This is so different from most of the other channels on narcissism. I like that you don't make this disorder black or white. I like that you don't make narcissist evil. It's refreshing to listen to descriptions of these individuals that don't trigger me, as someone with a previous relationship with a covert type narcissist. Thank you for these discussions. They're really helpful.
When you get picked up by a true NPD, you'll be left in an asylum or destitute. The "real-deal" destroys completely. This Diamond person is entirely out of their depths.
@@tracylf5409 exactly....I barely made it out alive years ago. Sadly some people I know weren't that fortunate, suicide after being married to a narcissist, cutting themselves, completely losing their mind. The doctor gets paid by the patients ofcourse she will say it's treatable, same the lawyer will say he can win the case eventhough it's not true. The only ones who can be treatable are people who endured their abuse, and the knowledge that saved my life has to be even more widespread, there are no other defenses against them.
@@jelena7440 Anyone who says they can "treat" (ie, "heal or reverse") a true NPD is either an idiot or an outright, attention-seeking liar. These so-called "experts" pile more damage onto the targets and do NOTHING to help anyone, least of all the remorseless, soul-sucking perpetrators. I'm a healthily-skeptical person and even I was fooled/blind-sided by my ex. What I've learned: NPD's lie as others breathe. They have no actual emotions, other than the unrepentant, self-serving rage of a toddler. They cry the loudest at a funeral because they are keen observers-- NOT because they understand sadness--> they do NOT have actual feelings. Worse, they "assume" that everyone is like them, so to treat an NPD with kindness only makes them angry and suspicious. Their targets are there to supply them with adulation and nothing more. They are paranoid, shallow, weak, lying, conniving, manipulative, scene-causing, stage-setters. And they do it all as easily as others breathe. They isolate, triangulate, and then present as the face of reason to those outside of what becomes the parasitic "relationship". They are dangerous freaks and spending time trying to "figure them out" is pointless and does an extreme disservice to all of us who have barely made it out with our minds/bodies intact. Here's a great website, and the one that saved me: www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/ I hope it's a help to others.
@@tracylf5409 thank you for the link, I will definitely read it. And thank you for putting it in so clear and so many words of what we are dealing with. I can understand the people who turn to these doctors who say they have the cure when they have narcissistic children, evil children, sadly they are milking them for every penny and making things worse. It's like we were living in matrix and finally unplugged ourselves from the machines ( narcissist).
@@jelena7440 Whenever I see someone actively enabling or supporting (in no matter how small a way) an NPD, I have to think they're working for one. Or, will be. Narcissism is NOT NPD.
This explains why pathologically narcissistic people seem to "pick" friends and partners who have a lot of really good qualities and values, and then they mirror having all of those good qualities and values even though they don't, in general, really behave in their day to day life like they have those qualities and values.
Bingo And then they begin to mistreat, devalue and discard the person with those values that they desperately want. They realise they cannot just consume your qualities and it makes them hate you. I had a couples therapist tell me that my ex is jealous of my qualities and wishes he could be me and do the things I do. Like having autonomy and boundaries. Being able to say no and seperate and differentiate myself from others. Needless to say it went downhill the more I exhibited those qualities. He idealised me as someone he wanted to be and then tried to consume me. When he couldn't and realised that's my person, my individual self, he hated me for it and began to abuse and devalue me. These people cannot be helped.
Excellent video. Ideas that spoke to me- 1:08 without an INTEGRATED SENSE OF IDENTITY and stable self concept you aren’t able to invest deeply in relationships. Relationships will remain superficial. People are there to prop up your grandiosity (fragile ego). She says the other people might ‘fill in for the vulnerability’. I don’t understand this. Narcissists confuse admiration with love ❤️
What Diana said at the end is super interesting about seeing others as an extension of themselves. This is why a lot of narcissists have a view of others that is basically one dimensional, that everyones needs and wants are the same thing, and anyone who wants something else is viewed as crazy or mental or even bad. An example would be if that particular person with NPD was very money oriented and motivated, someone who was just happy with working a low paying job that they really enjoy doing is seen as "lazy", "stupid" etc. They can't comprehend that someone wants something different in life than they want. This is where the breakdown in empathy comes into play, because unless another person has lost something that the narcissist values, they don't understand how the person can be hurt, because "everyone is the same" in their minds.
Wow. The facial expressions stuff. My spouse had run me crazy with what I considered as “mind reading” it was nearly always inaccurate, but he was so sensitive to any microscopic change in facial expressions. I became obsessed with trying to figure out what I must’ve been doing to Him. I recorded myself, tried to learn about micro expressions/body language, drove my therapist crazy I’m sure lol I could have the faintest furrowed brow because I’m concentrating on what he is saying or working through it and he would melt down. Accuse me of all these thoughts and feelings and derail the conversation. But he could laugh at me, mock me, verbally abuse me and I needed to have a straight face! The idea of this as projection never occurred to me. It makes so much sense. I always thought it was more about maybe strong reaction to a facial expression that a family member may have had or something. But this makes more sense imo. He projected everything else!
To make it even more confusing, narcissists themselves are known to project, coerce others into pathological projective identification, and use facial expressions of their own to gesticulate rather than verbalise in order to avoid accountability. There is an apparent risk of misattribution in this situation.
As layman I want to write that when Professor Diamond described the contents of healthy narcissism I could instantly checkmark them all as mental ”contents”/traits that people that suffer from narcissism can not mirror, mark or understand in relationships. In a relationship with a narcissist or as a member in a dysfunctional family - with cluster B-organized parents or siblings - you can not expect healthy narcisissm to be acknowledged because no one knows what healthy narcissism is.
Want to add. How do one know that a narcissist can not mirror, mark or understand what is normal or healthy narcissism? Because one experiences in a relationship the constant and chronic denial of what is normal or healthy and the person suffering from narcissism can not see what is being lost because they do not see any value in it.
I heard Sam Vaknin explain why they don't see other people as actual other, existing outside of themselves.. something to do with having no self; you have to have an ego, a self to be able to distinguish yourself in the world and others. The narcissist doesn't have an ego; he is selfless that's why "other" doesn't exist. Ironically this is the goal of spiritual traditions but in actuality something which is highly dysfunctional and non-human
@@juicylucy6488 it's not my theory. It's psychological development theory. If the child can't individuate i.o.w. become a separate and fully functional 'person' in it's own right/mind and body it can't have a self; the ego must be there (it is developed over time) to give you a sense of self so that you can know who you are and that implies also that you know what and who you are not. If there is no functional ego a person cannot interact with her/himself and can not interact with objects (people are objects according to the object relations theory). You have to interact with people and the world outside to develop a self...
this is very interesting, I have narcissistic traits for sure, maybe even disorder (my therapist hasn't confirmed it yet). and I am also a cult survivor, I was brought up there
The self and other point is very interesting. Perhaps this could be why they don't respect other people's boundaries, and also could somehow be related to why narcissists seem to support other narcissists.
So does this kind of mean when you get to the end of a relationship like I did recently and went from a bubbly energetic positive soul to kneeling by her bedside saying I didn’t want to be alive anymore then she discarded me so when you get to that point are they treating you like shit because they hate who they are and your almost reflecting their inner self when your in that state they melted you into ?
Oh men.... I was there fifteen years ago, I was 24 and I had no idea what narcissists were. She treated you like shit because at the end they hate us for not being perfect person they thought we are. Four stages Love bombing, Idealisation, Devaluation and Discard. Don't take it personally they do it with everyone. What you have is a trauma bond, it's breakable but it takes time.
The part about healthy narcissism is so true and I think its become a big misunderstanding of what NPD is. While someone who actually is very successful (lets say an Olympic Gold medalist) brags about their success and talks grandiosely, is often annoying and seen as a lack of humbleness, its not NPD. They are just overconfident. NPD is the person who is 55, living in their parents basement with no job and a high school diploma and is saying how they are going to be the next CEO of Apple.
Just like the famous painting. They see their reflection. I guess without access to another's humanity there is a blank space in others faces. They choose a reflection over the nothingness. People's faces are their humanity. They literally are in the way of themselves. Do all humans have some kind of blind spot in self awareness or is this highly indicative of narcissism I wonder.
Self awareness is in many ways a skill that needs to be taught. A lot of people don't get taught how to self reflect, and you don't need to be a narcissist to have that issue.
Yes, this happens. Particularly in toddlerhood narcissistic personalities. But isn’t it treatable? Please reply, Dr. Can’t they be counselled that you and others are different personalities. So patience and empathy are very critical role in good relations.
I could have sympathy for a narcissist having not been sucked in by several of them. From a distance, it looks like a very sad and unfortunate condition. The problem is the damage that they end up doing to others is over the line of sympathy that most people are able to have. If we have sympathy for this pattern, we will only end up getting sucked in to their delusions. It becomes a real conundrum about how on Earth to treat them (and of course I would love to hear good news that NPD can be treated and successfully cured), however I don't see much evidence for that. I'd love to see what latest clinical developments there actually have been in recent years and how that treatment is implemented.
::: There are a few possibilities floating around that don’t require years of therapy... maybe the NPD can be deprogrammed by immersing them in a real time survivor style situation?
@@dallimamma You know, that's probably not a bad idea. A situation where they are forced to develop gratitude. There was a program that I had heard of growing up called 'outward bound', which was supposedly a wilderness survival program designed for delinquent teenagers. It was said to have a fair amount of success, so maybe something like that for adult narcissists could be developed. (shrug)
@Eva Cuche I don't think you are correctly assessing my conclusion, though I'm not sure I was making anything other than a casual observation, not a specific diagnosis or a specific course of action to dealing with them.
This is so different from most of the other channels on narcissism. I like that you don't make this disorder black or white. I like that you don't make narcissist evil. It's refreshing to listen to descriptions of these individuals that don't trigger me, as someone with a previous relationship with a covert type narcissist. Thank you for these discussions. They're really helpful.
When you get picked up by a true NPD, you'll be left in an asylum or destitute. The "real-deal" destroys completely. This Diamond person is entirely out of their depths.
@@tracylf5409 exactly....I barely made it out alive years ago. Sadly some people I know weren't that fortunate, suicide after being married to a narcissist, cutting themselves, completely losing their mind. The doctor gets paid by the patients ofcourse she will say it's treatable, same the lawyer will say he can win the case eventhough it's not true. The only ones who can be treatable are people who endured their abuse, and the knowledge that saved my life has to be even more widespread, there are no other defenses against them.
@@jelena7440 Anyone who says they can "treat" (ie, "heal or reverse") a true NPD is either an idiot or an outright, attention-seeking liar. These so-called "experts" pile more damage onto the targets and do NOTHING to help anyone, least of all the remorseless, soul-sucking perpetrators. I'm a healthily-skeptical person and even I was fooled/blind-sided by my ex.
What I've learned: NPD's lie as others breathe. They have no actual emotions, other than the unrepentant, self-serving rage of a toddler. They cry the loudest at a funeral because they are keen observers-- NOT because they understand sadness--> they do NOT have actual feelings. Worse, they "assume" that everyone is like them, so to treat an NPD with kindness only makes them angry and suspicious. Their targets are there to supply them with adulation and nothing more. They are paranoid, shallow, weak, lying, conniving, manipulative, scene-causing, stage-setters. And they do it all as easily as others breathe. They isolate, triangulate, and then present as the face of reason to those outside of what becomes the parasitic "relationship".
They are dangerous freaks and spending time trying to "figure them out" is pointless and does an extreme disservice to all of us who have barely made it out with our minds/bodies intact. Here's a great website, and the one that saved me: www.halcyon.com/jmashmun/npd/
I hope it's a help to others.
@@tracylf5409 thank you for the link, I will definitely read it. And thank you for putting it in so clear and so many words of what we are dealing with. I can understand the people who turn to these doctors who say they have the cure when they have narcissistic children, evil children, sadly they are milking them for every penny and making things worse. It's like we were living in matrix and finally unplugged ourselves from the machines ( narcissist).
@@jelena7440 Whenever I see someone actively enabling or supporting (in no matter how small a way) an NPD, I have to think they're working for one. Or, will be. Narcissism is NOT NPD.
This explains why pathologically narcissistic people seem to "pick" friends and partners who have a lot of really good qualities and values, and then they mirror having all of those good qualities and values even though they don't, in general, really behave in their day to day life like they have those qualities and values.
Bingo
And then they begin to mistreat, devalue and discard the person with those values that they desperately want. They realise they cannot just consume your qualities and it makes them hate you. I had a couples therapist tell me that my ex is jealous of my qualities and wishes he could be me and do the things I do. Like having autonomy and boundaries. Being able to say no and seperate and differentiate myself from others. Needless to say it went downhill the more I exhibited those qualities. He idealised me as someone he wanted to be and then tried to consume me. When he couldn't and realised that's my person, my individual self, he hated me for it and began to abuse and devalue me. These people cannot be helped.
This channel keeps getting more and more fascinating.
By far the best information on cluster b personality disorders is given on this channel. Thanks so much.
i love that she has notes
Don't leave home without them. -P
Excellent video.
Ideas that spoke to me-
1:08 without an INTEGRATED SENSE OF IDENTITY and stable self concept you aren’t able to invest deeply in relationships. Relationships will remain superficial. People are there to prop up your grandiosity (fragile ego). She says the other people might ‘fill in for the vulnerability’. I don’t understand this.
Narcissists confuse admiration with love ❤️
Yes! Seeing other as self is the trapped narcissist’s understanding of empathy
Very gently explains some core truths .glad to see this channel .thanks for posting
Ahhhh, this makes sense.
Absolutely fascinating
What Diana said at the end is super interesting about seeing others as an extension of themselves. This is why a lot of narcissists have a view of others that is basically one dimensional, that everyones needs and wants are the same thing, and anyone who wants something else is viewed as crazy or mental or even bad. An example would be if that particular person with NPD was very money oriented and motivated, someone who was just happy with working a low paying job that they really enjoy doing is seen as "lazy", "stupid" etc. They can't comprehend that someone wants something different in life than they want. This is where the breakdown in empathy comes into play, because unless another person has lost something that the narcissist values, they don't understand how the person can be hurt, because "everyone is the same" in their minds.
I love Dr. Diamond--she's that giiiiiiiiirl!!!
This is profound. I'm learning about myself better and better each day from this channel. Thank you.
Wow. The facial expressions stuff. My spouse had run me crazy with what I considered as “mind reading” it was nearly always inaccurate, but he was so sensitive to any microscopic change in facial expressions. I became obsessed with trying to figure out what I must’ve been doing to Him. I recorded myself, tried to learn about micro expressions/body language, drove my therapist crazy I’m sure lol I could have the faintest furrowed brow because I’m concentrating on what he is saying or working through it and he would melt down. Accuse me of all these thoughts and feelings and derail the conversation. But he could laugh at me, mock me, verbally abuse me and I needed to have a straight face!
The idea of this as projection never occurred to me. It makes so much sense. I always thought it was more about maybe strong reaction to a facial expression that a family member may have had or something. But this makes more sense imo. He projected everything else!
Nope, that's a borderline tendency. They are extremely sensitive to changes in expression and regard even neutral faces as negative emoting.
@@ST-yc7uj thanks for your insight!
@@Mothermochi not mine exactly, they have a video of this as well
To make it even more confusing, narcissists themselves are known to project, coerce others into pathological projective identification, and use facial expressions of their own to gesticulate rather than verbalise in order to avoid accountability. There is an apparent risk of misattribution in this situation.
As layman I want to write that when Professor Diamond described the contents of healthy narcissism I could instantly checkmark them all as mental ”contents”/traits that people that suffer from narcissism can not mirror, mark or understand in relationships. In a relationship with a narcissist or as a member in a dysfunctional family - with cluster B-organized parents or siblings - you can not expect healthy narcisissm to be acknowledged because no one knows what healthy narcissism is.
Want to add. How do one know that a narcissist can not mirror, mark or understand what is normal or healthy narcissism? Because one experiences in a relationship the constant and chronic denial of what is normal or healthy and the person suffering from narcissism can not see what is being lost because they do not see any value in it.
Fascinating.
I heard Sam Vaknin explain why they don't see other people as actual other, existing outside of themselves.. something to do with having no self; you have to have an ego, a self to be able to distinguish yourself in the world and others. The narcissist doesn't have an ego; he is selfless that's why "other" doesn't exist. Ironically this is the goal of spiritual traditions but in actuality something which is highly dysfunctional and non-human
Not having an ego, leading them to being “selfless” that’s why others don’t exist.
Very interesting theory you have.
Hmm would you share more ?
@@juicylucy6488 it's not my theory. It's psychological development theory. If the child can't individuate i.o.w. become a separate and fully functional 'person' in it's own right/mind and body it can't have a self; the ego must be there (it is developed over time) to give you a sense of self so that you can know who you are and that implies also that you know what and who you are not. If there is no functional ego a person cannot interact with her/himself and can not interact with objects (people are objects according to the object relations theory). You have to interact with people and the world outside to develop a self...
@@Ss-zl1ru thank you for sharing. It helps me understand better.
@@retnosofyaniek678 you're welcome; Vaknin has a youtube channel if you want to know more.
this is very interesting, I have narcissistic traits for sure, maybe even disorder (my therapist hasn't confirmed it yet). and I am also a cult survivor, I was brought up there
Fascinating
The self and other point is very interesting. Perhaps this could be why they don't respect other people's boundaries, and also could somehow be related to why narcissists seem to support other narcissists.
Love Dr. Diamond. She's got a soothing but leadership like quality to her. I wish she was my psychologist..lol
This really makes sense.
So does this kind of mean when you get to the end of a relationship like I did recently and went from a bubbly energetic positive soul to kneeling by her bedside saying I didn’t want to be alive anymore then she discarded me so when you get to that point are they treating you like shit because they hate who they are and your almost reflecting their inner self when your in that state they melted you into ?
Oh men.... I was there fifteen years ago, I was 24 and I had no idea what narcissists were. She treated you like shit because at the end they hate us for not being perfect person they thought we are. Four stages Love bombing, Idealisation, Devaluation and Discard. Don't take it personally they do it with everyone. What you have is a trauma bond, it's breakable but it takes time.
The part about healthy narcissism is so true and I think its become a big misunderstanding of what NPD is. While someone who actually is very successful (lets say an Olympic Gold medalist) brags about their success and talks grandiosely, is often annoying and seen as a lack of humbleness, its not NPD. They are just overconfident. NPD is the person who is 55, living in their parents basement with no job and a high school diploma and is saying how they are going to be the next CEO of Apple.
Just like the famous painting. They see their reflection. I guess without access to another's humanity there is a blank space in others faces. They choose a reflection over the nothingness.
People's faces are their humanity.
They literally are in the way of themselves. Do all humans have some kind of blind spot in self awareness or is this highly indicative of narcissism I wonder.
Self awareness is in many ways a skill that needs to be taught. A lot of people don't get taught how to self reflect, and you don't need to be a narcissist to have that issue.
Yes, this happens. Particularly in toddlerhood narcissistic personalities. But isn’t it treatable? Please reply, Dr. Can’t they be counselled that you and others are different personalities. So patience and empathy are very critical role in good relations.
I could have sympathy for a narcissist having not been sucked in by several of them. From a distance, it looks like a very sad and unfortunate condition. The problem is the damage that they end up doing to others is over the line of sympathy that most people are able to have. If we have sympathy for this pattern, we will only end up getting sucked in to their delusions. It becomes a real conundrum about how on Earth to treat them (and of course I would love to hear good news that NPD can be treated and successfully cured), however I don't see much evidence for that. I'd love to see what latest clinical developments there actually have been in recent years and how that treatment is implemented.
::: There are a few possibilities floating around that don’t require years of therapy... maybe the NPD can be deprogrammed by immersing them in a real time survivor style situation?
@@dallimamma You know, that's probably not a bad idea. A situation where they are forced to develop gratitude. There was a program that I had heard of growing up called 'outward bound', which was supposedly a wilderness survival program designed for delinquent teenagers. It was said to have a fair amount of success, so maybe something like that for adult narcissists could be developed. (shrug)
@@billbirkett7166 ::: Yes, where the core of the human can triumph!
@Eva Cuche I don't think you are correctly assessing my conclusion, though I'm not sure I was making anything other than a casual observation, not a specific diagnosis or a specific course of action to dealing with them.
This is not easy for me to understand exactly
2:35 The myth of Narcissus.
Let’s get to the root…centralized currencies and cluster B psychology are one ☝️…..
She didn't have any trouble maintaining a relationship...with her ex-husband.
Has this woman ever actually lived with a narcissist?
DO UNTO OTHERS AS YOU WOULD HAVE DONE FOR YOU
Doesn't work if you lack self-respect.
I know she’s the professional, but her definition of narcissism is not accurate.
She’s one of the leading experts on the topic. I’m going to hedge a bet that she knows more about it than you.
Yeah, she's making money out of it.
This pissed me off. Narccisim is NOT healthy. This sounded like a BS load of word salad.
She has not lived with one. It’s purely academic.