Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#21

Post by scottlocklin » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:04 PM UTC

You seem like a fairly well adjusted fellow, if you've caught yourself being a jerk and want to make positive changes. Maybe you're more of a minor league egotist rather than an actual DSM narcissist. If you like keeping fit, it's difficult to be that kind of a jerk if someone's beating the shit out of you on a regular basis in a dojo. Sports in general are good for people living a life of the mind (aka HN nerds); it chips away at common character defects that come from being a disembodied brain waddling around. You'll expose yourself to people from all walks of life who will give you immediate feedback if you display bad character, and it will get you moving around and make you humble.

If you enjoy history and literature, maybe Plutarch's parallel lives of Alcibiades and Coriolanus; or Christopher Lasch's "Culture of Narcissism" could provide some perspective. And as someone said below, Dale Carnegie's book on winning friends and influencing people, 100 years later, is a really useful, life changing book.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#22

Post by joelbluminator » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:05 PM UTC

rendall wrote: post #10

Get yourself diagnosed by a mental health professional if you don't just mean "egotistical" or "self-absorbed". You might be able to fix egotism and self-absorption. You won't be able to fix actual narcissism for yourself. Good luck!

That's a good point, but I don't OP is describing full blown narcissistic personality disorder. He just has plain all full of himself disorder, something that so many of us have (and it's probably getting worse).

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#23

Post by vearwhershuh » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

Get married and have kids.

Nothing will cure narcissism more effectively than holding a quivering, helpless newborn in your arms and realizing that you must keep this miracle alive.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#24

Post by snarfy » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

Volunteer at an animal shelter for a couple hours a week. The cats at pet stores always need volunteers.

Animals can't communicate so you are forced to empathize.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#25

Post by glormph » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

chadcmulligan wrote: post #3

I used to be narcissistic but now I'm perfect. Are you sure - there's levels of narcissism, some is healthy. Someone with full on Narcissistic Personality Disorder doesn't see a problem with it from my readings and sees no need to change, and would never ask this question. As @kstenerud a bit of empathy training could help, good on you for trying to change. Listen to people, learn to see the good in everyone etc.

Not sure if you're being intentionally ironic about "not a narcissist but perfect" :).

I'd echo the rest of your comment with my MD friend's "narcissists can't be treated, they think there is no problem and pointing out what they are doing only makes them think that their behaviour is actually good...".

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#26

Post by Solomoriah » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

This question seems like a trap... asking people who have overcome narcissism to talk about how much better they are now. Wouldn't that be narcissistic?

With that said, I'll agree that talking to a mental health professional might be the best thing, if you can afford it. Autistic spectrum disorder, for example, sometimes looks like narcissism... if you can't sense other's emotional states, it makes listening to them instead of talking about yourself more difficult, mimicking narcissism. And I'm sure there are other diagnoses that might also have the same effect.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#27

Post by moretai » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

ggambetta wrote: post #15

Seeing a therapist might be infinitely better than reading a book, and not just for narcissism. We're all broken in our own wonderful and unique ways. I've been seeing a therapist for 5 years now, and the positive impact this has had in my life and on my general self-awareness can't be overstated. As engineers and tech people we have one tool that has proven incredible useful in our careers: our brilliant rational mi…

What are examples of problems you couldn't solve with your mind?

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#28

Post by vanderZwan » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

ggambetta wrote: post #15

Seeing a therapist might be infinitely better than reading a book, and not just for narcissism. We're all broken in our own wonderful and unique ways. I've been seeing a therapist for 5 years now, and the positive impact this has had in my life and on my general self-awareness can't be overstated. As engineers and tech people we have one tool that has proven incredible useful in our careers: our brilliant rational mi…

> As engineers and tech people we have one tool that has proven incredible useful in our careers: our brilliant rational minds. So we tend to think that we can solve any problem in life with this tool. thinking that therapy is somehow beneath us is pure hubris.

To add to this: we also tend to think we can correctly assess any problem without external help, but especially when it comes to the "self" this fails. It's kind of inevitable: being able to analyze a problem requires some distance, but taking distance from yourself, especially your problem areas, fundamentally goes against that. The result is blind spots.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#29

Post by throwawa66 » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

There’s a guy on youtube, Sam Vankin. He is the author of Malignant Self Love: Narcissism Revisited and has been studying this for a long time. He claims to be or have been a narcisist himself due to some early childhood trauma. Look him up, he claims he developed a therapy for this and he lives in eastern europe, you can even pay him a visit if you’re interested in aleviating or improving your condition. Whats worse about this condition is, that if left untreated and despite any acomplishments you’ll have ever made you’d always be deeply unhappy within, basically a shell of your true self and this will probably spill in your life and around you and make a lot of victims: family, friends, basically everyone around you.

Re: Ask HN: How did you fix your narcissism?

#30

Post by drinfinity » Thu, Feb 06, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

Why do you want to change? Regret anything?

I don't know the first thing about you, so it's hard to say what is going to help. If you truly are a narcissist all bets are off, but perhaps you are just a bit self-centered which might mean there is still hope after all.

I'd look for books on being a "building lasting relations", "how to deal with emotions", "how to be a good mother/father". That kind of stuff. Bring out the wounded inner child and see if some CPR is still an option.