A reader asks "I was wondering how you direct your impulses? Naturally control would of been poor so I figure it is best to attempt to direct impulses in a more creative manner. However I do wonderfully at it I was wondering if you had anything you did in particular."
My response:
I don't know if I have necessarily gotten better at directing my impulses. I like to think I have, but I think largely my impulse control has come more from being very careful about not putting myself in situations in which I know I'll have problems. I sleep 10 hours a day. I take fish oil and eat dark chocolate all of the time. I try to treat my brain nice. When I travel, I spend money on small conveniences so I won't get frustrated or over taxed. If that doesn't work and I still get angry, I will close my eyes and try to flood my mind with awareness of sensory inputs -- try to feel every inch of my skin, what's touching it, hot or cold, listen to every sound, feel the pull of gravity, all of the things that you generally ignore in day to day life.
What I can sometimes do is direct inclinations into proper channels before they become impulses. I try to always have at least one active seduction going on to scratch the itch that is my desire to mess with people. I try to get caught up in professional exploits to satisfy my need for dominance. I will spend a day in bed alone to satisfy my need for laziness and just "being myself."
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Child sociopath? Surviving Newtown
One of my associates told me the story of the one child who survived the Newtown massacre when everyone else in her class died. How? By playing dead, aided by the blood of her classmates. She waited until everything had died down and then got out of there, in fact she was apparently one of the first people to leave the school. How was she capable of accomplishing this incredible feat? God, says some Pastor.
In an interview with ABC News, Pastor Jim Solomon said the girl laid among her 15 other classmates covered in blood until she felt it was safe to leave, "She ran out of the school building covered from head to toe with blood and the first thing she said to her mom was, 'Mommy, I'm OK but all my friends are dead."
Her quick decision truly shows her wisdom and ultimately saved her life. The Daily mail reported that she was the first person to run out of the school building, "Somehow in that moment, by God's grace, [she] was able to act as she was already deceased." Pastor Solomon added, "What did she see in there? Well, she saw someone who she felt was angry and somebody who she felt was mad. "He continued, "How at 6 and a half years old can you be that smart, that brave? I think it's impossible outside of divine intervention. She has wisdom beyond her years."
Now, I'm not saying it wasn't God, and I'm not saying that she is a child sociopath... But she behaved in a way that you would expect a child sociopath to also behave -- keeping her cool, calm and clear headed under pressure, exploiting an opportunity without little regard for her fellow students, all while seemingly knowing exactly what she was doing. Just another reason why having a child who may be a sociopath may not be the worst thing in the world.
In an interview with ABC News, Pastor Jim Solomon said the girl laid among her 15 other classmates covered in blood until she felt it was safe to leave, "She ran out of the school building covered from head to toe with blood and the first thing she said to her mom was, 'Mommy, I'm OK but all my friends are dead."
Her quick decision truly shows her wisdom and ultimately saved her life. The Daily mail reported that she was the first person to run out of the school building, "Somehow in that moment, by God's grace, [she] was able to act as she was already deceased." Pastor Solomon added, "What did she see in there? Well, she saw someone who she felt was angry and somebody who she felt was mad. "He continued, "How at 6 and a half years old can you be that smart, that brave? I think it's impossible outside of divine intervention. She has wisdom beyond her years."
Now, I'm not saying it wasn't God, and I'm not saying that she is a child sociopath... But she behaved in a way that you would expect a child sociopath to also behave -- keeping her cool, calm and clear headed under pressure, exploiting an opportunity without little regard for her fellow students, all while seemingly knowing exactly what she was doing. Just another reason why having a child who may be a sociopath may not be the worst thing in the world.
Monday, December 31, 2012
Chew toys
A reader asks:Do you like to be the boss in relationships? What I mean by that is do you respect boundaries at all for instance, open others mail, walk into the bathroom on somebody, check cell phones, hide things, lock doors and have the only key, that kind of thing. What the hell is that anyway? I thought it was insecurity.My response:
I don't like to be the boss in relationships. I like to be in relationships with equals in power. I don't like to run all over people, but I do like playful sparring, people who act slightly difficult with me, people who need me to win their devotion again and again. I need stuff to do, stuff to think about. I grind my teeth at night, and without the little plastic guard I'd grind my teeth away. That's how I feel about relationships. I grind on them the same way I grind on everything else in life, so I like it when the people I'm with give me a chew toy -- rather than letting me chew on their favorite shoe.
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Addiction
A reader writes:I'm a recovering addict, clean from drugs for 8 years. I notice a higher concentration of ASPD (Anti-Social Personality Disorder) addicts in 12-step fellowships and was wondering if there is a connection between addiction and ASPD. I displayed sociopathic traits as well as addictive behaviors long before I picked up drugs. I've found those of us with ASPD have a harder time fully addressing the various aspects of our addiction than those without. Just curious if you're a recovering addict as well.My response:
I'm not a recovering addict but I know that I am very prone to addiction so I have actually tried to avoid addictive substances. I always want to try everything at least once, but I can usually tell when something is too good to be good for me, if you know what I mean.
Sociopaths allegedly don't learn well from experience/mistakes. I think that is because we have a higher tolerance for pain, discomfort, etc. This can be a huge advantage in situations where pain is paralyzing or otherwise not constructive. It also makes us dangerous to ourselves, though. We're like those people who can't feel physical pain. I have had way more near death experiences than anyone else I know of in my peer group or family. I'm also reckless emotionally and mentally. I have taken on emotional or mental burdens before that have led to the brink of a breakdown. We have to be extra careful about what we do to ourselves because we don't have the risk-averseness and emotional/psychic pain to signal to us to stop doing something because it is hurting us. I can see how this would make us especially prone to acquiring addictions.
Saturday, December 29, 2012
The Gervais Principle (part 2)
The second part talks about how sociopaths and non sociopaths (losers or clueless) behave.
On how sociopaths behave:
The bulk of Sociopath communication takes places out in the open, coded in Powertalk, right in the presence of non-Sociopaths (a decent 101 level example of this is in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, when Hermoine is the only one who realizes that Prof. Umbridge’s apparently bland and formulaic speech is a Powertalk speech challenging Dumbledore). As the David-Jim example shows, Sociopaths are in fact more careful in private.
Why? Both examples illustrate the reasons clearly: for Sociopaths, conditions of conflict of interest and moral hazard are not exceptional. They are normal, everyday situations. To function effectively they must constantly maintain and improve their position in the ecosystem of other Sociopaths, protecting themselves, competing, forming alliances, trading favors and building trust. Above all they must be wary of Sociopaths with misaligned agendas, and protect themselves in basic ways before attempting things like cooperation. They never lower their masks. In fact they are their masks. There is nothing beneath.
So effective Sociopaths stick with steadfast discipline to the letter of the law, internal and external, because the stupidest way to trip yourself up is in the realm of rules where the Clueless and Losers get to be judges and jury members. What they violate is its spirit, by taking advantage of its ambiguities. Whether this makes them evil or good depends on the situation. That’s a story for another day. Good Sociopaths operate by what they personally choose as a higher morality, in reaction to what they see as the dangers, insanities and stupidities of mob morality. Evil Sociopaths are merely looking for a quick, safe buck. Losers and the Clueless, of course, avoid individual moral decisions altogether.
On how non-sociopaths rarely are able to pull off sociopathic techniques themselves:
So what is going wrong here? Why can’t you learn Sociopath tactics from a book or Wikipedia? It is not that the tactics themselves are misguided, but that their application by non-Sociopaths is usually useless, for three reasons.
The first is that you have to decide what tactics to use and when, based on a real sense of the relative power and alignment of interests with the other party, which the Losers and Clueless typically lack. This real-world information is what makes for tactical surprise. Otherwise your application of even the most subtle textbook tactics can be predicted and easily countered by any Sociopath who has also read the same book. Null information advantage.
The second reason is that tactics make sense only in the context of an entire narrative (including mutual assessments of personality, strengths, weaknesses and history) of a given interpersonal relationship. The Clueless have no sense of narrative rationality, and the Losers are too trapped in their own stories to play to other scripts. Both the Clueless and Losers are too self-absorbed to put in much work developing accurate and usable mental models of others. The result is one-size-fits-all-situations tactical choices which are easily anticipated and deflected.
And the third and most important reason of course, is that your moves have to be backed up by appropriate bets using your table stakes, exposing you to real risks and rewards. A good way to remember this is to think of Powertalk as decisions about what verbal tactics to use when, and with what. The answer to with what is usually a part of your table-stakes. The stuff you are revealing and risking. If you cannot answer with what? you are posturing. You are not speaking Powertalk.
I thought this was interesting, particularly on the heels of this recent post about Sherlock Holmes' ability to conceptualize the inner worlds of others. The author has another similar post about constructing narratives in bargaining situations (e.g. "I'm just a poor student, I don't have that kind of money to spend"), locking in the other party to a narrative that favors you ("I appreciate that you are a local business that offers fair prices to loyal customers"), and building upon the narrative until it becomes so convoluted that the other party is not able to keep up with the verbal sparring so the deal must close. It reminded me of these findings that people with more creativity tend to be less moral.
On how sociopaths behave:
The bulk of Sociopath communication takes places out in the open, coded in Powertalk, right in the presence of non-Sociopaths (a decent 101 level example of this is in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, when Hermoine is the only one who realizes that Prof. Umbridge’s apparently bland and formulaic speech is a Powertalk speech challenging Dumbledore). As the David-Jim example shows, Sociopaths are in fact more careful in private.
Why? Both examples illustrate the reasons clearly: for Sociopaths, conditions of conflict of interest and moral hazard are not exceptional. They are normal, everyday situations. To function effectively they must constantly maintain and improve their position in the ecosystem of other Sociopaths, protecting themselves, competing, forming alliances, trading favors and building trust. Above all they must be wary of Sociopaths with misaligned agendas, and protect themselves in basic ways before attempting things like cooperation. They never lower their masks. In fact they are their masks. There is nothing beneath.
So effective Sociopaths stick with steadfast discipline to the letter of the law, internal and external, because the stupidest way to trip yourself up is in the realm of rules where the Clueless and Losers get to be judges and jury members. What they violate is its spirit, by taking advantage of its ambiguities. Whether this makes them evil or good depends on the situation. That’s a story for another day. Good Sociopaths operate by what they personally choose as a higher morality, in reaction to what they see as the dangers, insanities and stupidities of mob morality. Evil Sociopaths are merely looking for a quick, safe buck. Losers and the Clueless, of course, avoid individual moral decisions altogether.
On how non-sociopaths rarely are able to pull off sociopathic techniques themselves:
So what is going wrong here? Why can’t you learn Sociopath tactics from a book or Wikipedia? It is not that the tactics themselves are misguided, but that their application by non-Sociopaths is usually useless, for three reasons.
The first is that you have to decide what tactics to use and when, based on a real sense of the relative power and alignment of interests with the other party, which the Losers and Clueless typically lack. This real-world information is what makes for tactical surprise. Otherwise your application of even the most subtle textbook tactics can be predicted and easily countered by any Sociopath who has also read the same book. Null information advantage.
The second reason is that tactics make sense only in the context of an entire narrative (including mutual assessments of personality, strengths, weaknesses and history) of a given interpersonal relationship. The Clueless have no sense of narrative rationality, and the Losers are too trapped in their own stories to play to other scripts. Both the Clueless and Losers are too self-absorbed to put in much work developing accurate and usable mental models of others. The result is one-size-fits-all-situations tactical choices which are easily anticipated and deflected.
And the third and most important reason of course, is that your moves have to be backed up by appropriate bets using your table stakes, exposing you to real risks and rewards. A good way to remember this is to think of Powertalk as decisions about what verbal tactics to use when, and with what. The answer to with what is usually a part of your table-stakes. The stuff you are revealing and risking. If you cannot answer with what? you are posturing. You are not speaking Powertalk.
I thought this was interesting, particularly on the heels of this recent post about Sherlock Holmes' ability to conceptualize the inner worlds of others. The author has another similar post about constructing narratives in bargaining situations (e.g. "I'm just a poor student, I don't have that kind of money to spend"), locking in the other party to a narrative that favors you ("I appreciate that you are a local business that offers fair prices to loyal customers"), and building upon the narrative until it becomes so convoluted that the other party is not able to keep up with the verbal sparring so the deal must close. It reminded me of these findings that people with more creativity tend to be less moral.
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