Everyday self-care for the everyday narcissist

Warning: This post contains references to trauma and neglect

Patti Smith sleeping backstage with guitar (1977) by Lynn Goldsmith

Actor Marlon Brando once complained that those who did not understand what he had been through treated his talent naively as a kind of shining pearl. The pearl had cost him, personally, too much. Narcissism can be a bit like pearl diving – the search for something genuinely special. But pearl divers – however deep they can go to get a result - should never forget completely that they need to breath.

I am most often writing about extreme cases of narcissism. Its performance face can lead some to a life of iconic fame. But there is a continuum. In this article I’m going to look more at everyday narcissism – the kind that might lead us to start writing an on-line newsletter. Like this one. I want to focus on a neglected aspect of everyday narcissism: self-neglect. And what we can do about it.

Please don’t read this article as a literal confession. But as I write I am trying to acknowledge my own narcissism and its risks. I don’t really believe in calling people who are narcissistic ‘narcissists’, but as part of the title here it seemed to fit. So I don’t think of Patti Smith as a ‘narcissist’. And I still struggle with the idea of ‘healthy narcissism’. I can’t help thinking that my family doctor wouldn’t describe a fully functioning liver as ‘healthy hepatitis’. It’s not a healthy version of hepatitis. It’s just a liver doing its thing. But human personality doing its thing can include narcissism. It can be charismatic, performing, powerful, controlling even. It can take a superior knowing stance. If this is strategic enough and appropriate to the situation, then it’s adaptive. It leads not to victims but to growth and sustenance.

But even with our everyday narcissism, we need to monitor it. We need to check that the option of being charismatic, eloquent or high achieving is not drifting towards compulsion. The measures of who we are and even how we are can become limited to external markers of achievement, recognition and admiration. In narcissism, the primary goal of these strategies is to find distance from our more emotional selves – in particular vulnerability and shame. These extrinsic goals are pursued because they promise to deliver feelings that are far from vulnerable: feelings of power, admiration or judgment. The external becomes everything. Whilst striving towards the next goal, our (internal) emotional needs are put to one side. Narcissism is, paradoxically, a kind of self-neglect.

So, we can get the A-list partner, or the fast car, or the perfect mouth, get the top position or meet our subscribers target. But narcissistic choices are made based on how they meet external goals and expectations – how they validate a persona. This can work up to a point. But we think of narcissism as a problem for a reason. And the impact these strategies might eventually have on those around us is not the only problem. So how can this go wrong?

Problem 1: The fading goal

The first way in which this strategy can backfire is described in

W. Keith Campbell

‘s The New Science of Narcissism as the fading goal problem¹. The fading goal is right here. It’s likes on our posts. Restacks on our articles. How many will this article get? Will I be pleased? Or nursing disappointment. The fading goal is status. Its material wealth. It’s having our body looking exactly how we want it. Its fame. It’s the trophy partner. But I have to qualify all this. Because getting likes and having a great body and becoming famous are not necessarily unhealthy. In theory, we can become famous as a consequence of doing the thing that we love doing. Or we can do a job so well that we find ourselves in an expensive house. So where is the distinction?

Career, fame, physique, possessions or a trophy partner can promise multiple feelings: the reassurance that we have the power to have what we want when we want it. Shoplifting is also great for feeling that we are not limited or constrained. Another source of relief. Another fading goal. But again, its high stakes. The problem is that none of these meet our need in a sustained way. The effect fades. We might know intellectually that a new work position will not fully meet our emotional need. While pursuing it, we may feel the promise that it will. The actual impact though, when the goal is reached, is fleeting. The return for our investment is minimal. And we have stopped investing in sustainable relationships and occupation that meets our personal needs. This is the problem with the fading goal.

Problem 2: Spinning plates

If the first problem is a goal that fades, the second is more like the old circus trick of spinning plates on top of multiple sticks. The problem with the pursuit of one fading goal, is that you need to follow up with another. When we reach high status, or establish a persona, the expectations are raised. We may be accepted into a performance-heavy environment. But here we become not less likely to fail, but more so. And there is further now to fall. How do we maintain this bright or impressive persona under increased pressure? Well, we could purchase something. It might be just a nice restaurant experience. Others will want to come. Or an expensive holiday. A new car. But these are fading goals. What do we turn to next?

We can always turn to sex. Some sex promises admiration. Sex with the right person can promise power. Some sex promises distance from feelings of dependence on the person we are really in a relationship with. But the feelings themselves give way over a short space of time to other feelings – perhaps those feelings that sex was supposed to remove. We might find ourselves stressed with having to cover for our behaviour or just feel guilty. And we’re not good with guilt.

But we could turn to alcohol or drugs. Some drugs promise excitement, confidence and a sense of power. Feelings of dependence or vulnerability are forgotten. Other drugs sooth us. But once the promised effect has been delivered, the fade clock is again ticking. And the avoided feelings of being ordinary, dependent, or disappointed, will return.

We can find ourselves chasing status, power, fame, wealth, sex, drugs or even someone to hurt. But these are fading goals that force us on to the next. Achieving a hit, in turn, can create a new goal to smooth over the fall out of the last. Narcissism can be a lot like spinning plates. The risk is that our life is consumed by these goals – all keeping us one step away from our authentic needs. As each goal is met, it is a quick fix to the shell of a persona. But the real person inside is starved of validation and sustenance. Ultimately, the energy taken up spinning these multiple plates over time can deplete our ability to perform. And our skills at building a more sustainable life are pencilled in as a potential future training project.

The grainy TV image of Marilyn singing Happy Birthday to JFK in on May 19^th, 1962.

Of the icons whose lives I have looked at so far, the starkest example of the fading goal has perhaps been actress Marilyn Monroe. She does not fit well the narrowed down mainstream concept of narcissism. But in her life, we see compulsive use of performance, persona, sex and drugs. Is it unfair to say this about a woman whose traumatic start in life included sexual abuse? And in Marilyn’s adult sex life, was she not still being exploited? Yes. But what was the adult vulnerability, after all this trauma, that was being exploited by others? The vulnerability was her need, at all costs, to steer away from feelings of vulnerability and powerlessness. Her strategies for achieving this included performance, drugs and sex.

Despite these strategies, it seems that a number of Marilyn’s needs were not being met. And yet these strategies became like plates that she had to keep spinning. Despite global fame, disappointments began to pile up. By the age of 36 she had been ghosted by the US president after their affair². She was then invited into further humiliation – to sing at this same man’s birthday party – televised across the US. The president’s wife boycotted in disgust². But three months before her death by overdose, and heavily reliant on drugs, Marilyn could only accept this invitation to perform. Tragically, before Marilyn or anyone around her was able to do anything about it, the plates all came crashing down.

Everyday self-care

In the iconically famous, the collapsing of strategies can lead to victimhood in others. But they can lead also to victimhood in the celebrity. In our more everyday narcissism, the impacts may be less catastrophic. But what can we do to manage them better?

Firstly, we can try to notice the chasing of admiration and power as a goal. In healthy narcissism, this is not compulsive, but we may stray into this from time to time. We don’t like to call them admiration and power of course. So, we need to work out what we call them in our mind. It might be the setting in our mind of a likes or restacks target for the post, whilst disregarding our genuine feelings about the same article. It might show up as frustration with the engagement in comments. Whatever this fading goal is shaped as in our mind. Secondly, we try to avoid judging ourselves for chasing fading goals that will not meet our needs in a sustainable way. There’s a reason we are doing that. Thirdly, and more radically, do we need the help of a therapist to re-learn self-compassion that will spill over onto our relationships with others? There may be good historical reasons why we struggle with this.

Finally, what are the things and people in our lives that do sustain us and that are sustainable? Do we need to stop and notice how our current partner makes us feel? Or how we are not feeding that relationship? Or just how lonely we are? Do we need to remember the reason we are writing a newsletter in the first place? What are our values? What is it about our job or relationships that makes our life worth living? What are those three activities that help us to reconnect to ourselves and those close to us? Are we doing them more or less? Those able to make life sustaining choices are also able to stay connected to their real spontaneous feelings - on a week by week, moment by moment basis. Can we find a balance between the external satnav of likes and subscribers and the internal compass of our true self? Will I be OK if this gets zero likes?

Disclaimer: All views expressed are my own unless otherwise stated, and do not necessarily reflect the views of any institution I have been employed by. The content here is for information and should not be interpreted as advice.

1. Campbell, K. & Crist, C. (2020). The New Science of Narcissism. Sounds True.

2. Taraborrelli, J.R. (2009). The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe. Pan.