You were in a great mood, but after meeting this person, you begin to look at what is happening and at yourself with doubt and anxiety. What’s the matter?
The person who suddenly made you feel worse could be anyone. For example, the mother of a baby who plays with yours in the sandbox. In thirty minutes of communication, she let you know that she does everything perfectly: she builds a career, takes care of children, while she is unfamiliar with the guilt that working mothers often experience.
And a couple of questions that she seemed to accidentally ask, suddenly make you feel: against her background, you are a failed loser. But in the morning you seemed to be doing great with everything.
According to psychoanalyst Alfred Adler, in the vast majority of such cases, we are dealing with people who successfully build a «facade» of their lives. They assert themselves at the expense of your self-doubt, which they manage to instill in you.
This desire for superiority distinguishes narcissists, that is, people with a narcissistic personality type.
They strive to constantly confirm their own significance for themselves at any cost. Studying the behavior of such people, Alfred Adler identified two types of narcissists: «pretentious» or «grandiose» — those who quite sincerely believe that they are superior to everyone around, and «vulnerable» — those who, under the guise of perfection, hide inner weakness and extreme insecurity .
In a certain sense, it is the “vulnerable”, in contrast to the “grandiose”, who turn out to be great “social predators”, since in order to feel their superiority, they need to psychologically suppress their neighbors. Psychologist James Brooke from the University of Derby analyzed the characteristics of these people and showed what signs distinguish them.1.
He would do it better
Suppose you have been assigned a responsible project. It would seem that before such professional tasks did not frighten you and seemed interesting. However, since you are forced to collaborate with a new colleague, it seems to you that you are doing everything wrong and fill up all the work.
He doesn’t criticize you directly, but occasional, inadvertently thrown remarks and brief mentions of what success he achieved by acting in a completely different way make you doubt your abilities. If every contact with this person increases your doubts, then with a high probability it can be argued that your counterpart is projecting his insecurity onto you.
Bragging inadvertently
Often disguised as complaints. However, it looks to others in such a way that even the experiences and difficulties of a person seem attractive. The brightest platform for this vanity fair is social networks.
We all regularly read the posts of “sufferers” who are forced to literally tear themselves up while traveling, enduring the hardships of flights with disgusting food, so spoiled lately in business class.
And at home they have no peace — they have to attend either the musical performances of their daughter (where she, of course, took first place), or the hockey competitions of their son, whose team won thanks to the goal scored by the offspring.
Your low bar
After meeting with a person, it suddenly becomes clear to you that what you put up with for a long time would never have passed his “quality control”. He would never accept such a salary, would not dine at the restaurant you are going to now, would not save last summer, like you, on a hotel.
“But I could also rest with great comfort,” we catch ourselves thinking, listening to the reasoning of the interlocutor. He does not seem to brag, much less condemn your choice.
Your interlocutor strives to look democratic and makes it clear how much he appreciates value for money
It’s just that he, literally according to Oscar Wilde, has a very simple taste — he chooses only the best. He communicates his priorities to you in such a way that you suddenly feel embarrassed about your choice.
“At times like this, it’s worth remembering that this is all a veiled desire to rise at your expense,” says James Brook. — Looking for self-identification with things and services, which, moreover, often exist only in the imagination of our interlocutor, is driven by extreme self-doubt. Any of your doubts and unpleasant emotions feed the ego of this person.
1 J. Brookes «The effect of overt and covert narcissism on self-esteem and self-efficacy beyond self-esteem», Personality And Individual Differences, October, 2015.