Narcissism and Its Discontents | Ramani Durvasula | TEDxSedona

[Music] [Music] today I am going to talk about the most overused misunderstood problematic words of our time a phenomenon a word that is shaping all of our destinies that word is narcissism narcissism is a word that is being used to understand bad behavior everywhere in national leaders in heads of state heads of corporations fancy academic types athletes celebrities we actually no longer recoil at their grandiosity their entitlement and their incivility in fact too many people award them grudging admiration for their successes and that grants permission to everyone to replicate these abusive patterns of behavior with impunity now things got confusing when people started using narcissism as a clinical term it became a way of medicalizing bad behavior it's actually not a diagnostic term narcissistic personality disorder is a diagnosis but it's pretty rare because these folks don't show up to be diagnosed anyhow so narcissism is in fact a personality pattern it's a sort of way of relating to the world it's an adjective to describe their style much like you could describe someone as agreeable or stubborn or introverted some of these patterns are valued by society and others aren't and the fact is most people don't receive being called narcissistic as a compliment it's just however a descriptive term and no matter how much we turn our noses up at it paradoxically as a society we reward it dr. Alan Francis was one of the architects of the diagnosis of narcissistic personality disorder and he argues that we actually give badly behaved jerks and out when we call it a diagnosis if a person is a jerk then they're a jerk disliking a pattern of behavior doesn't make it a mental illness that so-called jerk has to be experiencing problems in their lives and for their narcissism to actually be considered a diagnosis so if we were to cobble together all the various things that make up narcissism we land on a very uncomfortable summit narcissism is comprised of certain pillars as I call them lack of empathy grandiosity entitlement superficiality admiration and validation seeking hypersensitivity rage and a tendency to manipulate and exploit people it's confusing because they're simultaneously under responsive they tend to be emotionally aloof cold and distant but then they're hyper responsive they have hair-trigger temper that set off like that when their fragile egos get threatened so narcissism however I believe is synonymous with pathological insecurity the key to understanding the narcissist is that they feel constantly unstable and empty their grandiosity is actually an immature defense against these threats to them their sense of self and they're desperate for the world to keep validating them on their good days they look happy they're great they're grandiose but on the bad days the facade crumbles quickly and we see disproportionate rage shame and vindictiveness I became interested in narcissism through a couple of different pathways but the most striking was the fact that more and more clients were coming into my office and talking about relationships in which their partners treated them with utter disregard indifference coldness they lacked empathy they would question their reality they would lie to them at times they were unfaithful they were inconsistent and no matter what they tried with their partner it didn't get better at the same time I started working with more narcissistic clients and would you know nothing we tried really made things better in fact they just remain difficult people and I don't think I'm not bad a therapist so it was clear that these relationships were being kept in place simultaneously by hope and fear hope that someday it would get better if they kept trying harder but fear that if they left these relationships they would be alone forever without partner or even without a mother and some of them had the fear that maybe this is as good as it gets the world has become more insecure and the reasons for that are varied galip's annual global emotions report said that in 2017 was the most miserable in about a decade the report indicated that sadness anger worry stress and physical pain were more frequently endorsed last year than in the ten years prior now Gallup speculated on a variety of reasons for this but let's pitfall for a minute could it be that this increase in misery could reflect the increase in insecurity incivility and tolerance of narcissism our world supports the increasing insecurity in our world and the platforms that capitalize on it such as consumerism have created optimal fertile ground for narcissism to incubate and proliferate when human value is driven entirely by external incentives such as success then qualities such as empathy do not have a fighting chance because we no longer value them and they're no longer valuable so why do we get pulled into these relationships we're not flocking to narcissism because we love emotional coldness or invalidation or shallow people we're drawn in because narcissism is seductive I call it the three C's of narcissism charm charisma and confidence that's not to say that all charming and charismatic people are narcissistic however we do know that these traits are so seductive that we get drawn in and they can blind us to the more venomous characteristics that are unfolding at the same time such as entitlement vindictiveness or lack of empathy so then once a person is in a relationship and it's uncomfortable and is painful why would they stay with a narcissist all of us are vulnerable to those narcissistic charms and in fact we may be rendered even more vulnerable to sticking around for the abuse by a narcissist if we originated from family systems in which the patterns of narcissism were normalized such as having a cold authoritarian distant invalidating or abusive parents our own insecurities render us vulnerable and also less able to climb out when the climate shifts from charm and charisma to invalidation and abuse most of us are great at giving second chances and second chances are in fact the accelerant for narcissism at all levels when we are in a narcissistic relationship we make excuses that's just how he is he didn't really mean that she means well ah that's just her culture and there's the rub that's how this infectious virus of being in any form of narcissistic relationship whether with an individual or a family or a company or a culture can slowly proliferate and take over most of us issue second chances with zeal our storytelling in our culture is immersed in tales of hope redemption and forgiveness and while that's all very healthy in the wrong hands hope and forgiveness may not represent an opportunity for growth or change or restoration but rather permission to just keep things going as they are because with narcissists forgiveness is interpreted as hey let's just keep the status quo have we created a world in which narcissism as a pattern as a personality is becoming necessary to succeed in the new world order this is where we hit a bit of a problematic divide the very qualities associated with material success are actually bad for our health because while these qualities may be festered and fostered by our cultures and our schools and our economies and our societies they are never going to be good for our close relationships and that doesn't just mean spouses and partners that means parents children siblings extended family friends colleagues narcissistic patterns undercut the core of what's necessary for healthy relationships those things include mutuality respect compassion patience genuineness honesty and trust things that are simply not possible with the system or a person which is narcissistic and it's in that intimate relationship space where we see the most profound impacts of a narcissist what did that be a spouse or a partner a relationship with a narcissist is a gradual indoctrination you slowly become inured to their lack of empathy though Tantrums their rage their insults and their entitlement their lies and their challenges to your reality they're insulting words slowly become your self-talk and before you know it your new mantra becomes I am not enough anyone who's had a narcissistic parent will acknowledge that it shaped the arc of their lives it instilled an insecurity in a chronic jousting at psychological windmills from an early age narcissistic parents leave a legacy including an inability to trust your own instincts to safely enter close relationships to trust your own abilities and a lifetime can be spent trying to gain the notice of the aloof detached and disconnected parent the proliferation of narcissism and leadership in our culture governments companies and world has made very difficult workplaces the narcissistic boss is the insecure tyrant these are workplaces ruled by fear and subterfuge abuse and vindictiveness deceit and slippery ethics and in the face of the me2 movement the top notes of narcissism pervaded all of the stories the entitled and untouchable tyrant pillaging the workforce and in most case with almost no consequences the most painful realization is that narcissistic patterns are just not that amenable to change at a minimum for any change to occur the narcissus has to recognize the harmful pattern of their behavior then they have to want to change it and then they have to put in the daily work of change there is a small number of cases where that kind of happened but under conditions of stress and frustration the usual issues of Rage will pop up the rubberband of personality returns to its usual shape and size the small changes that could be made may not be enough to make a close intimate relationship sustainable and if somebody is not willing to recognize that they need to make changes because they're hurting other people there's little likelihood they will make a change but there is a likelihood they will continue to blame other people the world or you for their bad behavior so that means that the only remaining strategies are to maintain your expectations and set boundaries not to try to change that person or waste hope on the possibility of change but to recognize that this is how it is and either accept it or slowly step away from it now this is very individual and it's not always possible if it's your parents or your child who's narcissistic you may not be willing to sever that tie finances culture children or love can make walking away from a marriage or a romantic relationship seemingly impossible and that's fine but managing expectations on this pattern can protect you from the downstream effects of this ongoing abuse and allow you to construct a more realistic reality sadly most of us put 90 percent of our hearts minds and souls into our most dysfunctional unhealthy invalidating relationships and save the little bit that's left for the people who are good and kind to us it's time we flip this skewed calculus and start giving the best of ourselves to our healthy and reciprocal relationships and really only give the bare minimum to the relationships that really aren't helping us grow perhaps that's a healthier way of negotiating these treacherous waters of narcissism without losing ourselves in the depths of self-doubt and self-criticism now this can be extended to our thinking about the world at large it can be small fixes such as turning off the polarizing discourses we hear and learning to measure our self-worth and the worth of others with new metrics of success authenticity compassion kindness and empathy we can learn to tend to our own gardens and not get pulled into hostile interactions that benefit no one so this begs a question can there be happy endings or narcissistic or tagging istic personalities and cultures are concerned I actually think there can be the greatest challenge about happy endings in real life is that they rarely look like the ones we crafted when we're young and it's easy to get stuck in our own old narratives people who come from narcissistic families may feel as though they missed out on having a parent who is an ally or a supporter even as they go into adulthood people who married narcissistic partners may find themselves mired in a nightmare of emotional abuse or simply finding that they're actually alone despite being married few people write stories of their lives that build in disappointment I have found that survivors of all kinds of narcissistic and antagonistic relationships actually can and do have happy endings they just don't look like they thought all of us are bigger than this epidemic of narcissism any of us can change that you are not enough narrative that still resonates we can repair it ourselves we can look at the entitled shenanigans of people who shriek don't you know who I am and realize that you don't give a damn about who they are where there are scars beautiful things actually can spring forth khalil gibran writes out of suffering have emerged the strongest Souls the most massive characters are seared with scars yes the world is in fact becoming more narcissistic and insecure don't let the global epidemic of incivility infect you inoculate yourself find your communities find common ground with other people instead of living in polarization practice kindness and empathy even when other people are not choose your friends and your romances with care every life story can be a miracle or a tragedy it just depends on how you write it these days with the world in such disarray anyone who is surviving with their empathy unbroken their hearts sound their integrity in place and theirs sense of humor intact is nothing short of dauntless pushing back on narcissism is a human rights issue all of us need to stop giving permission to narcissism and narcissists and start taking our lives our souls and our world back thank you [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 332,865

Rating: 4.9439487 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Humanities, Psychology, Relationships

Id: aHHWgG7dB6A

Length: 16min 21sec (981 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 28 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/brandnewismysoul]

Well, damn