Review
...This book has an important purpose ... It will be appreciated in a library,classroom or among the mental health profession. --
Katherine Theriault - Inscriptions Magazine, Vol. 2, Issue 20I cannot recommend this book enough to those who have this disorder, families, and friends who are trying to understand. --
Patty Fleener, MSW, Webmistress of mental-health-today.comIf you wish to get under the skin of a Narcissist ... to know how he thinks, feels, behaves... --
Anthony M. Benis, Sc.D., M.D. - Author ofIf you wish to get under the skin of a Narcissist, then this is the book for you. --
Dr. Anthony Benis, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York - Author Towards Self and Sanity - On the Genetic Origins of the Human CharacterMy 4000+ members enthusiastically and unanimously recommend Dr. Vaknin's book. It is an essential and crucial 'Must Read'. --
Darla Boughton, owner of the MSN Narcissistic Personality Disorder and Psychopath support groupsSam Vaknin is the world's leading expert on narcissism. --
Tim Hall - New York Press, Volume 16, Issue 7This book is required reading for any codependent - to understand how the other side works. --
Dr. Irene Matiatos, Webmistress of drirene.comTruly insightful. The author has done probably more than anyone else to educate others to this poorly understood condition. --
Tim Field, author of
Product Description
When the personality is rigid to the point of being unable to change in reaction to changing circumstances - we say that it is disordered. Such a person takes behavioral, emotional, and cognitive cues exclusively from others. His inner world is, so to speak, vacated. His True Self is dilapidated and dysfunctional. Instead he has a tyrannical and delusional False Self. Such a person is incapable of loving and of living. He cannot love others because he cannot love himself. He loves his reflection, his surrogate self. And he is incapable of living because life is a struggle towards, a striving, a drive at something. In other words: life is change. He who cannot change cannot live.
The narcissist is an actor in a monodrama, yet forced to remain behind the scenes. The scenes take center stage, instead. The Narcissist does not cater at all to his own needs. Contrary to his reputation, the Narcissist does not "love" himself in any true sense of the word.
He feeds off other people, who hurl back at him an image that he projects to them. This is their sole function in his world: to reflect, to admire, to applaud, to detest - in a word, to assure him that he exists. Otherwise, the narcissist feels, they have no right to tax his time, energy, or emotions.
The main body of research about Narcissism is surveyed in the book.
Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Re-Visited offers a detailed, first hand account of what it is like to have a Narcissistic Personality Disorder. It contains new insights and an organized methodological framework. The first part of the book comprises more than 100 Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) regarding relationships with abusive narcissists and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
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