In one of my recent blogs I discussed remorse and the narcissist. Today, I want to discuss a related topic of regret. The narcissist often engages in ways that are mean, cruel, and lead to pushing people away. The narcissist is self-centered and focuses on their needs and wants over everyone else. They are selfish and don’t consider how their actions affect others. Does the narcissist know what they are doing? Despite their selfish tendencies, do narcissists regret their actions?
Today, I will discuss regret with the narcissist. Check out my other blog for more information on narcissists and remorse. I have separated out the topics of regret and remorse because regret and remorse are two different emotions. The narcissist is unlikely to experience remorse but can experience regret. For a quick summary, remorse involves feeling guilty about something you did and then admitting your mistake and taking responsibility. Regret is wishing you didn’t take a specific action or engage in a behavior. To experience regret, there is no expectation or requirement for someone to take responsibility for their action. They just need to acknowledge an action happened to regret it.
Regret can occur if your action hurts someone else, or if it hurts you, including the potential to hurt you. For a narcissist, they can experience regret, but their regret is inward focused and is void of concern for how it could have affected someone else. Regret experienced by a narcissist is about their own emotions and potential consequences of their actions.
For the narcissist, one place you will see regret in action is with their gaslighting and blame shifting. The narcissist will say something that is not taken well by the other person and be confronted with the consequences of this action. This may include the other person getting angry or sad or the other person wanting to talk about the issue with the narcissist. Because the narcissist doesn’t want to take responsibility for their actions and regrets saying anything to begin with, they will blame shift and make statements that imply the other person was the problem. The narcissist moves into their typical behaviors of blame shifting and deflection because of the regret they are experiencing. They are on the defense and worry they will be found out for who they truly are and regret their actions that led to push back from the other person.
Some example regret statements a narcissist might use are: “Why do you always get upset?”, “Can’t you take a joke?”, “If you wouldn’t have done that then I wouldn’t have gotten angry.” What you see with each of these examples is that the narcissist has shifted blame onto the other person while not taking responsibility. However, these are examples of regret statements because the other person has acted in a way that has led to the narcissist trying to protect against narcissistic injury based on what they said or did to the other person.
The regret from the narcissist is void of concern or compassion for others. The regret is only about them and what they think they are losing because of their actions. If they say something hurtful to their partner, who then threatens to leave, the narcissist doesn’t regret their statement because it has hurt their partner. The narcissist regrets they could be losing a source of narcissistic supply. The narcissist thinks of how they will be impacted and will regret what they may have said or done.
The narcissist may act nice in response to an inappropriate comment but don’t be fooled. They are not being nice to make you feel better, they are regretting possible consequences and gaslight or even love bomb as a way to get the focus off of them and onto you. With the narcissist, it is best to always think of how things will affect them to better understand their actions and responses.
