Abuse, Trauma, and Torture - Their Consequences and Effects Read Online Free PDF Page B

not here yesterday so …
you cannot … you should … (interpreted as rude imposition,
narcissists react very badly to perceived restrictions placed on
their freedom) … I (never mention the fact that you are a separate,
independent entity, narcissists regard others as extensions of
their selves)…" You get the gist of it.
    Manage your narcissistic boss.
Notice patterns in his bullying. Is he more aggressive on Monday
mornings - and more open to suggestions on Friday afternoon? Is he
amenable to flattery? Can you modify his conduct by appealing to
his morality, superior knowledge, good manners, cosmopolitanism, or
upbringing? Manipulating the narcissist is the only way to survive
in such a tainted workplace.
    Can the narcissist be harnessed? Can his
energies be channeled productively ?
    This would be a deeply flawed – and even dangerous – "advice". Various management gurus purport to teach us how to
harness this force of nature known as malignant or pathological
narcissism . Narcissists are driven, visionary,
ambitious, exciting and productive, says Michael
Maccoby , for instance. To ignore such a resource is a
criminal waste. All we need to do is learn how to "handle"
them.
    Yet, this prescription is either naive or
disingenuous. Narcissists cannot be "handled", or "managed", or
"contained", or "channeled". They are, by definition, incapable of
team work. They lack empathy, are exploitative, envious, haughty
and feel entitled, even if such a feeling is commensurate only with
their grandiose fantasies and when their accomplishments are
meager.
    Narcissists dissemble, conspire, destroy and
self-destruct. Their drive is compulsive, their vision rarely
grounded in reality, their human relations a calamity. In the long
run, there is no enduring benefit to dancing with narcissists – only ephemeral and, often, fallacious,
"achievements".

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Narcissism in
the Boardroom

    The perpetrators of the
recent spate of financial frauds in the USA acted with callous
disregard for both their employees and shareholders – not to
mention other stakeholders. Psychologists have often
remote-diagnosed them as "malignant, pathological
narcissists".
    Narcissists are driven by
the need to uphold and maintain a False Self – a concocted,
grandiose, and demanding psychological construct typical of the
Narcissistic Personality Disorder. The False Self is projected to
the world in order to garner Narcissistic Supply – adulation,
admiration, or even notoriety and infamy. Any kind of attention is
usually deemed by narcissists to be preferable to
obscurity.
    The False Self is
suffused with fantasies of perfection, grandeur, brilliance,
infallibility, immunity, significance, omnipotence, omnipresence,
and omniscience. To be a narcissist is to be convinced of a great,
inevitable personal destiny. The narcissist is preoccupied with
ideal love, the construction of brilliant, revolutionary scientific
theories, the composition or authoring or painting of the greatest
work of art, the founding of a new school of thought, the
attainment of fabulous wealth, the reshaping of a nation or a
conglomerate, and so on. The narcissist never sets realistic goals
to himself. He is forever preoccupied with fantasies of uniqueness,
record breaking, or breathtaking achievements. His verbosity
reflects this propensity.
    Reality is, naturally,
quite different and this gives rise to a Grandiosity Gap. The
demands of the False Self are never satisfied by the narcissist's
accomplishments, standing, wealth, clout, sexual prowess, or
knowledge. The narcissist's grandiosity and sense of entitlement
are equally incommensurate with his achievements.
    To bridge the Grandiosity
Gap, the malignant (pathological) narcissist resorts to shortcuts.
These very often lead to fraud.
    The narcissist cares only
about appearances. What matters to him are the facade of wealth and
its attendant social status and Narcissistic Supply. Witness the
travestied extravagance of Tyco's Denis