← The Little Shaman: On Narcissists & Toxic Personalities
The Little Shaman: On Narcissists & Toxic Personalities
Episode 263: Narcissists Have No True Self (THIS Is What They Have Instead)
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Hey everybody, it's Shaman Sister Sin, and you are listening to the Meditations and More podcast here on the little shaman.com brought to you by Trans Relational Healing, shamanspiritcenter.com and littleshaman.org that's me, the little shaman. Today, I wanted to talk to you about something that is often not understood very well regarding pathologically narcissistic people, and that is that those who are truly pathological have no true self to speak of. Not in the way that we think of that phrase. The phrase true self in the context of pathological narcissism is a little bit of a misnomer, and it can create an impression about the structure of the narcissistic personality that doesn't really appear to be correct. To say that a narcissist has a true self can lead to the impression that there is in fact a whole and fully formed identity in the narcissistic personality structure, and that this is being intentionally hidden, the way that wearing a Halloween mask intentionally hides a person's true and fully formed face. That's not really what's going on with narcissists, although it's often how it ends up in a way. So I thought we could talk about that for a little while. To be clear, narcissists do wear masks after a fashion, a disguise, so to speak. But that's not really because they're hiding a true self. The disguise is meant to function as a true self. It's not like wearing a mask to hide your true face. In other words, it's more like wearing a mask because you don't have a true face. It's like wearing a mask instead of a face. This is one of the reasons narcissists are such good, superficial mimics. For example, when you don't have a true face, it's much easier to put on the face of somebody else. The lack of a stable, cohesive identity in the narcissistic personality structure is what is responsible for this phenomenon. A person's true self is their actual identity, who they really are, underneath all of the social and whatever other identities and roles that they inhabit. Most people have a different sort of face that they present publicly. Nothing so drastically different from who they truly are, of course, but most people behave differently, for example, around people they just met versus people they have known for years, or at the public library versus in their own home. It's not about being phony or pretending to be somebody other than you are. It's just that most people need to feel comfortable Enough to relax and be more of themselves. Again, most people's public face is not much different from their private face. When there is a big difference, that is when we tend to see more problems in a personality. Why? Because human identity needs to be stable and cohesive in order to function correctly. It isn't supposed to be fragmented and compartmentalized into multiple different parts and Personas. If it is, that usually indicates problems with that personality. The more separation that there is here, the more drastic the difference is, the bigger the issues tend to be in that particular personality. An extreme example of this would be dissociative identity disorder, which we used to call multiple personality disorder, where we see multiple, separate disconnected personalities in the same body. In the case of pathologically narcissistic personalities, not only are these parts and Personas markedly, sometimes significantly, separated and different, there is no concrete connecting thread that runs through them that would create cohesion, stability, or any real sense of identity. Narcissists are like water, but not in the Bruce Lee sense of existing in harmony with your environment while still remaining separately and authentically yourself. Narcissists are like water in the sense that they absorb their environment and then mimic whatever is around them in order to try to fit in. They attempt to become the environment because they lack a stable identity. Therefore, they take the shape of whatever container they happen to be in because they have no shape of their own. Because of their constant mimicry, and because they often display compartmentalized parts or Personas. The Jekyll and Hyde presentation, as we often refer to it here on the show, many people believe narcissists have more than one personality or identity. They think that narcissists have dissociative identity disorder. They don't. In point of fact, they don't even have one real personality or identity, let alone many. But because these parts appear so different from each other, with people often reporting that the narcissist in their lives even looks different during these shifts, it's easy to see why people make that mistake. The reality is that the different parts of a narcissist personality are so compartmentalized from each other that they can appear to be incompatible in the same personality. They're not because of the way, pathologically narcissistic personalities are structured. But it can certainly look that way to someone with an integrated personality structure. Barring that assessment, the multiple personality assessment, and because these parts compartmentalize mainly along black and white binaries such as good and bad, people often believe that the narcissist is intentionally hiding their bad side, and that the bad side is actually their true self. The reality is actually both much more complex and much simpler than that. The number one defense mechanism used by narcissists is denial. We see this in virtually all of their behavior in some way. Denial of reality, denial of who they are, denial of who you are, denial of impact, of awareness of everything. This binary compartmentalization of their bad qualities is really just another example of denial. They don't like these things, so they try to psychologically and emotionally ignore them, to banish them. These are not usually actions or anything as concrete as that. These are more things like anger, jealousy, fear, vulnerability, shame. Anything they perceive as a negative emotion or state of being that would make them uncomfortable. Because denying things doesn't make them go away. These things, of course, do not stay banished. And because the narcissist ignores, avoids, and denies their existence, they exist completely unchecked. This results in tsunamis of these emotions whenever they come, because they've never really been addressed in any way. The narcissist has never learned how to address or regulate them at all. Their response to these things is to ignore and deny them. That's why they tend to deny the existence of these things, even when it's really obvious. I'm not angry. As if you somehow misunderstood being screamed at for four hours. That's also why these so often show up as uncontrollable rages and tantrums. This person has never learned how to deal with or control them in any way. So they're gigantic. They just take over. Remember, too, that even if the narcissist in your life expresses these things in a cold way versus in a hot way, it's still what it is. Passive aggression is. Is still aggression. Someone who gives you the silent treatment for weeks or tries to destroy your reputation to other people behind your back is acting outrage. Don't ever mistake that for anything else, no matter how it comes out. These things absolutely are aggressions toward other people. Because these negative emotions and things are compartmentalized so completely away from most of the other things in the narcissist's limited framework of understanding about themselves. Whenever these things show up, they can be shocking. They transform the narcissist into what seems like a different person in the face of this tidal wave of emotion. A lot of times, whatever limited ability a narcissist might have to engage in rational thinking is essentially obliterated. They are pure emotions screaming itself out into your face in some way or another. This is when any person is at the most dangerous. And narcissists are no exception to that. Especially because this can not only show up just out of a clear blue sky, but it's showing up in a person who was never even suspected, expected of anything remotely resembling what people are now seeing from them. It's shocking, it's scary, it's confusing. And because it's all of these things and more, we attempt to make sense out of it the only way that we can. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde cannot possibly be the same person. Simply not possible that these things coexist in the same personality. Therefore, one of them is fake. And why would anybody pretend to be a raving, abusive lunatic? This means the bad side is the true self, right? You would think so, and many people do. But it's only because they are starting with the assumption that there's a whole true identity here in the first place. In people who are truly, pathologically narcissistic. There isn't. The reality is that Dr. Jekyll is Mr. Hyde, and neither of them are the narcissist's true self. They are both masks in their own way. The bad side is arguably even less of a real personality than other things that you might see from this person. Often it is literally just raw emotion with a voice. It is the screaming ego of a primitive personality that cannot regulate itself because it's too immature. That's not to say that narcissists are not intentionally hurtful and sneaky and liars and all the rest. They absolutely are. But these things don't indicate an identity. They're just collections of behaviors grouped together in categories of good or bad. The good side of them is what they've cobbled together as an image of who they would like to be or think that they need to be. The bad side is all of their perceived bad qualities. Bad experiences, bad emotions locked in a closet that's about to explode open any second because everything in there is so huge and so out of control. Both of these things, the good side and the bad side, exist as a reaction to the fact that this person has no true self. If they had a stable identity, there would not be a need for such strict and rigid compartmentalization in the first place. The fact that they have flaws or negative qualities or negative emotions or negative anything would not be so overwhelming for them. This is why they need narcissistic supply. As we have discussed in other episodes, what's actually being supplied to the narcissist is a self image, an identity. They see themselves through the Eyes of other people. And this is how they're able to experience themselves. If they had an identity, if they had a so called true self in the way that we mean that when we say it, they would not need that reflection from other people. That's why they need supply and why their personality generally experiences collapse if they can't get it. Without some kind of identity, a human personality cannot function. Your identity grounds you in reality in the world. Imagine if you woke up and you didn't know who or what you were. How scary would that be? What would life feel like now? Imagine that you're in that state all the time for your entire life. You have never known who you are because there is no you. All you have are the things other people think or say that you are. You only exist as an image in other people's minds. If that were true, you would be looking for yourself in the face of every person that you see. And that's what narcissists are doing. This is something that we see in very small children. They have no real self concept or identity and they have no ability to create any self worth. They rely solely on input and reflections from caregivers to form these things. If the caregiver is loving and treats the baby as if the baby is very important, if they give a reflection that the baby is good, for lack of a better word, the baby starts to form a positive image and opinion of itself. If a caregiver is inconsistent or even neglectful and abusive, if they treat the baby, if the reflection they give is that the baby is not important, the baby does not matter is if the baby is bad, again, for lack of a better word, the baby starts to form a negative image and opinion of itself. This is exactly what narcissistic supply does for adults who are pathologically narcissistic. Their self concept and self worth is completely reliant on external input, on input from other people. This is why not receiving the reflection that they're looking for is so traumatizing for them and why it results in the reactions that it does. This is why they're willing to harm or betray people in order to get that. For example, if your narcissistic significant other does not like the reflection of themselves that they're getting from you because of the way that they have treated you and the way that you now see them, they may very well go somewhere else to find a better one. This could be done by finding another person to flirt with or sleep with so that they can see themselves as a good desirable person through somebody else's eyes. Or it could be accomplished by telling other people that you are actually the abuser or the whatever, so that they can see themselves as the victim through another person's eyes. That is what all of this is about, how they need to see themselves. You are being used here and so is anybody else who gets dragged into it. In the absence of a true self or an identity, narcissists have an idealized image of themselves instead. And narcissistic supply is about finding people who can be convinced to believe in that image enough that they will behave toward the narcissist as if it's real. Then the narcissist can believe in it too. Then they can live it. It's very simple. The narcissist has a false image of themselves in their mind. It's not an actual identity, but it functions in a similar way because it's the way that they need to see themselves in the world in order for their fragile house of cards type of self reference framework to function. It starts with that one dimensional identity image. I am this, therefore this and this and this are true. For example, I'm a victim, therefore nothing is my fault and I will always be the priority for everybody. Or I'm a genius, therefore I'm never wrong and other people will always defer to me. This one dimensional image and the usually stereotypical role that accompanies that is the linchpin which holds all this other stuff together. It is the narcissist global justification and it's the only lens through which they can really understand the world. Which highlights quite a few humongous problems right there, by the way. But it's not enough to just say these things. Anybody can say that they're anything. There has to be some kind of validation that this is actually true. Otherwise it's just not. Since narcissists cannot actually be the thing that they think they need to be with any consistency or stability, that's where you come in. You and all the other people that a narcissist interacts with. When you react to this image as if it's real, when you interact with the narcissist as if this false image is really who they are. When you validate that they actually are a victim or a genius or whatever, you make that image real for them. You are reflecting back to them this false idealized image of themselves. Now it's not just a false idealized image. Now this is who they really are because someone believes it. Someone interacts with them as if it's a fact, as if that's who they really are. Finally, now everything makes sense for them, and everything lines up the way that they need it to line up. Validating that false image in turn, automatically validates all of the other things that that false image means. To the narcissist, I am this, therefore this and this and this are going to happen, or are true. This validated false identity makes narcissists feel as grounded as they ever can feel. And in that way, it functions in place of an actual identity. It doesn't function very well at all, but it's the best they can do. And even though it always fails eventually, they can live in this space for a time and feel almost stabilized, almost normal. This is partly the reason why they can seem to be doing so well. When they have a new relationship or a new job, or they move somewhere and they don't know anybody, they often seem to be functioning very well in those situations. At first, this is the crux of what they're trying to do. And they seem incapable of understanding that imagining or wishing or even pretending to be something can only go so far. If you're really not that thing, people are going to figure that out. This cannot be prevented. From afar, maybe people can be fooled, but up close, a person wearing a disguise just looks like a person wearing a disguise. They don't fool anybody. If narcissists just remain at a superficial arm's length, they may be somewhat successful at fooling others into believing the idealized image into reality. But they generally can't do that because most of them are so enamored by their own false ideas. Identity. The victim, the genius, the martyr, the hero that they want validation of that all the time. They want to live their dream. Identity. They have to come closer and closer and closer and get more and more and more. Until now the jig is up. Now you can see them up close, which means that you can see they are not who you thought they were. Like in the story of Icarus who flew too close to the sun on wings of wax and fell into the ocean and drowned. The narcissist is so entranced by the supply, the reflection they deceiving, that validates, essentially creates this idealized identity that they overreach, eventually exposing themselves and basically destroying the illusion that they want to live with their own childish greediness. This will happen to them over and over and over again with different people and in different scenarios, because their lack of a true self drives them to seek identity through other people. In this way, it always falls apart because it's false. It isn't enough to just make people believe something. Initially. Belief does not make things real. You can believe that you have a million dollars in the bank. That doesn't make it real. Because this is not a real identity and because this person does not have one, the whole production is doomed from the start. It's doomed from the very beginning. Once people see through the facade, narcissists feel extremely, even brutally betrayed by that. They thought they finally found somebody who would never let them down in this way, and now here you come, you did it anyway. There is no ability on their part to understand this is all their own fault, it's all their own doing. Ironically, they might even call you a liar or a phony, insisting that you misrepresented yourself or that you tricked them somehow. What has actually happened is that when you saw what they needed you to see, you were perfect in their eyes because their image was perfect in yours. Now you see them differently and they can't tolerate the reflection of themselves. It's traumatizing and excruciatingly painful. Once again, they can't see themselves. Once again they have to fight against the terrible, horrible, negative emotions that are just waiting in the wings, or worse, the truth of what they really are. Now you're a betrayer, now you're the enemy. Only the most evil or cruel or stupid or careless or whatever person on the planet would do something like that. The reality is they've done it to themselves. The absurd caricatures that most narcissists create as identity roles for themselves are so one dimensional and binary that nobody could ever live up to that. In real life. People are multifaceted and multidimensional. Even narcissists are multifaceted and multidimensional. But because they cannot integrate all of these things together in a cohesive image of themselves, this is what you get. A stilted, stereotypified, shallow, one dimensional Persona that operates along one directive or storyline and can't stand up to any scrutiny at all. Sometimes people ask, well, but why do all that? Why don't they just be the person that they think they need to be? And first of all, of course, the answer is because they're just not. But also, identity is not just about doing. Identity is about being. They try to do the doing and it doesn't work because they can't do the being. They lack the ability to really be anyone. To put it very simply, it's kind of like asking a person without a car why they're taking the bus when they could just drive. Or asking why a person with nowhere to live doesn't just go home. They don't because they can't. They would if they could, but they can't. So they have to do this instead. It's not a real identity. There are background bit part characters in second rate TV shows that have more depth and development than these binary one dimensional Persona images have. But it's the best they can do. It's important to remember too that even though in many ways the deceit here is intentional, it's also inherent to the process. In other words, this phenomenon is not something that narcissists are doing just because they want to do it. They do it because this is what their mind has to do in order to function. Because it doesn't have an actual identity. There is no true self. It has to try to find or make one somehow. And that's what this is. It's just as automatic as the way that your mind works. Us being able to understand or explain it to each other doesn't mean that narcissists learned it somewhere. Or they're putting out this step by step intentional program. This is just what they do, it's just how they work. And don't forget, you're not the only person they're trying to deceive. You're actually not even the main target of the deception here. The person who needs to believe in the false image of the narcissist is the narcissist. You're just a tool that they're using to be able to do that. A prop that makes the performance more believable. Your part here is important, but relatively speaking, it's pretty small. This is about them. You don't really matter very much at all in this equation. They could get the same thing from anybody. And really, once you get to know them even slightly better, once you start to see them even slightly more realistically, you actually cease to be a source of what they really need. The image of them in your mind is now tarnished. Therefore the way that they see themselves through your eyes is tarnished. And it cannot recover because you will never actually believe in that one dimensional Persona again. Ever. It's done for people with actual true selves. It's normal and healthy to get to know people better, to see more dimension to them, to get past any idealization to who they really are. For relationships with narcissists, this is a disaster, because there's nothing else there. The closer you look, the less you See, it's just so hard to believe that a lot of times people don't recognize it, even though it's actually blatant and almost like in your face. It's difficult for people to understand this level of fundamental deception. Most people understand lying, of course, but it's hard to understand an entire person being a lie, being a deception. Like, how can that be? This is part of why people often talk about, for example, seeing behind the mask of the narcissist. They want to believe that they saw something real. But did they? Can you see something real in an image where nothing is real? If you see behind a mask but all you saw was another mask, does that actually count for anything? Does it mean anything at all? People want to believe that there is a true self there because the alternative is that there's really nothing there at all. This can be hard for people to take, but it's important to understand because it helps us see what this really is. This person, whoever you think they are, is not really there. In many ways, the image you have of them in your head is all there really is to them as far as your relationship with them is concerned. That's why in different relationships, they can seem like a different person. A different image of them in someone else's head is now at play. If you don't believe that, push all of your images and projections aside and just look, just listen. Observe them objectively and see what you find. How much depth, how much dimension, how much authenticity, how much originality, how much anything do you actually see? The pathologically narcissistic personality is not a whole and complete elite person. In many respects, this person is essentially a cluster of intense emotions and fantasies that never concretize into anything real. Beyond that, it is you who has arranged them into something tangible. It is you who has believed them into something concrete. Stop doing that. Stop projecting, stop filling in the gaps. Stop expecting to see this or that. Stop looking for such and such. Just stop all of that and really look at what's actually there. You'll see it. I hope this clears a few things up for you. As always, I look forward to your comments, questions and suggestions. So please keep those coming. I take appointments online, over the phone, via text, via messenger, via email, through Skype, and through Zoom. So if you are interested in speaking with me one on one about, about this or anything else, you can visit littleshaman.org to do that. I have several books in publication and there are more on the way. So if you are interested in picking up a copy of any of those. You can visit littleshaman.org to do that, or you can find them on Amazon.com I teach workshops, seminars and clinics, so if you're interested in seeing what we're running this month, you can visit littleshaman.org to do that. And if you're interested in joining our support support group with access to exclusive content, weekly support meetings, and more, you can visit littleshaman.org to do that as well. You have been listening to the Meditations and more podcasts here on the little shaman.com brought to you by Translational Healing, shamanspiritcenter.com and little shaman.org that's me, little Shaman. May the Great Spirit bless you. Have a beautiful day.