Sunday, April 21, 2013

Emotional palette

A reader writes about his "emotional palette":
Being this way, I feel like I’m an expert in identifying emotion because I rarely express any real ones, creating the majority of my daily ones from scratch. Like oil painting, I use mix of small amounts of mental garbage and physical movements that take on the form of a variation of the only three genuine emotions: anger, happiness, or sadness. Those are sort of like the red, blue, and yellow of emotions that can be used to make all the other various shades.

At least, that’s how I would break it down for the average emotional someone who doesn’t get that a lot of them are simply wasted energy.

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Q&As (part 4)

(last one)

You believe that ambiguous sexuality is one of the best identifying traits of a sociopath, relying on it more than any other one trait to form your own opinion about who is and isn’t a sociopath. Why?

For whatever reason there are sociopath “wannabes” out there. They tell their stories to highlight how cold they are. I frequently use ambiguous sexuality as a litmus test with these types to determine whether or not they are legitimate. If they freak out at the mere suggestion, as so many “normal” men do, I usually conclude they’re poseurs. A sociopath would not find their ego threatened by the suggestion that they are gay; in fact, that might be one of the least offensive things a true sociopath would ever be accused of in his life! They don’t have a strong identity of being straight, and don’t share the common moral assumption that homosexuality is sin.

What do you believe is the most important message of your book?

Sociopaths should not have to justify their very existence amongst other equally flawed examples of humanity, but if they did, there are some legitimate reasons to think they’re not as bad as they are made out to be. Also, child sociopaths perhaps best illustrate the fact that people don’t ask to be sociopaths. Sociopaths are not going away, so it is in society’s best interest to find a way to live with and benefit from them.

Are sociopaths capable of having healthy relationships with non-sociopaths?

Yes. I have relationships with non-sociopaths. It’s not for everyone, and particularly not for the faint hearted. A relationship with a sociopath seems to work best if you are either not sensitive or are extremely sensitive, enough to empathize enough with even a self-centered sociopath. As a friend put it, “it’s like owning an exotic pet.”

People often ask you if you think certain celebrities are sociopaths. Why do you consider it unlikely that they are?

Celebrities are much more likely to be narcissistic rather than sociopathic. Sociopaths don’t like to be center stage. They’re much more likely to be the producer than the actor, the vice-president or chief of staff than the President. Sociopaths prefer to operate undetected, pulling the strings from behind the curtain. Center stage would bring too much scrutiny, which is dangerous when you’re trying to hide so much.

Friday, April 19, 2013

Q&As (part 3)

(cont.)


Do all sociopaths have criminal tendencies?

There is a higher proportion of sociopaths in prison than there are normal people, but most sociopaths are not criminals by profession. Still, there are several traits that may dispose a sociopath to crime: impulsivity, lack of guilty feelings, and risk-seeking, among others.

Research shows that one in twenty-five people is a sociopath, yet most of us believe we’ve never met one. Are we just kidding ourselves? Are you able to spot them?

Statistically, everyone has met at least one sociopath; further, most people will have a closer encounter with a sociopath at some point in their lives, either as a friend, family member, or lover. Sometimes I can tell who they are. I find that many successful sociopaths will leave breadcrumbs for you to discover who they are, the thought being that only other sociopaths would recognize them. I think sociopaths, like serial killers, often have a yearning to be acknowledged for who they are. They want people to admire their exploits and that is hard to do when they are completely hidden, so they make small compromises.

You are a lawyer, and a professor at a law school. How has being a sociopath made you good at those jobs?

Some clients can be despicable people, but even they deserve adequate legal representation. The best lawyers are the ones who are able to detach themselves from emotionally or morally reacting to their clients’ stories. That has never been a problem for me. As for teaching, the best teachers present material in an even, unbiased way that will be the most palatable to the audience. My professors would often try to hide their own personal ideologies or incorporate other, foreign learning styles into their lecture plans. I do these things very naturally.

Do sociopaths have emotions? 

Sociopaths have emotions, but they do not give their emotions the same meaning that most people do. Many people believe that their emotions are expressions of “Truth”-- that if they feel hurt, it is because someone hurt them. Sociopaths experience their emotions largely without context. Except perhaps for anger, sociopaths do not experience a strong cause-and-effect relationship between reality and their emotions. For sociopaths, emotions have a disjointed, dreamlike quality. So a sociopath is not likely to make emotional decisions based on anything besides anger.

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Q&As (part 2)

(cont.)


Do you think that sociopaths are born or created? 

Most researchers think that there is both a genetic and environmental component to sociopathy. I think I received my genetic component from my father’s birth father, who abandoned his  family, lost the family fortune on a vanity project, and had prominent facial scarring from all of the risky behavior he engaged in over the years. The environmental component was my unstable childhood home with an unpredictable and often-violent father and a sometimes hysterical mother.

You were raised Mormon, graduated from Brigham Young University, and teach Sunday school. How do you reconcile that with being a sociopath?

Being raised Mormon is probably the reason why I am not in prison. More than anything else, the church taught me that actions have consequences. I learned certain choices might look like they would make me happy but ultimately would leave me worse off. The Mormon church and its members were also a stabilizing force in my family life. When my parents weren’t around, we had our teachers, leaders, and friends’ parents to pick up the slack. I can honestly say my life has been better for being a church member, and so I remain.

You believe that sociopaths have a natural competitive advantage. Why?

Sociopaths have several skills that lend themselves to success in areas such as politics and business: charm, an ability to see and exploit weaknesses/flaws (which in politics is called “power-broking,” and in business, “arbitrage”), confidence, unflagging optimism, an ability to think outside the box and come up with original ideas, and a lack of squeamishness about doing what it takes to get ahead.

If you don’t have a sense of morality, or feel the emotions that most people do, how are you able to operate in the world without being detected?

I think everyone learns to lie about his or her emotions to a certain extent; I just take it a step farther. People ask, “How are you?” and you respond, “fine,” even though you had a fight with your spouse that morning, have a sick child, or any multitude of things that make it hard for you to feel fine about almost anything in your life. You could honestly answer the question, but you don’t because overt displays of strong emotion in ordinary social interactions are not accepted. Most of the time I don’t need to show any emotion at all, and I try to limit the times that I do by begging off attending funerals, weddings, etc. When I do show up to these functions, I try to mimic the other attendees. If I’m dealing with a person one-on-one, I just try to reflect their emotions; usually they’re distracted enough by their own overflowing emotions not to notice my lack of them.

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Q&As (part 1)

I did these Q&As for book promotion and thought I'd share them here as well:


Were you always aware that you were different? 

Yes, though when I was young, I thought maybe it was just because I was smarter than everyone else. I saw things that other children did not see, was aware of the adult world in a way that even my smart siblings were not—awkward interactions from the end of an affair, why my grandpa treated my Dad differently from his other children (he was adopted), and so on. I knew other people did not see these things because I would reference them and get blank stares in return. I learned to keep things to myself, even to pretend I didn’t see them. Those were probably some of my first attempts to wear a mask of normalcy.

What are the common characteristics/behaviors shared by most sociopaths? Do they describe you, too?

Lack of remorse or concern for hurting or stealing; being deceitful, manipulative, impulsive, irritable, aggressive, and consistently irresponsible; failure to conform to social norms; and being unconcerned about people’s safety, including their own. You need to have at least three of these to be sociopath. I have them all, to varying degrees.

Why did you write CONFESSIONS OF A SOCIOPATH under a pen name?

I understood that being completely anonymous would hurt the authenticity of the book, yet I have no desire to be famous for being a sociopath. I also have relatives and friends who asked me to respect their privacy. But I still wanted people to know that I am a real person, and these things really did happen.

The book’s publication will likely out you as a sociopath. Why were you willing to take that risk?

I’m a risk-seeker and writing the book is probably one of the riskiest things I have done. I’m also a novelty seeker. I say “yes” to more things than I say no to. Writing the book gave me something interesting and exciting to divert my energies in a productive manner, rather than indulging any urges to stir up trouble in destructive ways.


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