The Difference Between Benign and Pathological Narcissism So, you have just been burned in a relationship, your partner suddenly broke up with you and the bizarre, lack of remorse and compassion stuns you. In addition she starts fluidly and smoothly flirting with a man right in front of you and is acting like a person you never knew, like a totally different person- as if a mask has just fallen off. Then the clincher, she and the man she flirted with gaze into each others eyes while making hand contact, all with you looking on from 5 feet away. The flirting is smooth and practiced, like someone who is used to doing it. Your ex, the person you thought you knew, would have never been capable of this. In addition that “look” she just shared with the other man was how your relationship with her began and she told you this had never happened to her before she met you. So in the course of no more that 5 minutes, you knew you had been had. When you confront your girlfriend about the flirting she tells you it never happened, she totally denies it. You put in some of the parameters of the bizarre behavior as well as the lying that you now have proven she was doing into a web search and you come up with a tentative diagnosis of Covert Narcissism, a condition you never knew existed. Sure enough, the more you learn about covert narcissism, the more you understand that this fully describes your partner, She fits 7 of the 9 parameters of Narcissism as defined by the DSM-4 and you strongly suspect she also fits the other 2 parameters, but only to a certain degree. Many months later it's clear she fits all 9 parameters and she is definitely a Narcissist. After just having labeled your partner a narcissist, is that all a person should do? Absolutely not. A normal person should look at themselves and entertain the possibility that they are the narc and not their partner. So let's focus on that possibility. All people are narcissistic to one extent or another. We all like to look out for ourselves and love ourselves more than the next person as the Bible points out (see Matthew 22:39). We all think more highly of ourselves that we should, we all sometimes misrepresent ourselves and put ourselves in a more favorable light. We all sometimes put someone down to make ourselves look better in comparison. We are all sometimes blind to or indifferent to another person's suffering and problems, especially when we are in the middle of our own suffering and problems. We all occasionally lie and are envious of another person's good fortune. So, aren't we all narcissists? The difference is in the degree to which we have these traits and the fact that we do not indulge in these negative attitudes to the point of hurting someone. A normal person can be aware of these self-centered tendencies and see them as the negative things that they are and constantly work on becoming more selfless. Eliminating these negatives and making other people more important than ourselves is an ongoing journey for most people who constantly strive to become better, kinder, nicer. Moreover, a normal person recognizes these traits as negative. No one thinks of lying as a virtue. Normal people also have empathy for another human being, admit to having done something wrong, and are remorseful when they hurt someone. So, even though we are all narcissists, the people we are discussing are pathological narcissists. They know right from wrong, but see no problems with doing wrong. They feel no guilt about having their narcissistic traits and are actually proud of some of these negative characteristics. My narc was particularly proud of her ability to lie and convince others of her truthfulness. These narcissists purposely lie to manipulate, deceive, and hurt people and never feel any remorse about the pain they cause. On the contrary, the narc actually gets pleasure out of the torment and pain they cause. All of these things are clearly not normal and the reason people who have been exposed to a narc need to understand and sort this bizarre behavior out and warn others about it. This type of narcissism is clearly a mental disorder, because it is a dysfunctional way of thinking that harms both the person afflicted and all of those that are in contact with that person, the narc. So are you a narcissist? Maybe, but if you can feel love, empathy, compassion, and you admit to your faults and see lying as wrong and something you are not proud of, you are probably not a narc. If you don't enjoy hurting people and feel remorseful if you do, you are not a narc. If you are aware of your own shortcomings and are truly trying to change for the better, you are not a narc. All of these traits are on a spectrum, so there can always be a fine line between a pathological and a benign narcissist. The difference is always the attitude towards the narcissistic tendencies. Those who consider their own narcissistic tendencies wrong and undesirable, spend their lives trying to eliminate these traits. Those who see nothing wrong with narcissism can spend a whole lifetime refining these negative traits. That is the BIG and very important difference. It can send a cold shiver up your spine knowing that people like this exist and can put you into a cold sweat when you realize you were intimately involved with a creature like this. Thank you for watching, your comments are always welcomed.