Narcissism vs Psychopathy

Description:
In this video, Dr Syl answers a comment around the difference between narcissism and psychopathy and whether these can be considered 'mental illnesses'. Dr Syl explores the psychologial structure of a psychotically organised personality vs a narcissistically organise personality. Hope you enjoy this exploration and discussion.

My favourite book to better understand personality structure: Psychoanalytic Diagnosis, Second Edition: Understanding Personality Structure in the Clinical Process (Nancy McWilliams)

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PLEASE READ - DISCLAIMER
If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, please call a local emergency telephone number or go to the nearest emergency room. This channel is intended for general educational mental health content only. It is NOT a substitute for seeking professional mental health/health advice from your doctor or therapist. Interacting with my channel does NOT constitute a Doctor-Patient relationship. I do NOT represent any medical college or organisation. This content represents my PERSONAL views only.

[DrSyl]

My favourite book to better understand personality structure: Psychoanalytic Diagnosis, Second Edition: Understanding Personality Structure in the Clinical Process (Nancy McWilliams)

[AlastorTheNPDemon]

"I'm not worth anything unless I can perform."

Possibly the strongest belief I have about myself. I am absolutely mired in shame when I can't do everything I set my mind to, whether that reason being poor sleep or being stuck in traffic. However, I see the roots of this belief played out consistently in Western society - everything is transactional; debt is the glue that binds us together; love always comes with terms and conditions; true unconditional love is a fairy tale and anyone who believes in it is naïve.

[cosmicwolffe]

You packed so much information into 20 minutes and deep quotes such as, "I am not worth anything unless I can perform " I find both these personalities interesting thank you Dr Syl xx

[acrefray]

It's also fascinating how often traits from these personality structures are lauded. Traits such as perceived confidence, ability to manipulate, desire for power.

[canbaran]

It was another very high quality and informative video, thank you for teaching and informing about the differences between these two illness subjects. Dr. Syl

[projectpiano]

"Narcissism is from fear of shame, psychopathy is from fear of weakness" has implications for what is the role of the medical system and what is the role of the legal system. In general the more I learn about this kind of thing, the more I think the medical system at its core is about giving options to someone to take care of their health, and the legal system is about what we collectively agree someone should be forced to do (which could be receive a certain type of medical treatment in the case of involuntary treatment). It feels a lot cleaner to cut it that way in my opinion. Medical system = give options, legal system = what do we agree people should be forced to do. Or in other words, medical system = meet someone where they're at, legal system = act on their behalf based on collective agreement.

[trust.honesty]

This dude seems to get it.. while so.. soooo many people don't... even psychologists. Earned a sub.

[mathew]

Hey mate, been a bit since i've watched your videos. Did you get a new camera? The quality looks great. Also, I like the structure of you with a pen and book facing me, it's like almost like you're across the table from me. This video led me to a lot of "ahhhh" moments. The dichotomy between the interpretation of a narcissist and psychopath when someone shows emotion or admiration is fascinating. The narcissist feels validated, and feeds off that, while the psychopath also feeds off that but sees a prey and someone to exploit. So interesting. I also wonder how a psychopath or narcissist ends up in therapy if they don't want to be there? How does that work? I image there would need to be something additional like psychosis or an admission to a hospital that would require them to undergo psychiatric evaluation ontop of whatever other reason theyre in the hospital for. Anyway, Cheers Dr syl, great video!

P.s I think not writing on the line on the page is pretty psychopathic!

[missdrool]

These videos are so good and helpful, I love the way you explain things. I've learned a lot, even about my own mental health. Thanks, and much love from Finland ❤

[Uhlbelk]

In medicine as a GP, I look at "illness" as something not normal for the patient. Someone with schizophrenia, depression, anxiety, these things are not that normal state, which is typically why they are ego-dystonic, and frequently want help. This is also true with physical medical conditions, someone with an infection, or a tumor, they are not in their normal state and have an illness. Illnesses in medicine are "treated", the medication and other treatments are given to cure or prevent damage. When a condition is actually part of someones normal state, that is simply a "condition" something that is identified because it presents difficulties for the patient and people around them. Someone with Turner syndrome isn't sick, they don't have an illness, but they have a condition they have to live with that is different than what typical people have to live with. This is true of lots of psychological issues, sexual orientation is just how someone is, narcissism and other personality disorders are the same. These type of people are not being treated by medicine, they are "coping" with their condition. Coping can mean medications to prevent damage, but health professionals shouldn't look at conditions as things to "cure". Not saying nothing can be done about conditions, just that the expectation for the health care providers and patients should be different. Things are very complicated and overlap.

Someone with type 2 diabetes are treated for their illness with medications to bring down their blood sugar, maybe they are dealing with a depression an illness that has come on with their diabetes or contributed to them developing diabetes that can be treated, but they may also have a personality disorder that has contributed to their condition as well, and it is not something that the medical provider should be looking at as an illness, but as a condition that the patient needs help coping with, not curing.

[chelucupar]

I have a PhD in engineering. And a diploma in psychology. And I'm a licensed psychological counselor. But what I like most is writing. Could probably say I'm an artist, because except for the projects I'm supposed to do for work, I don't actually try to sort things out quite clearly. Btw, I work as an engineer. And the thing I wanted to mention is that people that aren't involved in arts, probably don't quite understand what it's all about. If you call an engineer insane, it's usually a bad thing. If you call an artist insane... That's usually good. This artist was just insane. It means he was really really good, making people's brains blow up. Guys like Picasso, Dostoyevsky, Proust might have been called insane during their period, but from an artistic point of view, that's the highest compliment an artist can achieve. It means that he's doing art at such a high level that regular people just can't understand. And, personally, I always wanted to write books. That was my dream so to speak. I did the other things strictly for money. I never had any personal desire to do them, I just had to. So for me, if someone calls me insane, I'm just like... Uuuu... That's good. Better be doing more of that. And during the years many people have called me insane and I was like... Maaaan! I must be a genius or something. I don't really know how people relate to artists or whether one needs some special diploma to be recognized as an artist. Looking back in history, it doesn't seem to me that anyone needed a diploma for that. And artists... The status of an artist in society has always been a highly controversial one. Many of them were right out in an open conflict. And some say that's actually the job of an artist, to be in conflict with society. I don't think that someone who's really well behave has ever been recognized as an artist. A few years ago I used to be really harsh on some writers I used to hang out with. They weren't drinking. If you don't even drink, what exactly are you writing about? If you don't experience on your own realities that people are facing, how can you write about them? So being addicted to drugs, drinking, etc... For an artist is probably a badge of honor. Anyway, that's not the point. I'm not trying to promote alcohol abuse, just saying that sometimes I actually thought in this way, I want to do this and that in order to know on my own what's it all about so I can write about it. But I always seem to be finding myself in between realms so to speak. People at work don't really like artists, especially writers, the CEO openly stated that a few times and artists also don't like me because I'm not depended of my art for a living. If someone asks me to do something in the arts department that I don't want to do, I just don't do it. Cause there's no way to actually coerce me. And I somewhat like it like this. Writing for money as in kissing ass... It kinda goes against the code so to speak. I've been bullied on both fronts so to speak, but I've always been like... Really? You sure you wanna mess with me? You really do believe that the sword is stronger than the feather? Let's find out, shall we? But maybe the main issue is the psychology diploma. I wanted to become a licensed psychotherapist. I am a counselor, but I never did it as a profession. Maybe conversations about it. And the main reason I'm writing this is the fact that always being in between realms so to speak always made me wonder what was it all about. A narcissist and a psychopath. I remember some definitions so to speak, but if I were to be writing a book trying to create a stereotypical character portraying just that, I wouldn't be able to do it. It wouldn't seem real. And from my experience with the psychological/psychiatric environment... To be honest, it always felt like a witch hunt. I'm going to refer to a Bible passage. It's one at the beginning, describing how Jacob or some other character, I can't remember the name now, wanted to buy a tomb for his dead wife. And he asked some leader for a space and the leader said he'll give it to him for free. And Jacob said no, I want to buy it, here's the money, take it or leave it. And if you ask me, Jacob simply avoided being scammed. Because there are moral debts so to speak. If he would have taken it for free, people could have come to ask him for stuff. And he didn't want to have that happen to him. And now... What's that? Is that psychopathic behavior? Because people don't like it when you do that to them. Telling them no, I will not accept the gift you've brought. Because that's a moral judgement. It says that I don't trust you. And you've seen what happened in the story about Cain and Abel, when God refused Cain's gift. So I think it's really complicated. And in a way I feel that psychopaths have been portrayed in the literature as the bad guys most of the time. Even when they were the protagonist, they still had an off feeling. Rambo fighting the police, killing police man... I just don't know about that. Narcissists on the other hand... They never seem to get the death chair so to speak. They're usually portrait as not being as aggressive and determined as a psychopath. What do you think? Legally blonde is portraying narcissists or not? Teenagers movies, are they about narcissists or psychopaths? I would say that they are mostly about narcissists. Or maybe horror movies. People gathering in an old house, partying, being all shallow and stuff, a psychopath showing up to kill them. And this is strange. Because in movies portraying narcissistic behavior, unless it's a horror movie in which they just get killed, they never seem to be doing that bad at the end. Maybe in some movies concerning drugs... Requiem for a dream, where the older lady wanting to lose weight ended up being a vegetable. That's a how narcissists are portrayed. And that's how movies describe what can be called a narcissist's bad ending. A psychopath's bad ending is him getting killed, ending up behind bars, something like that. And I've mentioned that there's a which hunt for psychopaths. I say that because in movies, is always easy to label a psychopath. But narcissists never got labeled properly as what they are. And when I talk to people that seem to display narcissistic traits, I always get the feeling that they don't recognize themselves in movies. Psychopaths seem to do. But narcissists seem just clueless of the possible dangers evoking from their condition so to speak. And I find this to be important. Think of it in movies terms. The Highlander. What do immortals do? They fight each other and then more or less mind their own business. What do people in Legally blonde do? They fight over who's purse looks better and start "wars" over clothes. More or less, of course. And if that's not a witch hunt or as they call it today, discrimination, what is it? And OK. I'm probably more on the psychopathic side than on the narcissist side. But have you seen those other guys? I might go like get out of here, you are annoying me. But it's somewhat unlikely I will come to your room to steal your courses so that you don't get your diploma. Also, again, The Highlander. I roam alone, if provoked fight to the death, whatever. I don't clump up in gangs to start a party that destroys the entire neighborhood. Those are the narcissists. And those people in Requiem for a dream... Were they doing drug dealing? It seemed to me that way. Were they narcissists or psychopaths? None of them seemed that willing to be fighting to the death.

[kayberries]

I’m so early I clicked the notif instantly

[OakleyOaks]

How would you explain, “Being hyper aware of your disorder. But being unable to control yourself or communicate and falling back into the same pattern even if you’re aware that you’re doing it.” And the endless cycle of being aware but failing at changing it?” I might be wording it funny but could you talk about this? I have BPD and dissociation disorder and I can tell when things get bad, and understand what I need to do- but when it comes down to “going through it” I end up either emotionally hurting myself or others. How does one manage this and how can I look at this obstacle differently?

I appreciate you and the videos you put out. You really make being different feel normal. You’re very good at what you do and these videos make my week or month. Please keep it up. Sending love and support.

Thank you Dr. Syl.

[andreasobuaculla]

I havent tuned in for a while, My narcissist neighbour, is finally locked up, I almost ended up in an asylum

[projectpiano]

13:57-14:05 Follow up question: Is it strictly necessary to act out at some point (whether with a therapist or in a stable personal relationship) in order to heal personality vulnerabilities? Because if you're not shown unconditional love before then in order to feel unconditional love later on in life you need to have evidence that challenges previous deeply held beliefs that developed (an example of evidence that challenges a belief could be, "If I act out to try to get a need met, my need gets met")? I hope my reasoning for why I could think it's strictly necessary there makes sense ^^. Also I recognize that may be unanswerable or oversimplified but I'm curious what your thoughts are on it.

Nice video, identifying narcissism and psychopathy's roots as being shame and need for power (respectively) seems really key and makes personality organization more experientially/intuitively accessible imo

[DennisBolanos]

I have a question: Do stimulants help people without ADHD?

[zekaay]

From what I know so far these conditions are rather rare, so I think I have met maybe a real NPD one time in my life - maybe. Retrospectively, this was a woman whose favorite "hobby" was to manipulate people, but she did not realize that this was not "normal" - she considered herself a victim of the very people she was manipulating, and she hid herself cleverly in the humanitarian work-field. She would be vocal in performative activism and seemingly in practice too, somehow I think somebody can still have that psychological condition and still want to help people. She was definitely not genuinely kind - and weirdly she had no idea about it. Although by the sound of your interpretation she does not seem to fit the mould, but she was a sick minded person who would constantly create fake FB profiles to get close to people who blocked her and then would pose as a different person having conversations with them. Like a spider luring the food into their web. Top of the cherry was when she associated herself with a man I had to cut off because he ghosted me and then kept trying to contact me (which I refused thankfully, this was the beginning of when I started noticing what type of people I should not be investing energy into anymore). So this woman said to me once she feels sorry for this man because she feels like he is like her. This was kind of revealing because the man was extremely toxic you know over promising and under delivering type of thing. I think back to that moment to this day (this was decades ago) as it was a clear sign to me about the inner mechanisms of this woman.

[purelyambi]

If the structure of personality is how one relates to others. how one relates to self and how one tolerates and react to stress, How does this framework apply to Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) ?
For me the separation of self states can be overt particularly under stress and absolutely have their own personality, and in some cases cluster b personality disorders.
Is this separation and multiple presentations of interrelating with the world why it is Identity rather than personality

[muma]

you talk about structure, that's what MyerBriggs is about, the general structure of a person's cognitive functions

[Grungehead]

Psychopathy isn't a personality disorder. its a broad spectrum of signs of cluster b symptoms relating the DSM. borderlines, narcs, and histrionics all show signs of Psychopathy.