Narcissism

The problem with narcissism is, “what exactly IS it?”  A quick run through Google indicates it is “An excessive preoccupation with one’s own personal importance, or with achieving one’s own chosen goals rather than bonding with others, or with associating only with others whom one chooses.”  So, what is excessive here?  An excessive lack of preoccupation with one’s own personal importance or preoccupation with bonding with others at the expense of self is lack of boundaries or perhaps co-dependency. The problem, as always for me, with these diagnoses is that they are extremely difficult to define. “I can’t tell you what it is, but I know it when I see it”.  I assume most wagon train leaders, most inventors and many entrepreneurs would meet these criteria.

So, I would ask you, as I do in the assessment process, to go all the way back to the behavioral issues.  What exactly are the problems “this” person is demonstrating that lead people to decide he/she is narcissistic?  With those, we can perhaps pin down what some expected brain activation patterns might look like.