Are you a narcissist?

I'm too great to be a narrcissist.

Hey, Mark, all kidding aside, this term "narcissist" is used a LOT here in Los Angeles. Maybe too much. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given that Hollywood is ground zero for fantasy ego projections.

But it seems to me that people toss the term around quite liberally without thinking through the full meaning. Can you offer a definition of the term?

Your description above doesn't really provide much clarity. For instance, example #1 doesn't necessarily clarify what a narcissist is (or isn't). There are a lot of reasons why someone might blurt out an idea and thereby interrupt other people. I work in an office where that happens all the time, but I don't consider my colleagues narcissists. They have a lot of ideas. The interruptions are generally worthwhile, and they're always tolerable.

Likewise, I don't think it necessarily means someone is a narcissist if they take offense at getting interrupted. Sometimes, it's just plain rude to interrupt someone else. So getting offended is not such an unreasonable reaction.

In sum, I think it's a little facile to say that someone who reacts in a certain way is an a**hole or whatever. Depending upon the circumstances, the reactions might be perfectly reasonable.

Care to clarify?

RT

So if you don't like to be interrupted, you are a narcissist and an ******* and a *****?

Nobody likes to be interrupted. My point was that if you are someone who interrupts others frequently when they are talking or when they're thinking, but then react with hostility when they do it to you, you are living a double standard and are acting as if you're more important than others and as if others are less important than you.

True narcissists believe the world revolves around them. They haven't the capacity to empathize with others (this is KEY). Self-obsessed, self-involved, exaggerated sense of self-importance. Much like the myth of Narcissus, others exist to serve as mirrors to their "beauty" and "magnificence."

Criticize a narcissist and you'll be treated to a NARCISSISTIC RAGE episode (narcissistic injury). Entitled? You bet. The slightest personal inconvenience unleashes the hounds of hell. You've seen them in lines at the airport.

Narcissists use and manipulate others to get what they want. True narcissists don't see their behavior in this way. Others exist to serve. They are casually cruel and dishonest. They contradict themselves in the same breath, leaving others to feel like they're the crazy person. For example they say or do something hurtful and then deny they said or did it 5 minutes later. "But you just said. . ." "I don't know what you're talking about." Huh?

People can have narcissistic TRAITS and not have full on NPD (Narcissistic Personality Disorder). Other personality disorders (e.g., Borderline Personality Disorder, Anti-Social Personality Disorder) share many of the same symptom features.

It's an easy over-simplification to refer to someone who's behaving like an entitled jerk as a "narcissist," but are they really? Maybe they're having a bad day. Maybe they're going through a difficult time and they just suffered one indignity too many. To accurately diagnose someone as a narcissist, you need to observe them over time and in different situations.

http://www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/howto.html

Thank you Tara for supplying the steak to my sizzle as you always do. I appreciate the value added that you add.

And now for a little more sizzle. If you apply your explanation about narcissists and narcissistic rage, could this explain why people are often hesitant to blow the whistle on a narcissist in power (i.e. they have the power to use that rage to really hurt you) or as I like to describe it, declaring that: "The Emperor has no clothes, and no scruples."

Could this also explain why when someone does stand up to that narcissist and doesn't get destroyed, that others start to come out of the woodwork?

And might this explain why formerly pro-Clinton supporters have now started to "vote with their feet" according to their core values and now support Barack Obama, such as Bill Richardson and Robert Reich (and George Stephanopoulos several years back)?

Furthermore might this also explain why nations of the world are no longer hesitating to do whatever they want and risk the ire of the United States, now that the US has been defanged and declawed?

Maybe this comment should be a separate blog: Who are YOU afraid to stand up to?

Great comments Dr G & Tara,
I am interested in finding out what causes a person to be a narcissist. Do either of you provide some insight.
Also I used to work for one and the advice that my shrink gave me to deal with him was to visualize a large wound on his chest and be very thoughtful about what I said so I didn't set him off.

A little narcissism never hurt anybody...actually, I am not condoning people being jerks but rather promoting confidence. Also, there are narcissists all over the world, not just in Los Angeles! I encountered more when I went away to college in the South - way more than growing up here in L.A. Many of the egocentric people in this city moved here and are giving the rest of us a bad name. I run into kind, down-to-Earth, good people every day here - both transplants and natives. And let's not forget, Hollywood and entertainment are only a portion of what it's all about here - there is so much more to life!

I am all for confidence and having strong opinions, I am not for arrogance and being opinionated.
A narcissist needs to be right; a confident person wants to know what's right and then lets that be their true north.

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Amen!

Well put Dr. Mark! You say it with so much more eloquence than I!

Hello,

A good article, and the comments are even better. I would like to add a few more.

Actually, from what Nancy McWilliams writes in her book, it becomes evident that behind the confidence and arrogance of narcissic persons there lies deep unconscious fear because such people are vulnerable. Hollow as they are, they have no strong moral principles, which makes them look like young children doing whatever they please. Narcissism stems from corrupted upbringing, when parents treat their child not like a human being with personality, but rather like an object that should display certain behaviour to be socially acceptable. The child becomes an object put to display by his/her parents.

Soon the child learns that if he behaves in a certain way he earns his parents' gratitude and respect. However, he does not know or feel why he should behave so and so. This gives birth to a constant feeling of uncertainty and vulnerability.

Gradually the child stops thinking about it and understands that if he is dressed sharp, if he has an expensive car and holds himself like a prime minister, he will almost always win. Here I must note the difference between a narcissic personality and a healthy one. A narciss relies on the outer side of things, his judgments of people are not based on their character or personality, but rather on their looks.

This can be explained. A narcissic person was never taught to see people as human beings, to understand them and share the common morality.

The biggest problem with narcissic personality disorder is that it is very hard to see the hollowness inside such a person under his shell of superficial confidence. Such persons are very unbalanced, and their view of other people very distorted.

While I certainly do not pretend to be a specialist in NPD, I felt a strong urge to talk about it. Thank you guys.

Narcissists love Cleavland Steamers and Donkey Punching your mom too. Those bastards. Aargh.

yes