This research seeks to give an overview of narcissism and how it has increased due to a culture of neoliberalism. I further elucidate how the role of superego fell out of favour in analysis at the same time with the rise of neoliberalism. Citing (Caveth 2013, 20162017a, 2017b, 2018), I question Freud’s (1923) decision of merging conscience into the superego and how this made it difficult to investigate the conflicts between them. In addition, I will reflect on my personal integrative model in relation to the research findings.
Definition of Narcissism
‘Grandiose narcissism represents the prototypic manifestation of narcissism, which consists of high trait levels of antagonism (i.e., grandiosity, selfishness. deceitfulness, oppositionality, and callousness) and agentic extraversion (i.e., assertiveness, high activity level, and attention seeking/exhibitionism). Vulnerable narcissism consists of high levels of antagonism (i.e., distrust, selfishness, deceitfulness, oppositionality, and callousness) and negative affect (i.e., anxiety, depression, self-consciousness, and vulnerability)’. (Millar et al., 2017, p1.2.)
The foundation of a healthy community is social-cohesion, which is centred on positive interpersonal connections (Delhey & Dragolov, 2016). There was a decisive move away from a community based culture towards a narcissistic one of self-promotion, where self-aggrandisement is perceived as essential, in order to attain personal desires (Twenge & Campbell, 2010). They have posited that narcissism has reached an ‘epidemic’, with social media, parenting, celebrity status and materialism making a significant contribution. In this research, they cited that 6% of the American population had experienced Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) at some stage in their lives. There was notable generational difference with 3% of individuals over 65 having experienced (NPD), which contrasts with a rise of nearly 10% of individuals in their 20s. McDonald (2014) states, though (NPD) is severe and rare, sub-clinical narcissism is now an epidemic with serious consequences, especially amongst the young. Young Minds (2013) noted a huge increase with young people experiencing depression and anxiety, with hospitalisation of self-harm up by 68% over the last 10 years.
The above research highlights the challenges I can face particularly with young people, where they will find it difficult to connect with anyone beyond themselves, described by (Dawson, 2017) as ‘Generation Mute’. There is a notable increase in self-admiration with ‘selfies’ and social-media to gain popularity (Wang, Yang, & Haigh, 2016; Fox & Rooney, 2015; Weiser 2015; Utz et al., 2012). In my own observations, it seems
‘the light of the mother’s eye’ (Hamiltion, 1987/1994, p45),
that the youth turn to, is their own self-portrait, which is idealised, however according to (Jin, 2018; Jin & Phua, 2014) this is vulnerable to negative feedback.
As a counselloTaking a PC approachr, it means I means using (Rogers 1951, 1959, 1961) ‘core-conditions’ to facilitatehaving to slowly awaken my client to seeking ‘self-worth’ within and explore their ‘self-concept’, where their ‘ideal-self’ and ‘self-image’ may not be congruent. through working a person centred approach (PC) in recreating the mother/child bond, based on psychodynamic theory (PD) and the impact of early attachment experiences (Bowlby, 1969-80). J. Jung (1968) believed using architypes, symbols and metaphors, accesses the unconscious and (Geldard and Geldard, and Foo, 2016) advanced that it ffacilitates clients to get in touch with their thoughts, feelings and beliefs. I have used metaphors/symbols to help my clients explore their challenges, so as stimulate their insight, and help them examine ways to promote self-generated behavioural change. One client who felt a ‘dark cloud’ of despair was overhanging him, became a motivation for change, where he wanted to move from darkness, into the life-giving sun.
(Geldard and Geldard, and Foo, 2016).Working from a Jungian/Freudian perspective, it is like theI can use (Grimm and Grimm, Fairytales, 1812/2014) where the youthful ‘Snow White’ having to facefaces the hostile ‘Evil Queen’s’ hostile superego of his/her own self-hatred and/or envy, where he/she can ‘dance’ with the symbolic little dwarfs of his/her own lack of self-development, towards a more integrative self of the ‘shadow’ side. This process reminds me of (Winnicott, 19651971), where therapy acts as the ‘playground’, the ‘transitional space’, where my client can creatively ‘play’, and come out of hiding behind a ‘false self’ and make a forward movement, towards finding their ‘true self’.
‘It is a sophisticated game of hide-and-seek, in which it is a joy to be hidden but a disaster not to be found' (Winnicott, 1963, p. 186)
There is an intrinsic sense to belong, to share in values of a compassionate community (Larkin, 2009), yet in today’s narcissistic times, meaningful friendships and mature loving relationships maybe cast aside (McDonald, 2014; Sales, 2013; Pinksy, 2006). Happiness is the central problem for Freud (1920), a doctrine of enlightened hedonism, of a life lived with the ‘pleasure principal’ on one hand and the ‘reality principal’ on the other. (Freud, 1914, 1920), advocates the only path to genuine happiness is beyond narcissism, which (Levinas, 1991) suggest takes us beyond the self to the other. Fairbairn (1940) proposed that having an emotional connection with another is what gives meaning to our life, which means moving away from ‘pleasure seeking’ to a psychic activity in ‘object seeking’. Mineo (2017) in
‘The Harvard Study of Human Development’, almost 80 years old and still continuing, ‘has proved that embracing community helps us live longer, and be happier’ (para 1) and ‘those who kept warm relationships got to live longer and happier, … and the loners often died earlier’ (para 15).
Kernberg (2008) hypothesises that narcissists wake up between the ages of 40 to 60, with an anxious sense of lost years, where failure to develop significant relationships
‘results in a chronically empty internal world, depleted of emotionally deep and meaningful experiences’ (p.301).
This research benefits my understanding of the painful sense of loneliness and emptiness that a client might face particularly around 40–60. My 42-year-old male client, having lived a life of pleasure seeking, found himself disconnected from others with a profound sense of loneliness, and felt his development and growth had come to a halt. I worked (PC) to build a trusting relationship, so as to encourage my client to ‘free associate’ and (PD) to help understand his unconscious drives (Howard, 2017). (Erikson and Erikson, 1997) psychosocial theory hypothesises that he was in a crisis of ‘stagnation’ vs ‘generativity’. One of the reoccurring dreams he shared, was been chased by some of his old friends, who were happily married; had a home and secure employment, and felt envious towards them. From this he saw how others invested in meaningful and gratifying relationships and for most of his life this is what he was running away from. This unconscious message of the dream been brought into consciousness (Jacobs, 2017), helped my client make a (Bion, 1959; Higdon, 2004) ‘link’ from his early childhood experiences of been terrified and running to hide behind a curtain to avoid seeing his mother/siblings been beaten by an alcoholic father. Working this through, he saw how he feared intimacy, and responded to seeking relationships based on immediate gratification with an escape through drugs, alcohol and gambling adding to his excitement. Behind his longing for a good father, he felt a disappointment in his mother. At a deeper level, he feared he would follow in his father’s aggressive footsteps and this made him withdraw from seeking a meaningful relationship. With mourning and guilt of the lost opportunities through the folding of time, my client is beginning to accept his past and simultaneously expand towards the future with hopefulness. In the session, I experienced the mourning of his lost idealised father, his feeling of worthlessness, and his desire to quit therapy to avoid delving emotionally deeper, which reflected his in relationship with others. The warm and caring therapeutic setting helped my client to gradually invest in a meaningful connection (good-enough mother/father) in the session and waking up to his lost years.
Lasch (1979) in his book ‘Culture of Narcissism’, proposed that there was a flight from guilt and demoralisation, with a shift towards neo-liberalism, a product of consumer capitalism. (Monbiot, 2016) identifies neo-liberalism as the
‘root cause of all our problems’ (para, 1),
where citizens are defined as consumers. Neoliberalism became the means to circumvent conscience, an ideology that defines what was morally reprehensible to been acceptable e.g. greed is good (Sagan, 1988). This marked a paradigm shift away from citizen concern to an ‘oral’ fixation, in what (Opree and Kühne, 2016) termed as ‘Generation Me’. It is a culture which is hostile to regulation, where bending the rules and an aversion to guilt, toxified the economic crisis of 2007-8 (Monbiot, 2016). Such demoralisation and evasion of guilt can only be found in a culture of narcissism (Carveth, 2013). Britton (2003) posits that guilt evasion is part of a narcissistic disorder, where (Winnicott, 1954) hypothesises the ‘true self’ retreats behind a false façade. Viewing oneself as all good, obviates against admitting to wrongdoing (Carveth, 2013). This cultural change has brought about a significant rise in egotism (McDonald, 2014). Narcissistic self-indulgence, however rationalised, either as liberalism or individualism, is self-defeating and eventually ends in suffering (Hedges, 2011; Carveth, 2013).
Carveth (2013) argues that the rise of neo-liberalism and the culture of narcissism, coincided with psychoanalytic abandonment of the intra-psychic dynamics of the ‘superego’ and guilt in analysis, in favour of intersubjective and interpersonal relationships e.g. abuse, deprivation and trauma. Sandler (1960), identified that cases at Hampstead clinic had a
tendency ‘tendency to veer away from the conceptualisation of material in superego terms’ (p.129).
Würmser (1988) referred to
‘The superego is still the sleeping giant of psychoanalysis’ (p.394).
Carveth (2013), identified a therapist’s role was to disempower or displace the superego in favour of conscience.
Carveth (2013, 20162017a, 2017b, 2018), challenges (Freud, 1923) decision to fold ‘conscience’ and ‘ego-ideal’ into the ‘superego’. Carveth (20162017a, 2017b), argues that the superego consists of aggression turned inwards against the self, which identifies with the aggressor, due to internalising cultural/social constructs that can be immoral; racism, bigotry, classism, consumerism, selfish-individualism etc. Whereas, conscience develops from early attachments (Bowlby, 1969-80) and identification with the nurturer, which involves caring for self and others (Winnicott, 1960, 1963). Carveth (2013, 2017a, 2017b, 2018), Heposited that the superego and conscience has roots in ‘Thanatos’ and ‘Eros’, where the superego punishes, the conscience has a desire to heal (Carveth, 2016). From a (Klien, 1937/1967)Kleinian perspective, it is a move away from persecutory guilt (‘paranoid-schizoid position’) towards reparative guilt (‘depressive position’). It means working through the narcissistic persecutory guilt of the ‘paranoid-schizoid position’, where it moves in support for (Winnicott, 1963) ‘capacity for concern’, which is an identification with the nurturer. The superego strips our self-esteem and confidence, whereas conscience gives courage and strengthens our self-respect (Carveth, 20162017a). (Carveth, 2017a, 2017b, 2018) states that Freud’s tripartite model amounted to seven possible conflicts of the mind. Whereas, (Carveth, 2017a, 2017b, 2018) five5-part model, takes out ‘conscience’ and ‘ego-ideal’ out of the original Freudian superego construct, and treats them as separate, offering the therapist; fifteen possible dynamics where conflicts can be observed.
This research has contributed significantly in the development of my integrative model, where my previous working was in terms of (PC) intersubjective understanding and (PD) object relations, trauma and abuse. I now wish to give greater inclusivity of the dynamics between the ‘id’ (passion), ‘ego’ (reason), ‘superego’ (morality), ‘conscience’ (love and concern) and ‘ego-ideal’ (heir to narcissism) (Carveth, 2013). By distinguishing the ‘superego’ from ‘conscience’, it brings additional ways in which I can look at conflicts that arise in a client’s mind. This can only enhance my understanding of the complexity of the psyche and how I can help clients. This is a significant change for me, as in supervision and in class these concepts do not arise when talking about clients. It will be challenging for me to discuss these things, especially because the superego has dropped out of favour as a central topic of discussion. This reorientation to psychodynamic roots I believe will be a valuable instrument in gaining new insight into client work.
Narcissism destroys themselves and others, and ultimately it comes back on them (Rosenfeld, 1964, 1971, 1987; Symington, 1993; Greene, 2012). Freud (1914) viewed narcissism as the ego taking its own self as the love object. Symington (1993) posits that the self is relational orientated, whereas narcissism turns away from the ‘lifegiver’ in infancy. When this separation/disruption occurs through a shock/trauma, the internal and external structure of the infant maybe radically altered, where the infant may turn away from the mother, and turn in towards itself (Symington, 1993). To dissociate from the traumatic experience, the person retreats into the
‘narcissistic envelope’ (Symington, 1993, p.77),
to protect the individualitself from the painful experiences (Symington, 1993). To move forward, the person has to give up the way they are defending themselves (Symington, 1993). Klien (1949) states we have to surrender omnipotence of the ‘paranoid-schizoid’ narcissistic self in preference for the ‘depressive position’, which (Winnicott, 1958, 1963) describes as the ‘capacity for concern’ for the other (object-love). Symington (1993) advances there is an autonomous choice, an inner-psychic action that leads to knowledge, which entails a leap into the dark to face the emotional pain, where the ‘lifegiver’ as an internal-mental object comes into being. Lacan (1966) views narcissism as a universal problem, where we have to accept castration and overcome ‘lack’, an incompleteness, and traverse the ‘fantasy’ of been the ‘phallus’, described by (Lacan, 1998) as the
‘desire for the desire of the other’ (Seminar XI, p.235).
(Sartre, Barnes and Sartre, 1957; Beckett, 1954) similarly describes that our desire for that which is absent, creates a feeling of nothingness and (Symington, 1993, p10) suggest it ‘blinds us to self-knowledge’. Greene (2012) postulated that the search for an object
‘not immediately accessible, opens up a dimension of desire’ (p.83).
Based on this, a step towards the m/other will bring knowledge (Symington, 1993). Kohut (1971, 1977, 1984) theorises that the emotional experience provided by the therapist can remedy or correct the deficient ‘self-object attunement’ in childhood. Whereas, (Symington, 1993) states that
‘it is the inner action of the patient that corrects the experience’ (p.109).
My client, who displayed signs of grandiosity, attention seeking and strong opposition with envy in therapy, was mirrored in his story how he treated his children, friends and extended family members. He prided in selling a very comfortable family home on two occasions, without the support of his spouse, he would then buy a derelict building, so as to both hurt and rescue them, thereby becoming a hero, who was going to fix all the problems for them. He I suggest he wanted to inflict the same feeling of abandonment, defeat, helplessness and humiliation onto his family, that he too suffered himself. He decried that his adopted children were inferiors, describing them as ‘worthless dogs’ and envied that he could not have children of his own due to impotence. It was not long before any progress made in therapy was sabotaged, it was like a ‘shadow’ that he tried to escape from. The inner-conflicts of his mind were strong oppositional forces against the part of I been the ‘lifegiver’, with his (Bion, 1959) ‘attacks on linking’. I hypothesize, he perceived me as the returning ‘superego’ that would act a self-regulating function in his life. I tried to help him bear the guilt, as it might empower him to repair his internal/external objects (Safán-Gerard, 1998).
‘if we believe that guilt is a necessary response to an awareness of the individual's own destructiveness, our goal will be to help the patient bear the guilt so that reparation for the fantasized or real attacks on his or her objects can take place’ (Safá-Gerard, 1998, p352).
He sought to weaken me, castrate the good enough m/other in the birth envy of new knowledge, so as to retain control and protect himself against exposure to feeling guilty (superego) in how he treated others and to deny any move towards his conscience of love and concern (‘depressive position’). His unforgiving self, increased his own resentment towards his self. He could not tolerate his own guilt and pain in the ‘paranoid-schizoid position’ and so projected it into me, where I had to contain it, like a concerned mother; tolerating an anxious child who feared annihilation of self-castration. Despite my efforts of (Bion, 1984, 1965, 1962) ‘containment’ in the (Winnicott, 1958, 1963) ‘holding’ position, the client ended therapy.
In conclusion, this research highlights a ‘civilisation and its discontents’ with a rise in narcissism created by a culture of neo-liberalism. In addition, I discussed (Freud, 1923) merging of conscience into the superego and how this made it difficult to examine the conflicts between them. My challenge is to support the struggling life-enhancing side of the client, against that part the desperately tries to keep hidden within its narcissistic refuge, where a client might continue to remain unawares within an anaesthetized mind. This understanding helps me to be more aware to listen to their inner-world of experience and to share this with the client (Kahn, 2001), in the hope the client will correct his experience through inner-mental activity. (Winnicott, 1958, 1963) ‘capacity for concern’, the role of (Syminton, 1993) ‘lifegiver’, (Rogers, 1951, 1959) ‘core-conditions’, (Freud, 1923; Carveth, 2018) inter-psychic conflicts and existentialist theory, meets with my desire of working as a ‘good enough’ integrative counsellor (see p13 PIM).