The Narcissus You Know

Dissecting and dismissing narcissism (yours too)

Ever met someone who only looks at you with a smug face as if he’s constantly repeating in his head “I’m better than you, I’m better than you, I’m better than you because of X reason”?

You know the narcissistic specimen… the perpetually raised eyebrow type who feels no need to reciprocate a smile, who looks down on you without even looking at you, who takes himself a tad too seriously, who expects you to take them more seriously than they take you; and if you don’t take them more seriously than they take you — or if you don’t blatantly admire them as much as they delude themselves they deserve to be admired — then they take your equal treatment as as insult, because this is how entitled they are: They demand you to respect them more than they respect you, since their delusion of self-worth has to be nurtured by everyone else too, regularly.

It’s this reliance on constant, cheap, and meaningless external validation from impressionable nobodies that reveals the narcissist’s hopeless, desperate insecurity. This desperate need to constantly one-up everyone, otherwise they will retreat into their default state of self-loathing.

This is the mentality of the needy conqueror, the loathsome, tormented soul that cannot create anything out of self-hatred; it must only crush others, lest it crush itself.

If you don’t show admiration to narcissists, their subconscious voice of realism creeps back up to the conscious surface, and that cognitive dissonance produces panic and hate toward you for daring to do this to them, for forcing them to doubt themselves. This is what happens to those who lack conviction in their self-worth.

This is how desperately they need constant approval. This is how insecure narcissists are.

The cheap approval granted by their faux, pretend-confidence is the drug that keeps them from facing their inadequacies. And just like any drug, they need more and more of it, and hate anyone who denies it to them.

Psychodynamics of narcissism

There’s a mantra narcissists must constantly repeat in their minds so they can keep deluding themselves they’re “better” than you. And that is reminding themselves they one-up you in some circumstantial, inconsequential thing; a perk that, in their imagination, grants them superior status, like happening to be a doctor, or a military scum mercenary, or some rich networked politician. Or physical attributes, like height and attractiveness, or they happen to practice some bullshido martial art, or they were lucky enough to have been enabled to learn some entertaining skills.

You can witness how narcissists keep reminding themselves of this “advantage” of theirs, because they can’t help but keep bringing it up randomly and out of congruency.

---

And thus, narcissists can’t comfortably interact with anyone unless they — the narcissists — have convinced themselves firmly they are superior. Narcissists will treat you like their worst enemy if you don’t supplicate to them. The only exception is in cases where the narcissists are met with their match in the areas they believe grant them relative superiority; then the narcissist turns into a timid suckup, chasing approval from their “superior” in cowardly hopes of never having to face off. Notice how willingly supplicating a narcissist can become when faced with an even greater narcissist, especially one whose “advantage” is in the same area. And there’s always an even greater narcissist, an even greater one-up.

Narcissists aren’t a minority. You see them everywhere, people who can’t cope living unless they are better than everyone in everything, or at least better than those in their entourage. I know of narcissists who will choose groups of people based on their perceived “superiority” in those groups. I know of overachievers who keep switching gyms every time a better “gym alpha” shows up. Pathetic, really, and it shows how those with lesser prowess are more unwavering in their self-esteem.

And if you’re better than a narcissist in an area they don’t value, they belittle that something and tell themselves their single one-up is the most important objectively, and that your specialties don’t matter.

Narcissists are weak because they lack the conviction to be OK with themselves when they’re not the king or queen. They must be on top, or they can’t bear their own existence. Sad.

Narcissists, narcissists everywhere

Narcissists are too insecure to admit to themselves they are insecure. They are so hopelessly lost in their despair from self-loathing that they have to pretend to take themselves too seriously as a spastic over-compensatory cope for no one taking them seriously at all, least of all themselves.

Admittedly, this deluded, bluff-arrogance actually convinces the impressionable, cheap masses, and the masses begin to take narcissists seriously. But the narcissist is so drunk on his self-delusion that he chooses to believe that cheap validation from morons is somehow meaningful. It’s meaningful, alright, but not in the way he thinks.

Some people’s approval is an insult, and their disapproval a compliment.

As an individual, you need the respect of yourself, and of good people. Yes, I won’t pretend you don’t need anyone else’s approval. You do. Anyone who claims otherwise is lying to you. You need people around you, good people who share the same values with you. We are social animals, even the most anti-social among us; especially so. We need external validation, but only from the right people who validate our true self, our true values, principles, virtues, and ideals.

But don’t be confused. Don’t assume the approval of desperately insecure people and of narcissists alike is a good thing. It isn’t.

When the devil loves you, it means one of two things, or both: The devil has targeted you for exploitation, or you are devilish yourself.

My unsolicited advice

Be careful whose approval you seek. You can waste an entire lifetime losing yourself just to gain the cheap, pointless approval of cheap people who value cheap things.

Look at the people that most people approve of: the celebrities, the influencers, the politicians, the clueless tech-guru frontmen. Popularity isn’t the flex you think it is. If you’re popular with the masses, you need to reevaluate yourself, unless you prefer to bask in blissful self-delusion and meaningless admiration from NPCs who’d applaud anything.

Look at who approves you and why. If they approve a fake persona you put on just to impress the impressionable, then, for your own good, you should scrutinise why you feel the desperate need to earn meaninglessness.

And look at why the approval of those few good people — those who approve you the way you truly are — isn’t enough for you. This will point you towards crippling trauma, and once you recognise it, then perhaps you stand a chance at somewhat mitigating it. If anything, do it for the people who approved you for you, not for some cosplay character you thought you needed to be just to impress the unimportant masses. The people who always accepted you for your true self — the one who is without pretending — deserve as much.

And the fake persona you put on? That’s your Narcissus, your masked, festering insecurity. Recognise your narcissism as proof of your insecurity, the fear of expressing your vulnerable true self.

Final thought

At the end of the day, what’s truly admirable is not efficacy or status. Both of these things are circumstantial. They rely on opportunity, age, luck, or even the absence of misfortune. And they can be taken away from you in a split second, the moment when you’ll realise you never had any control over your perceived “success” as you conveniently told yourself you did.

What’s truly admirable is bringing yourself to a point where you are unaffected by the efficacy or status of others. As they say, the biggest man in the room isn’t the king; it’s the man who doesn’t give a fuck who the king is.

And this is why you should judge people by what or who impresses them. Judge yourself by this standard, too.