APHANTASIA & the Narcissistic Personality: Is there a connection??

Is there a connection between Aphantasia and the narcissistic personality? There could be!

When we’re involved with narcissists, much of our time is spent pondering the how, why and ‘how could’ of the narcissist we’re dealing with. We want to figure it all out and then we want to fix it even if we lose a bit of our soul in the process. Yes, we are willing to do all that until, of course, we’re not and this turning point usually occurs when 1) we’ve exhausted all emotional resources, and/or 2) we realize that this person literally does not give a damn. Either way, it’s never easy and a lot of tears are shed over the fact that we feel, in the end, that we’ll never really know what happened. I mean, we know this person is a narcissist because he or she meets the universal criteria but how they really get that way or what causes those abusive and dismissive behaviors that wreck us will forever be a mystery…until now, that is, because I believe I actually may have found at least one possible answer.

Personally, I have often dismissed speculation about what causes narcissism (an abusive childhood, neglect, drug addiction, etc.) simply because I felt that there was no excuse EVER for such atrocious behavior. And even now, with what I am about to explain, I am in no way giving narcissism a pass. No matter what, the narcissists that we deal with are adults who are competent enough to make choices in how they treat people so to that end, there IS no excuse. That being said, just yesterday, thanks to YouTube’s infinite algorithmic wisdom, I stumbled upon (what I think could be) a possible “cause” for narcissistic behavior that truly piques my interest. Actually, ‘piqued’ is too mild a word because the shock of my discovery made me sit straight up in bed. I was all ears.

What I stumbled upon was a short video documentary (created by the YouTube channel WIRED) on a newly discovered neurological “condition” known as Aphantasia. Although no one but me seems to be connecting this “condition” to the narcissistic personality, I’m willing to put my theory out there and if you bear with me, I think you might agree.

Let’s start by looking at a few of the online definitions for Aphantasia:

1. Aphantasia is the inability to visualize mental images. That is, not being able to picture something in one’s mind. Many people with Aphantasia are also unable to recall sounds, smells, or sensations of touch.
2. Aphantasia is the inability to voluntarily create a mental picture in one’s head. People with Aphantasia are unable to picture a scene, person, or object, even if one or all three are very familiar.
3. Aphantasia sufferers can not conjure up mental images, original or from memory. Instead, their ‘mind’s eye’ is a dark, blank canvas that can not be painted on.

Aphantasia’s connection to the narcissistic personality

Let’s take a look at the main crux of the disorder: the inability to form mental images of people, real or imaginary. According to the video from WIRED, this symptom causes the afflicted person to not particularly feel any emotions for those people that are not within immediate eyeshot. For instance, the death of a parent, even one that the afflicted person is ‘close’ to, does not conjure up the same emotional distress that typically affects a ‘normal’ person in the same situation.

How does this relate to narcissism? I think it relates a lot, in my opinion. It would explain narcissistic discards and silent treatments and future faking and even the concept of compartmentalization which explains how narcissists mitigate all relationships. Aphantasia would explain how narcissists can appear to love you one minute and not the next and how a narcissist can disappear and go on about their lives while discarded partners feel deep loss and despair. It would explain a crazy-making narcissistic behavior I call ‘seduce and discard’ where a narcissist will subject a partner to a vicious rinse and repeat cycle of push/pull and love/hate, sometimes for years on end.  It would explain my theory of ‘historical rejection’ where a narc seemingly dismisses the entire relationship timeline, treating a partner with complete indifference as if both he and his or her partner had just met. After learning about Aphantasia, the phrase I use quite often to explain how narcissists view their partners – ‘out of sight, out of mind’ – takes on a whole new meaning!

In my new book, Vacancy in the (Relationship) Rabbit Hole, written prior to my discovery of this new disorder, I actually attempt to explain what I now know to be this mind-bending phenomena:

I’ve come to believe that as we get older, we automatically start to empathize more than we sympathize simply because our archive of meaningful experiences has grown bigger. To the contrary, a narcissist is completely incapable of feeling empathy because he or she has no archive to draw from. The events in a narcissist’s life are momentary at best and YOU are simply an ‘event’ like any other. The narcissist has experienced many, many of the same situations we have, maybe even right alongside us, but the “takeaway” for a narc from these situations is completely different.

We archive almost every experience in ways that enrich our ability to interact with people now and in the future. A narc, unfortunately, lives through all or most experiences feeling nothing and, therefore, this is exactly what he or she brings to the table when interacting with others – nothing. He or she simply can’t ‘relate’. The narc may try to relate (for a minute) but the interaction, in retrospect, is always awkward. A narcissist would rather fake it and flee rather than help to relieve the burden of another. A narcissist, no matter how busy in life, will always have an empty archive of experiences from which to draw from. For a narcissist, deception becomes the only solution. From our experience archive, as a “normal” player in the Game of Life, we identify quickly that love is the answer and then proceed to pay it forward. A narcissist would think that this is nothing more than the nonsense thinking of normal humans.

One of the most frustrating nuances of my former relationship with a narc was the bizarre way we would suddenly reunite after months of silence. For example, during a long separation, we might, just by chance, run into each other at, say, a red light and with just one quick beep of his car horn to get my attention, we’d be back together.  Just like that, my months of agony and separation anxiety were over. This repeatedly blew my mind over 13 years. It was as if, to my ex, my face and mere presence in those happenstance moments would trigger a nostalgic response so powerful that he had no choice but to hop back into the pilot’s seat as if the plane had never crashed. Mind controlled and in shock, I always obliged, often reluctantly…and we’d be off to the races as if the separation and, more importantly, the reason for the separation never happened. We often never even discussed that part. This was how we played together or, more notably, how he played the Game of Life with me in it. I’m not gonna lie, a bit of Aphantasia would explain all this.

Apparently, for my ex, it was ‘out of sight, out of mind, until you’re back in sight’ at the red light. For those who read my first book When Love Is a Lie, there was a moment, early on in the relationship, when my ex announced “I can take you or leave you”, hurting my feelings more than anyone ever had. I simply could not understand this way of thinking, especially since the sex was amazing and we had much in common. What I learned, as time went on, was that my ex could “take or leave” anyone and anything. I deemed this characteristic as his “inability to attach” but what if this inability to attach to people, places and things was caused by a neurological condition where he simply couldn’t visualize me or any aspect of our relationship as soon as we were apart…that the reason for the disconnect was that, while apart, he simply couldn’t plant my face in his mind’s eye because…well…he didn’t have one?

Why on earth is Aphantasia a NEW neurological phenomenon?

Apparently, from what I can see, no one besides myself has attempted to connect this newly discovered disorder to the mind-boggling behaviors indicative of the narcissistic personality. This is startling to me. Considering the fact that doctors and psychologists are apparently studying the nuances of Aphantasia as we speak, the connection should have clicked.  It certainly did for me.  At the very least, someone who studies personality disorders should already be associating the details of the disorder with the underlying conditions that could possibly “cause” a person to act narcissistically at the level that I discuss on this website and on my YouTube channel. Unfortunately, with the exception of this article, there is no information to be found which now makes me question if those in the medical community understand narcissism at all.

Please understand that my point here is not to say that people who suffer from Aphantasia are all narcissistic. What I am proposing, to the contrary, is the possibility that all narcissists may have a good bit of Aphantasia and that THIS would explain so many of the behaviors that emotionally devastate a narcissist’s recipient partner.

Certainly, as the WIRED documentary explains, one can have this newly discovered neurological condition and learn to deal with it to the best of his or her ability. Clearly, those sufferers interviewed for the film do not and did not want to cause harm to others. With a narcissist, however, the choice to treat others with kindness and compassion is not an option and will never be part of the narcissistic personality make-up. As a narcissist’s partner, for now and likely forever, therein lies the most perplexing of our problems.