Hello I m Darren Magee and today s topic comes from many different questions in an around
narcissism, specifically around motivation. Why did narcissistic people behave the way they do?
What is it drives them? What is their motivation? So in order to answer those questions in this
video, I'm going to outline typical behaviours, characteristics and beliefs to try to illustrate
recurring themes and common threads, and then I'm going to talk about the wine, why they think and
act the way they do. But just to remind you, this video is for information purposes only. So first
of all, I would like to say that narcissist is a term that's often used out of context. It's a name
we give to someone that we're having an argument with. It's a near me give to someone we consider
to be quite vain. The boss doesn t give us next Tuesday off and we call them and narcissist. Now
maybe they are, but not necessarily, not always. If we're honest all of us behave selfishly from
time to time. We get embarrassed, we get outraged. Sometimes we lash out. Other times we might
actually prioritise ourselves a bit. We prioritise our work, our career are self care. But if you
think about it, there is a healthy balance between looking inwards and looking outwards. There is a
healthy balance between paying attention to our own needs and paying attention to other
people s needs as well. Now narcissism in terms of a personality disorder anyway, is different.
It isn't the same as self interest, self care or even self love. Certainly not the healthy way any.
The key word is disorder. Now I often think of it a disorder as looking at the impact it has
on a person's day to day functioning, the impact it has on their relationship with themselves as
well as with other people. And what I mean by that is looking at a belief system that
isn't open to change. Behaviours that are constant, pervasive, they re persistent.
If you will, it's like a default setting. With narcissistic personality disorder. As
a self inflated idealised image of themselves. Now that image helps them to avoid feelings of shame
and insecurity, but the work, the effort that goes into creating and maintaining that image can be
can be very dysfunctional and very destructive, not just to the people around them but to
themselves as well. So looking at some of the common behaviours and characteristics, number one,
they believe they are special, they believe they are unique. They believe they are entitled,
and because of this, they expect special treatment. Now anyone who doesn't comply is either
of no value or they are the enemy. They believe they deserve the best, it is theirs by right. Now
that being said, some narcissistic people do work very hard and do enjoy the fruits of their labour,
but other times, other narcissistic people, they believe it is theirs by right, without having to
earn it without having to work for it and they can be very resentful when they don't get it or don't
have it. And that sense of entitlement can lead them to be very exploitative of others. There's
a lack of empathy there, which means they wouldn't really think twice about you taking advantage of
other people to get what they want, especially those with a very kind and gentle nature.
Anyone who challenges this sense of entitlement or defies them in anyway is often met with
aggression or passive aggression or cold shoulder rejection. Next, they believe they are innocent,
they are virtuous and they are always right, which generally means everyone else is either wrong or
is in the wrong. They will always be the hero or the victim, never the villain. They will
always know more than anyone else. Now think about it, maybe you're a brain surgeon, you have
thirty years experience doing brain surgery, well they will know more by brain surgery than you do.
Either that or they will know a very powerful very influential person who knows more than you.
Another common characteristic of narcissism is being highly sensitive or highly resistant
to criticism, so anything that threatens their version of themselves, they tend to react very
defensively and that could include becoming very aggressive, which is normally referred to as
narcissistic rage, in other words, they explode. Or they will implode. They become very sad,
very depressed, just want the world end. Those defensive reactions tend to have the people around
them acting very cautiously, even reluctant to challenge their version of reality, their version
of themselves. They fear the reaction. They fear the punishment. So the narcissistic person, using
maladaptive and unregulated behaviour, condition the people around them not to challenge them.
They want to be surrounded by or associate with people and things that give them status, they
exaggerate and lie about their accomplishments, about their contributions to a project.
They want to be showered with praise and admiration. If they don't get it,
or if it's not to the standard that they want, or if it begins to diminish somehow
they tend to punish or devalue the people around them, or they just go and look for a new source.
Another common characteristic of narcissism would be double standards. A relationship
with a narcissistic person tends to be very one sided. They demand a lot of respect, but insist
that others have to earn theirs, which they never will. They can be very jealous and controlling of
their partners in relationships, but might not necessarily have a problem cheating themselves.
They can be resentful and envious of other people and their achievements, but demand
admiration for theirs. They hold other people to account for their words and their actions,
but take no responsibility for their own. The expression I often use is,
They went to bed and they blame the blanket. But the thing is, narcissistic people often accuse
other people, particularly their victims, of doing the very things they do themselves. And lastly,
they demean and devalue others. Now they treat others, even those closest to them, with contempt.
They believe that people should envy them, so they kind of get a bit annoyed if they're not envied,
but they feel threatened if they are envious of someone. And that envy could just be
around someone who's happy, confident though popular. They become insulting,
patronising and scornful. So there are some of the common characteristics and beliefs around
narcissism. Back to the question as to why. Why are they like that? Why do they behave like that?
Why are they so disagreeable? Why do they say no to something that could well be in their own best
interest? Why can they lie to your face and two minutes later deny saying that very thing? Why can
they pull up something from a decade ago that you said as evidence against you being wicked or wrong
today? Why do they live in a world that tends to involve a lot of self deception, distorted,
sometimes even magical thinking? Why do they live in a fantasy world that s all about image, self
glory? They are powerful, influential, drop dead gorgeous, virtuos, free of whatever happens to be.
Well, it's because narcissism is primarily ego driven. Now all of us are driven by our ego
from time to time but remember, the keyword disorder . Narcissism is primarily ego driven.
Now that s not to say they can't be emotionally driven or rationally driven or even purpose
driven like everyone else at times. But it is primarily ego driven. It's all about me,
my status, my power, my gratification. It s about how I look, how I feel. There is an emptiness
inside which can never really be filled, there's a constant need for validation and
admiration and praise from other people. They have a damaged fractured sense of themselves,
so need constant external validation. People often use the term narcissistic supply,
other people supply them with attention. It fills their ego, it feeds their ego and try
to fill that inner emptiness. If they can't get positive affirmation by the way they'll try and
get negative, if they can't get positive attention they will settle for negative. They often create
drama because they feed off the energy. They have unrealistic standards that other people can never
meet, but the more those people try to meet, the more important and powerful they feel. The
grandiose behaviour or the sense of helplessness now are just facades that they hide behind, as is
their virtue signalling, their moral outrage over perceived injustices, their superficial charm, the
pseudo intellectualism. Even when they re being kind and altruistic, these are all facades. It's
all about how do I look when I'm doing this and, What does it get me what I want it? All image, but
no depth. It's all about how others see them from the outside. They are a wonderful, loving parent,
great family person. They are the best friend. They are the best employee. They are an amazing,
loving, caring partner. It is only those closest to them that get to see the real them.
When there align the other people about their victims it's all about maintaining
that false sense of self, that image. If they can't control how the victim is seeing them,
they're going to try to control how other people see the victim. And their ego is so
weak that they can pick up on anything that they might consider to be a slight against them. Any
threat to their status, that view of themselves is often taken as a personal attack
and they overreact. Which is why they can be very vindictive, they have been emotionally wounded
somehow. Now the thing about narcissism as well as has a very long memory and they hold on that they
hold onto that rather for a long time. It also tends to be very destructive. So when narcissistic
people can no longer destroy something from the inside, they will try and destroy it from the
outside. For example, when it comes to the end of a relationship with a narcissistic person,
that's often when the abuse ramps up a gear. Their ego has been wounded. The ex partner has to be
punished for leaving them. And certainly not in every single case, but in many cases those who do
get back together after a breakup often report the abuse gets worse. It becomes more insidious. That
narcissistic person may have been grateful for being taken back and being given a second chance,
but only for a short time. It's not long before they re back to being resentful because they had
to face the consequences for their behaviour. It's not long before they re back to projecting that
hurt back on to the partner. But the difficulty is with narcissistic personality disorder,
people like that can be very resistant to changing their behaviour, even when they do recognise
it is causing them problems. That being said, it's not to say that people with narcissistic
behaviour can't be helped because some would be once known as quite high functioning. They learn
to regulate their behaviour with the right kind of help on the right kind of support. Even if
that takes time and a lot of hard work. But the difficulty is it's not accepting responsibility.
With a lot of narcissistic people, remember, the fault always lies outside of themselves.
So if the fault lies outside of them, so does the solution. It's everybody else's fault. I'm
the one who suffered here. Everybody else has to change to make it easier for me,
so they will have to try harder. One of the things I often say is to discern the difference
between the change in a tactic and the change in a person. I hope this video has helped shed
some light on the motivations of people with narcissistic personality. Now as always there
so much to cover there's many things I haven't mentioned such as gaslighting, trauma bonding,
the manipulation, and so on. Please feel free to use the comment box below if there's anything you
want to add. There are some interesting conversations start around these videos.
But if you find this video helpful or interesting, please consider subscribing to my channel
for future updates on mental health related topics until next time. Thanks for watching.