Just depression

I responded to another "am I a sociopath?" email two years later and found another young person who would now describe what she was going through at the time as something very different from sociopathy. I asked her to write how her perspective changed over those years:

During most of my teenage years, I was determined to find the crucial component to my personality; a defining factor. Something has to be wrong with me, because no one else seems to have my problems and issues. In 9th grade, I had friends; none close, but people to talk to during class, and see in the halls. I would act differently around all of them... (it wasn't until two years later that I noticed this behavior). When around the cool kids, I'd act cool, when around the nerds, I'd act nerdy, and so on. I'd take on similar personalities, so I could fit in, and have friends. 

Later on I noticed that my emotions were fading away... as if one day I'd wake up and no longer be able to feel a certain emotion. I first noticed it with embarrassment, from my ability to do anything and not feel that emotion from it... I felt fear at the realization that I could potentially lose my emotions and become void. It was until one day that I no longer feared losing my emotions that I realized was a sociopath. I didn't feel empathy or regret... I didn't care who I upset. Albeit I realize it now, just a teenager's desperate attempt at clawing their way into accepting themselves. 

All of this was from depression, that went unnoticed for years. I didn't know that then. I convinced myself, and others, that I was a sociopath, and I lived by it. I didn't allow myself to feel emotion, and that bit me in the butt. In the latter part of my teenage years I sorta, grew out of that pit devoid of emotion... Back then, I wanted to be important and special. A lot of people going through their teenage years experience this with other categories too. I wanted to be the strong one of my family, no emotions to cloud my judgement... pure logic; like a robot. I take this in part that there was no father figure in my family. I felt like I had to be the man. 

That's not me now... I climbed out of the hole I dug myself into by conditioning myself to feel happiness. What I mean by that is, I would do my best to find something to make me happy during my day... It took a while to feel full emotions again but now I'm at the point where it's a normal part of my life. I have learned that with happiness, comes sadness... and to not block either emotion. Emotions are like yin and yang and you cannot have one without the other. 

Mental health is not self-diagnosis, mental health is accepting your personality for what it is... if you are normal, average... that's okay. I had to learn that. Also of course, seeing a therapist helps, which is what I did to get my anxiety under control. Now, I will be driving down the road and I'll smile at a bright blue day, and I'll smile at a gloomy rainy day. Both are beautiful to me, because contrast is good. 

The whole period where I thought I was a sociopath is not something I'm proud of. It's a little embarrassing because I genuinely believed it. and now I know how stupid it was. Let this be a lesson to all.

J'Accuse: Twitter justice

As a sort of follow up to yesterday's post that referenced justice and mercy from a religious standpoint, I thought this piece on the Dylan Farrow open letter accusing Woody Allen of molesting her was interesting. Under the title, "The kangaroo court of Twitter is no place to judge Woody Allen":

First off, I don't know if Woody Allen abused his adopted daughter Dylan Farrow and nor do you. I only know what I am inclined to believe and what the reasons are. Those reasons are, in fact, opinions. Some are to do with this particular case, some with the way that victims of abuse are routinely dismissed, some with the way Hollywood operates. Some are to do with the films he makes – the texts themselves – and some with the context: the context in which so many perpetrators walk free. That context is changing.

When the custody battle between Farrow and Allen took place in 1992, social media was not around. Right now online, especially on Twitter, many people are absolutely certain that Allen is guilty. Just as they are absolutely certain that Amanda Knox is guilty, just as they will be absolutely certain that what I am saying here is wrong. There is not a lot of nuance in Hashtag Justice. There is a hashtag #IBelieveDylanFarrow.

I hesitate (just slightly) to write again about social shaming as an increasingly prevalent method of enacting mob justice. But I thought this case provided an opportunity to share a parallel example of a legal point of view -- the infamous Dreyfus Affaire, in which a French Jewish artillery officer was railroaded by a corrupt justice system because people were so certain he was guilty of his alleged crime (espionage). Evidence was falsified and secret court proceedings were held to accommodate the feelings of the masses. As Emile Zola argued in his own open letter to a newspaper, "J'accuse":

“Above all beware of this line of the reasoning . . . : ‘It is possible that Dreyfus was convicted illegally, but it was justly done; that is enough.’ . . . It is a serious error. . . . See to it that the supremacy of the law is undisputed, and through the law rid our hearts of this respect for reasons of state that is absurd in a democracy.”

What Zola is describing is the very definition of a kangaroo court -- picking an outcome, and then coming up with a procedure that will guarantee this outcome. Zola was arguing against this method of justice because we will almost never be able to determine "the truth" with absolute certainty. Since we will almost never know (or agree) about who should be punished, why, and how much, our only hope is to ensure that we follow fair procedures for determining guilt. In the United States this idea is enshrined in the Due Process clause of the Constitution, which guarantees that nobody shall be deprived of life, liberty, and property without due process of the law. There is no constitutional guarantee that the justice system accurately identify wrongdoers or uniformly dispense justice for the simple reason that it would be impossible to do so. But we are seeing a resurgence of the idea that mob justice can be real justice. This is why the Dreyfus Affaire is perhaps more relevant now than ever. As Adam Gopnik argues in his review of Louis Begley's, “Why the Dreyfus Affair Matters”:

It showed that a huge number of Europeans, in a time largely smiling and prosperous, liked engaging in raw, animal religious hatred, and only felt fully alive when they did. Hatred and bigotry were not a vestige of the superstitious past but a living fire—just what comes, and burns, naturally. 

Sound familiar? It reminded me of this comment from yesterday's post:

It's important to delineate sociopathic impulses and "emotional overload". Sociopathic impulses have a basis on having a lack of emotional barriers (ie. regret, grief, and remorse) which would typically inhibit/prevent fulfilling the impulse. Emotional overload have a basis on overwhelming rational barriers (ie. logic, situational awareness).

So I understand why sociopaths can be scary -- we don't have any of the emotional barriers. But empaths can be scary too, especially when their emotional sense of right and wrong overwhelms rational barriers.

Sociopath?

From a reader:

Firstly, I'd like to tell you that I'm not a native English speaker, so excuse me, if there are any language mistakes.

I think I may be a high-functioning sociopath, but I also can find some definitely non-sociopathic behaviour. First, I have to tell you that I have cerebral palsy, but it's a light form, so I don't have much problems with it. But why i think I'm a sociopath? 

When I was a kid, I had moments in which I felt I didn't have the same feelings as other people. For example, I was never able to feel love to my parents, and therefore to say them: ''I love you'', or to be moved by a song, and I couldn't make many face expressions. Additionally, I was quite well accepted by people, but strangely I was good contacting mainly with the older ones, meaning that I was the loner at school. But I also had that period when I didn't want to meet new people and I was starting to growl and felt anger (I know that there is too much contradiction, right?). Another contradiction is that, while I was the loner at school, I also tried to be with the other kids and to communicate with them, but most of the time I was rejected. 

Later, at middle school, this tendency continued, but (another contradiction) I started chatting to some of my mates on the Internet and in 6th grade we became friends. My behaviour with them wasn't like the one that is expected from a sociopath - many times I was rude and sarcasstic with them, but it wasn't a big deal. Most of these people are still my friends. 

When I entered high school, the same story began. I tried to get in contact with people, but again I was somehow rude to them and I didn't made any friends (maybe here is the place to say that since I was a kid, I've had moments in which I had thought that I'm better without friends). At the second year, the rudeness peaked and I lost any opportunity to have friends at my class. In the summer I went to an excursion in the mountain, and met there three girls, all one year younger than me, and we became friends. On the next school year I had the idea of stay and repeat the school year, so we can be at the same class. It didn't happen, and, additionally, I started behaving extremely rude with my classmates, which worsed my relations with them (that rudeness was a theatre, but i will talk about it at another point of the e-mail). 

Now I'm 18 and I'm 11th grade, second-to-last year high school student. The relations with my classmates improved, but still I don't have friends at my class.

I think some of my problems at school are caused by my incapacity of feel empathy, gulit, fear (to a lesser extent) and remorse. For a contradiction, I have to say that I'm not very risky person, and even had regret missing some opportunities for meeting new people, for example. Another contradiction is that I don't like thinking much about important things. For example, I decided i want to learn Spanish at high school after the first episode of a Spanish TV series.

My personality is something very relative. I have never had any favourite music style, celebrity, etc. Instead I have taken parts of music styles that I like, and I have used them to try a create an image, but I have always failed. When talking with people, I immitate emotions, so I can be appropiate, but I have problem with face expressions. In last years, I have trained myself to be a good liar, and when I'm with friends, or face a problem at school, it works.

Boredom is something I have always experienced. It had led me to a number of things - changing wishes for jobs, becoming bored of people, imagining making friendships with other people, strange behaviour on the Internet (as you see, imaginary things are also a contradiction, but I will clarify this at the other part of the mail), etc.

At my family things are thew following: my parents say I was very good and sociable child, yet I've had also spend much time alone and i was selfish. Here is where my first problems at school started to influence me. At junior school I was the best student - no need to say that I loved being said that I'm smart and intelligent. But in 5th grade I started failing at maths. As my father is very good with maths, he started helping me to learn the things faster. The problem was that I wasn't understanidg anything and he started to yell at me and sometimes even insult me. After that I have always felt bad, but only for a short time. Another problem was my lying. When I had a bad mark at maths, I was lying that the results hadn't come out yet, but in few days I was ending up with an explanation and a dramatic excuse. Later I continued to lie them about other things, but it led to a paradox where in most cases when I lie, they believe me, but in some cases when I tell them the truth, they don't believe me.

I have a brother. He is 16 months old. When I heard I will have a brother, I turned to the calendar, pretending to see if it was the 1st of April, then I said: ''O.K.''
When he was born, I faked a smile at my face. I have never paid him much attention. But some months ago, something interesting happened. 

I was playing with him (very rare thing) an suddenly put my hand on his throat and I felt a crave to kill him. But I stopped for a second, started thinking, and then I felt horrible. The idea of doing it was horrible. But I continued imagining it and I got into a point when I liked the fantasy and even started asking myself: ''If I kill him, would I feel better?'' But I didn't do it. Now I don't have this fantasy. And it wasn't the first time I had experienced it. When I was a kid, I used to imagine myself killing my then baby cousin, and when I was holding a knife, I've had a craving to kill the person against me, and I even was asking myself: ''What it would be if I do it?''

With my relatives I have generally a good connection. The only real bad thing I have done was when my grandma died. She died in front of my eyes. firstly, I didn't feel anything, then I forced myself to cry, and cried for 15 minutes. At the funeral I wasn't crying and I was thinking: ''What's wrong with me?'', but, at the end, I forced again myself to cry and thought: ''I cry, so I'm normal''.

The non-sociopathic part of me is related to my behaviour and there are 2 crucial characteristics. The first one is my imagination. With this one I had fulfilled many of my time, and I still continue to do it. It's very various and includes things both from the real and from fictional worlds. I've had fantasies about making friendships with people, having talents like singing, I invented a parallel government of the youth people in my head and was the primr-minister for a while, I've had imagining ideal love and ways to get to know my crushes, etc. The other one is related with something which I call hyperactivity, and the others are calling it extra energy. It consists in constant walking, or jumping, or running inside and outside with stick, pen, pencil, or whatever similar, and it is a way to express the little bit of emotions that I have (a contradiction to what I've said above, but true), because this emotions are the power of this hyperactivity. I even do it in class if I'm bored (it happens almost all of the time) and is something that people around me know that is a part of me, but some of them, like my parents, are annoyed from it and try to stop me doing it. Recently, emotions aren't the power of this movement, because they don't exist, or if they are, I have to think about an emotion to be able to feel it.

There are two less important characteristics, as they are more recent. One of them is that I was a hypohondriac and had diagnosed myself with diabetes, AIDS, schizofrenia, paranoia, etc. Because of the schizofrenia thoughts I started visiting the school psychologist. Now she knows that I think I'm a sociopath, but doesn't believe I am one. The other one is something that I know is very non-sociopathic. I have a problem with my sexual orientation. When i was 11 I found out that I'm gay (I'm a boy) and as I knew that I find out boys as more beautiful than girls, I was O.K. with that. My friends (they are all girls), also. My crushes were boys from school, mainly younger than me. The only year I had crushes older than me was the first year of high school, as I was among the youngest. The feelings were always different, the time - not too much, and they all were boys that I didn't know personally. However, with the last two of my crushes I had strong feelings and I liked them for a longer time. My last crush was from the class of my friends and even started dating one of them. I was hurt, but overcame this for 2 days.

But even of the time when I liked my second-to-last crush, I had the thought that I may like a girl. It wasn't very important, so I forgot it after a while. But recently I realised that since then there was an emerging feel towards girls, which I still want to eliminate. Now I'm in a situation where I find many boys cute, I even have a crush, and it's a combination of jealous when I see him with another girl, and the knowing that I'm hetero.

That's it. I have more information, but maybe I will post it on the comment section of the blog.

"I knew I was different when I was a child..."

I thought this comment posted here on July 7, 2013 at 9:42 AM was a good compliment to the recent posts on being told you're a sociopath:

I absolutely knew I was different when I was a child. My parents and all the "adults" I knew were emotional beings. I could not understand why they were so dramatic. I could not understand why they yelled, hugged, cried and talked about their feelings. It was bizarre to witness and I could not relate. Nor could I relate to my emotional siblings and classmates.

As an adult, I have to remind myself to hug my relatives when I see them or else they get quite cross. I comply to avoid their sad eyes, questions, and messy emotions.

I was strong willed as a child and learned to be deceptive to avoid punishment. And, of course, for the thrill of having "pulled one over" on authority figures.

I was always the schemer and the ring leader in pranks. I reveled in my ability to shock and bother others. I was always the calm, calculating one of the group. To this day, I never panic. I don't worry about social norms. Nor will I have them forced upon me by people I couldn't care less about.

Granted, there are places where I am no longer welcome. I guess those people never got the joke. Just because I thought it was funny doesn't mean they did.

I've been told by others that I am a cold person but I disagree. I can feel some emotions but usually think they are a waste of time. Who wants to float in an emotional cloud? I just want to have fun. I am the life of the party. I am a thrill seeker. Is there anything wrong with that as long as I do not physically harm others?

I learned at 2 years old not to harm things. I caught a butterfly and wanted to kill it, so I did. I stuffed it in a soda bottle and filled it with water. I watched it struggle and become still.

I didn't feel remorse about killing it but did regret that I would no longer be able to enjoy the beauty of its fluttering from flower to flower. For some reason, it seemed very important to me to remember that lesson and so I did. I may mess with your head and your heart but I will not physically harm you unless you attempt to harm me.

I had a boyfriend hit me, probably because he couldn't control me. Besides, I'm small in stature and seemed like an easy victory. I responded with a ferocity that alarmed him just enough to give me the advantage. I am very proud of the physical scars he bears from that encounter.

A message to empaths: Leave us alone and mind your own business. You cannot "fix" us and we do not desire your pity unless we can use it to our advantage. If engaged, we will win. We always do.

Cheers.

Conversation with a friend

This is a very early, pre-blog conversation I had with a friend.

M.E.: The other night I met these strangers and within hours we had all outted ourselves as sociopaths and started collaborating on internet startup ideas. There was one non-socio there who was asking all these questions.

Friend: Do you really feel no guilt?

M.E.: No, I feel guilt

Friend: Well, that's not very sociopath of you.

M.E.: Well, I am not full sociopath then maybe. But I mean, it's a different kind of guilt.

Friend: Are those people full?

M.E.: I don't know. The other guy was funny, he was like "good sociopaths" do this. I think it is true that there are good sociopaths. I don't know if I feel guilt. I feel regret.

Friend: How many of the symptoms do you think you have? It seems like a lot, I guess.

M.E.: I dunno, like everyone has different symptoms because they deal with the lack of empathy in different ways. Some people see it as a lack and try to make up for it, others don't see it as a lack at all and sort of exploit it. So the symptoms are very varied.

Friend: It seems that there are plenty of consistent things.

M.E.: Ha, yeah, well everyone is manipulative, everyone is trying to avoid detection, everyone is a little reckless. Anyway, I told the empath that it is probably harder for socipaths to become an empath than for empaths to become a sociopath.

Friend: Hah, funny that you call him an empath.

M.E.: Because there is low road and high road mental processes going on. High road is conscious thought, low road is unconscious instinct type thought. So I tried to explain to him that sociopaths are essentially just shifting way more of their decisions into high road thought than the typical empath. Empaths can practice that and get good at making conscious decisions about everything (socio). But how can socios conscious force decisions into the unconscious? I think it could happen but it would have to be through the influences of someone else training you, something that you could remain unaware of.

Friend: It's not really like that

M.E.: Like what?

Friend: high/low

M.E.: Yeah, it is kind of

Friend: Well, we disagree

M.E.: Or I mean, pop science stuff I have read has said that the brain works that way. Are you saying that that isn't the distinction between socios and empaths? Or just that the mind doesn't work that way? Or not all high roaders are socios?

Friend: It's not that you're more conscious. It's that all your conscious thoughts are focused on the single-minded goal of achieving your interests. To the destruction of others. Everything is a war game to you and the fact that you are more conscious than most just means that there are lots of dumb people.

M.E.: Yeah, good point. You hate that I am a sociopath?

Friend: That's like saying I hate you because of your gender or ethnicity. Doesn't mean anything, really.

M.E.: You hate the sociopath in me, though? You hate the tendencies?

Friend: Well, obviously I don't like that you are manipulative and megalomaniacal and reckless abt your life and others. But I mean, that's just a given, isn't it?

M.E.: Given meaning that's just who I am and always have been?

Friend: And I mean, who knows what else arises from you believing you're a sociopath. That's just who you are. Alright sociopath, I'm going to maybe try to take a nap.

Informed consent

From a reader:

An old friend of mine and I are talking.  She too is in the legal profession, is brilliant, and scored really high on the psychopathic deviate portion of the MMPI.

She is full of crap in a pleasant kind of way, doesn't seem to have any vices that I cannot tolerate.  We knew each other 20 years ago and just started talking.  We had a wonderful weekend a while back and spend lots of time in the evenings talking or typing via social media and/or text.

She, like me, has been with people who have in one way or another been abusive.  She says that through a year of therapy, she and therapist have deconstructed her old construct for dealing with things.  At times, when I ask her how she feels about us, she says she has no access to the information.

She is very honest it seems and given me detached advice, detachment being a forte of hers, lol.  ("First: Run. Like hell. The cons are this broad is WAY to fucked up in the head to make the pros worth dealing with. If, however, you choose to ignore THAT bit of advice... Second: be patient. You are dealing with a very damaged individual who has deep-seated trust issues as well as a host of other psychological problems. If you really are foolhardy enough to want to venture into something more than a really fun friendship (which is a *really* bad idea, it will likely do more harm to you than you *ever* thought possible), you are going to have to move very slowly and carefully.")

When I mention her emotional state, she reacts like a turtle and withdraws.  If she is affectionate and I act like I do not notice it, it's ok because I am not calling her attention to it being vulnerable.  

She is trying to talk me out of being with her and seems to think that I will end up being hurt.  I think things might be workable.  We live four hours away, with her near my hometown where I go see my parents.  I don't necessarily think that choosing a partner based on logic rather than emotion is a bad thing.  In fact, our "hearts" often get us in trouble.  She seems to be a good, practical fit for me if we can work around this.  And I her.

I have questions:
1) When she says she is wary about letting me too far into her head ( "I have been straightforward about what a mess I am, and about the fact I don't believe any decent human being deserves to have to deal with my shit. I'm willing to try anything once or a few times, but I honestly believe I'm too damaged to be functional in any kind of healthy relationship and that mere exposure to the full scope of the mess in my head is enough to damage a decent person far beyond what I find acceptable. Like I said - I like you. You're a great guy. Which is exactly why I don't want to let you too far in"), what does she mean?  She is less hateful than my ex-wife, who was Jezebel reincarnate.  What is inside there, and how can I handle/manage/deal with  it?  If I can?

2) Does this seem viable enough for us to take things slowly?  We have no choice.  She is an attorney, I teach college English, and we live a little ways away.  

3) She is determined not to show "vulnerability" by acting as if she cares for me.  When I pin her on it, she says things like "i won't admit to it, but the fact that I was whining when you needed to get off the phone ought to tell you something."  Facta non verba here, correct?

4) Any other advice you might have?  I would like things to work, but I don't want to feel used either. 

"I read this recently on your blog as posted by another reader: 'With other sociopaths, I believe there is fear of rejection, inability to respond emotionally and the ever-present wall so many of us have built. We get sick of being rejected, of being labeled, judged or 'fixed.' When someone gets past the wall of a sociopath, they will typically find a deep pool of human emotions they didn't expect. These emotions are shown to few and are always followed by efforts to re-establish comfortable emotional distance. If you're not a sociopath and you had the opportunity to 'swim in the pool,' feel privileged, as few do. We're lonely, misunderstood people.' 

A friend of mine who is sociopathic claims to protect me by 'not letting me too far inside.'  What may be in there, and why the reluctance?"

Thanks for your knowledge and all you do.  Respects!  

And since I'm like 11 months behind in replying to emails, upon asking for a quick follow up on what had happened in the last year, the reader continued:

She ended up just cutting off contact. And marrying a man who was a lot like me, yet obviously dumb and easy to control.  I bet he doesnt know about her psychopathy, though he will find out about this eventually, I am sure.  Then again, there are people who are ok with this.

I ended up going on antidepressants but then realized that plenty of people have selfish motives and veil them,which may be even more dishonest.  Like some of you typed, it's kind of like surviving cancer, being let in that far.  But I don't regret the experience at all.  Big insight into human nature . . .

She did have integrity and did give me the chance to have informed consent, which she did not have to do.  Why do you think she even bothered with this?? Maybe she liked me enough to not let me in too far, or maybe because I was/am intelligent, I wouldn't be easy enough or fun enough to try to dupe.

I have learned from this: being raised by motorcycle clubs since I was 16, I am very loyal though I myself have sociopathic leanings in the eyes of the dominant culture due to this.  I put my people first.  I have learned that channeling this woman appropriately and thinking about how somebody like her might handle a situation allows me to detach enough to think critically and oftentimes give the people I work around what they want without hurting anybody *or* coming on too strong with it, which she does sometimes.

I am Wiccan and am joining the Freemasons, so these things provide me with a good background to not feel bad about getting what I want while still providing an injunction against deliberately screwing other people over.

The experience freaked me out, but it taught me a lot too.

Any commentary would be appreciated.

My response: The idea of informed consent is interesting, I find myself doing it with people that I sort of respect -- they're not the average sheep, but someone whom I could honestly see myself having uncommon meetings of the minds with. I sort of write about it here.

She reminds be a little bit of the Violet character from True Blood, if you've seen it.

Another sociopath story (part 2)

As for empathy, I used to have traces of it as a teenager but now it seems to have faded into oblivion. (Hence I always wondered if you can turn narcissist/sociopath after the age of 15, yet I've read many times that the onset of both conditions is usually during early childhood.) I do sometimes wonder, however, whether what I now remember as "moments of empathy" was mere self-manipulation. For one, I cannot remember ever crying about anything, besides a single major personal defeat. I never lost my sleep or got anxious about another person, though I've experienced both in relation to my own problems. I have felt anger and even gratitude (or chivalry, if you prefer), I have felt regret and embarrassment, but I haven't felt guilt or remorse to any meaningful degree.

Another awkward thing is... I have never, EVER been depressed in my life. Not a single day. I believe I can evade depression forever because I have a very helpful, well-developed skill: the ability to manipulate myself in erasing memories. I have read many times in your blog that our flexible identities can create fake memories, so I suppose all of us can easily erase memories as well. For example, if I experience a rejection in the context of dating, I can totally "forget" about it, not just dehumanize or attack the credibility and worthiness of my rejector. Complete and utter removal of the unpleasant event from history. Maybe this explains our rumored lack of ability to learn from past mistakes and punishment strategies... maybe we just erase the mistake/punishment from our textbooks and just move on.

Yet, although I do not feel depression/melancholy, I often used to experience emptiness and a lack of identity. "Normal" people seem to have a very static self-image, even when they're not fully aware of it. Their lives have structure and coherence, and they can track their progress over time. (On the flip side, they can get pretty morose if their progress has stalled because of this.) I, on the other hand, can never "settle." I feel I want to be everything and everyone. (And I can!) But very often I have NO IDEA who I really am. Your blog has been extremely helpful in this respect. I now define myself more accurately as the "mask bearer." I am perfectly fine not being "something in particular," but "something that can turn into anything." The only real problem for me now is keeping track of my actual preferences, my real wants, and not overly assimilate the preferences of the persona I'm pretending to be. But I'm getting better at it.

Book responses (part 4)

From a reader:

I have been following your blog for a while and I've found it fascinating, so naturally when I heard about your book I jumped at a change for a larger glimpse into your life. I preordered it as soon as I heard about it, and when it arrived on my kindle yesterday I spent the whole day lost in the rabbit hole I found myself in. Much of your book resonated very strongly with me, especially your description of ruining people and how often the potential for ruin is enough. I have always implicitly felt this but could never put a name to it. I always considered it a propensity to quit before the end, but when you consider the appreciation of potential as an end in itself, the subsequent ruination is just "busy work" and not worth my time. This is actually a great relief to me, because while I can tolerate moral ambiguity in myself, I absolutely cannot tolerate a weak mind that cannot follow through its projects to their end.

Although it is most likely too early to tell, I consider myself a sociopath, or at least highly sociopathic. As a child, I never really fit into social situations, neither with adults nor children. I always felt the
greatest contempt for what I viewed as adults trying to manipulate me with a sourceless moral code that I did not believe in. It shocked me when they expressed surprise that I would need a justification for morality. With children, I was exceedingly awkward, a trait that I mainly attribute to an upbringing by East Asian parents, but may also have been because I simply didn't care about the frivolities that others did and never made an attempt to pretend otherwise. However, that upbringing also protected me, as the cultural mandate on conformity effectively masked my deviant thoughts and behavior. However, occasionally my utilitarian value set still shone through, like when I kicked one of my best friends in the ribs to make him stop yelling at recess. Afterward, deciding on a whim that honesty was a value I should always observe, I freely admitted to having done so, absolutely enraging my teacher for my apparent stoicism and lack of regret. I suppose I should have shown more contrition, but the truth is I simply didn't care that my friend was injured. I got what I wanted, and there was no permanent damage done. Was I supposed to care further on such trivial, temporary effects?

Although you discussed a lack of emotional affect in mainly humorous terms (people taking your deadpanned threats as jokes), I have found a very practical use for it, pathological lying, A combination of Asian distaste for outward displays of emotion and my sociopathic inability to express emotion has given me the highly useful ability to lie in practically any situation, even to my closest friends, a skill that I hone and treasure. It's pathetically easy to lie to strangers who don't know anything about you and are willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but lying to someone who intimately knows your mannerisms is absolutely beautiful. I have actually ruined someone's inherent trust in people; after talking to me for a few months she can no longer take peoples' statements at face value and always wonders if they are lying, even if said person has never had a history of lying. I'm not sure how an empath would react to something like that, but I personally find it hilarious.

Speaking of empaths, I have never had an "Ann" in my life. No empath has ever healed me or shown me how redeemable empaths are. Instead, I only have people who stubbornly refuse to acknowledge my inherent differences and strive to evoke in me the emotions that they believe me to have. My inability to feel emotions alien to me is only interpreted as further reason that I need this “therapy,” until I am completely overwhelmed and I disengage entirely. I have never met an empath I can deal with, and the people I identify with closest all share sociopathic traits with me. Often, interaction with me has brought those traits to the surface. I'm sure a normal person would watch in horror as I “corrupt” people, but I only feel pride in having so much influence, not just in peoples' actions, but their very philosophies on life.

Unlike you, I have no religious code whatsoever, and my ethics can easily be described as questionable. My morals are based entirely on my aesthetic sense, but, given the nature of my aesthetics, it keeps me out of trouble anyway. What I find most beautiful is predatory grace, which requires, to put it simply, perception and ability. My aesthetics drive me to eschew denial and constantly strive to improve in all areas, which ironically gives me a relatively normal sociopathic life. It also gives me a relatively normal life by empath standards, as evidence of actions is usually ugly, giving me incentive to always cover my tracts. Violence, likewise, if used because I have lost control of the situation and can only resort to brute strength, is disgustingly ugly. Is this a strange code to live by? Clearly it is strange for empaths, but I have gotten the impression that my lifestyle is strange for sociopaths as well. Am I truly deviant or am I just calling the same motivations by a different name? I personally think my aesthetic sense is just a different name for the inborn instincts that everybody has (the will to live, which requires one to improve as to not get eviscerated), but given the reactions I have gotten from sharing my views, I may really be different.

Reading the reviews of your book on Amazon, I was surprised at the number of reviews that criticized the excessive length of the book. I was entirely engrossed from start to finish, but that may be because I responded personally to the material in a way that an empath simply wouldn't. In any case, you specifically described the book as a memoir, not an academic work, something that these reviews seem to have overlooked. I did notice that you left out any accounts of interactions with other sociopaths, even though you vaguely referenced them. Given how thoroughly you accounted your interactions, the story seems one sided. I would love to hear those, but even without those anecdotes, your book elucidated many concepts that I felt but couldn't put to words, and that deserves gratitude, as well as respect.

On a friend asking if I'm a sociopath

I sort of self-diagnosed myself five years ago. It seemed to fit. Not everything, of course. I believe that there is a spectrum of the emotionally impaired like there is a spectrum of the blind or the deaf. You are legally blind without your glasses, right? But that doesn't mean that you consider yourself in the same category as completely blind people. Similarly, I may be emotionally impaired without necessarily being handicapped. I think there is a big difference in terms of how people can function in the world depending on where they fall on the spectrum. But I do think that emotional language is like a second language to me. I have to go through several different deductions before I can "empathize" with people, and not just sometimes but most of the time. I do think that I use different strategies to navigate the world than most people--that I have different wiring.

I definitely have sociopathic impulses. I find myself ignoring urges to kill or do great bodily harm to ignoring a temptation to ruin somebody, to even just ignoring the invitation to view the world in a way that would push me to engage in excessively risky behavior. These urges cloud my judgment and take me away from the person I want to be, so I try not to indulge them. I treat them like hallucinations instead. They feel very real, everything feels so real, but I have experienced them frequently enough to know that they are wrong--that I will regret acting on them. So I try to ignore them, just like I would try to ignore the image of a monster breathing fire in my peripheral vision.

Religious moral reasoning vs. guilt and getting better

A reader sent me this video of David Woods (Christian psychopath) talking about his religious conversion and how he gets pushback from other Christians because he still doesn't feel guilt.

First, him explaining (I don't think super well) about guilt. 

Second, him talking about how religious people insist that feelings of guilt are a necessary part of religious conversion/salvation. 

I remember when I got judged by some members of my own church, they said that it wasn't necessarily what I had done in the past that made me such a bad person, but that the way that I felt about it. I thought that was a totally anticipated reaction for people to have because my religion does emphasize to a certain point one's change of heart over the ledger recording one's actions in life, whether good and bad. That is, someone might have a change of heart at the last minute death row style and still be just as worthy of salvation as someone who had been "good" their entire life. On the other hand, it's obvious a mental health disorder to not have the same feelings of guilt and to expect someone to feel differently is like expecting gay people to not be attracted to members of the same sex. So I feel like this thoughts vs. action issue is something that many if not all religions have had to evolve their thinking on as we learn more and more the limits of controlling one's thoughts and feelings.

A quick word about guilt. The way I explain a sociopath's lack of guilt is through sense of self. Shame is something that society imposes on you to make you feel bad because you have violated one of their moral constructs. Guilt is a feeling that you have violated your own moral construct or self construct. For instance, if you think of yourself as being an honest and generous person, you may feel guilt if you behave in a dishonest or selfish way. But if you don't think of yourself in any sort of terms, either as being dishonest or honest, you won't ever have experience guilt because you won't ever violate your own self concept. I think sociopaths can regret that things didn't play out differently, and they can even feel remorse when they understand that it was their action that led to things paying out poorly or hurting people that they didn't want to hurt but maybe in a moment of extra impulsivity they did hurt.

Here's his video saying that before a sociopath can get better, he has to see himself as having a problem or being flawed or missing something, rather than seeing sociopathy exclusively as a super power.

Narcissists, Psychopaths, and Sociopaths

Here's another video that one of my family members sent:

I just ran into this video on youtube and I was wondering what your opinion on it is, based on the research that you have done into these kinds of distinctions.  To be honest, I had a hard time even comprehending some of the things she was talking about and I think that it might have something to do with the nature of empathy.  Like it seems like people who are empathetic are naturally so (and this is what makes it so hard for empaths to even understand what it would be like to be a sociopath/psychopath) but the stuff she said about psychopaths being born and sociopaths being made made me wonder if empathy is an acquired skill.  Have you seen other people citing this same distinction between psychopaths and sociopaths (i.e. that the causes are nature and nurture, respectively)?  If you haven't seen this video before, it might be interesting to show to your blog and see how people react to it there. 

See below my response to the distinction between psychopaths and sociopaths. But I think the issue of empathy being an acquired skill is sort of a separate question, in a way. From my own experience, I think that anyone can learn to do better perspective taking -- or cognitive empathy. But I've had brain scans that show low low levels of function in the typical empathy brain areas. And after so many years of therapy, I still don't really have the sensation of feeling affective empathy. I don't feel like I will ever get to where I am feeling affective empathy normally. But I also don't feel like I need affective empathy for a normal, happy, fulfilling life. In fact I think the overreliance on empathy in our society has led to a great many ills.

I like her explanation of guilt and shame. I think along with the previous video about regret, these people are accurately describing what negative emotions sociopaths may or may not experience.

I don't necessarily agree that a psychopath is born and a sociopath is made. I have heard this before, but I don't know that this is a consistently held belief or that there has been a good deal of research to justify this distinction. I do think that there probably is a different between people that I would consider sort of a genetically driven sociopath and those that may have been culturized or socialized that way. For instance, I have heard from several people that a high degree of the population of Romania seems sociopathic. That seems like more of a cultural response. Whether that means we call them sociopaths and other people psychopaths, I don't know. I'd like to see the academic empirical research on this.

One story I did like is the girl who broke up with a dude who  tries to win her back, successfully. They date for a solid year and he is the perfect boyfriend. On the one year anniversary of getting back together, the boyfriend tells her that he had been playing her this whole time to break her heart. Wow, cold. But I could see sociopaths (especially young ones with a lot of time on their hands) do something like this. 

Living in the moment

I read this NY Times column and thought it was an interesting and hopefully relatable example of how (I believe) sociopaths think most of the time, in terms of compartmentalizing fear and living in the moment.  The author is describing how liberating it feels to ride a bike in busy, traffic-ridden New York because he is plagued by a vague sense of anxiety, but is rather focused and in the moment:


Natural selection has made us hypervigilant, obsessively replaying our mistakes and imagining worst-case scenarios. And the fact that we’ve eliminated almost all of the immediate threats from our environment, like leopards and Hittites, has only made us even more jittery, because we’re now constantly anticipating disasters that are never going to happen: the prowler/rapist/serial killer lurking in the closet, a pandemic of Ebola/Bird Flu/Hantavirus, the imminent fascist/socialist/zombie takeover. The disasters that do befall us are mostly slow, incremental ones that seem abstract and faraway until they suddenly blindside us, like heart disease and foreclosure. So we go about our days safer and more comfortable than human beings have been in five million years, constantly hunched and growling with a low level of fight-or-flight chemicals in our bloodstreams. My doctor assures me that this is the cause of most of our chronic back and neck problems; my dentist says nocturnal tooth-grinding became so endemic in New York after 9/11 it actually changed the shapes of people’s faces by enlarging their masseter muscles. He sells a lot of night guards.

Which is why it’s such a relief, an exhilarating joy, to break the clammy paralysis of worry and place yourself at last in real physical danger. Even though it’s the time when I am at most immediate risk, riding my bike in Manhattan traffic is also one of the only times when I am never anxious or afraid — not even when a cab door swings open right in front of me, some bluetoothed doofus strides into my path, or a dump truck’s fender drifts within an inch of my leg. At those moments fear is a low neurological priority that would only interfere with my reaction time, like a panicky manager shoved aside by competent, grim-faced engineers in a crisis. I doubt that the victims of sudden violent accidents die terrified; they’re probably extremely alert, brains gone pretty much blank while their galvanized bodies try to figure out what to do. I don’t think our minds are designed to accept that there’s no way out. Based on my own close calls, I suspect that if I am killed while biking, the state of mind in which I am likeliest to die is extreme annoyance. And at least it won’t be by drowning.
***
When I’m balanced on two thin wheels at 30 miles an hour, gauging distance, adjusting course, making hundreds of unconscious calculations every second, that idiot chatterbox in my head is kept too busy to get a word in. I’ve heard people say the same thing about rock-climbing: how it shrinks your universe to the half-inch of rock surface immediately in front of you, this crevice, that toehold. Biking is split-second fast and rock-climbing painstakingly slow, but both practices silence the noise of the mind and render self-consciousness blissfully impossible. You become the anonymous hero of that old story, Man versus the Universe. Your brain’s glad to finally have a real job to do, instead of all that trivial busywork. You are all action, no deliberation. You are forced, under pain of death, to quit all that silly ideation and pay attention. It’s meditation at gunpoint.

I’m convinced these are the conditions in which we evolved to thrive: under moderate threat of death at all times, brain and body fully integrated, senses on high alert, completely engaged with our environment. It is, if not how we’re happiest — we’re probably happiest in a hot tub with a martini and a very good naked friend — how we are most fully and electrically alive. Of course we can’t sustain this state of mind for too long. People who go through their whole lives operating on impulse tend to end up in jail. We are no longer purely animals, living only in the moment; we are the creatures who live in time, as salamanders live in fire, prisoners of memory and imagination, tortured with dread and regret. That other, extra-temporal perspective is not the whole reality of our condition. It’s more like the view from the top of the Empire State Building, of people as infinitesimal dots circulating ceaselessly through a grid. Eventually we have to descend back to street level, rejoin the milling mass and take up our lives; you lock up your bike and become hostage to the hours again. But it’s at those moments that I become briefly conscious of what I actually am — a fleeting entity stripped of ego and history in an evanescent present, like a man running in frames of celluloid, his consciousness flickering from one instant to the next.

How does the sociopath accomplish this in daily life?  I believe through extreme compartmentalizing, that actually allows him to quiet all of the mental buzz clogging up most people's neural pathways and hyperfocusing on the moment.

Guilt

I'm still learning a lot about myself. For instance, I was prompted recently to think about "guilt." A reader writes:

Sometimes I feel what I think may be guilt, but there's always a metaphorical voice in the back of my head telling me, "No, you only feel that way because your image was tarnished." That "voice" is incredibly difficult to pay attention to, by the way. I feel a horrible feeling whenever I do something that hurts someone and it can be linked back to me. If there is no link to me, I don't feel anything. It's very hard for me to differentiate between this and guilt, and I've frequently used it to justify my own humanity. But why don't I feel such things if nobody knows who caused it? It can't be guilt. I only care when there are consequences for me.

I reply:

That is interesting how you feel bad only when you are caught, essentially. I mean, it's a trite phrase -- "he's only sorry he got caught" -- but it is so true for me. I can actually feel really really badly about things that I got caught for, for whatever reason. But the phrase doesn't fit exactly. It's not like I feel disappointed that I couldn't get away with it. I just feel ... out of sorts. I feel like the world is an ugly place where I don't belong. That is what makes me feel bad. Definitely not, "oh, poor person I hurt." It's more like, "poor me for having to live in this ugly world and deal with this." This happened to me very recently when I stole/borrowed something from my neighbor, hoping she would never find out before I returned it. She did find out, though, and confronted me about it. Or she at least asked me about it and I didn't know what she knew so I just came clean, but spun a story of emergency, etc., figuring that would be better for me than to be caught in a lie. But she wouldn't have it. She threatened to call the authorities. Now that seemed like an overreaction by anyone's standards, but for some reason it deeply disturbed me. I think I realized how vulnerable I am, how hated I am just by virtue of what I am. I didn't really think about it at the time, but what you wrote really made sense to me. I wouldn't have felt the least tinge of guilt if I had never been caught, but being caught made me feel all sorts of guilt, or what felt like guilt at least. Maybe it was just regret.

"Emotion is weakness"

From a reader:

I recently went looking through my old schoolwork from ages passed and was somewhat surprised to find that the sociopathic vein in my writing was clearly expressed as early as sixth grade where I, in a possibly narcissistic move, took the time to keep a book filled with my quotes. One of the first quotes simply stated "Emotion is weakness." This was around the same time that I started receiving court-mandated therapy to cover any possible psychological side effects of my parent's divorce. Those therapy sessions were where I first realized that I was different. I saw these sessions from the viewpoint of a bystander, and marveled at how stupid my therapist was. I made sure to get on her good side, covering up my extremely introverted personality by bringing comic books (Calvin and Hobbes) and using the topics of different strips to control the flow of our discussion. In later meetings, I managed to use up most of the time by getting the therapist to talk about herself. Later, I eavesdropped on her reporting to my mother that I was charming, outgoing, and generally well adjusted. It was then that I decided that I never wanted to be normal, to be as blind and stupid as this woman. My mother became friends with her and I had to visit often. It was annoying until she died of cancer, a few years later.

I bought my first copy of The Art of War in seventh grade, Machiavelli's The Prince in ninth. By eleventh grade, I had a fully formed self-concept, complete with a self-diagnosis of ASPD, and took home the school library's copy of Mein Kampf, only to be disappointed by the obscuring emotion that riddled the work. Most of my time since sixth grade has been spent furthering my self-concept, and honing my skills. The Myers Briggs personality inventory classified me as a strong INTJ (The mastermind) with 20 out of 20 points in introversion. I had two close friends at the time, and both of them were also INTJ's (which only appear in 1% of the population), as well as being in the highest intellectual tier. I don't form complete social networks; I merely connect with the 'elite' and the 'delinquents' (My esoteric personality is largely ignored by the vast majority) who think as I do. From them, I had complete access to whatever I wanted.

However, problems arose at home, where my addictive personality resulted in major cracks in my mask, leading to a rift between my father and I; and causing a complete lack of trust between us. It was a major obstacle in my maneuverings until I left home. My method of theft from him had to be complicated multiple times until it became easier to simply get money in other ways.

During the last few years of high school, my relationship was so grating that I constantly had to seek catharsis, which led to increasingly risky activities. Fortunately, I still had enough peace of mind to think before acting and to plan out these releases, although the family dog almost died (luckily, the only bruises were on her neck, which could be explained away) and I was almost caught breaking into a nearby university at three in the morning (The night Janitor was there early, which I later learned was due to an event scheduled later that day).

During philosophical conversations with my inner circle, I was forced to defend my actions (as part of the argument, no one was offended, they’d done worse) so I stated my worldview something like this: I don’t care if there’s a god or an afterlife because either way, I won’t know until I’m dead. I believe that nothing exists for a purpose, and the only meaning in this world is the meaning we create for ourselves. My ultimate goal in life is something to give meaning, something almost impossible to achieve (I chose world domination because I could play it off as a joke if anyone asked). Long-term hedonism is good, but the will to power saves one the time of making reasons, because it is a reason in and of itself. Live life with one principle, to regret nothing.

Those are all the answers I need.

-Potens

Morning after pill for conscience

A reader writes:

I came across this article in the Village Voice. It’s about the possibility of a “morning after pill” for the conscience. This pill would prevent moral emotions like remorse and regret. As you’ll see in the article, the thought is that they’d ostensibly use this kind of medication to ease the effects of PTSD, especially for active duty, on the battlefront soldiers. After all, who wants to live with the self-imposed emotional suffering that seems to accompany killing people in a war zone? But of course, the ramifications of being able to do away with remorse and guilt with a pill will come with debate on how moral using such a pill would be. Is it morally right to deny our fighting men and women a means to effectively eradicate the most painful emotional effects of being on the front lines in a war that the nation asked them to fight in the first place? On the other hand, is it morally right to create a pharmaceutical that might turn off emotions that act as a safeguard against mankind’s less than ethical impulses? We all know such a drug would not stay within the confines of the military forever. Does science really want to, in effect, sell sociopathy in a bottle?

Dating other sociopaths

From a reader asking if it is a good idea for sociopaths to date other sociopaths:

My reasons for thinking we're a perfect match:

1)   Point: We need a challenge; everyone else is just too easy to win over. 

      Personal experience: When friends ask me how I do it, I shrug and say something banal because it is useless to try to explain. I feel that “game” is a skill that is fine-tuned throughout life, and even a lifetime of practice will not be of desired effect unless one already possesses an uncanny knack for reading body language, understanding weaknesses and individual needs, deciphering subliminal clues people unknowingly give off, and minimal emotional involvement. The ease at which I get what I want can actually be frustrating. I usually lose interest right after I acquire my target's complete attention and/or whatever I need from him. As I slowly let it go (so as not to burn bridges just in case I ever need that bridge again), I usually get some sort of a love confession. It’s a nice ego boost, but it honestly annoys me. Maybe it annoys me because it reminds me that I am incapable of feeling anything back. More likely, it’s because I have to waste my energy trying to let him down easy. Yet even more likely, it's probably because it reinforces the fact that I'm failing in my search for another of equal mindset. 

      Rationale: Dating another sociopath would be much more invigorating, as it would be a constant challenge for one another’s attention. As stated in Robert Greene’s “The Art of Seduction”, the most successful couples are those in which both people have mastered seduction. Without this, we get bored. We need a game, and an incompetent opponent is no fun after the first round. 

2)   Point: Save the emotional acts.

      Personal experience: I do manipulate, but I do recognize that if I want to remain in respectable societal standing, I have to play towards the emotions of the people I deal with. In my past relationships, I have had to fake what I am not feeling (i.e. pretend to comfort the guy when he’s upset, force myself to do the whole stare-into-each-other’s-eyes thing, convince him that I feel the same way, etc.) I’m not sure if there are other socios out there that feel this, but strong expressions of love and sadness are the two emotions I feel the most phony mimicking. I can literally feel the insincerity seeping out of my pores. Near the end of relationships my tolerance for such acts fizzles out, and I am accused of not caring…and since I generally don’t, he ends up hurt. While I have never felt sorrow or regret from this, I also do not want to leave a trail of broken hearts behind me. It’s essentially damaging my reputation and whatever connections I might need to make in the future. 

      Rationale: Tending to a lover’s emotions is tiresome and an enormous waste of time. Dating a sociopath would eliminate this rollercoaster of ridiculous emotional performances, and we would be able to live in drama-free harmony. Paradoxically, it would actually be a more honest relationship. 

3)   Point: We are attracted to those who are both book-smart and street-smart.

      Personal experience: I am attracted to intellect and power, and I assume that most other socios are as well. I’d rather marry an ugly but manipulative and successful genius than a sexy-as-hell but dumb-as-a-rock superstar. I saw that you mentioned the 48 Laws of Power. I cannot discuss this book with anyone I know. They lack the ability to see the rules as one entity from which we must derive certain principles, based on what our situation and goals are. I consider craftiness along with the ability to gauge situations and handle them with appropriate tact to be my definition of "street-smart". Lacking this quality is a complete turn-off for me. Being book-smart is also essential for my attraction to another; if I feel that I am capable of getting better grades on a factually-based exam than someone, I can't take them seriously. In my dealings with dating, I have come across only one person who has mastered both areas. I have insincerely told several people throughout my life that I "love" them (usually out of obligated reciprocation); I'm unsure of what my take on love is, but I can honestly say that what I feel for that one person is closer to love than what I've felt for anyone else.

      Rationale: There are plenty of book-smart people out there. There are also plenty of street-smart people. To have both is rare- and those who have both have an edge over everybody else. Most socios are able to recognize this potential for success, for they possess it within themselves. Naturally, we are attracted to excellence. Therefore, we are attracted to other sociopaths.

4)   Point: Being a "chameleon" can only be understood by others like us.

      Personal experience: I change my persona depending on what I need and who I am around. My groups of friends are eclectic and from all walks of life. In the past, when the guy I'm with at the time has met a group of friends who views me differently than he does, disaster ensued. "Who are you?", "You didn't tell me you used to do such-and-such things",  "I talked to so-and-so...I don't even know you", and so on. I am forced to purposely avoid letting my significant other meet certain people or hear certain things, in an attempt to maintain his view of who I am to him.

     Rationale: Who we date is usually a frequent escort. That being said, it is difficult for someone who isn't a social chameleon to get along with more than one group of your friends- or anyone who sees you in a different light than your lover does. Dating another sociopath means that he/she will easily fit into your eclectic groups of acquaintances. He/she will understand the necessity of mimicking and will be able to recognize when it is being done. He/she will also be able to mimick, which eliminates the "why do your friends hate me?" mediation and the "what was that all about?" explanations. He/she will understand that the "you" that you are pretending to be is just an act.

      I could probably continue, but I'll wait for some feedback first. Please do note that I am presenting this from theories I've derived from my own experiences. Also note that I am not referring to full-blown psychopaths, sadists, or those that might only date to extort things from/harm the other. Rather, I am referencing "mild" sociopaths like myself, who understand self-interest and are frustrated with dating simpletons.

Guest post: The Next Generation

I've long been struck by the idea of childhood diagnosis of sociopaths--of exactly how early and easily we can be spotted.  I, myself, was pretty aware of my own differences at an early age.  Couldn't describe it back then, but I always saw the difference, that desire to compete fiercely, and even humiliate, break, and if possible, injure the competition in a way that never led back to me, all while playing adults like fiddles.  Because of this history, I recently recognized another small sociopath with absolute clarity.

Recently, my wife and I were on vacation visiting friends of ours from grad school. They have a five-year-old boy.  It was like looking at a little version of myself.  Seeing this kid take joy in first playing with his puppy, and slowly but surely escalating the play and contact to the level of inflicting intentional pain.  I recognized on his part that he knew precisely when he was crossing a line--looking up, causing the pain when he thought no adult was looking, and the false regret in his voice but clearly not his eyes when caught.  It was like looking back in time into a mirror.  He didn't reserve his violence and force for his pet, either, but also targeted both his parents and my wife and I.   When his parents tried to use the old parenting canard of "you're hurting mommy and daddy" which usually reduces kids to crying, mewling shame-balls, their son only grinned.

If seeing his joy at this weren't a recognition of my own childhood feelings when I caused physical or emotional pain, the cinch was seeing his uncanny understanding of social dynamics, and the privileged role that most kids occupy in society which saves them from adult wrath.  In other words, this child was manipulative beyond his years.  Again, something familiar to myself.

By looking at him, you wouldn't think he's growing up in a nurturing, progressive, yuppie household where both parents hold doctorate degrees (or on second thought, maybe you would).  His parents were oblivious to their little 'angel' and the intentionality of his aggression.  Or at least have developed a practiced obliviousness.

But what surprised me most was how quickly a weekend around a small version of myself stirred up territorial feelings.  Those feelings made me think of the practices of male lions direct towards a competitor's cubs.  Good thing I live half a country away.

Not feeling bad about not feeling bad

I thought this story from a reader was very interesting, particularly the parallels with my own life. I especially find her thoughts about religion to be very familiar:

I just recently started doing research on sociopaths.  Years ago a girl that knew me well said she thought I might be a sociopath but I brushed it off thinking that I’m nothing like the monsters sociopaths are portrayed as.  That’s why I find your website so refreshing.  Its not claiming all sociopaths are the same, nor are they always people that should be avoided at all cost.  Last week again I had someone close to me say they think I have sociopathic tendencies.  I started reading from your website and I do see a lot of similarities.  I’ve always felt different from everyone else.  I have an very emotional mother and growing up I could never understand her reactions to things.  Most of the time when I see anyone get emotional or upset by something it’s not like I don’t care, I just don’t feel it. I want to understand it like a puzzle.  I’ve always struggled with the concept of guilt.  I grew up in a very religious family and feeling remorse and repentance for your mistakes is considered to be key for forgiveness of sins.  I’ve always really struggled with what guilt is exactly because when I’ve done things I know I shouldn’t have, I don’t get an emotional response.  Me knowing it’s wrong is always based on logic and knowing what’s expected of me.  When I have done something wrong I do regret it but it’s usually because I see it as a failure on my part to live up to an expectation that either I or others have placed on me and I hate feeling like I don’t have control over myself or I have failed in anyway.  I know I have been cruel to people before and have messed with and manipulated people’s emotions.  When I was young I did it because watching how easily people could believe something or be manipulated was entertaining.  Now it’s usually only when I feel wronged or slighted and I never feel bad about it because it does seem justified.

I have a great job, a few close friends and overall I think I’m a very stable person but I do feel different.  I was disconnected from my family entirely for a year and I never felt an emotional sense of missing them.  My parents are normal people, never abused me, always supportive so when I hadn’t seen or talked to them for a long time I was hoping I would feel something but I mostly just felt indignant and irritated when I asked for help with different things and they ignored me.  On the reverse side while I usually get bored with guys very quickly there was this one guy that was almost impossible for me to let go of.  He has a PhD in psychiatry and he’s always fascinated me.  Whenever I saw him do something to intentionally irritate or passive-aggressively insult a friend simply because they told him something he didn’t want to hear I became more drawn to him.  Everything about our time together was intense but I would feel this gaping sense of loss any time he had to go or I didn’t see him for a while.  Even now I compare other guys to him and I can’t be bothered.  I don’t know why with one guy I could miss him so intensely but with my own family I feel so indifferent.  I don’t want to be a difficult person to be around but whenever I want something and I see a way of getting it I instinctively start shifting and manipulating the people around me to get it.  I think what I want usually benefits other people as well so I don’t feel bad about it and when a close friend who knows how I am calls me out and tells me she feels played I can’t help but feel she’s missing the bigger picture. I have also done a lot for the people close to me. I’ve gotten them jobs, found them nice places to live and helped them out of bad relationships.  I don’t think I’m a bad person or ‘evil’ and yet I am so disconnected from the people around me.  I mentioned I’m religious.  I do believe in God but recently I’ve had people in my religion ask me ‘heartfelt’ questions.  They’re the only questions I’ve ever struggled with.  I found myself trying to take apart the meaning of the questions, remember if I had heard other people express their answers before and guess what they wanted to hear because inside I didn’t understand, there was nothing indicating how I felt about it.  Explain why I want to be part of the organization, how guilt and repentance have motivated me to correct my actions; deep down I still don’t really think anything I’ve done has been all that bad.  Knowledge of the consequences and not wanting to see myself as a failure have taught me not to make the same choices.  I do want to make God happy but I don’t see why my actions or way of thinking would make him unhappy.

I read an excerpt from your book online just now and just in the small portion I read I see a lot of similarities.  When I was a teenager I had this girl I couldn't stand and I used to break into her house and rearrange little things around her room and memorize snippets from her diary to work casually and discretely into regular conversation to mess with her.  I even get the staring thing, I constantly have people think I'm glaring at them or trying to seduce them because I don't look away like most people. I just read a couple paragraphs but I think I'll have to buy a copy soon and take a read. It's interesting some of the things I recognise in myself. Even putting myself in life threatening situations... almost bleeding out on a camping trip because I didn't want to call attention to my injuries, look weak or have people try to assist me when I figured I could deal with it on my own.

I’m emailing I guess for curiosity and understanding.  I know this is the way I am and I don’t think it’s ‘bad’, just different.  I struggle with having to control myself, I want to have fun, I want to take chances and I enjoy seeing how one action can lead to a ripple effect in my favour but I don’t think I’m dangerous or need to be fixed I just want to know if that’s how sociopaths sometimes feel.  Like I said, I just started looking into this and I’m not saying I am a sociopath or think it’s terrible if I am. I just want to know more.

In my religion, there are a lot of people who think that emotions are the way that God speaks to you or a sign of true repentance (godly sorrow). But that's not necessary. As LDS Elder Richard G. Scott taught:

A testimony is fortified by spiritual impressions that confirm the validity of a teaching, of a righteous act, or of a warning of pending danger. Often such guidance is accompanied by powerful emotions that make it difficult to speak and bring tears to the eyes. But a testimony is not emotion.

And why would we need to feel things? Why would God make a group of people who were doomed to hell the moment they were born that way? But some religions believe that, I guess. Also some people believe that gay people are going to hell?
 

How to maximize utility of socio relationship?

I thought this was a remarkably insightful comment, left July 7, 2013 at 7:56 AM

HOW TO BEAT A SOCIOPATH ... is the wrong question. If you're trying to beat, that means you're engaged in a competition, and non-socios tend to get revved up by their emotions during competition and thus will make it very difficult for themselves to "beat the socio", while the socio expends much less effort to pick at the non-socio's weaknesses.

Instead, the proper question for non-socios is "How do I maximize the utility to me of the socio relationship?"

In some cases, there may be no utility, so just terminate the relationship, or get out of it with at little damage as possible. In other words, you're in a hole, stop digging, don't try to beat or compete with the socio, just tend to your own needs. Do not feel sorry for the socio, or try to make the socio regret or repent, just leave. (If you can't control your own emotions, particularly to stop worrying about the socio, then you certainly aren't going to be able to control anyone else, including the socios, who are very good at control.)

If there is possible utility, then strictly enforce your boundaries, so the socio cannot damage you. Constantly assess whether you are getting enough from the relationship; do not worry that you are being selfish, trust that the socio is doing the same calculation for themselves, and will leave if they aren't getting what they want, so you can just worry about your own needs.

The tricky thing is to realize that socios imitate emotions to manipulate non-socios. If this satisfies your utility need, then great. Otherwise, realize that the socio has limits, and if you impose unrealistic expectations on the socio, you will just get burned.

It reminds me of this recent tweet:

"I am no more using them than they are using me."
— M.E. (@sociopathworld) January 24, 2014

Sociopaths in literature: E.M. Forster's Maurice

A slow nature such as Maurice's appears insensitive, for it needs time even to feel. Its instinct is to assume that nothing either for good or evil has happened, and to resist the invader. Once gripped, it feels acutely, and its sensations in love are particularly profound. Given time, it can know and impart ecstasy; given time, it can sink to the heart of Hell. Thus it was that his agony began as a slight regret; sleepless nights and lonely days must intensify it into a frenzy that consumed him. It worked inwards, till it touched the root whence body and soul both spring, the "I" that he had been trained to obscure, and, realized at last, doubled its power and grew superhuman. For it might have been joy. New worlds broke loose in him at this, and he saw from the vastness of the ruin what ecstasy he had lost, what a communion.

Maybe not full-fledged sociopath, maybe just baby or very high functioning sociopath, maybe just British.