Why Something Wicked This Way Comes III: How I Love Me . . .
The past two weeks I’ve been talking about motivating your bad guy/gal. When you go deeper into their psyche, you create a well-rounded evil person that haunts your reader’s dreams. Last week I talked about fear disguised as jealousy and envy. Today I’m still talking about a different fear. First, I want tell you a story. So grab your blanket and some warm milk.
A long, long time ago there was a beautiful young boy. He was the most beautiful boy in his village. All the girls loved him. All the boys wanted to be him. His mother admired him. The boy was proud and new of his beauty and perfection. And he believed no one was as great as he. The gods saw his prideful spirit and punished him in a way that prevented him from truly knowing himself. One day he came across a pond, stooped down to admire his reflection, and became enthralled with himself. He stared at his reflection until he withered and died. The End.
Why are you looking at me like that? Oh! I forgot to tell you the boy’s name. Silly me. The boys name was Narcissus.
His name inspired the word narcissism and narcissistic. His story inspired the psychological disorder Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD).
For those unfamiliar with the personality quirks of NPD, here they are: grandiosity, self-absorbed, lack of empathy, lack of awareness of other's needs, intolerance, rage, loathes criticism (any and all, big or small), controlling, and blames others for failures. Oh! They have STORMY relationships, if they have any.
Before I continue, know that I am talking about pathological narcissism, the person who is unwilling to EVER see another person’s point of view. They demand respect. They want people to fear them. They DO NOT like people.
Or so you think.
This person does care. (Don’t roll your eyes.) If you look in this person’s past you will typically find his primary caregiver provided inconsistent (i.e., sometimes gives praise and sometimes indifferent) or incongruent (i.e., says child is most beautiful when he is average) feedback regarding the child’s worth. Many times the child filled a void in the caregiver’s mind and heart; thus the child was overvalued. The combination of mixed messages and inappropriate value skewed the child’s understanding of relationships and human value. S/he had been an object, a means to an end. Thus, all people became objects, a means to an end. If you popped his puffed-up ego you would see a kid who is scared and insecure and uncertain. You would find a kid who is afraid of people and relationships. Controlling people is how they temper that fear.
So what does narcissism look like in an antagonist? Glad you asked. The dictator who believes he can build a powerful nation and make other nations bow to him. A CEO who believes it is okay to embezzle money to prove to the Board that the CEO holds the power, not them. The professor who sexually harasses his students for fourteen years, telling each one no one will believe their story because people respect and fear him. The husband who has buried three wives after their “mysterious deaths” and then sits in interview after interview with a smug look on his face that says, “You are too stupid to catch me.”
A narcissist is determined to prove he* is smarter and faster and better than EVERYONE. If he fails or gets caught doing wrong it is because someone lied or cheated. And whoever wronged him, will be crushed. He will not be made to look a fool or weak. EVER. Because if you knew he believed himself irreversibly flawed . . . if you saw who he really was . . . you would not like him. After all, who likes a nice guy, who gets his feelings hurt, and likes people?
*he/him is used because narcissism is primarily a male disorder.