Recently, I heard someone say their cat was a narcissist. This made me think about how the term narcissist might be losing some of its original meaning. Like when the word “literally” stopped meaning “literally” and started meaning “actually.”
At its core, Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a diagnosable condition. It’s characterized by a grandiose sense of self-importance, an intense need for admiration, and a severe lack of empathy. That means someone has to be consistently self-absorbed, not just once. A person with NPD would not only forget to ask you how you’re doing; they would forget that you are a person capable of “doing.”
The truth is, everyone has narcissistic traits. If you’ve ever checked your reflection in a dark window, even mid-conversation, you have at least a sprinkle of it. If you’ve ever posted a photo of yourself volunteering and then stared at it for a long time, that’s called narcissistic behavior, not a disorder.
The difference between a narcissistic person and a person with NPD is like the difference between someone who drinks coffee and someone who needs coffee handed to them by someone lesser than them because they are just that important. It’s a matter of intensity, frequency, and how much it destroys your relationships. If you’ve lost friends because you’re constantly talking about how your success is due to your superior DNA, you might qualify. If you just think you’re smarter than everyone else and keep it mostly to yourself, that’s just private confidence.
However, it might not destroy your career. People with NPD often have more powerful jobs and make significantly more money than those without NPD. Let that sink in.
For a diagnosis of NPD, the traits must be inflexible, pervasive, and cause significant impairment. That means it has to mess up your relationships and ability to function in some major way. If you are unsure whether you have NPD, ask yourself: “Do I use people like pawns to prop up my fragile ego?” If the answer is yes, but you feel bad about it, then you’re just insecure.
It’s also worth noting that many people with narcissistic traits learned to survive in environments where vulnerability was punished. Their arrogance is a defense mechanism, like a turtle’s shell, except the turtle thinks it is better than you. Defense mechanisms can look like ego. That doesn’t excuse harm, but it does complicate our black and white thinking. Complexity is uncomfortable, so people tend to skip it.
Next time someone hurts you, instead of jumping to the conclusion that they’re a narcissist, you could try saying, “That person exhibited self-centered behavior that felt painful to me.” But that’s a lot of syllables.
In closing, not everyone is a narcissist. Some people are just annoying. Some people are traumatized. And some people are therapists who started writing blogs because they were told it would “help build their online presence.” And here we are.