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Adults who suffer from narcissistic problems were originally injured early in their development. All infants and young children need to be responded to empathically by their caregivers, mirrored and reflected by their caregivers. This validation shores up the child’s ego and mental representation of his or her own self-experience, supporting the formation of identity.

 

Caregivers’ positive and validating responses to the child provide a relational experience known as “healthy grandiosity” or “primary narcissism.” This is necessary for the child to experience as it forms the building blocks of the child’s self-esteem and supports the capacity that comes online later in development: the realization that one’s inner reality is not necessarily the reality shared by the rest of the world. You cannot achieve humility and the capacity to relate empathically to others without initially experiencing the feeling that you’re the center of the universe.

 

Things go wrong for an infant or young child when their feeling states are consistently not reflected by their caregivers. The child gets the message that not only are the child’s feelings insignificant or invalid, but that the child’s need to be validated and mirrored is foolish or unfeasible.

 

Once this occurs, the child’s mind unconsciously resorts to any of a number of psychological defenses, one of which is the narcissistic defense. The narcissistic defense organizes a personality style that may persist across the lifespan.

 

In the narcissistic defense, what the child’s mind does is essentially prevent any future relational trauma from occurring. The child has had profound feeling states and the need for affirmation from others that have been refuted and scorned. So the child withdraws from ever being in this situation again. The child’s mind moves toward invalidating others, especially others who are recognized as actually having something valuable to give, and then adopts various means to elevate him- or herself over others, whether by avoiding them, criticizing them, humiliating them, or projecting upon them.

 

By and large, the child’s mind creates a kind of cocoon or boundaried fortress in which significant others are no longer experienced as significant, are no longer needed, and can no longer activate the narcissistic vulnerability the child has been scarred with.

 

An adult with narcissistic issues employs a particular relational style that reflects the early developmental dynamics and defensive processes I have just described. There are 5 main phases that occur in a relationship with a narcissist, and again these phases echo how the narcissistic as a young person negotiated his or her interpersonal world. Here are the 5 phases:

 

Phase 1: Identification of a Person of Value

The narcissistic person unconsciously desires and seeks persons who are perceived as having “value,” value in terms of high personal character, notable professional competence, strong self-esteem, etc. While narcissists are usually highly competent and successful persons themselves, deep down they feel as if they are lacking and so they want to connect with someone who they feel is special because they don’t really see themselves as special.

 

Phase 2: Enthusiastic Recruitment

The narcissist is highly motivated to become quickly connected to this person of value and will actively recruit this person, either personally or professionally, to become part of the narcissist’s world. The person being recruited usually feels flattered but a little put off by the narcissist’s charm and persistence and may even fall victim to the narcissist’s projections, that is, the person being recruited may begin to feel as if he or she is connecting to a person who is really amazing or special.

 

Phase 3: The Person Who is Recruited Shines

In this phase, the person who was recruited by the narcissist shows their stuff. Whether in a romantic relationship or in the workplace, the person manifests what the narcissists initially sensed; the person’s strengths, competence, and talents shine. But as this occurs, the narcissist is unconsciously traumatized — what is recognized is the other’s “specialness” which further validates for the narcissist that what they had been taught long ago in their relationship experiences remains true: they themselves are not special.

 

Phase 4: Conversion

In this phase, given that the specialness of the person recruited is shining, and the narcissist is traumatized by internal feelings of not being special, the narcissist begins a psychological campaign of converting the person from an independent special being to an insecure, fragile indentured servant.

 

What I mean is that, literally, the narcissist attempts, through various forms of manipulation, to extract and distinguish all that is unique and special of the recruited person. The narcissist may criticize or gaslight the person, subtly bully, embarrass, shame or humiliate the person, or simply deny the person of any form of validation or gratitude. The hope is that these tactics will result in the person’s loss of their sense of self, their unique individuality, their specialness — all of which the narcissist was initially drawn to but could not tolerate.

 

5: Fork in the Road

At this stage, one of two things can happen. On the one hand, the person in relationship with the narcissist may give up their entire sense, submit to their narcissist, and, finally, reflect what the narcissist thinks and feels — much like what happens in many cults. The person who was recruited now only seeks to appeal to the narcissist and will do almost anything to win the narcissist over.

 

If it gets to this point, the narcissist has achieved something quite profound when you really think about it. The narcissist, lacking mirroring and validation from caregivers he or she once relied on decades before, has now literally created the next best possible thing. The person who the narcissist recruited has now literally become a human mirror, i.e., in complete alignment with and devotion to the narcissist. The narcissist has managed to gut the recruited person’s individuality, colonize the person with the narcissist’s self-concern and self-importance, and, finally, encase the recruited person into a role of indentured servant, disciple, fan, and soldier. When the narcissist looks into this person, the narcissistic sees only him- or herself, not the other person.

 

Of course, another course this could all take is the recruited person disengaging him- or herself from the rather powerful, seductive and treacherous dynamics the narcissist had conferred upon them. I will discuss how a person extracts him- or herself from the web of the narcissist in future presentations.