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March 8, 2010 at 4:03 pm #594106
KenParticipantWe Need to Have Empathy for Tea Partiers
http://www.psychologytoday.com/print/39146
Excerpt:
There isn’t one cause of paranoia. Tomes have been written about it. Individual variations and exceptions abound. A few generalizations, however, can be made. Paranoid people are trying their best to make sense of and mitigate feelings of helplessness and worthlessness. Their beliefs are attempts to solve a profound problem, albeit in ways that distort reality.
People can’t tolerate feeling helpless and self-hating for very long. It’s too painful. It’s too demoralizing, too frightening. They have to find an antidote. They have to make sense of it all in a way that restores their sense of meaning, their feeling of agency, their self-esteem, and their belief in the possibility of redemption. They have to. They have no choice. That’s just the way the mind works.
The paranoid strategy is to generate a narrative that finally “explains it all.” A narrative-a set of beliefs about the way the world is and is supposed to be–helps make sense of chaos. It reduces guilt and self-blame by projecting it onto someone else. And it restores a sense of agency by offering up an enemy to fight. Finally, it offers hope that if “they”-the enemy, the conspirators–can be avoided or destroyed, the paranoid person’s core feelings of helplessness and devaluation will go away.
Take an extreme case. Someone I saw years ago had a paranoid delusion that orbiting satellites were trying to control his mind. He went to great lengths to insulate his apartment so as to repel these psychic assaults. When I got to know him better, I discovered that he developed this delusion as a way to make sense of an on-going but terrifying experience–the genesis of which lay in his childhood–that he wasn’t a separate person and didn’t have the right to his own thoughts. This terrifying feeling of helpless vulnerability was rendered comprehensible to him by his delusion about orbiting satellites. In a paradoxical way, his delusion reduced his terror even as it generated its own fears and dangers.
Another patient I saw had a daughter who was mentally retarded. When the daughter’s disability was discovered, he felt so helpless and guilty (normal feelings that were exaggerated by experiences from his own childhood) that he slowly developed the belief that the daughter had been the unwitting victim of sexual abuse by relatives, that this abuse had led to various cognitive arrests, and that treatment for the abuse could and would restore her to normalcy. In this way, he negated his guilt, and momentarily overcame his helplessness through a heroic search for a therapeutic “cure.”
While extreme cases, these vignettes illustrate the core truth about paranoia, namely, that it is an attempt to lessen unbearable feelings of self-blame and powerlessness. In this special sense, psychotherapists understand paranoid beliefs as attempts at adaptation and self-healing, even as these beliefs compromise the ability to test reality and invariably create suffering of their own.
While this may read a little pop-sci, it has a basis in our own experiences. We have all experienced helplessness in the face of accelerating pace of change. Some use that feeling as impetus to learn new skills and new ways of dealing with the world.
So retreat and try to limit the complexity they are exposed to.
The brain has mechanisms to help both types of adaptation strategies, But one requires compartmentalization of information and rejection of new information that does not fit into those compartments.
Stress and feelings powerless need to be resolved or mitigated in some way, but the article does not mention that aprox 10% of the population emerge from adolescence with a seeming hardwired predilection for this condition.
Reference:
March 8, 2010 at 4:41 pm #689790
anonymeParticipantThe word “empathy” is commonly being misused these days in place of “sympathy”. Empathy implies an intimate knowing of the experience of another, usually as a result of having had the same experience. The word “sympathy” is umpopular these days, probably for it’s lack of drama and maudlin implications. However, “sympathy” would be the correct usage in the title of this post, as it refers more accurately to understanding and tolerance.
Any advice on how to deal with a passive-aggressive pathological narcissist in the workplace?
March 8, 2010 at 6:43 pm #689791
dhgParticipantAnonyme: Good call out. I appreciate the explanation and I think you hit the nail on the head when you say that sympathy is too closely associated with maudlin emotions. It is also much too facile and shallow, whereas “empathy” could never be, due to inserting oneself in the place of the other.
March 8, 2010 at 6:47 pm #689792
dawsonctParticipantLiberals see the world around them change and say, “hmm, I think I will develop my thinking to encompass and understand these changes.”
Conservative minds see the world around them continue to evolve and say, “whoa, I need to circle the wagons around my sudden lack of certitude.”
It’s all about adaptability.
Interesting study on the subject:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200612/the-ideological-animal
“Preliminary research shows that reminding people that as human beings, the things we have in common eclipse our differences—what psychologists call a “common humanity prime”—has the same effect.”
“”People have two modes of thought,” concludes Solomon. “There’s the intuitive gut-level mode, which is what most of us are in most of the time. And then there’s a rational analytic mode, which takes effort and attention.”
The solution, then, is remarkably simple. The effects of psychological terror on political decision making can be eliminated just by asking people to think rationally. Simply reminding us to use our heads, it turns out, can be enough to make us do it.”
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Be rational, people.
March 8, 2010 at 9:02 pm #689793
JoBParticipantWhat? Think? In the face of all opposition to the idea?
This is why our educational system is critical.
March 8, 2010 at 9:25 pm #689794
waterworldParticipantKen: Where I come from, “teabagging” is not for tea parties. Is that what you meant?
Anonyme: My advice for dealing with passive-aggressive narcissists at work is detach, establish boundaries, and conduct business by e-mail or at least with another person in the room.
March 8, 2010 at 9:34 pm #689795
dawsonctParticipantBy the way, I was being a little tongue-in-cheek, I know there are thoughtful, open-minded, flexible conservatives out there who don’t feel they have all the answers and that any disagreement or differing opinion with their POV is NOT a personal attack.
It would be nice, even beneficial to our society, if they would start asserting themselves within their party again. Purge the paranoids.
March 8, 2010 at 9:47 pm #689796
AimParticipant“Any advice on how to deal with a passive-aggressive pathological narcissist in the workplace?”
Anonyme, one of my favorite articles on this topic can be found here: http://www.cnn.com/2009/LIVING/worklife/07/13/o.scary.coworkers/index.html
I know, I know, it comes from Oprah.com originally, but don’t judge based on that. It’s actually some pretty good advice. Also I HIGHLY recommend the book “Working with you is killing me” – avail. at barnesandnoble.com or your favorite local bookseller.
March 9, 2010 at 12:18 am #689797
anonymeParticipantWaterworld & Aim, thanks for the links! I’ll check them out. There is some interesting information out there on narcissists. They’re not always easy to spot, but you can frequently discern their presence by the stabbing pain between your shoulderblades…
March 9, 2010 at 3:44 am #689798
velo_nutParticipantUhhh… does anyone want me to tell you what “Teabagging” really means here in the year 2010?
March 9, 2010 at 3:45 am #689799
JoBParticipant -
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