The narcissist’s attachment to his grandiose false self accounts for the first three attributes in ...
The Greatest Show on Earth – the Narcissist’s façade or false self! The impenetrable wall behind that MASK and the rage that protects it! If you have ever tried to understand, empathize, or even help a Narcissist, you know it is futile because the closer you get to the truth or the heart of the ANY problem or matter at hand, the closer you get to things blowing up in your face and perhaps being raged at. The Narcissist doesn’t want their issues to be solved, they prefer to blame others for their problems – THEY HAVE NO ISSUES, you and I are the ones that have issues! No matter how viable or good your concern or solution may be, or how much unconditional love and support you offer - when you share it with a Narcissist, they will either dismiss it, find reasons why it doesn’t work or say the true problem lies elsewhere. It is their defense mechanism or denial as well as a diversion tactic. Blame energizes them and keeps them at a distance from the reality of their true issues. They ar...
A narcissist would tend to display the sadistic aspect of his personality in one of two cases: That the very acts of sadism generate Narcissistic Supply to be consumed by the narcissist ("I inflict pain, therefore I am superior and omnipotent"), or That the victims of his sadism are still his only or major Sources of Narcissistic Supply but are perceived by him to be intentionally frustrating and withholding. Sadistic acts are his way of punishing them for not being docile, obedient, admiring and adoring as he expects them to be in view of his uniqueness, cosmic significance, and special entitlement.
I am describing is a state of omnipotent self-sufficiency; the belief that one does not need anything from others , which is an illusion that may paradoxically deny an extreme dependency. Such people may not be able to freely give or receive affection; they may be truly isolated within their fortress so that they neither hear nor receive anything from the outside. Some of my patients describe themselves as being encased in a plastic bubble, a mummy case, or, as Sylvia Plath perceived it, a bell jar. As one penetrates further into this phenomenology, one learns that the illusion of self- sufficiency is reinforced by a magical belief that they occupy a protected sphere, removed from the dangers of the world, removed from the possibility of death, disease, and misfortune, that they are not "really in the world". In this sense they have achieved an illusion of invulnerability; they cannot be surprised, influenced, or controlled. The critic Lionel Trilling,...
The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment Published on March 21, 2010 If you are confused about your own people pleasing tendencies, need for external approval, and even your own feelings, I suggest you read The Narcissistic Family: Diagnosis and Treatment by Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman and Robert M. Pressman. In their work as therapists, the authors discovered an unusual trend - patients with traits similar to adult children of alcoholics, but no evidence that their parents were substance abusers. Moreover, many of the patients did not recall any overt abuse as children. So why then were these patients exhibiting the dysfunctional psychological, interpersonal, and work traits of abuse survivors? The answer was a different type of dysfunctional family. Coined by the authors as the narcissistic family , what these patients all had in common was that as children, the needs of their parents took precedence over their ne...
The dynamics of narcissism Narcissism and its pathologies are commonly tackled by the application of the various psychodynamic models. The mother-child bond According to these models, parents ("Primary Objects") and, more specifically, mothers are the first agents of socialization. It is through his mother that the child explores the most important questions, the answers to which will shape his entire life . How loved one is, how lovable, how independent can one become, how guilty one should feel for wanting to become autonomous, how predictable is the world, how much abuse should one expect in life and so on. The mother, to the infant, is not only an object of dependence (survival is at stake), love and adoration. It is a representation of the Universe itself. It is through her that the child first exercises his senses: the tactile, the olfactory, and the visual. Later on, she is the subject of his nascent sexual cravings (if the child is a male) - a diffuse se...