5

Transform Self-love into

Empathy

The Law of Narcissism

e all naturally possess the most remarkable tool for connecting

to people and attaining social power—empathy. When

cultivated and properly used, it can allow us to see into the moods

and minds of others, giving us the power to anticipate people's

actions and gently lower their resistance. This instrument, however,

is blunted by our habitual self-absorption. We are all narcissists,

some deeper on the spectrum than others. Our mission in life is to

come to terms with this self-love and learn how to turn our sensitivity

outward, toward others, instead of inward. We must recognize at the

same time the toxic narcissists among us before getting enmeshed in

their dramas and poisoned by their envy.

The Narcissistic Spectrum

From the moment we are born, we humans feel a never-ending need

for attention. We are social animals to the core. Our survival and

happiness depend on the bonds we form with others. If people do not

pay attention to us, we cannot connect to them on any level. Some of

this is purely physical—we must have people looking at us to feel alive.

As those who have gone through long periods of isolation can attest,

without eye contact we begin to doubt our existence and to descend

into a deep depression. But this need is also deeply psychological:

through the quality of attention we receive from others, we feel

recognized and appreciated for who we are. Our sense of self-worth

depends on this. Because this is so important to the human animal,

people will do almost anything to get attention, including committing a

crime or attempting suicide. Look behind almost any action, and you

will see this need as a primary motivation.

In trying to satisfy our hunger for attention, however, we face an

inevitable problem: there is only so much of it to go around. In the

family, we have to compete with our siblings; at school, with

classmates; at work, with colleagues. The moments in which we feel

recognized and appreciated are fleeting. People can largely be

indifferent to our fate, as they must deal with their own problems.

There are even some who are downright hostile and disrespectful to us.

How do we handle those moments when we feel psychologically alone,

or even abandoned? We can double our efforts to get attention and

notice, but this can exhaust our energy and it can often have the

opposite effect—people who try too hard seem desperate and repulse

the attention they want. We simply cannot rely on others to give us

constant validation, and yet we crave it.

Facing this dilemma from early childhood on, most of us come up

with a solution that works quite well: we create a self, an image of

ourselves that comforts us and makes us feel validated from within.

This self is composed of our tastes, our opinions, how we look at the

world, what we value. In building this self-image, we tend to

accentuate our positive qualities and explain away our flaws. We

cannot go too far in this, for if our self-image is too divorced from

reality, other people will make us aware of the discrepancy, and we will

doubt ourselves. But if it is done properly, in the end we have a self

that we can love and cherish. Our energy turns inward. We become the

center of our attention. When we experience those inevitable moments

when we are alone or not feeling appreciated, we can retreat to this self

and soothe ourselves. If we have moments of doubt and depression,

our self-love raises us up, makes us feel worthy and even superior to

others. This self-image operates as a thermostat, helping us to regulate

our doubts and insecurities. We are no longer completely dependent

on others for attention and recognition. We have self-esteem.

This idea might seem strange. We generally take this self-image

completely for granted, like the air we breathe. It operates on a largely

unconscious basis. We don't feel or see the thermostat as it operates.

The best way to literally visualize this dynamic is to look at those who

lack a coherent sense of self—people we shall call deep narcissists.

In constructing a self that we can hold on to and love, the key

moment in its development occurs between the ages of two and five

years old. As we slowly separate from our mother, we face a world in

which we cannot get instant gratification. We also become aware that

we are alone and yet dependent on our parents for survival. Our

answer is to identify with the best qualities of our parents—their

strength, their ability to soothe us—and incorporate these qualities into

ourselves. If our parents encourage us in our first efforts at

independence, if they validate our need to feel strong and recognize

our unique qualities, then our self-image takes root, and we can slowly

build upon it. Deep narcissists have a sharp break in this early

development, and so they never quite construct a consistent and

realistic feeling of a self.

Their mothers (or fathers) might be deep narcissists themselves, too

self-absorbed to acknowledge the child, to encourage its early efforts at

independence. Or alternatively the parents could be enmeshers—

overinvolved in the child's life, suffocating it with attention, isolating it

from others, and living through its advancement as a means to validate

their own self-worth. They give the child no room to establish a self. In

the backgrounds of almost all deep narcissists we find either

abandonment or enmeshment. The result is that they have no self to

retreat to, no foundation for self-esteem, and are completely

dependent on the attention they can get from others to make them feel

alive and worthy.

In childhood, if such narcissists are extroverts, they can function

reasonably well, and even thrive. They become masters at attracting

notice and monopolizing attention. They can appear vivacious and

exciting. In a child, such qualities can seem a sign of future social

success. But underneath the surface, they are becoming dangerously

addicted to the hits of attention they stimulate to make them feel

whole and worthy. If they are introverts, they will retreat to a fantasy

life, imagining a self that is quite superior to others. Since they will not

get validation of this self-image from others because it is so unrealistic,

they will also have moments of great doubt and even self-loathing.

They are either a god or a worm. Lacking a coherent core, they could

imagine themselves to be anyone, and so their fantasies will keep

shifting as they try on new personalities.

The nightmare for deep narcissists generally arrives in their

twenties and thirties. They have failed to develop that inner

thermostat, a cohesive sense of self to love and depend upon. The

extroverts must constantly attract attention to feel alive and

appreciated. They become more dramatic, more exhibitionistic and

grandiose. This can become tiresome and even pathetic. They have to

change friends and scenes so that they can have a fresh audience.

Introverts fall deeper into a fantasy self. Being socially awkward yet

radiating superiority, they tend to alienate people, increasing their

dangerous isolation. In both cases, drugs or alcohol or any other form

of addiction can become a necessary crutch to soothe them in the

inevitable moments of doubt and depression.

You can recognize deep narcissists by the following behavior

patterns: If they are ever insulted or challenged, they have no defense,

nothing internal to soothe them or validate their worth. They generally

react with great rage, thirsting for vengeance, full of a sense of

righteousness. This is the only way they know how to assuage their

insecurities. In such battles, they will position themselves as the

wounded victim, confusing others and even drawing sympathy. They

are prickly and oversensitive. Almost everything is taken personally.

They can become quite paranoid and have enemies in all directions to

point to. You can see an impatient or distant look on their face

whenever you talk about something that does not directly involve them

in some way. They immediately turn the conversation back to

themselves, with some story or anecdote to distract from the insecurity

behind it. They can be prone to vicious bouts of envy if they see others

getting the attention they feel they deserve. They frequently display

extreme self-confidence. This always helps to gain attention, and it

neatly covers up their gaping inner emptiness and their fragmented

sense of self. But beware if this confidence is ever truly put to the test.

When it comes to other people in their lives, deep narcissists have

an unusual relationship that is hard for us to understand. They tend to

see others as extensions of themselves, what is known as self-objects.

People exist as instruments for attention and validation. Their desire is

to control them like they control their own arm or leg. In a

relationship, they will slowly make the partner cut off contact with

friends—there must be no competition for attention.

Some highly talented deep narcissists (see stories starting on this

page for examples) manage to find some redemption through their

work, channeling their energies and getting the attention they crave

through their accomplishments, although they tend to remain quite

erratic and volatile. For most deep narcissists, however, it can be

difficult to concentrate on their work. Lacking the self-esteem

thermostat, they are prone to continually worrying about what others

think of them. This makes it hard to actually focus attention outward

for long periods of time, and to deal with the impatience and anxiety

that comes with work. Such types tend to change jobs and careers quite

frequently. This becomes the nail in their coffin—unable to attract

genuine recognition through their accomplishments, they are forever

thrown back on the need to artificially stimulate attention.

Deep narcissists can be annoying and frustrating to deal with; they

can also become quite harmful if we get too close to them. They

entangle us in their never-ending dramas and make us feel guilty if we

are not continually paying them attention. Relationships with them are

most unsatisfying, and having one as a partner or spouse can be

deadly. In the end, everything must revolve around them. The best

solution in such cases is to get out of their way, once we identify them

as a deep narcissist.

There is one variety of this type, however, that is more dangerous

and toxic, because of the levels of power he or she can attain—namely

the narcissistic leader. (This type has been around for a long time. In

the Bible, Absalom was perhaps the first recorded example, but we find

frequent references in ancient literature to others—Alcibiades, Cicero,

and Emperor Nero, to name a few.) Almost all dictator types and

tyrannical CEOs fall into this category. They generally have more

ambition than the average deep narcissist and for a while can funnel

this energy into work. Full of narcissistic self-confidence, they attract

attention and followers. They say and do things that other people don't

dare say or do, which seems admirable and authentic. They might have

a vision for some innovative product, and because they radiate such

confidence, they can find others to help them realize their vision. They

are experts at using people.

If they have success, a terrible momentum is set in place—more

people are attracted to their leadership, which only inflates their

grandiose tendencies. If anyone dares to challenge them, they are more

prone than others to go into that deep narcissistic rage. They are

hypersensitive. They also like to stir up constant drama as a means to

justify their power—they are the only ones who can solve the problems

they create. This also gives them more opportunities to be the center of

attention. The workplace is never stable under their direction.

Sometimes they can become entrepreneurs, people who found a

company because of their charisma and ability to attract followers.

They can have creative flair as well. But for many of these leader types,

eventually their own inner instability and chaos will come to be

mirrored in the company or group they lead. They cannot forge a

coherent structure or organization. Everything must flow through

them. They have to control everything and everyone, their self-objects.

They will proclaim this as a virtue—as being authentic and

spontaneous—when really they lack the ability to focus and create

something solid. They tend to burn and destroy whatever they create.

Let us imagine narcissism as a way of gauging the level of our selfabsorption,

as if it existed on a measurable scale from high to low. At a

certain depth, let us say below the halfway mark on the scale, people

enter the realm of deep narcissism. Once they reach this depth, it is

very difficult for them to raise themselves back up, because they lack

the self-esteem device. The deep narcissist becomes completely selfabsorbed,

almost always below the mark. If for a moment they manage

to engage with others, some comment or action will trigger their

insecurities and they will go plummeting down. But mostly they tend

to sink deeper into themselves over time. Other people are

instruments. Reality is just a reflection of their needs. Constant

attention is their only way of survival.

Above that halfway mark is what we shall call the functional

narcissist, where most of us reside. We also are self-absorbed, but

what prevents us from falling deep into ourselves is a coherent sense of

self that we can rely upon and love. (It is ironic that the word

narcissism has come to mean self-love, when it is in fact the case that

the worst narcissists have no cohesive self to love, which is the source

of their problem.) This creates some inner resiliency. We may have

deeper narcissistic moments, fluctuating below the mark, particularly

when depressed or challenged in life, but inevitably we elevate

ourselves. Not feeling continually insecure or wounded, not always

needing to fish for attention, functional narcissists can turn their

attention outward, into their work and into building relationships with

people.

Our task, as students of human nature, is threefold. First, we must

fully understand the phenomenon of the deep narcissist. Although they

are in the minority, some of them can inflict an unusual amount of

harm in the world. We must be able to distinguish the toxic types that

stir up drama and try to turn us into objects they can use for their

purposes. They can draw us in with their unusual energy, but if we

become enmeshed, it can be a nightmare to disengage. They are

masters at turning the tables and making others feel guilty. Narcissistic

leaders are the most dangerous of all, and we must resist their pull and

see through the façade of their apparent creativity. Knowing how to

handle the deep narcissists in our lives is an important art for all of us.

Second, we must be honest about our own nature and not deny it.

We are all narcissists. In a conversation we are all champing at the bit

to talk, to tell our story, to give our opinion. We like people who share

our ideas—they reflect back to us our good taste. If we happen to be

assertive, we see assertiveness as a positive quality because it is ours,

whereas others, more timid, will rate it as obnoxious and value

introspective qualities. We are all prone to flattery because of our selflove.

Moralizers who try to separate themselves and denounce the

narcissists in the world today are often the biggest narcissists of them

all—they love the sound of their voice as they point fingers and preach.

We are all on the spectrum of self-absorption. Creating a self that we

can love is a healthy development, and there should be no stigma

attached to it. Without self-esteem from within, we would fall into

deep narcissism. But to move beyond functional narcissism, which

should be our goal, we must first be honest with ourselves. Trying to

deny our self-absorbed nature, trying to pretend we are somehow more

altruistic than others, makes it impossible for us to transform

ourselves.

Third and most important, we must begin to make the

transformation into the healthy narcissist. Healthy narcissists have a

stronger, even more resilient sense of self. They tend to hover closer to

the top of the scale. They recover more quickly from any wounds or

insults. They do not need as much validation from others. They realize

at some point in life that they have limits and flaws. They can laugh at

these flaws and not take slights so personally. In many ways, by

embracing the full picture of themselves, their self-love is more real

and complete. From this stronger inner position, they can turn their

attention outward more often and more easily. This attention goes in

one of two directions, and sometimes both. First, they are able to direct

their focus and their love into their work, becoming great artists,

creators, and inventors. Because their outward focus on the work is

more intense, they tend to be successful in their ventures, which gives

them the necessary attention and validation. They can have moments

of doubt and insecurity, and artists can be notoriously brittle, but work

stands as a continual release from too much self-absorption.

The other direction healthy narcissists take is toward people,

developing empathic powers. Imagine empathy as the realm lying at

the very top of the scale and beyond—complete absorption in others.

By our very nature, we humans have tremendous abilities to

understand people from the inside out. In our earliest years, we felt

completely bonded with our mother, and we could sense her every

mood and read her every emotion in a preverbal way. Unlike any other

animal or primate, we also had the ability to extend this beyond the

mother to other caregivers and people in our vicinity.

This is the physical form of empathy that we feel even to this day

with our closest friends, spouses, or partners. We also have a natural

ability to take the perspective of others, to think our way inside their

minds. These powers largely lie dormant because of our selfabsorption.

But in our twenties and beyond, feeling more confident

about ourselves, we can begin to focus outward, on people, and

rediscover these powers. Those who practice this empathy often

become superior social observers in the arts or sciences, therapists,

and leaders of the highest order.

The need to develop this empathy is greater than ever. Various

studies have indicated a gradual increase in levels of self-absorption

and narcissism in young people since the late 1970s, with a much

higher spike since 2000. Much of this can be attributed to technology

and the internet. People simply spend less time in social interactions

and more time socializing online, which makes it increasingly difficult

to develop empathy and sharpen social skills. Like any skill, empathy

comes through the quality of attention. If your attention is continually

interrupted by the need to look at your smartphone, you are never

really gaining a foothold in the feelings or perspectives of other people.

You are continually drawn back to yourself, flitting about the surface of

social interactions, never really engaging. Even in a crowd, you remain

essentially alone. People come to serve a function—not to bond with

but to placate your insecurities.

Our brains were built for continual social interaction; the

complexity of this interaction is one of the main factors that drastically

increased our intelligence as a species. At a certain point, involving

ourselves less with others has a net negative effect on the brain itself

and atrophies our social muscle. To make matters worse, our culture

tends to emphasize the supreme value of the individual and individual

rights, encouraging greater self-involvement. We find more and more

people who cannot imagine that others have a different perspective,

that we are all not exactly the same in what we desire or think.

You must try to run counter to these developments and create

empathic energy. Each side of the spectrum has its peculiar

momentum. Deep narcissism tends to sink you deeper, as your

connection to reality lessens and you are unable to really develop your

work or your relationships. Empathy does the opposite. As you

increasingly turn your attention outward, you get constant positive

feedback. People want to be around you more. You develop your

empathic muscle; your work improves; without trying, you gain the

attention that all humans thrive on. Empathy creates its own upward,

positive momentum.

The following are the four components that go into the empathic

skill set.

The empathic attitude: Empathy is more than anything a state

of mind, a different way of relating to others. The greatest danger you

face is your general assumption that you really understand people and

that you can quickly judge and categorize them. Instead, you must

begin with the assumption that you are ignorant and that you have

natural biases that will make you judge people incorrectly. The people

around you present a mask that suits their purposes. You mistake the

mask for reality. Let go of your tendency to make snap judgments.

Open your mind to seeing people in a new light. Do not assume that

you are similar or that they share your values. Each person you meet is

like an undiscovered country, with a very particular psychological

chemistry that you will carefully explore. You are more than ready to

be surprised by what you uncover. This flexible, open spirit is similar

to creative energy—a willingness to consider more possibilities and

options. In fact, developing your empathy will also improve your

creative powers.

The best place to begin this transformation in your attitude is in

your numerous daily conversations. Try reversing your normal impulse

to talk and give your opinion, desiring instead to hear the other

person's point of view. You have tremendous curiosity in this direction.

Cut off your incessant interior monologue as best you can. Give full

attention to the other. What matters here is the quality of your

listening, so that in the course of the conversation you can mirror back

to the other person things they said, or things that were left unsaid but

that you sensed. This will have a tremendous seductive effect.

As part of this attitude, you are giving people the same level of

indulgence that you give yourself. For instance, we all have a tendency

to do the following: When we make a mistake, we attribute it to

circumstances that pushed us into doing it. But when others make a

mistake, we tend to see it as a character flaw, as something that flowed

from their imperfect personality. This is known as the attribution bias.

You must work against this. With an empathic attitude, you consider

first the circumstances that might have made a person do what they

did, giving them the same benefit of the doubt as you give yourself.

Finally, adopting this attitude depends on the quality of your selflove.

If you feel terribly superior to others, or gripped by insecurities,

your moments of empathy and absorption in people will be shallow.

What you need is a complete acceptance of your character, including

your flaws, which you can see clearly but even appreciate and love. You

are not perfect. You are not an angel. You have the same nature as

others. With this attitude, you can laugh at yourself and let slights

wash over you. From a position of genuine inner strength and

resilience, you can more easily direct your attention outward.

Visceral empathy: Empathy is an instrument of emotional

attunement. It is hard for us to read or figure out the thoughts of

another person, but feelings and moods are much easier for us to pick

up. We are all prone to catching the emotions of another person. The

physical boundaries between us and other people are much more

permeable than we realize. People are continually affecting our moods.

What you are doing here is turning this physiological response into

knowledge. Pay deep attention to the moods of people, as indicated by

their body language and tone of voice. When they talk, they have a

feeling tone that is either in sync or not in sync with what they are

saying. This tone can be one of confidence, insecurity, defensiveness,

arrogance, frustration, elation. This tone manifests itself physically in

their voice, their gestures, and their posture. In each encounter, you

must try to detect this before even paying attention to what they are

saying. This will register to you viscerally, in your own physical

response to them. A defensive tone on their part will tend to create a

like feeling in you.

A key element you are trying to figure out is people's intentions.

There is almost always an emotion behind any intention, and beyond

their words, you are attuning yourself to what they want, their goals,

which will also register physically in you if you pay attention. For

instance, someone you know suddenly shows unusual interest in your

life, gives you the kind of attention you've never had before. Is it a real

attempt to connect or a distraction, a means of softening you up so

they can use you for their own purposes? Instead of focusing on their

words, which show interest and excitement, focus on the overall feeling

tone that you pick up. How deeply are they listening? Are they making

consistent eye contact? Does it feel like even though they are listening

to you, they are absorbed in themselves? If you are the object of

sudden attention but it seems unreliable, they are probably intending

to ask something of you, to use and manipulate you in some way.

This kind of empathy depends largely on mirror neurons—those

neurons that fire in our brain when we watch someone do something,

such as picking up an object, just as if we were doing it ourselves. This

allows us to put ourselves in the shoes of others and to feel what it

must be like. Studies have revealed that people who score high on tests

of empathy are generally excellent mimics. When someone smiles or

winces in pain, they tend to unconsciously imitate the expression,

giving them a feel for what others are feeling. When we see someone

smiling and in a good mood, it tends to have a contagious effect on us.

You can consciously use this power in trying to get into the emotions of

others, either by literally mimicking their facial gestures or by

conjuring up memories of similar experiences that stirred such

emotions. Before Alex Haley began writing Roots, he spent some time

in the dark interior of a ship, trying to re-create the claustrophobic

horror slaves must have experienced. A visceral connection to their

feelings allowed him to write himself into their world.

As an adjunct to this, mirroring people on any level will draw out an

empathic response from them. This can be physical, and is known as

the chameleon effect. People who are connecting physically and

emotionally in a conversation will tend to mimic each other's gestures

and posture, both crossing their legs, for instance. To a degree, you can

do this consciously to induce a connection by deliberately mimicking

someone. Similarly, nodding your head as they talk and smiling will

deepen the connection. Even better, you can enter the spirit of the

other person. You absorb their mood deeply and reflect it back to

them. You create a feeling of rapport. People secretly crave this

emotional rapport in their daily lives, because they get it so rarely. It

has a hypnotic effect and appeals to people's narcissism as you become

their mirror.

In practicing this type of empathy, keep in mind that you must

maintain a degree of distance. You are not becoming completely

enmeshed in the emotions of another. This will make it hard for you to

analyze what you are picking up and can lead to a loss of control that is

not healthy. Also, doing this too strongly and obviously can create a

creepy effect. The nodding, smiling, and mirroring at selected

moments should be subtle, almost impossible to detect.

Analytic empathy: The reason you are able to understand your

friends or partner so deeply is that you have a lot of information about

their tastes, values, and family background. We have all had the

experience of thinking we know someone but over time having to

adjust our original impression once we get more information. So while

physical empathy is extremely powerful, it must be supplemented by

analytic empathy. This can prove particularly helpful with people

toward whom we feel resistant and whom we have a hard time

identifying with—either because they are very different from us or

because there is something about them that repels us. In such cases we

naturally resort to judging and putting them into categories. There are

people out there who are not worth the effort—supreme fools or true

psychopaths. But for most others who seem hard to figure out, we

should see it as an excellent challenge and a way to improve our skills.

As Abraham Lincoln said, "I don't like that man. I must get to know

him better."

Analytic empathy comes mostly through conversation and

gathering information that will allow you to get inside the spirit of

others. Some pieces of information are more valuable than others. For

instance, you want to get a read on people's values, which are mostly

established in their earliest years. People develop concepts of what

they consider strong, sensitive, generous, and weak often based on

their parents and their relationship to them. One woman will see a

man crying as a sign of sensitivity and be attracted to it, while another

will see it as weak and repulsive. By not understanding people's values

on this level, or by projecting your own, you will misread their

reactions and create unnecessary conflicts.

Your goal, then, is to gather as much as you can about the early

years of the people you are studying and their relationship to their

parents and siblings. Keep in mind that their current relationship to

family will also speak volumes about the past. Try to get a read on their

reactions to authority figures. This will help you see to what extent

they have a rebellious or submissive streak. Their taste in partners will

also say a lot.

If people seem reluctant to talk, try asking open-ended questions, or

begin with a sincere admission of your own to establish trust. In

general people love to talk about themselves and their past, and it is

usually quite easy to get them to open up. Look for trigger points (see

chapter 1) that indicate points of extreme sensitivity. If they come from

another culture, it is all the more important to understand this culture

from within their experience. Your goal in general is to find out what

makes them unique. You are looking precisely for what is different

from yourself and the other people you know.

The empathic skill: Becoming empathetic involves a process, like

anything. In order to make sure that you are really making progress

and improving your ability to understand people on a deeper level, you

need feedback. This can come in one of two forms: direct and indirect.

In the direct form, you ask people about their thoughts and feelings to

get a sense of whether you have guessed correctly. This must be

discreet and based on a level of trust, but it can be a very accurate

gauge of your skill. Then there is the indirect form—you sense a greater

rapport and how certain techniques have worked for you.

To work on this skill, keep several things in mind: The more people

you interact with in the flesh, the better you will get at this. And the

greater the variety of people you meet, the more versatile your skill will

become. Also, keep a sense of flow. Your ideas about people never

quite settle into a judgment. In an encounter, keep your attention

active to see how the other person changes over the course of a

conversation and the effect you are having on them. Be alive to the

moment. Try to see people as they interact with others besides you—

people are often very different depending on the person they are

involved with. Try to focus not on categories but on the feeling tone

and mood that people evoke in you, which is continually shifting. As

you get better at this, you will discover more and more cues that people

give as to their psychology. You will notice more. Continually mix the

visceral with the analytic.

Seeing improvement in your skill level will excite you greatly and

motivate you to go deeper. In general you will notice a smoother ride

through life, as you avoid unnecessary conflicts and

misunderstandings.

The deepest principle of Human Nature is the craving to be appreciated.

—William James