Is it fair to want to be loved- to what extent?
Have you ever seen the flower “Narcissus” (Nargis) from the family of daffodils?
Greek mythology says that Narcissus was a beautiful hunter who used to decline love advances from people after luring them. He finally fell in love with his reflection in the water and perished, turning into the flower.
This loving self without any genuine considerations of others is termed Narcissism. No one knows if the flower was named after the character or vice versa.
Nevertheless, the point here is psychology, which fascinates me deeply, points out Narcissism as a Cluster-B personality disorder (Reich J, 1986).
The case I- A young boy fanatically chases Sushmita (I know) for years doing all the love-bombing and, at last, marries. Life undergoes a slow death. Love is replaced with verbal, mental, and emotional abuse.
To mend the straining relationship, the girl ends up with a psychologist.
Case II- My friend Basheer’s incessant efforts to meet the ever-rising expectations of his enthusiastic boss go in vain. He is beleaguered, culminating in low self-esteem, depression, and ultimately psychotherapy.
Case III- Manav’s father is overprotective, getting ecstatic at his every accomplishment. He wishes the world for him and makes him relentlessly work till he succumbs to it, committing suicide.
(Note: Names have been changed)
These appear as straightforward cases of incompatibility, incompetence, and depression.
But no, the problem is not that simple and lone. Strikingly, those who undergo treatment or kill themselves can be secondarily infected. Here, it was discovered that the boy who hounded Sushmita, the boss who patted and pestered Basheer, or the domineering father were all suffering from Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD)!
Narcissists call for constant admiration while demeaning others. Their moral compass is not for them as they resort to gaslighting and demanding loyalty with no returns. Having an exaggerated sense of superiority coupled with control freakiness defines them.
It is nothing but self-love to the point of no return adorned with a mask of fake emotions.
Who doesn’t love to be admired?
Is self-love a disease?
Categorically yes, when you don’t see red signals and speed past others’ boundaries. For a narcissist, “you” is just an object of “I,” which is exploited whenever needed, as pointed out in Martin Buber’s book Ich and Du (1923)
Society expects Sushmita to behave as a rehab center, convinces Basheer to leave the job, and wants the likes of Manav to be obedient!
My first encounter with psychology was as a 6-year-old me being scolded by my mom for disclosing something to a neighbor. I couldn’t understand if the truth is good, how much? How do brains respond to situations?
When a section of society is going gaga over physical fitness, hitting mental health opens a can of worms. We usually don’t see mental illness until it has a physical component. It is not just about looking gloomy with depression and panic attacks. “One who looks extremely appealing can be an ill mental patient.” Such deviant behavior can be psychopathy, borderline personality disorder, or Narcissism with varying grades and shades.
The prevalence of mental disorders is shockingly at around 22% (Charlson, 2019). It is a vicious contagious circle where mental disorders aggravate with other comorbidities, affecting others.
How many of you pay the price of living with mentally unstable people, getting emotional insults from toxic personalities?
They can be your nectar-sucking friends, manipulative colleagues, dictator bosses, over expectant parents, or YOU, yourself. Clubbed together, narcissists are emotional predators.
One of my dear friends pointed out that everyone has a can with a particular need which they try to fill. For me, narcissists have this leaky. Whatever you pour, they will still be empty, demanding more out of you, till you get drained and exhausted. And lo! they walk away to greener pastures leaving you devastated.
Taking responsibility, we need to wake from the deep slumber which has kept us in denial of this hidden layer of mental problems. In 1914 Sigmund Freud, founder of Psychoanalysis introduced Narcissism. The research is still on but does not strike large masses’ attention. Bell C, in 1980 remarked that racism is also a symptom of Narcissism. The weak family structure, the crumbling societal fabric, and the disintegrating world order seem to be the case where the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
If you find a narcissistic individual, the only escape, as suggested by psychologists, was “RUN.” So Sushmita ran, and Basheer left the well-merited job anticipating a solution from researchers like us.
Can we diagnose the bad in the guise of good?
Can we cure the bad?
Maybe not in totality now, but undeniably Yes!
“There are no such things as incurable; there are only things for which man has not found a cure”- Bernard Baruch.
The hope
Several digital platforms are evolving over decades. The True Colours Remote Symptom Monitoring System (Goodday, 2020) are rampantly used in the UK to score and diagnose behaviors. Recently, an exciting study on neurofeedback published in Emotion (Paret et al., 2020) brings hope by talking about giving live feedback to the brain through fMRI to change emotions.
Research shows abnormalities in the brain’s gray areas (Schulze L, 2013) in NPD combined with environmental components. We still need a watershed moment to treat NPDs and other harmful personality disorders. Though India is lagging with little structured research, I am optimistic about the future!
The gateway to solving a problem is to recognize it.
Start by asking,
Am I Sushmita, Basheer, or Manav?
Or Am I from the family of daffodils?