Narcissism: BETWEEN HEALTH AND DISEASE 
Summary In the history of psychology links between individual pathology and social pathology has been made since the days of Freud. This type of reflection was developed by Fromm and recently Benasayag Schmit and beautiful in their essay "The era of sad passions. In this paper we attempt to show that narcissism is a psychic force that can vary along a continuum and is to be linked with the cultural variables specific to a given society.
The myth of Narcissus The myth of Narcissus is in
Metamorphoses of Ovid and tells of a young man of beautiful appearance, the son of god and the nymph Liriope Cephisus river, of which men and women fell madly in love . Narciso preferred spending his time hunting, regardless of its suitors, including the nymph Echo. Rejected by Narcissus, the nymph hid in the woods and disappear. Eco not only, but all the young and the young despised by Narciso, invoked the vengeance of the gods. Narcissus was so condemned by Nemesis to fall in love with his reflection in the water. More and more fascinated by the image of his face, Narcissus came to potersene not detached, leaned over the water and left to die. Where his body lay a beautiful rose flower, which was called by his name.
Narcissism in Freud In a rough definition, then
narcissism means love for its image . In psychoanalysis, Freud used the concept of narcissism made the following distinction:
1. Primary narcissism: it is conceived as a stage in which the child invests all his libido on himself before turning to external objects. Compared autoerotism, where each drive seek its own gratification related to the functioning of an organ, in the primary narcissism is still autoerotic gratification, but with reference to a unified image of the body or a first draft of the ego.
2. Secondary narcissism: the ego is characterized by a withdrawal of object libido withdrawn his investments. This is possible primarily because the investments object do not suppress the ego investment, and secondly because, writes Freud, "The ego must be regarded as a great reservoir of libido from which libido is issued on the objects, if it is always the ego is always ready to take upon himself libido which flows back from these "
To better understand this distinction, we must remember that for Freud's psychosexual development takes place along two lines:
• in relation to the erogenous zones (oral, anal, phallic, latency and genital);
• in relation to the object.
Regarding the line of development that the relationship with the object, the child undergoes an initial stage of auto-eroticism where the partial drives are met independently of each other, as pleasure organ. We then move on to primary narcissism in which the partial drives are gathered around a single object, which in this case is the ego, an ego perceived as a unitary body. The next step is to love or love object mature adult. There is talk of secondary narcissism, in reference to a return of narcissism in adulthood. The secondary narcissism characterizes both normal phenomena (their regression of falling, children, a physical illness), and abnormal phenomena (mental illness), this term the withdrawal of the investment from the outside world, and a reflux of these charges on the ego. Libido, then, that unity which originally invested is the Self, then investing the objects, but can also be withdrawn from them and reported back on the ego. But, says Freud in Totem and Taboo "a human being remains somewhat narcissistic even after finding external objects for his libido." The development, for Freud, it would be an evolution from narcissism to an absolute objective reasoning skills and love for the object, a capacity, however, that does not go beyond certain limits.
Narcissism individual and social Fromm Fromm puts
discuss the concept of libido, sexual energy, replacing it with the more general psychic energy, but leaves unchanged the general scheme of interpretation of narcissism and dynamic conception of the psychic apparatus. Let's rebuild his view of narcissism, citing some pages of his love
Psychoanalysis:
begin our description of narcissism with two extreme examples: the "primary narcissism" of the infant and the patient's narcissism. The child does not have relations with the outside world (his libido in Freudian terminology has not yet projected out objects). In other words, the outside world does not exist for the child, so that he can not distinguish between the 'I' and 'not me. " We could also say that the child has no interest (interest = "be in) to the outside world. The only reality that exists for the child is himself: his body, his physical sensations of cold and heat, thirst, need for sleep and physical contact. The mentally ill are in a situation that is not fundamentally different from that of the newborn. But as for the baby to the outside world has not yet emerged as real, for what it has ceased to be real. In hallucinations, in fact, the senses have lost their function to record external events - they record the subjective experience into categories of sensory responses to external objects. The same mechanism is acting paranoid delusion. Fear and suspicion, in fact, that emotions are subjective, it is objectified in such a way that the paranoid is convinced that others are conspiring against her. It is precisely this difference with the neurotic person: it can have constant fear of being hated, persecuted, etc.. But still know that this is what he is afraid. For the paranoid fear turned into reality .... Psychosis is a state of absolute narcissism, in which the person has broken any connection with external reality and substituted its own person to reality. It is completely full of himself, has become the "god and the world" for itself ... (Fromm 1971, pp.66-67)
Fromm talking about the baby reminds us that at that stage that the infant lives M. Mahler called autistic
phase: in the first month of life the child is unable to differentiate itself from the outside world does not notice the existence of a separate agent of care, ie someone who takes care of him. Only after the second month of life gradually emerges a vague and confused awareness the existence of an agent of maternal care. The satisfaction of physiological needs (hunger), continuous contact with the maternal body, the observation of the face that moves cause the child to recognize, albeit vaguely, that there is something that is "not himself" from which depend on his wealth or his discomfort. The mother-object is not perceived as an entity separate from himself, but is caught in a symbiotic fusion in which there is no clear boundary, either physical or psychic, between child and mother (
symbiotic phase ). Only after the fifth month, with the first attempts to explore physical environment, begins that phase of physical and psychological distancing from the mother is called
process of separation-individuation, which is completed around the third year of life with the acquisition of identity psychic and physical insistently says "mine" and "I" to assert himself, says "no" to assert his independence, he begins to recognize himself in the mirror.
The success of this evolution should thus allow the emergence of self-awareness in children as a separate individual, while awareness of the existence of a world outside themselves. In psychosis, to Fromm, there is a return all'indifferenziazione childhood: the outside world disappears behind the hallucination. The absolute narcissism, whether the child is that of the psychotic, is characterized, therefore, the denial of objective reality. As Fromm said: "Whatever the various manifestations of narcissism in all its forms is a common lack of genuine interest in the outside world ..." (op. cit. P. 71) But if
narcissism leads, as shown by the myth, self-destruction, because we are, to varying degrees, linked to this trend that seems dysfunctional in every respect for life? Fromm gives us that answer.
Narcissism is a passion whose intensity in many individuals may be comparable to sexual desire and the desire to be alive. In fact, many times turns out to be stronger of both. Even in the individual medium in which it does not have that intensity, it remains a core narcissistic that is almost indestructible. In those circumstances we might suspect that, like sex and survival, even narcissistic passion has an important biological function. ... Biologically, in terms of survival, man must give himself more important than than anyone else. If he did so from where you catch the energy and interest to defend itself against the other, to work for their livelihood, to fight for their survival, to raise their claims against those of others? ...
However, once it is recognized that narcissism plays an important biological function, we are faced with another problem. The extreme narcissism is not the function of making a man indifferent to others, unable to put their own needs in second place when it is necessary to cooperate with others? Narcissism does not make man asocial and, indeed, when it reaches an extreme degree, crazy? There is no doubt that the extreme individual narcissism would be a serious obstacle to the whole social life. But if this is true, it must be said that narcissism is in conflict with the principle of survival, because the individual can survive only if it is organized in groups, hardly anyone would be able to protect itself against the dangers of nature, nor would it be able to do many kinds of work which may be made only in the group. This causes the paradoxical result that narcissism is necessary for survival, and at the same time is a threat to survival. The solution of this paradox follows two directions: one is that narcissism is optimal for survival over the ceiling, that is to say, the degree of narcissism is biologically necessary to reduce the degree of narcissism is compatible with social co-operation; the other is that the individual is transformed into narcissism narcissism group, clan, nation, religion, race, etc.., become the objects of narcissistic passion rather than the individual. So narcissistic energy remains but is used in the interest of survival of the group rather than the individual's survival ...
From the point of view of any organized group that wants to survive, it is important that the group invested by its members of narcissistic energy. The survival of a group depends in some way by the fact that its members consider its importance as or more than that of their own lives, and who also believe in the validity, or rather in the superiority of their group in comparison to others.
(op. cit. Pp.72-78)
For Fromm, then, narcissism is a force that can not be eliminated, to some degree, it is functional to survival, affirmation of self, but when it makes too much ' individual unfit for social life and cooperation with other individuals. To prevent risks from excessive individual narcissism, the company encourages the movement of 'narcissistic energy from the individual to the social. At this point it will be your clan, nation or group of faithful to be invested with narcissistic energy. Belonging to a group, considered by its members above, is reflected, in fact, on a positive 'self-esteem of individuals who belong to it. Identification with a group considered "superior" can, in fact, improve self-image, a process that could be defined syllogistic: "My group is higher (major premise), I am a member of the group (minor premise ) = I'm better (conclusion). " As well as individual-level causes excessive narcissism, the inability to think in terms of objective even at a high social cohesion creates narcissistic pathological phenomena of the same sign.
regard to the pathology of narcissism group, the most obvious symptom, and frequently, as in the case of individual narcissism is a lack of objectivity and rational opinion ... If the policy actions are based on narcissistic self-glorification, the lack of objectivity often leads to disastrous consequences ... The narcissism of the group need satisfaction just as the individual. From one point of view that satisfaction comes from the common ideology of the superiority of their group, and the inferiority of everyone else ... If the narcissism of a group is hurt, then we find the same reaction of anger that we talked about the individual narcissism .... The violation of the flag, the insults against his God, emperor, leader, war and the loss of the territory have often led to violent feelings of revenge collective that later resulted in new wars. The wounded narcissism can only be appeased if the offender is crushed, and so the insult to his narcissism is cleared. The personal and national revenge, is based on wounded narcissism and the need to "heal" the wound through the annihilation of the offender.
(ibid., pp.85-87)
There is thus a narcissistic pathology a narcissistic individual and social pathology. What relationships exist between these two levels of narcissism? To try to answer your question, it is appropriate to compare different cultural models.
cultural models and visions of the self A certain amount of self-respect, esteem and self-respect, in our Western culture are not only normal but desirable.
That this assumption, however, is not universal, we can understand some passages rebuilding intervention Jeanne Tsai, a psychologist at Stanford University, one of the meetings of the Mind and Life (study group formed by the Dalai Lama and leading researchers in psychology and neuroscience), whose contents can be found in the essay
Destructive Emotions (Dalai Lama, D. Goleman 2003).
"How does culture influence the emotions? The cultures are similar and different in many respects. Social scientists have identified one of the differences between Western and non-Western cultures: the vision of self that, in turn, affects our emotions and our feelings ". Jeanne explained that the deepest core of the self seems to depend less on the culture, while the outer layer is strongly influenced them. This outer layer was the subject of his presentation today.
Although each cultural orientation of a certain amplitude, such as the vision of the self, to move along a continuum, Jeanne developed the argument stressing the extreme cases. "One type of this outer layer is what psychologists Hazel Markus and Shinobu Kitayama call themselves a 'independent' - typical of people living in Western cultures - which sees itself as separate from others, including parents, children, the colleagues and friends. These people see the self as something that has values, beliefs - the internal attributes.
In contrast to this, there is a self 'interdependent', much more typical of people living in Asian cultures. These people see the self as something linked to the other, something that is indeed part of a social context. The interdependent self is defined in terms of social relations ...
"How do we know if these different visions of the self really exist? Although the literature and the arts provide the samples, we psychologists like to ask questions like 'Who are you?'. The Americans, with an independent self reply, 'I'm open, they are friendly, I'm smart, I am a good person', while the members of Asian cultures say, "I am a daughter or son, I work in this company, I play the piano" . Are defined more in terms of social roles that of inner attributes ...
"These different cultural views of the self affect the objectives that punctuate the life of an individual. The aim of the life of a person with an independent self is to separate, divide this into itself from the others. These are people who, in principle, they do express their inner beliefs, how they are saying and stressing their importance, particularly in relation to others ... But these objectives are different from those of someone who has an interdependent self, which is to contact with others and maintaining relationships. We do moderate our inner beliefs and minimizing the importance that we have respect the other ... These divergent views of the self affect different aspects of emotions ... First of all affect what constitutes an emotion desirable ... Westerners give value to the development of the self while Asians do damage to the cancellation of the self ... In American culture we think it's very, very important to have a high level of self-esteem ... We believe it is good to have a high self-esteem, low self-esteem and that's a bad thing, if it is low, for example, is related to depression and feelings of anxiety ... The idea is that Asians as they have on average lower self-esteem, may seem less healthy in terms of psychological within the dominant American culture. But it's not - it is simply the fact that their vision does not imply a normal exploitation of the self equal to that of Anglo-American. "
(op. cit. Pp. 334-340)
It is interesting to note here that the spread of the Narcissistic Personality Disorder seems to affect mainly certain cultural contexts. According to some observers, in fact, this disease has spread almost exclusively in Western capitalist countries.
How characterizes this disorder? We see the description given by P. Kernberg and others in
Personality disorders in children and adolescents.
Although the grandiose sense of self-importance is central to the DP narcissistic vulnerability is a feature associated with self-esteem. This makes it an unusual patients with narcissistic DP extremely sensitive to criticism or failure, which may respond with disdain, rage, or defiant counterattack. Their sense of entitlement endemic is often reflected in a failure of the superego, which looks like a lack of concern, guilt, or regret with respect to treat others badly. The non-self-monitoring that results gives rise to antisocial traits, personal bankruptcies, losses, or irresponsible behavior can be justified by rationalizations, prevarication or clear lies. In addition, introjects persecutors, destructive, primitive, which contribute to the formation of conscience, but which have not been well integrated into the superego, projected outside emerge in other anxieties as paranoid, or are expressed in somatic symptoms and how hypochondriacs. Finally, envy, deadly feature of the narcissistic patient with DP, destroys both the ability to experience satisfaction with what one has been able to do or gratitude for what others have done. The chronic sense of envy and devaluation, idealization of primitive self and others, efforts towards an omnipotent, narcissistic withdrawal or remain at a distance are all defenses that aim to protect the grandiose self.
(op. cit. 174)
In a culture that encourages a vision of themselves "independent", in which the individual is encouraged to define their own attributes to be through internal (and not under the system of relations where it is located), and where these attributes are going in the direction of the "strength and ability performing" Is it strange that people tend to hide their weaknesses and to develop a grandiose self-image?
The clinical link Benasayag Schmit and in the essay
The age of the passions sad (2005) depart from the negative assessment of our society, broken up in terms of (a social context of the pathogen itself), and have proposed a link
clinic.
"Working for the autonomy of persons": this could be the motto of the dominant ideology in the context of the therapeutic and medico-social ... In a society where the ties are experienced as constraints or as contracts, the ' be self-perceived quality of society as a highly desirable ... It is worth a brief reference to Aristotle. Aristotle in fact, contradicting the common sense says that the slave is the one who has no ties, which does not have its place, which can be used everywhere and in different ways. The free man but one who has many links and many obligations towards others, towards the city and to the place where he lives ... Paradoxically, then, our company has succeeded in fashioning an ideal of freedom that looks like a drop water, the life of the slave as well as Aristotle defines
... One might say that in our society, being autonomous means simply to be strong ... We psychotherapists we must ask ourselves this goal: to make people weak that we shall "not weak" even knowing that it is absolutely impossible. In doing so, in fact, we put in even more trouble, so we refer devaluing their image of themselves, because they can not do what they should be, or be independent and strong.
The degree of strength and weakness is the only criterion used to think our lives and design our lives. The force is such an obsession that our society has produced a conception of freedom based on the domain: free is the one who dominates. ... Our contemporary dream-autonomous domain, are seeking to gain power over others and the environment that allows them to pursue their goals and satisfy their own desires without hindrance and without opposition anyone. ... Some therapeutic interventions are proposed as this autonomy-purpose power and try to help the patient to better control its environment, its psyche and its symptoms. In this logic is not at all interested in trying to understand the message or existential difficulties that lie behind the symptom or behavior, because what's important is to become a wolf-performance, dominating everything, including her own instincts, not the intention of the ideal wisdom of many philosophies, but to channel them for a productive life and utilitarian ...
Our company endorses the idea that everything is possible and that freedom is closely linked to the domain: we have the fate of all to win. The alternative to this mainstream philosophical view that freedom consists in taking their destiny ...
We are what is given, which is woven from a certain age and for some time. Not "have" a destiny but at the same time, we're nothing more, because any attempt to escape it condemns us to nothing, the fatality. In short, we have this fate. ... The fate of that complex conditions, histories and desires to meet and intertwine resulting in a singularity, a person. It consists of the bonds that we create and develop freely ... The freedom accorded with the destiny we get into a dimension of vulnerability. ... Entering the fragility means to live in an interdependent relationship, in a network of links with others. Ties that should not be seen as failures or successes, but as the possibility of a shared life. The bonds are not the limits of the ego, but what gives power to my freedom and my being. My freedom is not so that ends where the other's begins, but rather begins with the liberation of the other, through each other. In this sense one could say that individual freedom does not exist: there are only acts of liberation that connect us to others. This is the dimension, or rather these are the dimensions of fragility. A philosophical perspective of this type can form the basis of psychotherapy and can, in our opinion, to meet the challenges of our time.
(op. cit. Pag.101-106)
Concluding remarks At the end of this overview on the narcissism which conclusions can be drawn? Thinking back to the lesson of Freud, that the individual pathology (intrapsychic conflict between the various departments, particularly between id and superego) can not be understood except in relation to a social context (in this case a society that sacrifices freedom in the name of security-re-read about it
Discomfort civilization -), I believe that the phenomenon of narcissism at the individual level is not understood except in relation to an analysis of our socio-cultural context. Ours is a society which, according to Jeanne Tsai, cultivates a vision of the self independent of the individual as monad. We could also say that our culture celebrates extreme individualism at the expense of relations, lived almost as soon as possible to get rid of ties. This society and this culture encourage narcissistic pathologies at both individual and group level. The only way out of this situation seems to me that indicated by Fromm. In the essay already mentioned, Fromm, starting from the fact existence in each of us to a core narcissistic probably unavoidable, proposes a change of "object".
If the whole human family, could become the subject of narcissism group as an object instead of hiring a nation, a race, a political system, it would be an advantage. If the individual could experience, first as a citizen of the world and mankind could be proud of and work performed by it, his narcissism turned towards the human race, rather than to its members in conflict. If the educational systems of all countries an incentive to enterprises of mankind instead of the undertakings of a single nation, it could do something more compelling and dynamic in favor of the pride of being a man ...
(op. cit. pp.90-91)
In this perspective, which I personally agree, the effort cultural, educational and policy should go in the direction of increasingly recognize the interdependence of people and nations to the detriment of the illusory visions that face individuals and nations-atoms and glorious self-sufficient.
REFERENCES Benasayag, M., SCHMIT, G.
2005
The age of sad passions , Feltrinelli, Milan.
Dalai Lama, Goleman, D.
2004
Destructive Emotions , Mondadori, Milan.
FREUD, S.
1971
Civilization and its Discontents, Hogarth Press Bollati, Torino.
FROMM, E.
1971
Psychoanalysis love , Newton Compton, Rome.
Kernberg et al.
2001
Personality disorders in children and adolescents , Fiori, Rome.
