The childhood origins of narcissism

this is Apple saad clinical psychologist at viral mind psychology here in Sydney Australia and this is the third video that I am recording on the topic of narcissism in our first video we described the psychology that are the pins narcissism in our second video we talked about the underlying passion or emotion that fuels narcissism and in this video I will be discussing the childhood origins of narcissism before I continue a shout out to the everyone that subscribed and everyone that's commented and that's engaged with the videos so far thank you very much I really appreciate your your engagement I appreciate your feedback and it gives me even more motivation to continue to produce content which is hopefully going to be helpful in in understanding various aspects relating to psychology mental health and in future videos also the link between mental health and nutrition which is one of my interests but back to the topic of narcissism as I said in this video I'm going to be talking about the childhood origins of narcissism and to focus our attention on the topic we have to recap that narcissism is fundamentally a pathology of the self the narcissistic individual experiences themselves in a pathological way in a way that is highly polarized between either grandiosity on one end of the spectrum and on the other end a total worthlessness greatness or defectiveness so there's this split in the narcissist and we've talked about how various defenses various ways of projecting various ways of devaluing others around them helps keep the narcissist afloat in their grandiose sense of self so narcissism fundamentally is a pathology of the self and the reason why that's important for understanding the the childhood origins of narcissism is because the sent the human sense of self our sense of self my sense of self develops through our earliest relationships with our primary caregivers in the first few years of life that's usually the mother in most cultures and secondarily the father so or the mother and father unit in the first few years of life so if the sense of self develops in our earliest relationships with our primary caregivers in our formative years and if narcissism is a pathology of the self then it follows that something has gone wrong for the narcissist in their earliest relationships in their experience of attack what we would call attachment to their primary caregivers and of course attachment is a huge topic in psychology it covers so many aspects it's got importance for psychotherapy importance for understanding trauma even for understanding physical illness an attachment is a hardwired biological drive to form a secure bond with our primary caregivers usually without a parents the first companies of life it is primarily the mother attachment is hardwired and one of the reasons we we know this is that for example babies are hardwired to respond to faces versus to other stimuli that don't resemble faces they naturally orient toward faces we know that the brain is a social organ unlike any other organ the brain can't just function by getting the right nutrients so if we if a baby is born and it and it gets a meticulous diet of all the amino acids and the vitamins and the minerals but doesn't get any touch it doesn't get any play doesn't get affection doesn't get the the the the the spontaneity of another of the parent interacting with it that that child will have profound deficits in their brain development so the brain as a social organ and brain development and self-development interact so to understand where things go wrong in the typical scenario for the narcissist in terms of their childhood it's important to first understand how good enough or normal parenting operates so in non narcissistic parenting a sort of parenting that is protective against narcissism in the offspring there is a sense of or a sense of wonder a sense of unconditional positive regard toward the infant so for a non narcissistic parent the the attitude to what the infant is one of a wonder of or vie I really can't get to a really can't wait to get to meet you to know you to see you grow to see you fulfill your dreams and ambitions and to support you unconditionally in to love you unconditionally while at the same time obviously imposing appropriate boundaries and limitations but never losing that unconditional positive regard and this this sort of attitude in parents pretty much guarantees protection against narcissism so for narcissistic personality disorder to develop usually there have been great violations to this optimal parenting mode that I've just described there's been a great deviation from that and I'm now going to go into what that parenting style sort of looks like and how it operates so the now the narcissistic the narcissistic parent of the narcissist invariably produces narcissistic children because the narcissist relates to his or her child as an extension of themselves I'll come back to the point that I made in my first video what that means is that the child is not seen for who they are but the child is seen for what they can do for the parent how they can fulfill the parents dreams how they can comfort the parent how they can help the parent regulate their own emotions so the child's natural self expression is stifled in exchange for what the parent demands or wants of the child in there's two main ways that this occurs the the first main way is that that the the child is put down the child is repeatedly put down in their expression of themselves so their feelings their emotions if they if they if they manifest a weakness a vulnerability that is crushed that is humiliated that is invalidated or that is ignored so the the child does not actually get any accurate mirroring or echoing of their internal mental state and they're given a message that what you think what you feel your your vulnerabilities are unimportant to me or they distress me they make me feel anxious they upset me I do not want you to express these things because for the narcissistic parent the child is a product for the parents consumption and the parent is very easily taken off track by the child's spontaneous expression so the first way that children are injured narcissistically which predisposes them to develop a narcissistic personality structure or disorder is through their spontaneous self-expression being humiliated rejected or ignored or all of the above the the second way that that produces a narcissistic injury in the child that predisposes them to become narcissist themselves is that the child is idealized the child is put up on a pedestal the child is excessively praised but for very specific attributes for very specific things that the child can which provides the parent with a sense of esteem with a sense of gratification so the child may be pushed for example to learn a musical instrument or they're praised for their athletic ability or their ability to be a star or for their physical attractiveness and the the the narcissistic parent selectively praises and values this aspect of the child because the child is an extension of themselves so this creates this feeds into the narcissistic need for self-aggrandizement for greatness the child has become an extension of themselves and those parts of the child that aren't so great in the parents eyes the vulnerability the tears the Tantrums the the the failures that children sometimes go through are dealt with either very harshly and the child is humiliated or put down or the child is ignored so in both of these combinations of parenting styles either a humiliation rejection or ignoring or a excessive praise and admiration the child learns that in order for me to get my parents affection the affection of my primary caregiver I need to be the in a sense this false self that my parents want me to be all right so I have to manifest these qualities that make my parents feel good and make them give me praise and give me some sort of love so the child begins to disavow a disconnect themselves from those parts of themselves that the parent either ignores or humiliates the vulnerability the sadness the more tender emotions because these in a way get these get in the way of the narcissistic parent right these do not provide the narcissistic parent with gratification so the child learns and they learn is very quickly because children are hardwired as I said to attach to their primary caregivers the child very quickly learns to disavow to disconnect to divorce themselves from those aspects of themselves which the parent has given the message directly or indirectly though those parts of you are weak as parts of you make me feel bad about me those parts of you I do not want you to express and this creates the classic split within the narcissist between grandiosity and worthlessness so the grandiose aspects are the parts that are praised that are given excessive attention and admiration and the part that a beautiful asar the part of the self that the parent could not or would not accurately mirror and reflect back to the child because they create a discomfort in the parent so the child becomes attached to the false self as a way to desperately cling on to some semblance of an attachment to the parent because they become highly attuned to the parents moods to the parents validation to the parents acceptance of them so they they begin to amplify magnify those aspects of themselves that can gain is gain them as theme in the eyes of their parents and disavow and divorce and cut themselves off from those parts of themselves that interfere with that attachment and those parts of themselves that interfere are the parts that we need to grow into healthy human beings those parts that express our vulnerability those parts that express disappointment those parts of us that help us regulate our emotions when or when we are upset are all very difficult for the narcissistic parent to tolerate to soothe and to mirror back to the child so the child can develop their own capacities to regulate their emotions and understand themselves so some of the ways that this can work here you know there's various manifestations of narcissistic parenting styles but the basic idea is that the child the narcissistic the child who is injured narcissistically is used in some way by the parent and I've given one example already can manifest as the child being used for a quality or a talent they have which the parent uses to amplify their own ego so the child has to disavow everything else about themselves and focus on that talent they have to gain esteem the child maybe narcissistically wounded because they were they were used by the parent because the child was particularly emotionally attuned or sensitive so a role reversal occurs where a parent may for example overburden a young child with lots of explicit details about their marital problems they may poison their minds against the other parent and the child almost becomes like a counselor or a soother or a comforter to the parent you know this classic role reversal or parental ocation is another example of a narcissistic parenting style and at times you know often if the child does not comply with the narcissistic parents explicit and implicit demands that they make of the child that the parent you know may may tantrum may withdraw may reject Mayhew Millie ate the child so there are very strong incentives for a child in their formative years to become attuned to what the parent wants them to be and to become that product for their parents consumption now depending on on how the narcissistic parent style manifests whether it's more about devaluing and putting down the child or it's more to do with putting up on a pedestal or in some occasions if both parents are narcissistic one parent might do the inflating the other parent may become envious of the child under the deflating it can become incredibly complex and this can lead to various manifestations of narcissism into adulthood so I hope in in this video I'm just looking at the time it's almost 15 minutes I've given you a sense of the sort of parenting style that lays the the framework for the dysfunction within the narcissism narcissistic personality and one of the best ways to understand that is to really focus on focus and understand how normal what we call good enough parenting works which is a major protector against the development of narcissistic personality disorder where the parent has the capacity to hold the child to comfort the child the parent has the capacity to put their own needs to one side and if there are needs that they need met they get the met in an adult way not through their children whereas for the narcissistic parent the child is is in a way used to meet the parents own needs and this is the core childhood origin genesis of the narcissistic personality of course once we understand this we can perhaps begin to have some semblance of empathy for narcissistic individuals now that doesn't mean that we're not aware of the damage that they can inflict but it does help humanize this pathology versus seeing it as some genetic or sort of alien condition that people somehow acquire it is a disorder of the self it is a pathology of the self and it has its roots in our earliest attachment experiences that have gone incredibly wrong thanks very much for watching don't forget to subscribe leave more comments feel free to share the videos with family with friends if they're of interest I think as promised one more video coming up on narcissism in terms of practical strategies for dealing with narcissus for protecting ourselves against narcissists and we will then perhaps move on to some other topics thank you very much for your comments thank you for subscribing keep in touch and I will do my best to continue to upload one video weekly take care bye bye

Channel: Vital Mind Psychology

Views: 727,803

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Length: 16min 57sec (1017 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 06 2016