Can Narcissists Feel Empathy?

submitted by Nechama from healdove.com

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[–]magnora7 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

I think that's kind of the definition of narcissism, is that they have trouble with that. It's definitely related to psychopathy and sociopathy.

However what's good is that many can learn empathy even if they're not good at it. However what separates someone pathological from someone moving in a good direction is that when they learn how to feel empathy for others, they use that to connect more tightly to the world and relate to it. A true narcissist or psychopath or sociopath will use those new skills of understanding empathy to further manipulate people, instead of using them to integrate with society in a positive way.

At least that's my understanding of those terms.

[–]Nechama[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I'm not sure they can learn empathy. If empathy can be taught (I don't know what I think about this), they would have to care enough about others and having relationships with others based on something other than their desires to want to learn it. The ones I've met at least don't even seem to understand such a thing as empathy or real feelings for other based on something other than manipulating them to serve their own wants and needs exists.

[–]magnora7 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

IMO it's just a matter of logic. Those who want to understand the world must understand other people, and their inner mental world.