People with narcissistic personality disorder have a grandiose sense of self-importance. They seek excessive admiration from others and fantasize about unlimited success or power. They believe they are special, unique, or superior to others. However, they often have very fragile self-esteem.
We all love ourselves. That seems to be such an instinctively true statement that we do not bother to examine it more thoroughly. In our daily lives – in love, in business, in other areas of life – we act on this premise. Yet, upon closer inspection, it looks shakier.
Some people explicitly state that they do not love themselves at all. Others confine their lack of self-love to certain traits, to their personal history, or to some of their behavior patterns (Marion, 1992). Yet others feel content with who they are and with what they are doing. But one group of people seems distinct in its mental constitution – narcissists.
According to the legend of Narcissus, this Greek boy fell in love with his own reflection in a pond. In a way, this amply sums up the nature of his namesakes: narcissists. The mythological Narcissus rejected the advances of the nymph Echo and was punished by Nemesis. Consigned to pine away as he fell in love with his own reflection - exactly as Echo had pined away for him. How apt. Narcissists are punished by echoes and reflections of their problematic personalities up to this very day. They are said to be in love with themselves. But this is a fallacy (Marion, 1992). Narcissus is not in love with himself. He is in love with his reflection. There is a major difference between one's True Self and reflected-self. Loving your True Self is healthy, adaptive, and functional.........
