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The term “narcissist” gets thrown around a lot nowadays. It’s an easy way to villainize someone we dated who didn’t seem to put in as much effort as we did . . . or a person who, deep down, we know we allowed to get away with being a little self-centered because we liked them so much.
But this casual use can minimize the dangers of dating a true narcissist—someone who at best will never meet our needs and at worst has the potential to dismantle our ego and our confidence because they’re viewed as a threat to the narcissist’s control.
If you’ve ever wondered if you’re dating a narcissist, this week’s video should give you clarity. In it, my brother Stephen and I give you 11 specific signs to watch out for (and some might surprise you!)
This is a meaty podcast and we go deep, so even if this doesn’t apply to your life today, having these signs in the back of your mind will likely save you from future grief.
Transcript provided by YouTube:
00:00
if narcissism can be associated with a
00:03
kind of obsession with control and the
00:05
way that i can do that practically
00:08
speaking is if i can dismantle your ego
00:11
if i can dismantle
00:14
your confidence because your confidence
00:15
is a threat to my control right the more
00:18
autonomous and confident you are the
00:20
more agency you have over your own
00:22
actions and opinions the less i am
00:24
needed
00:30
all right stephen shall we talk about
00:32
this very very
00:34
popular subject
00:36
in today’s dating world
00:38
the subject of
00:40
narcissists
00:42
now you found an article on this subject
00:44
do you want to just kick us off with the
00:46
article that you found and maybe we can
00:49
shed some light on
00:51
on narcissists
00:53
the difference perhaps between
00:56
diagnosable
00:58
narcissists people with narcissistic
01:01
personality disorder and those
01:04
with narcissistic tendencies
01:06
that can have a terrible effect on our
01:10
lives
01:11
even though they’re not fully fledged
01:14
narcissists well there was an article
01:16
about a self-confessed narcissist who
01:19
apparently gives us gives advice on
01:22
social media for how people can
01:24
basically avoid
01:26
dating a narcissist or find out if they
01:28
are dating one
01:30
uh so he’s sort of turning to public
01:32
service and he’s on
01:36
his name his name according to this is
01:37
ben taylor and on tick tock he has more
01:39
than 30 000 followers so a narcissist on
01:42
tick tock what could possibly go wrong
01:45
um by the way i’m only joking i’m sure
01:48
i’m sure he’s a nice chap he’s doing his
01:50
best to help people now so so fair play
01:53
um i uh he’s using his powers for good
01:56
use his powers for good and matt he
01:58
gives some of the signs so i want you to
02:00
react to some of these see what you
02:01
think okay let’s do it
02:03
narcissists do not like having rules or
02:07
limits imposed on them
02:09
if you’re communicating your comfortable
02:12
limits and they keep pushing those
02:14
beware
02:15
and
02:16
i think the idea is just that being told
02:19
no or
02:20
thinking that there are specific rules
02:22
that apply to you a narcissist will
02:24
immediately assume yeah but
02:27
that’s nice but i don’t actually have to
02:29
keep to them i can do what i want really
02:33
yeah
02:34
i suppose does this get linked with just
02:36
a problem with authority in general
02:39
uh an issue following rules in general
02:41
in life yeah i think it’s like lack of
02:44
social social grace or cohesion it’s
02:47
just a sense that whatever i feel is
02:49
right
02:50
is right or whatever works for me is the
02:53
thing i should do
02:54
right
02:56
yeah i can see that
02:57
i always i
02:59
it’s funny the whole
03:01
i don’t you know the rules are stifling
03:04
always seems to me
03:05
i mean look there for sure there are
03:07
rules in life and sometimes with other
03:10
people that we think are just silly that
03:13
that’s always going to be true there
03:14
always are going to be silly rules in
03:17
life but when someone as a blanket
03:20
approach just disregards other people’s
03:22
rules about how they want to be treated
03:24
or rules in society
03:26
that always seems to me to be a true
03:28
a true lack of empathy
03:31
that this role although it may not be
03:34
perfect has been created in some form
03:36
for us all to coexist better
03:39
it’s been created in some form to try to
03:41
improve life because without this rule
03:44
at all you wouldn’t want to know what
03:46
life looks like
03:47
it’s not even being able to make that
03:49
leap or it’s saying everyone else should
03:51
follow this rule but i shouldn’t in a
03:53
relationship
03:55
when someone’s telling you that they
03:56
have a rule it’s
03:58
it’s for the purposes of them feeling
04:00
better
04:01
so if we don’t if we have no regard for
04:04
their boundaries or their rules it’s the
04:06
same thing as saying i don’t care how
04:08
you feel
04:11
what i care about is how much freedom i
04:14
have
04:15
to live exactly the way i want to live
04:18
within this relationship or
04:20
as the case may be without
04:24
so um very good what’s the next
04:26
um he said you he’s this is the one from
04:30
one of his tick tock videos he said a
04:31
narcissist will often
04:33
degrade or humiliate someone to humble
04:36
them and to almost break down their
04:39
self-esteem so that they only come to
04:41
you for validation or to kind of
04:46
you know see if they’re doing the right
04:48
things so you’ll
04:49
you’ll find ways to subtly poke at
04:52
the things they do their identity
04:55
you know who they are what they’ve
04:56
accomplished and kind of break them down
04:59
so that
05:00
they think they have to win your
05:01
approval
05:04
that’s dark that’s that’s dark isn’t it
05:08
i that to me if you if you were
05:13
look firstly i can’t i won’t speak to
05:15
whether these are the
05:17
stephen maybe on this article it says
05:19
whether there are clinical psychologists
05:21
that back these up as genuine signs of
05:24
narcissism or not but i i intuitively
05:27
that makes sense to me because
05:30
if narcissism can be associated with a
05:33
kind of obsession with control
05:36
that i i want to be in control
05:40
i want to have a
05:42
kind of god-like status
05:44
and the way that i can do that
05:47
practically speaking is if i can
05:49
dismantle your ego if i can dismantle
05:53
your confidence because your confidence
05:55
is a threat to my control
05:57
right the more autonomous and confident
05:59
you are the more agency you have over
06:01
your own actions and opinions
06:04
the less i am needed
06:06
and the less
06:08
malleable you are and if i’m a
06:10
narcissist i want you to be malleable so
06:12
that i can control you or how do i make
06:15
you more malleable it’s not by making
06:17
you stronger
06:19
right there then i have a relationship
06:21
of equals well i don’t want you to be my
06:23
equal i want to be the best
06:26
so i have to make you malleable to stay
06:29
number one and to stay in control and i
06:32
can make you more malleable by
06:33
dismantling your confidence and if i’m
06:36
the one who’s dismantled it if i’m the
06:38
one who has knocked you down
06:41
and you’re the kind of person that i can
06:43
get away with this with because let’s
06:45
not forget it takes two to tango right
06:48
you need
06:50
you need someone who is proportionately
06:53
unsure of themselves or insecure or or
06:57
carries trauma
07:00
in proportion to the level of let’s say
07:03
in this case narcissism
07:05
that someone is showing
07:07
yeah so
07:08
i need to find someone this will work on
07:12
but if i can find someone who this will
07:14
work on and then i can
07:16
withdraw my approval of them
07:19
then it’s my approval they need again in
07:22
order to feel good yeah
07:24
so now they’re coming back to me to feel
07:26
good i become the source
07:29
of your happiness and if i am in the
07:32
narcissistic category that’s just how i
07:34
like it
07:35
that i don’t want you to experience
07:37
happiness outside of me yeah and there’s
07:40
almost that thing that they say that
07:42
they say that cults do this when they’re
07:44
brainwashing people but they’ll often
07:46
they break you down but unpredictably
07:49
they’ll come and like be really loving
07:51
and build you back up
07:53
you know what i mean like it’s
07:54
unpredictability
07:55
and it’s like oh they’re being really
07:57
loving today and i’m doing everything
07:59
right but then it’ll be like no you did
08:01
you put a foot wrong you did something
08:03
wrong
08:03
like you’re you’re a fool you’re an
08:05
idiot you’re broken and it’s that that
08:08
unpredictability can make you desperate
08:11
for someone’s approval
08:12
i think also it’s hard sometimes when
08:14
someone’s when someone’s making us work
08:16
like that
08:17
it takes up a lot of bandwidth
08:20
so you know if you’re just trying to win
08:21
someone’s approval again you you
08:23
sometimes don’t even stop to think about
08:26
why you’re doing this or
08:29
what
08:30
does this make sense that i’m trying to
08:32
get this person’s approval
08:34
what am i doing here they’re occupying
08:36
you with a lot to think about yeah a lot
08:39
to have to deal with i’m taking away
08:41
your confidence now you’re having to
08:42
work to get it back
08:44
um i do want to also point out though
08:46
because i think it’s important in in
08:49
wherever possible during these signs
08:51
to point out the mass
08:55
market version of this
08:58
so that we can all look for it in
09:00
ourselves
09:02
and say well look i may not be a
09:04
narcissist but
09:06
i’ve in some way in my own modest way
09:09
i’ve demonstrated this so when we talk
09:11
about that concept of if you’re you know
09:14
that one of the hallmarks of narcissism
09:16
is i want to be responsible for you for
09:20
your happiness and i don’t want you to
09:22
derive any happiness outside of me well
09:25
most of us at one point or another have
09:27
been in a situation where our partner
09:29
has gone to do something
09:32
that
09:32
we feel jealous of
09:35
you know they’re they’re going to do
09:36
something really fun with their friends
09:38
and
09:39
it’s something that we have this
09:42
feeling of like oh i’m you know
09:45
i’m jealous that you’re going to do this
09:46
really exciting thing without me that i
09:50
don’t get to experience it with you
09:52
well in a way that’s that’s just a mild
09:55
form
09:56
of the same thing isn’t it that
09:59
rather than put my partner’s happiness
10:01
first and say
10:03
oh this is wonderful they get to go and
10:05
do this really great thing that they’re
10:07
going to enjoy and because i love them
10:11
i’m gonna
10:13
i’m gonna
10:14
make my peace with the fact that this
10:16
happiness isn’t coming from me
10:18
that i’m not responsible for this and
10:20
that it’s happening without me there i
10:23
am just gonna love them enough to say
10:26
i’m just really happy that they get to
10:28
experience it
10:30
that that’s a form of generosity that
10:33
isn’t present in an awful lot of
10:35
relationships and it’s not because
10:37
there’s a narcissist in that
10:38
relationship it’s just because
10:41
that person has has made it about them
10:45
instead of making it about their
10:47
partner’s happiness yeah and that’s more
10:49
like immaturity like it’s immature to
10:52
feel threatened by
10:54
someone else every time they have a
10:55
success
10:56
every time your friend has a success
10:58
like oh i’m like oh that that threatens
11:01
me what does that say about me that’s
11:04
that’s not necessarily you’re a
11:05
narcissist it’s like immature
11:07
it’s like you haven’t grown up you
11:09
haven’t yeah or yeah or insecurity
11:13
or selfishness because you’re putting
11:15
you know you’re not putting how your
11:17
partner feels
11:18
um
11:20
first or on a level with how you feel
11:23
it’s less important it’s more important
11:26
that i feel successful more successful
11:29
all the time or is more important that
11:31
all of your happiness comes from the
11:33
time you spend with me and not
11:35
something you do outside of us
11:38
okay what’s the next one no amount of
11:40
surface level techniques in our life can
11:44
help us if our deeper confidence isn’t
11:47
in place the virtual retreat that i am
11:49
running from the 18th to the 20th of
11:51
march is designed to tackle your
11:53
confidence at the deepest level so that
11:56
you can be the best you can be in life
11:58
and until december the 23rd i have a
12:00
special holiday ticket to this event
12:02
that means a deep discount and a special
12:05
invitation to momentum week in january
12:08
which is a week where i’m going to be
12:09
spending an hour with you every day
12:11
working on your goals to kick off the
12:13
new year to get your special holiday
12:15
ticket to the virtual retreat go to
12:18
mhvirtualretreat.com the link for which
12:20
is in the description to this video
12:22
there’s one here that is ignoring your
12:26
needs
12:28
i think this was one he mentioned in a
12:29
video now that’s one
12:31
like your needs are just annoying to
12:33
them
12:35
and it’s like oh god like you you want
12:37
this thing or this is important to you
12:39
the only thing with that one and
12:40
obviously a narcissist would do that
12:43
but i reckon a lot of people would say
12:45
that about bad relationships they had
12:48
where someone he was bad at meeting
12:51
their needs or it’s like i really
12:54
needed this much uh quality time with
12:56
them or i wanted them to
12:59
uh
13:00
whatever it might be i wanted them to
13:02
spend more time together with my family
13:04
or i want to do this and they ignored
13:07
that
13:08
that may again have been signs of
13:10
someone’s immaturity
13:12
stages of their life where they were
13:14
particularly selfish maybe they just
13:16
were very badly incompatible with you
13:19
and i feel like that’s one where someone
13:21
could
13:22
easily just go yeah my ex was a
13:24
narcissist could they ignore my needs
13:26
well i i
13:27
look sometimes it’s
13:29
let’s also be real it’s easier to say
13:32
someone’s a narcissist than to come to
13:35
terms with the fact that someone just
13:37
wasn’t that interested in you
13:39
right
13:40
you know there are people
13:42
albeit
13:43
still a selfish act
13:46
there are people that
13:47
aren’t really serious about us
13:51
that aren’t as interested as we would
13:53
hope
13:55
and therefore
13:56
don’t really
13:58
weren’t they weren’t trying
14:00
the
14:01
relationship
14:03
worked
14:05
so long as you were catering to their
14:07
every need
14:09
but when you have a need
14:11
you become an inconvenience you just
14:14
become a burden because i i just ah god
14:18
you know you’re reminded
14:20
ah i this i don’t like this person that
14:22
much anyway and now they’re asking
14:24
something of me
14:26
yeah
14:27
i and now you resent them
14:29
for it
14:31
but that has that’s not necessarily to
14:32
do with narcissism it can be a kind of
14:35
selfishness
14:36
that you’re disregarding the fact that
14:39
you
14:40
taking and not giving is hurting
14:42
somebody
14:44
but
14:45
it can be a reflection of a relationship
14:47
or a dating thing that you’re in
14:50
because
14:51
it seems better than nothing at the time
14:53
but you’re not
14:55
as interested
14:56
as they are
14:59
so that’s a
15:00
that’s a distinction sometimes you can
15:03
ask for something
15:04
and they suddenly act aloof
15:07
or give you the silent treatment or
15:09
start to
15:11
break away
15:14
and you go well that’s they’re a
15:15
narcissist because they they were took
15:17
all this from me but now they can’t give
15:19
anything in return well it might be
15:21
because they’re not willing to
15:23
and it might be that
15:24
at some other point with somebody else
15:26
they might give more
15:29
that’s a hard truth to accept but it it
15:32
doesn’t change our reality
15:34
which is just that we want to meet
15:36
someone
15:37
who’s willing to contribute to the
15:38
relationship in the at least at the
15:40
level that we are even if they’re not
15:42
gonna you know relationships people
15:45
contribute in different ways but they’re
15:47
at least willing to give on the level
15:48
that we’re willing to give yeah to the
15:50
relationship yeah so last one in this
15:53
piece is a narcissist will never admit
15:56
they did anything wrong it’s almost
15:58
impossible for them the only way they’ll
16:00
say sorry for their actions is if they
16:02
know they can manipulate something out
16:04
of that apology
16:05
yeah that’s an important distinction
16:09
i truly believe one of the most
16:10
destructive
16:12
traits of a relationship is someone that
16:14
cannot apologize
16:16
and you know there’s there’s a
16:17
distinction to be made here you know
16:19
sometimes we’re with someone i mean a
16:20
lot of the time human nature is if you
16:22
criticize someone on something
16:24
they get defensive
16:26
most people are like that as a reflex
16:28
response for sure
16:30
most people don’t reflex apologize a lot
16:33
of people their ego kicks in
16:35
scorpion tail comes up and they’re like
16:37
i don’t i don’t do that or they just get
16:39
mad because they know they do that and
16:41
they’re annoying that they’ve you’ve
16:43
realized it
16:45
but there’s a difference between someone
16:47
who can come back
16:49
an hour later a day later a week later
16:52
and say hey i thought about what you
16:53
said and
16:54
you’re right
16:56
you know i i want to work on that
16:59
and someone who
17:02
absolutely
17:04
categorically thinks they’re right about
17:06
everything and will use any amount of
17:08
logic
17:10
to persuade you that you are the crazy
17:12
one in this scenario
17:15
and and that is a very very insidious
17:18
trait
17:20
when you’re with someone who this is
17:21
where you start questioning yourself and
17:23
everything you know
17:25
when
17:25
you’re not feeling good about something
17:27
when something’s hurt you when
17:29
something’s made you feel a certain way
17:31
and that person makes you feel crazy for
17:34
feeling that
17:35
that person makes you feel like
17:38
this is just representative of you being
17:41
completely insecure
17:43
of you imagining things the person who
17:46
cannot
17:48
apologize
17:49
yeah you cannot really you can’t work
17:51
with a person like that
17:53
you can’t build with a person like that
17:56
so if you’re with someone that that
17:58
cannot apologize
18:00
cannot acknowledging the acknowledge the
18:02
validity of what you’re feeling on some
18:04
level
18:05
that is a major major problem
18:08
yeah and i feel this is where these
18:10
behaviors that really damage you over
18:12
time they are the distinction you’re
18:14
looking for because like we say about
18:17
the over
18:18
diagnosis of narcissism i think some
18:20
people just confuse
18:22
people who are have huge egos and
18:24
they’re attention seeking and you see
18:26
them
18:27
showing off on instagram and stuff it’s
18:29
like i don’t think every one of them is
18:31
a narcissist some of them might be very
18:33
well capable of saying sorry or they
18:35
might feel guilt when they do something
18:37
wrong they don’t manipulate but they’re
18:40
people who love attention have huge egos
18:43
and
18:44
you know think they
18:46
think they’re the [ __ ] or whatever and
18:48
love adulation they might have a whole
18:50
host of ego issues but i think then
18:53
people just look at someone like that
18:54
and go oh that’s a narcissist and it’s
18:56
like but that person may not actually be
18:59
like this you know manipulative
19:02
or person who lies and you know makes
19:06
you feel crazy yes actively seeks to
19:09
control your thoughts and
19:11
and ensure
19:13
that you question yourself yeah in the
19:15
process to throw a couple more in i one
19:19
of one narcissistic tendency is
19:22
you know we we a lot of people go on a
19:24
date and they’re like i had the best
19:26
time it was amazing we did this we did
19:28
that
19:29
and they don’t actually ever think to
19:31
themselves well hang on did that person
19:33
actually ever ask me anything on the
19:34
date
19:35
did they take any pains to get to know
19:38
me at all
19:39
on that date did they make my opinions
19:42
seem
19:43
interesting or important were they even
19:45
interested in my opinions
19:48
did they come out of that date knowing
19:50
far more about me than when we went in
19:54
or did i just have an amazing time
19:57
because of how
19:59
exciting this person was because we did
20:02
something really amazing on the date
20:05
because they made me feel really special
20:07
and and some
20:09
some let’s let’s not forget
20:12
it’s not
20:13
it’s not like a stretch
20:15
that someone with narcissistic
20:18
tendencies could understand
20:20
that asking you questions and being
20:22
curious about you would be
20:24
something that would impress you
20:28
so
20:31
the key here is to recognize that
20:34
early on
20:36
a narcissist doesn’t ultimately care
20:39
about your feelings
20:41
but they do care about the way they make
20:44
you feel as a reflection of how great
20:46
they are yeah if i can make you fall in
20:50
love with me by the end of this date
20:53
then i’m gonna feel really special
20:56
it’s gonna remind me how great i am yeah
20:59
they care about their status a lot and
21:01
how they’re perceived yeah
21:03
that you go home and tell all your
21:04
friends how wonderful they were
21:07
and it’s one of the reasons that
21:10
in the beginning people may i can
21:12
understand by the way someone hearing
21:13
that and going well that’s great matt so
21:16
what you’re saying is if i go and have
21:17
an amazing time on a date and they ask
21:19
me lots of questions and they show
21:21
interest in my life and they
21:24
uh and they make me feel really special
21:27
then those are all
21:28
warning signs i’m not saying that i’m
21:31
saying that
21:33
the
21:33
truth is the only way you really know
21:37
if this is part of the show they’re
21:40
putting on
21:41
to make you fall in love with them so
21:42
that they can get that good feeling
21:45
or whether this is a genuine desire to
21:48
know you to see you
21:50
and for you to be happy with them
21:52
the only way to know that is over time
21:55
the only way to know that is to watch
21:57
and see if that curiosity about you is
22:00
consistent
22:01
to see what happens when you start
22:03
actually expressing needs to see what
22:06
happens when you ask for something
22:09
or when you talk about something that
22:11
you’re struggling with
22:13
or when you bring up something that they
22:15
did that you didn’t appreciate
22:18
how do they react
22:20
to those things
22:22
that’s when you start to get a picture
22:24
of whether
22:26
all those things you saw in the
22:27
beginning
22:29
were a
22:30
beautiful thing because they were just a
22:32
reflection of
22:34
all of these things they’ve continued to
22:36
be
22:37
or
22:38
whether those were actually
22:40
a sign of something more insidious which
22:42
is that
22:43
it was all about them
22:46
they gave you the greatest date ever
22:48
and made you feel unbelievable
22:51
so that they could feel like they were
22:53
valuable and in demand
22:56
it’s why you can never judge is why you
22:58
should never grieve a great date if it
23:01
doesn’t go anywhere
23:03
you should never get off of an amazing
23:05
date and grieve it if it goes nowhere
23:09
and and the the truth is most people
23:13
the more amazing the date was the harder
23:16
they grieve
23:19
it was i don’t get it we had the best
23:21
time
23:23
well
23:25
that’s not a reflection of anything
23:28
some people are really really really
23:31
great at making you have a good time
23:34
this is no reflection of
23:36
whether someone’s a good partner or not
23:38
this is just a reflection of someone’s
23:40
ability
23:42
to put on a great show
23:46
and putting on a great show isn’t a
23:48
relationship
23:50
so if the next time you have an amazing
23:53
date or an amazing couple of dates with
23:56
someone that suddenly falls off a cliff
23:58
and doesn’t go anywhere
24:01
tell yourself oh
24:04
they’re great at putting on a show
24:07
they have a great act
24:09
and don’t get me wrong it’s a great act
24:12
but it’s an act
24:15
it’s not real
24:16
it’s not about what we have because if
24:18
it was about what we have then it would
24:20
have become something
24:22
i had this point written down everything
24:24
is personal
24:26
to a narcissist
24:28
you know everything is about them
24:31
you know those people in life who you
24:33
you do something and someone says that’s
24:36
totally disrespectful to me
24:38
right but it had nothing it
24:41
absolutely had nothing to do with them
24:43
at all
24:45
it’s the same as someone you know
24:46
cutting you off in traffic and you get
24:49
so mad because you think it’s
24:51
like
24:52
this person just they disrespected me
24:55
not this person was late
24:58
this person’s in a rush to go somewhere
25:00
which is
25:01
much more likely by the way because
25:03
are we really saying they can have any
25:06
real intention toward you
25:08
as
25:09
a faceless person in a car that they
25:11
don’t even know
25:13
far greater likelihood is this is about
25:15
everything except you but we get mad
25:18
because it’s about me
25:20
right now again this is one of those
25:22
interesting areas where
25:24
i would say that there’s a narcissism
25:25
inherent in being human because we’re
25:27
all
25:28
guilty of this
25:30
every single one of us
25:32
we go to the coffee counter and
25:34
someone’s kind of rude and we go away
25:37
and go
25:39
they were rude to me
25:42
that was about me
25:44
and now you hate that person but
25:46
but what’s more likely that they had
25:49
some problem with you
25:51
or that this person is going through
25:53
something in their life that’s making
25:56
them this way or that this person has
25:58
been living their life this way the
26:00
entire time
26:02
so i think
26:03
it
26:04
you know there can be a
26:07
a trait in a true narcissist that
26:10
everything is about me
26:13
but it’s also
26:15
a trait about us humans in general that
26:19
we also have a tendency to think
26:21
everything is about us
26:23
we might say that
26:25
one of the ugly sides of all of us in a
26:27
relationship is making everything our
26:30
partner does about us
26:32
that you do this thing and immediately i
26:35
imagine how it affects me whether it’s
26:38
you having a good time whether it’s
26:41
you know
26:42
me not hearing about from you for an
26:44
hour i’m jealous you’re doing something
26:46
this is about me all of the ways that we
26:49
in an unjustified way make our partners
26:52
life more difficult
26:54
because we make something about us
26:57
is our own
26:59
hint of narcissism that we have to check
27:02
ourselves on at
27:03
fairly regular intervals the
27:06
other thing which we’ve certainly
27:08
touched on
27:10
is this idea that
27:12
a narcissist
27:13
fundamentally lacks a kind of
27:17
i’m i’m
27:19
scared to say empathy because i think
27:21
it’s possible to
27:23
to have a sense of what someone else
27:26
may be
27:28
experiencing
27:31
but the act of caring
27:33
about what someone else is experiencing
27:35
is a different thing altogether
27:38
so i may on some level have the
27:40
emotional intelligence of knowing that
27:42
the person that i’m dating
27:44
is
27:45
suffering
27:47
is having a hard time with something
27:50
but i’m not able to bring myself
27:53
to truly
27:54
care about that or act on that
27:57
yeah because there is nothing more
27:59
important to me than my feelings yeah
28:03
there is nothing more important to me
28:05
than
28:06
my favorite i need my favorite whatever
28:09
that is regardless of how it impacts
28:11
someone else i may understand how it
28:13
impacts someone else in my quieter
28:16
moments i may acknowledge it
28:18
but ultimately
28:20
it’s not nearly as important to me as me
28:23
yeah and you think oh i know that really
28:25
hurts them but
28:27
but i do want to do this anyway i want
28:29
to go and get ice cream i i want to go
28:31
and get ice cream now so i know they’re
28:33
upset but
28:34
but i want ice cream what am i not going
28:36
to have an affair
28:38
what am i not going to do my favorite
28:42
yeah i noticed her obviously i’m gonna
28:44
have the affair but i know this hurts
28:46
them but that’s what i want right now
28:49
there’s a a great book called against
28:52
empathy
28:53
by paul bloom
28:55
and uh he’s basically his argument is
28:57
that empathy is actually kind of a baser
29:00
emotion
29:01
um so he has a this whole argument where
29:02
he argues for rational compassion
29:04
instead but one example uses that
29:06
bullies are actually
29:08
they’re people say that psychopaths are
29:10
bad at empathy and bullies don’t have
29:12
any empathy but bullies are quite good
29:14
at empathy they know exactly the
29:16
pressure points to to make people
29:18
suffer
29:20
and so yeah i do think that’s an
29:21
important point matt where it’s like
29:23
it’s not that
29:24
a narcissist might not experience no
29:27
experience of empathy
29:29
they might just
29:31
put themselves first so much that it
29:32
doesn’t matter yeah
29:34
which is really
29:37
disorienting when you have someone like
29:39
that in your life because
29:42
you can have conversations with them
29:46
where
29:47
they seem to get it
29:49
where they
29:51
show understanding of how you’re feeling
29:54
they sometimes can even show contrition
29:58
but it doesn’t
30:00
change the fact that they always
30:03
put themselves first
30:05
in other words
30:06
when the rubber hits the road
30:09
their actions remain the same because
30:11
regardless of how much they
30:13
may seem to understand
30:16
your pain you’re right you’re right i i
30:19
can’t believe i’ve done that i’ll never
30:20
do that again i’ll you know you’re
30:22
you’re right i was
30:23
they cannot
30:25
they cannot change what they do because
30:27
what they
30:29
want
30:31
their own selfish desires
30:34
or for them avoiding their own pain
30:37
avoiding their own discomfort is the
30:39
most important thing in the world to
30:42
them the concept of truly putting
30:44
somebody else first
30:46
is something that is alien
30:48
to them but that’s a very hard thing
30:50
because it’s one thing to be with
30:51
someone who
30:53
doesn’t even get it who just makes you
30:55
feel crazy it’s another thing to be with
30:58
someone who seems to get it but still
31:00
doesn’t do anything about it
31:03
and that’s a very very painful thing
31:06
because you have to then
31:07
because with someone like that you can
31:09
genuinely connect
31:11
you can actually connect with them
31:14
you can feel like they understand you
31:16
you can feel like you’re both on the
31:18
same page
31:21
but
31:22
that’s where you have to you have to
31:24
look at
31:26
well
31:27
is anything actually changing
31:31
is this person actually
31:34
starting to put me
31:38
at least on the same level of importance
31:40
you know are they
31:42
actually taking account of my needs are
31:45
they actually changing are they actually
31:47
doing what they say they’re going to do
31:50
and then we have to look at their
31:51
actions and if the answer is no then the
31:54
fact that they get it
31:57
ceases to be important you know if you
31:59
keep torturing me
32:02
and telling me that i get it i know this
32:05
is really hard
32:06
but you just keep torturing me anyway
32:10
does it matter that you get it
32:12
because my reality is no different
32:14
i’m still being tortured so at that
32:16
point you have to say i can’t have a
32:18
relationship with you because
32:20
you’re still doing this thing even
32:22
though you get it which actually in some
32:24
ways just makes it that much more
32:25
egregious doesn’t it
32:27
do you want to change your life
32:29
go to this video now immediately right
32:32
now because you want to be happy enough
32:35
that you don’t settle for the wrong
32:37
thing you want to be happy enough that
32:38
if you find the right thing
32:40
but that person ends up treating you
32:42
badly you can walk away from it
—
This post was previously published on YouTube.
***
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