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evile
I don’t believe narcissists have ‘super powers’. In most ways, narcissists are less ‘super’ than neurotypical, emotionally mature people.
They are simple in that they are single minded, selfish, and always looking for people who will validate and enable their compulsive pleasure-seeking behaviors, whatever those may be (sex, drugs, food, booze, spending, hoarding, drama, risk-taking, extreme behavior, anything that creates an endorphin rush)
They are predictable in their tendency to over-indulge and take things to extremes. They are predictable in that they do not seem to recognize any cause-and-effect in their lives. They don’t understand consequences and they don’t seem to be able to make long-term plans beyond getting what they want as soon as possible. (please don’t mistake future faking[1] for long term planning ability!)
They certainly don’t seem to comprehend that immediate self-gratification can have extensive future consequences—when today’s bad choices become tomorrow’s hangovers, STIs, or credit card bills, they revert to a fragile, childish frame of mind “Why did this bad thing happen to me???” ….reflecting zero understanding of cause-and-effect, zero comprehension that yesterday’s choices led to today’s consequences, and zero empathy that treating someone like crap makes that person want to leave you.
They are absolutely incapable of taking responsibility or learning from their mistakes. In fact, they are unable to recognize their own behavior as even being a mistake! To hear a narcissist tell it, they never make mistakes or do anything wrong, ergo the bad things that happen to them are never their own fault! “Oh, poor misunderstood pitiful meeeeeee!”
They are sensitive in that attempts to hold them responsible for their behavior immediately leads to a melt down temper tantrum shame-and-blame fest more typically seen in a 5 year old.
Yes, their behavior is generally predictable. Disordered people’s behavior generally tends to ‘cycle’ in some way. If you are familiar with the cycle of abuse[2]you can generally get a feel for whether the narcissist is having a good day or a bad day, whether they are in a ‘tension building’ phase or in a ‘honeymoon’ phase with a given target, whether they are courting and idealizing new supply, or devaluing and discarding[3] old supply.
All of the behavior is cyclical and somewhat predictable. And, yes, you can almost set your clock or calendar by the times the narc will act out and rage out--around birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, or occasions where other people may be receiving gifts and praise that will trigger a narcissist’s jealous freak out.
What is not predictable is the potential for narcissistic injury[4] from some random interaction out in the world, and the degree to which they will act out and lash out in response to the injury, or who the target of their abuse might be this time.
For this reason, I do believe narcissists should be feared. An adult with adult physical strength, adult intellect, and adult resources (access to information, deadly weapons and heavy vehicles) with the poor emotional regulation and anger management skills of a 5 year old is a dangerous threat to life, livelihood, and well-being.
A 5 year old says ‘mean mommy!’ when mommy tells them no. Then the 5 year old kicks mommy as hard as s/he can in the shin. Ok, it hurts, but the 5 year old has limited physical capabilities and limited concept of what they could do that would really hurt mommy. So the damage is minimal.
What happens when you say ‘no’ to an adult narcissist— a 6′ 2″, 250 lb man who gets just as mad as a 5 year old when he hears the word ‘no’ and kicks you? That same man who has the emotional regulation of a 5 year old and owns guns? That same man who screams and yells and melts down like a kid when he doesn’t get his way and he’s got a big car with a V-8 engine and he just saw you standing in the parking lot? Yeah, that’s dangerous. That’s potentially fatal.
What happens when you say ‘no’ to an adult narcissist—a woman with a college degree who has experience in the legal field or Law Enforcement? An adult woman who gets just as angry as a 5 year old when she is told no, curbed, or reprimanded? She isn’t stupid, she’s just emotionally dysregulated, undeveloped, and immature. She has all the intellectual resources of an adult, she knows how to ‘work the system’ to make her target’s life a hell-she can make false reports to law enforcement, she can file legal paperwork against her target, she can contact her target’s employer or the licensing board which regulates her target’s work credentials. She can do real and lasting harm to that person.
And these adult narcissists absolutely will not, cannot, think of themselves as doing anything wrong or understand fully that they’re committing criminal acts by assaulting people or making these false reports to law enforcement, state agencies, or regulating bodies. They feel that they are the true victim, (because that other person did them wrong first!), who has the right to punish their target in whatever ways they can devise—whether that’s by physical assault, shooting, vehicular assault, false reports to police, etc. That’s all very dangerous.
Remember: Narcissists don’t have a good sense of cause and effect, they don’t generally tend to think beyond the needs of the moment, so they’re going to be more likely to act out their anger and have no thought as to the consequences. They don’t have a good sense of self-preservation. They don’t have a sense of ‘fighting fair’. They do have a strong desire to win, but more than that, they want to see their target LOSE. And they are more than willing to harm themselves as long as their targets are harmed first or worse. And that makes them terribly dangerous to deal with.
I don’t feel that it’s foolish to be afraid of narcissists, but there’s no point to living in a fearful or paranoid state—recognize when a person is toxic and remove them from your life as quickly as possible with as little fuss and drama as possible. I also don’t believe in assigning to them any supernatural or superhuman powers or abilities. They are simply damaged in ways that short-circuit a lot of the common-sense, self-preservation instincts that normal people have, and for that reason conflict with them is likely to be higher-stakes and more harmful than conflict with another normal human. They find new lows and then they start digging. Once you’ve known a person long enough to understand that they are personality-disordered and recognize their patterns and perversions, at that point it’s time to assess the threat level posed by the individual and respond accordingly[5] Narcissists aren’t mythical monsters with superhuman abilities, they are just very damaged and therefore dangerous.
In my opinion, a best practice is to approach every new person you meet with a healthy level of skepticism and don’t trust folks with any sensitive information, finances, etc. too soon.
Footnotes
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