One of the traits of Narcissistic Personality Disorder is “lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others”. While it is only one of nine possible traits a narcissist can have, it is an important trait that helps understand why narcissists are self-centered and are unable to treat people with kindness and concern for their well-being. The lack of empathy the narcissist has towards others is also something they lack in themselves as well. The narcissist is not only unable to recognize and identify with the feelings and needs of others, they are also unable to recognize and identify with the feelings and needs of themselves. Why don’t narcissists have empathy for themselves?
Emotions are often uncomfortable – even the positive emotions. Emotions are wrought with the potential for disappointment. If you are happy and really enjoying this moment of happiness, you might feel sad because this happy moment will end. Even positive emotions can come with negative secondary emotions. And of course, no matter what the source, negative emotions are unpleasant and we try to get rid of them as quickly as possible. If you can feel your own emotions, then you must be able to deal with them. The problem for the narcissist is they don’t know how to deal with their emotions. They don’t know what to do with an emotion they experience so they would prefer to not have to deal with the emotion at all.
For the narcissist, empathy is experienced at a cognitive level and not the emotional level. The narcissist tries to reason through situations versus feel it. This is why narcissists often appear detached. They aren’t emotionally invested in a situation because they don’t have the ability to access their own emotions, understand someone else’s, and/or manage any emotions they might experience. So, they keep a distance emotionally.
The narcissist is highly controlled in their lives. They need to have complete control over their situation, other people, and even their own emotions. Because emotions are unpredictable, can quickly take over, and sometimes be unpleasant, a narcissist will do whatever they can to keep emotions out.
So, the narcissist will avoid emotions at all costs. If someone they know is showing emotion, the narcissist activates their defensives and pushes them away. The narcissist cannot feel comfortable with an emotional person around them. As a result, the narcissist appears uncaring and detached from people. As with most things for the narcissist, detachment is a form of survival mechanism. It is how they survive in a world that they feel uncomfortable in due to a constant fear of being exposed for the fraud they are.
Other traits of the narcissists are a grandiose sense of self, belief they are special, and a sense of entitlement. The narcissist must maintain an image that they are superior and better than everyone else. These are, or course, not true, but the narcissist must believe this about themselves to keep themselves from falling apart. Anything that threatens their reality, puts them at risk of narcissist injury. This is an important reason why narcissists can’t experience empathy in themselves. When the narcissist experiences empathy towards themselves, they must consider the fact that they are flawed in some way. Flawed people experience emotions because when you have emotions that means you are no longer in control of yourself. The narcissist can’t see themselves as potentially flawed.
Empathy is a complex concept when considering the narcissist. To experience emotions can be painful and the narcissist doesn’t have the tools to deal with what happens when emotions are activated in them. So, they avoid, which is a typical way of dealing with life for the narcissist.