Warning Signs of Narcissism and Appearance Obsession
Photo: Stockbyte/Thinkstock
A
wrinkle here, a sag there—for some women, it's just the aging process.
For others, a less-than-perfect face or figure can bring on anxiety,
depression and obsession. In The Beauty Quotient Formula, plastic
surgeon Dr. Robert Tornambe explains the difference between healthy
vanity and narcissism. Can you tell the difference?
"I need this done. I have to have this procedure."
Whenever I hear that, I gently explain that cosmetic surgery is called elective for a reason. It's not necessary from a medical standpoint. No one will die without this procedure.
At that point, I'm looking for more cues that a patient might be suffering from depression. Few come out and admit that they are. They might not list antidepressants on their medical form if they don't want me to know. So I'll try to steer our conversation toward acknowledging that depression might be an issue, and I make it clear that I won't operate on them unless they see a therapist first.
"I need a guarantee that I'm going to look like this."
I'll explain that cosmetic surgery (and medicine in general, for that matter) is not an exact science and that everybody is different. Some people heal well after complicated surgery, and some don't. If patients still demand a guarantee, no matter what the procedure, then I'll just say that I can't help them.
"I only want a correction of 1.2 millimeters."
Anyone who has measured any part of their body down to a fraction may be suffering from body dysmorphic disorder, which is a fixation on perceived "deformities" that in reality are absolutely normal. Body dysmorphic disorder can become dangerous if not treated with therapy, as sufferers can continue to demand surgery and other procedures from less-than-ethical surgeons or physicians, to the point where the damage cannot be undone.
"I want to look young again, like when I was a teenager."
Having unrealistic expectations of what surgery can do to make you look younger is a typical warning sign of narcissism. It is also one of the most common comments I hear from patients who expect to erase decades from their appearance. Not only is this impossible, it is a warning sign to me that there are deep-seated psychological issues to address. Sure, we all want to turn back the clock a little, but expecting to look like a college freshman when your granddaughter is a college freshman is not going to happen!
I also notice this right away with someone who immediately talks about extremes, such as an especially petite woman who wants incredibly large breasts. She's likely to already have a high standard of self-esteem and knows she already looks good. She just wants to do something to be noticed, not for her, but for an external quality. That's crossing over the line into narcissistic thinking.
How to nurture healthy vanity
Years ago, I had
a new patient who told me that he was a judge, and he took his job and
the legal system very seriously. But the problem was he had a scowl on
his face, and he looked perpetually angry. His eyebrows were shaped
downward, and his brow was descending, so he really did look like a
mean, angry person.
"It really bothers me that people in my courtroom are scared of me and make snap judgments about my feelings because I look this way," he told me. "It's affecting my work. Can you help?"
In this case, I could, so I performed a face-lift. He was ecstatic afterward. It was a subtle transformation—he just looked happier. He later told me that his colleagues thought he'd gotten married because he seemed so pleased all the time. They had no idea he'd had work done.
This patient was a perfect example of someone with healthy vanity. He knew what was wrong—that he looked mean due solely to anatomy—and was willing to do what it took to change it.
A Simple Tip for Nurturing Healthy Vanity
One simple step you can take in your quest to nurture healthy vanity is to be conscious of your reaction to a compliment. It should be a simple "Thank you" rather than a negative, guilt-tinged reaction, such as: "This old thing? Oh, I got it on sale." If someone tells you your hair looks terrific or your dress is pretty, the effort you've put into your appearance has been noticed, and in the nicest way. Healthy vanity means you appreciate being noticed. Narcissism means you expect to be noticed because you're sure you deserve to be.
"It really bothers me that people in my courtroom are scared of me and make snap judgments about my feelings because I look this way," he told me. "It's affecting my work. Can you help?"
In this case, I could, so I performed a face-lift. He was ecstatic afterward. It was a subtle transformation—he just looked happier. He later told me that his colleagues thought he'd gotten married because he seemed so pleased all the time. They had no idea he'd had work done.
This patient was a perfect example of someone with healthy vanity. He knew what was wrong—that he looked mean due solely to anatomy—and was willing to do what it took to change it.
A Simple Tip for Nurturing Healthy Vanity
One simple step you can take in your quest to nurture healthy vanity is to be conscious of your reaction to a compliment. It should be a simple "Thank you" rather than a negative, guilt-tinged reaction, such as: "This old thing? Oh, I got it on sale." If someone tells you your hair looks terrific or your dress is pretty, the effort you've put into your appearance has been noticed, and in the nicest way. Healthy vanity means you appreciate being noticed. Narcissism means you expect to be noticed because you're sure you deserve to be.
Why is cosmetic surgery on the rise? We're so obsessed with being beautiful we forgot it's OK to be OK-looking
In recent years, I’ve lost count of the number of campaigns aimed at
making people feel sexy. Like Dove with its “real beauty” adverts,
lingerie company Aerie’s social media crusade featuring a “curvy” model,
and Selfridge’s Beauty Project featuring un-retouched photographs of
“unknown stars”.
But it hasn’t worked. According to statistics from the American Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (AAAPS) released this week, we’re feeling uglier than ever. Data shows that demand for cosmetic surgical procedures grew 13 percent between 2014 and 2015, with breast enlargement the most popular.
When I glanced over these numbers, my face did rather shrivel in shock. It’s a biological function I’m thankful for – as someone who has never paid to be stabbed with needles filled with Botox.
I’m troubled by our nationwide hunger for cosmetic surgery, and the alarming rate at which it is growing. Because it seems to me we’ve lost the ability to be all right with being all right looking.
Women, especially, are constantly told to feel beautiful. Just the other day I saw a post on Facebook that said: “When someone tells you that you’re beautiful, believe them. They aren’t lying.”
I was eating some Nik Naks at the time, so I couldn’t possibly believe I was beautiful right there and then. But it still got me thinking: wouldn’t most of us be happier if we accepted that we’re not stunners, and we shouldn’t necessarily have to be? Perhaps we should collectively come to the realisation that having small breasts, a big nose, or flab does not make you physically deformed. It simply makes you a part of a complex and varied species.
Our anxieties about being aesthetically substandard have been perpetuated by shows such as the ostensibly altruistic How To Look Good Naked or the outright cosmetics-crazy Extreme Makeover, which ultimately promotes the idea that your body must always be a “work in progress”.
Even Embarrassing Bodies is a bit too quick-fix for me. Whenever a participant turns up, unhappy with their physical appearance, there is rarely a dialogue about how they might live with it. It’s always a quick fix solution involving a surgeon. Whether that’s Alan with his wonky balls, or Sharon with her chub rub, uncommon is the day you hear presenters of such programmes say: “Go forth, Alan, and accept your wonky balls.”
But these are the sorts of conversations we need to be having as a nation. We live in a world where most of the images of the human body we experience come from filtered forums: porn, Instagram, the NYT’s sidebar of shame. Really, we should all go to life drawing classes and witness the complexity of the human body – in its ugly, gritty nature.
Lady Gaga was spot on when she told us to love ourselves the way we were born (well done, Lady Gaga). But part of that love has to come from realising that being ‘born this way’ might involve having big ears or a tiny, flat bottom or anything else that would offend the Kardashian family.
We live in a society that constantly tells us we have to be beautiful, or at the very least feel it. But the truth is that that’s a hollow goal doing more damage than good. What will really keep us away from the plastic surgeon’s knife is, instead, granting ourselves permission to be a bit ugly.
But it hasn’t worked. According to statistics from the American Association of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons (AAAPS) released this week, we’re feeling uglier than ever. Data shows that demand for cosmetic surgical procedures grew 13 percent between 2014 and 2015, with breast enlargement the most popular.
When I glanced over these numbers, my face did rather shrivel in shock. It’s a biological function I’m thankful for – as someone who has never paid to be stabbed with needles filled with Botox.
I’m troubled by our nationwide hunger for cosmetic surgery, and the alarming rate at which it is growing. Because it seems to me we’ve lost the ability to be all right with being all right looking.
Women, especially, are constantly told to feel beautiful. Just the other day I saw a post on Facebook that said: “When someone tells you that you’re beautiful, believe them. They aren’t lying.”
I was eating some Nik Naks at the time, so I couldn’t possibly believe I was beautiful right there and then. But it still got me thinking: wouldn’t most of us be happier if we accepted that we’re not stunners, and we shouldn’t necessarily have to be? Perhaps we should collectively come to the realisation that having small breasts, a big nose, or flab does not make you physically deformed. It simply makes you a part of a complex and varied species.
Our anxieties about being aesthetically substandard have been perpetuated by shows such as the ostensibly altruistic How To Look Good Naked or the outright cosmetics-crazy Extreme Makeover, which ultimately promotes the idea that your body must always be a “work in progress”.
Even Embarrassing Bodies is a bit too quick-fix for me. Whenever a participant turns up, unhappy with their physical appearance, there is rarely a dialogue about how they might live with it. It’s always a quick fix solution involving a surgeon. Whether that’s Alan with his wonky balls, or Sharon with her chub rub, uncommon is the day you hear presenters of such programmes say: “Go forth, Alan, and accept your wonky balls.”
But these are the sorts of conversations we need to be having as a nation. We live in a world where most of the images of the human body we experience come from filtered forums: porn, Instagram, the NYT’s sidebar of shame. Really, we should all go to life drawing classes and witness the complexity of the human body – in its ugly, gritty nature.
Lady Gaga was spot on when she told us to love ourselves the way we were born (well done, Lady Gaga). But part of that love has to come from realising that being ‘born this way’ might involve having big ears or a tiny, flat bottom or anything else that would offend the Kardashian family.
We live in a society that constantly tells us we have to be beautiful, or at the very least feel it. But the truth is that that’s a hollow goal doing more damage than good. What will really keep us away from the plastic surgeon’s knife is, instead, granting ourselves permission to be a bit ugly.
A Biblical Definition Of Vanity
Vanity is…
Vanity
of a person is seen as having excessive estimation (overestimation) of
one’s self, abilities, looks, or other attributes that makes them have
an excessive belief in their own abilities or attractiveness to others.
Perhaps this was the reason that a certain piece of bedroom furniture is
called a “vanity,” because it has a mirror and focuses on the person
looking into it. The Bible has a lot to say about vanity as we shall
see.
The Vanity of Riches
Vanity
is an emptiness or uselessness of things and Solomon wrote more about
vanity than any other author in the Bible and more so in Ecclesiastes
where vanity is mentioned 32 of the 35 times in the Bible. One such
example of the futility or vanity of riches is when “a
man to whom God gives wealth, possessions, and honor, so that he lacks
nothing of all that he desires, yet God does not give him power to enjoy
them, but a stranger enjoys them. This is vanity; it is a grievous evil” (Eccl 6:2) because “sometimes
a person who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave
everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also
is vanity and a great evil” (Eccl 2:21).
The Vanity of Life
In Ecclesiastes 6:3-4 in regards to a man’s life, “the
days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with life’s
good things, and he also has no burial, I say that a stillborn child is
better off than he. For it comes in vanity and goes in darkness, and in
darkness its name is covered” and so Solomon wrote “I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind” (Eccl 2:17) since “What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?” And I said in my heart that this also is vanity” (Eccl 2:15) and “I have seen everything that is done under the sun, and behold, all is vanity and a striving after wind” (Eccl 1:14). The psalmist saw the same brevity of life and wrote “Remember how short my time is! For what vanity you have created all the children of man” (Psalm 89:47)!
Mankind’s Teachings in Vain
There
is also something that is vanity or done in vain and that is teaching
manmade religious rules. Jesus rebuked the religious leaders of His day
saying “in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men” (Matt 15:9). Elsewhere Jesus said they “leave the commandment of God and hold to the tradition of men”
(Mark 7:8). The commandments of mankind are flawed but the law of God
is perfect and only it can convert the soul (Psalm 19:7). This is Paul’s
reason for “holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain” (Phil 2:16).
Israel’s Failed Mission
Israel was supposed to be a light to the nations around them as Isaiah wrote, “Israel, in whom I will be glorified. But I said, “I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity” (Isaiah 49:3-4) but when they fell into idolatry, Jeremiah wrote that “the customs of the peoples are vanity. A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman” (Jer 10:3). Some in the first century church were also failing God as Paul wrote that “Certain
persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain
discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding
either what they are saying or the things about which they make
confident assertions” (1st Tim 1:6-7). If
you are living a life outside of faith in Christ then your life is all
vanity too. It will pass away and be of no use beyond the grave. You
will be judged for everything you have done in this life and without the
blood of Christ, you will have to pay for your own sins after death.
For others who have repented and trusted in Christ, nothing is done in
vain as Paul wrote “for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose” (Rom 8:28).
Conclusion & Summary
Desiring God is vanity. Striving for piety is also vanity. I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity. In vain do they worship God, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men, says the Lord. The days of his years are many, but his soul is not satisfied with life’s good things, and he also has no burial, a stillborn child is better off than he. For it comes in vanity and goes in darkness, and in darkness its name is covered. I hated life, because what is done under the sun was grievous to me, for all is vanity and a striving after wind. What happens to the fool will happen to a wise man also. Why then have you been so very wise? And I said in my heart that this also is vanity. Remember how short my time is! For what vanity you have created all the children of man. A man who has toiled with wisdom and knowledge and skill must leave everything to be enjoyed by someone who did not toil for it. This also is vanity and a great evil. A man to whom God gives wealth, possessions, and honor, so that he lacks nothing of all that he desires, yet God does not give him power to enjoy them, but a stranger enjoys them. This is vanity; it is a grievous evil. Worshiping is vanity. Desiring Jesus is also vanity.
