Narcissist Hedges His Bets

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A Narcissistic Hedge is when a narcissist colours more than one field of activity with his narcissistic hues. He infuses the selected subjects with narcissistic investment. He prepares them as auxiliary Sources of Narcissistic Supply and as backup options in case of a major system failure. Another type of narcissistic hedge involves a charm offensive that it is intended to forestall or ameliorate the consequences of the disclosure of embarrassing, demeaning, or damaging information about the narcissist and his misconduct by "re-acquiring" the source of narcissistic supply that is most likely to be disenchanted and disillusioned by such revelations.

These ostensibly redundant activities and interests constitute a fallback option during a life crisis. In the majority of cases, the chosen subjects or fields all belong to the same "family". A cerebral narcissist might select mathematics and art, but not mountain climbing. A sportsman might choose to be a radio sports commentator but not a philosopher of science and so on. Still, the correlation between the various selections may not be very strong (which is why they can be used as hedges).

Experience shows that this hedging mechanism is not very effective. The narcissist responds to events in his life as a one rigid unit. His reactions are not differentiated or scaled. A failure (or a success) in one domain contagiously spreads to all the others. This narcissistic contagion effect dominates the narcissist's life.

(From the book "Malignant SelfloveNarcissism Revisited" by Sam Vaknin Click on this link to purchase the print book, or 16 ebooks, or 3 DVDs with 16 hours of video lectures on narcissists, psychopaths, and abuse in relationships)