 Bokeh O Shoshaneem, Sabah El Noor, Dobar Dan, or Dobor Yuto, and of course, not to forget, Guten Morgen, which sounds like I'm going to execute you and your entire family. Something like that. Okay, having proven to you that I know and speak many languages, let us proceed to the next piece of bragging online. My name is Sam Vakni and I'm the author of Malignan Serf Love, Narcissism or Revisited. I am a former visiting professor of psychology and still currently on the faculty of CIAPS, Commonwealth for International Advanced Professional Studies in several countries, all over this thriving, cool globe, cooler by the day, may I add. And today we are going to discuss a new phenomenon which I dub, narcissistic tunneling. It's a fascinating phenomenon, narcissistic tunneling. I will not say anything further before we get to it, but you're well advised to listen to the entire video and try to make it as short as possible. But before I go there, a comment about yesterday's video, peer rejection and how peer rejection creates narcissists, covert narcissists. Well, of course, not all rejected idiosyncratic children, not all children who are rejected by their peers become covert narcissists. Obese children, autistic children, gifted children, immigrant children, generally children who are shunned and mocked and ridiculed and avoided by their peers. Only a small minority of them become covert narcissists. Similarly, only a small percentage of children who are abused and traumatized by their parents become overt narcissists. Generally, only a tiny percentage of children who are abused and traumatized in a variety of ways by parents, role models, teachers, peers, you name it, only a small, a tiny percentage end up having or suffering from narcissistic personality disorder. I hope I've cleared this up and I apologize for any misunderstanding owing to yesterday's hasty video after having traveled or not. Okay, today we're going to discuss, as I said, tunneling. Now this video borrows concepts from biology or precisely genetics and from computer science and from physics. I know you like these salads and they are not word salads. They are what is what is called multidisciplinary, multidisciplinary. We need to borrow concepts from other fields, sometimes in order to elucidate or throw light on some issue in our own field. And this is a very, very useful practice. So start with recessive and dominant. An allele of a gene is said to be dominant when it effectively overrules a recessive allele. So every gene in the human body, every gene period has two alleles. One of them dominates and one of them is dominated, submissive, recessive. Remember this, recessive, dominant. Eye color, for example, and blood groups are both examples of dominant alleles and recessive alleles within genes. So you could have a recessive eye color or a recessive blood group or a dominant one. Dominant is not good, recessive is not bad, it's just a matter of statistics. Okay, that's concept number one, bearing in mind as we proceed to discuss narcissism. Concept number two, tunneling, also known as quantum tunneling in physics. It's a penetration of a barrier. It's a mechanical phenomenon in which an object such as an electron or an atom passes through a potential barrier, potential energy barrier, or even real barrier. According to classical mechanics, the object does not have sufficient energy to enter the barrier, penetrate it and exit the other side, or even to surmount it somehow. And yet it happens, atomic particles, especially atomic particles, disappear in one location and appear in another, having crossed a barrier inexplicably. And this is known as quantum tunneling. Now tunneling is also a concept in computer networking, in network theory. It's a way to move packets, packets of information, packets of data from one network to another network. And tunneling works through encapsulation. A packet is wrapped inside another packet. So there's a disguise here. One packet is disguised by another packet, inhabits it, colonizes it, is parasitic on another packet. And this way it crosses the network and appears on another network. So remember these three concepts, recessive and dominant. Tunneling in quantum physics surmounting a barrier and appearing mysteriously where you should not have appeared. And tunneling in computer networks, where packets are disguised inside other packets, and that way they cross networks. Now, two narcissism. Each and every narcissist alive, probably many dead ones, I'm not quite sure what's the difference. Each and every narcissist has a dominant type and a recessive type. So for example, a cerebral narcissist would have a dominant type cerebral and recessive type somatic. A covert narcissist would have a dominant type covert, shy, vulnerable, fragile, and a recessive type overt. Each and every narcissist has a hidden type, a suppressed type, a recessive type, a submissive type. But there is not type constancy. A cerebral canon does become somatic. A somatic attempts to become cerebral, laughably, as we will see a bit later. Covert sometimes becomes overt or grandiose and overt. Having been injured, for example, or mortified, tends to become covert and schizoid. So there's no type constancy. It's all in flux. And the various types are reactive to the environment. They are cued by the environment. That's why I describe types of narcissists as self-states triggered by circumstances, cues from the environment, social cues, sexual cues, and so on. Okay? The recessive type in the narcissist, the traits of the recessive type. Are expressed, then manifest, only obliquely, only indirectly, only in disguised and camouflaged form. And this is the equivalent of what is called a hidden text. You know a palimpsest? A palimpsest is a piece of parchment used to write on repeatedly different texts. Each time the palimpsest is scratched clean, scrubbed, and a new text is written on it. But the previous text is still somehow visible. For example, with X-rays. X-rays. So the narcissist is a palimpsest. There is a hidden previous text which is suppressed, invisible. And there is a dominant text which is overt text, readable, visible to the naked eye. But the underlying text, the hidden text, is a dynamic of its own. And this recessive type, this hidden type, this captured type, it's like a hostage. It's like someone held in a cell, like the men in the iron mask. This hidden type manifests itself, expresses itself via the process of narcissistic tunneling. It crosses the barrier of the dominant type disguised. So it is disguised. It disguises itself and then crosses the barrier of the dominant type. Similarly, we see the narcissist doing something which is atypical to his type. We see a cerebral narcissist, I don't know, exercising. We see a somatic narcissist reading a book or talking about philosophy. We see a covert narcissist suddenly becoming assertive and demanding narcissistic supply coercively. We see an overt or grandiose narcissist suddenly being subdued and shy. And so the hidden type, the repressed type, the suppressed, the recessive type of the narcissist, erupts from time to time, explodes, gets out of control, but very briefly, the only glimpses of the hidden type via the process of narcissistic tunneling. Now let me give you examples, private cases of this larger phenomenon which I dubbed narcissistic tunneling and I hope it will make things clear or clearer. Take for example covert narcissists. Covert narcissists are passive aggressive. They're envious. They're a bit malicious, inadvertently at least. Covert narcissists see them with fury at their own collapse, at their inability to secure narcissistic supply. And yet some covert narcissists are people-pleasers. They are YouTubers who are self-styled moral crusaders, heroes, rescuers, savers, healers and fixers. These are examples of covert narcissists who are essentially people-pleasers. Now people-pleasing is a codependent trait. These are covert narcissists whose dominant type is covert narcissism and latent type, hidden type, recessive type is codependent. That's why many covert narcissists masquerade as codependents are easily mistaken for codependence and are misdiagnosed with dependent personality disorder. It's because of the latent type, the hidden, the repressed type. So that's one example. Another example. Some covert narcissists are perennial and competitive victims. They can never do wrong. They're always wronged. They're always victimized, always tortured. They're always put upon. They're always in the right. They're always right. And that is an expression of their covert narcissism because narcissists are always right. But they are right by attaining the high moral ground. They are right by becoming victims. So these are YouTubers who self-identify as victims in codependence. Indeed, these covert narcissists, the dominant type is covert narcissists. The latent type is codependent. I've given you two examples now of covert narcissists. There's the exact opposite. The flip side of this coin. These are YouTubers who out themselves as narcissists. By the way, for the historical record, I was the first person ever to out himself as a narcissist in 1995. So now there's a new crop of YouTubers who out themselves as narcissists. But these narcissists claim to be on a healing trajectory, recovering or recovered in treatment. These are of course either lies, manipulative lies, or forms of extreme self-deception. So the dominant type here is overt grandiose narcissists. And the hidden type would be psychopathic narcissists, manipulative lies in order to accomplish goals. For example, views or to make money on YouTube via advertising. These are narcissists who claim to be healing and changing and recovering and transforming and give false hope to their viewers. So this is completely psychopathic. So the latent type here is psychopath. The alternative is that they really believe their own BS. They really believe this fantasy that they are somehow being transformed from narcissists to moral agents, healers, helpers, rescuers and so on and so forth. And then we are talking about manipulative codependency, also known as control from the bottom. And then we would have an overt narcissist as a dominant type and a codependent as a latent type. Actually, recently there has been a study published which tends to substantiate my claim that empaths, people who claim to be empaths, may well be covert narcissists. You can go to the description and look for the link to this study. I just want to read to you something, a kind of summary of the study. And then you can go and find the study all on your own and read it and form your own opinion. The study is titled Signaling High Sensitivity to Influence Others. Initial evidence for the roles of reinforcement sensitivity, sensory processing sensitivity and the dark triad. It was authored by Mautina Kaijic and Mauchin Moran and they are not morons, trust me. The study is very fascinating. It's constructed very well in my view. They found, among other things, I must say, this is not the only conclusion nor is it the dominant conclusion, but they found among other things, that individuals with higher scores on dark personality traits, specifically narcissism and psychopathy, are more likely to engage in signaling high sensitivity. Empaths. Yes, empaths have been saying for years that empaths are covert narcissists. The authors continue, they signal high sensitivity in order to influence others, these narcissists and psychopaths. And this finding supports the deceptive signaling hypothesis indicating that the expression of high sensitivity can be a manipulative interpersonal strategy employed by grandiose and callous individuals to gain advantage in social interactions. Again, empaths. So empaths are perfect examples of covert narcissists as the dominant type, but with a recessive type of codependent or psychopathy. Now these people disguise themselves, of course, and this leads me to think that they are more psychopathic than codependent. Similarly, a borderline would have a dominant type as a borderline and a covert, sorry, a latent type or a hidden type or a recessive type as a secondary psychopath, but that's only in extreme stress related situations. The borderline is abandoned or rejected and she decompensates and acts out as a secondary psychopath. Let's proceed. A cerebral narcissist. Cerebral narcissists are divorced from their own bodies, they hate their bodies. They don't want to invest anything in their bodies, they don't exercise, they're not fit. They rarely take care of their medical problems, they neglect themselves and so on and so forth because cerebrals value only their brains. They obtain and secure narcissistic supply by deploying their intellectual gifts. But there are cerebrals who enjoy food, the enjoyment of food, being a gourmet, dedicating a lot of time to cooking and eating and savoring the various tastes. That's not a form, not only a form of self soothing. That is a manifestation and an expression of the latent, hidden, recessive type of somatic. So the dominant type is cerebral narcissists. The cerebral narcissist rejects and loathes and hates his body. But then there is a recessive type, a hidden type, a latent type of a somatic. And the somatic enjoys food, which is essentially a sensory experience involving almost exclusively the body. Similarly, cerebral narcissists may have somatophone disorders. They may have a distorted body image, negative or positive. They may develop hypochondriasis, anxiety related to illness. They may have an eating disorder or they may be autoerotic, autoerotic and masturbate compulsively. They derive pleasure from masturbating and from redirecting the sex drive at themselves as a sex object. That is a somatic thing. That's not a cerebral thing. So a cerebral who masturbates compulsively has a dominant type, cerebral and a somatic type. And the somatic type, which is latent and hidden and recessive, erupts, comes to the surface, surfaces by masturbating or by eating or by having an imperfect body image or an eating disorder. So it's an example of narcissistic tunneling. Another example of narcissistic tunneling is a somatic narcissist. Now somatic narcissists have become somatic because they are not very endowed intellectually. They may be eloquent, they may be able to put words together in a very impressive way, but they are not original and they are not creative and they are not truly very intelligent. They are just mimics. They know how to imitate intelligent people effectively and efficaciously. So a somatic is someone who gave up on his intellect as a way to secure narcissistic supply and has cultivated and nurtured his body and his body functions as ways to obtain supply. And yet every somatic has a recessive, latent, hidden type as a cerebral. Every cerebral is a somatic. Every somatic is a cerebral. It's a dominant type and a recessive type. The somatic recessive type is the cerebral. So we can find these somatic narcissists or covert somatic narcissists philosophizing, engaging in philosophy or creating an ideology around sexual conquests, around dating, around gender issues, around relationships, around martial arts, around bodybuilding, around exercise. We can find these covert somatics or somatics becoming health nuts or amateur medical doctors or wannabe therapists or coaches or what have you. These are all cerebral pursuits. This is the way the cerebral recessive, latent, hidden type expresses or manifests itself via the barrier of the somatic dominant type. This is the way the cerebral, latent, hidden type tunnels through the somatic barrier, the somatic dominant type. Similarly, a covert may volunteer in high visibility projects or campaigns, virtual signaling in victimhood movements. He may initiate personal heroic morality crusades. He may join narcissistic or workly grandiose narcissistic institutions or collectives. These are all acts which are far more typical of the grandiose overt narcissists. And so the dominant type is a grandiose overt narcissist, but the covert expresses itself, manifests through the layer of dominant grandiosity by acting in ways which signal morality, virtue and victimhood. Another last example, an overt narcissist, the grandiose narcissist, may suddenly act shy or insecure or passive aggressive rather than in-your-face aggressive and defined or pseudo-humble in certain situations and is always envious. All these are typical covert attributes. They are not typical of covert grandiose narcissists. These are covert attributes. The covert is shy, insecure, passive aggressive, pseudo-humble, always envious and so on. That's a covert thing. But the covert expresses, manifests itself via narcissistic tunneling. And so suddenly the overt or grandiose narcissist appears for a day or an hour or a month or a week to be covert. We, narcissistic tunneling teaches us that there is an ongoing power play and competition between the dominant type and the recessive type. And that sometimes the recessive type has the upper hand and manifests and expresses itself via narcissistic tunneling. So we can never look at the narcissist and say that's a pure case of covert narcissism or overt narcissism or somatic narcissism or cerebral narcissism. We can never say this. Narcissists always surprise us by displaying behaviors and traits which are much more typical of the recessive type. Somatic becomes suddenly cerebral. It's laughable, of course. Somatics cannot be effective of efficacious cerebrals. They are wannabe cerebrals. They look like clowns. But still they do attempt to become cerebral. Similarly, cerebral narcissists suddenly become somatic. They regard themselves sexually irresistible and what have you. And that's equally laughable. And the same goes for covert narcissists and overt narcissists and so on and so forth. Narcissistic tunneling, in my view, is a very important concept because it describes dynamic pathways between hidden strata, hidden layers of narcissism. That have been suppressed owing to circumstances, environments, and the expectations of society, parental figures, the socialization process and anti-rejection. So there's always a hidden layer, a buried layer, a denied layer, a repressed layer. But it never goes to sleep. Exactly as Freud had predicted with his ab reaction, these layers have energy. They possess energy. They have a dynamic of their own. They are like hidden volcanoes, magma, lava, you know. And so the magma there erupts and becomes lava. There are always these volcanic eruptions of the recessive type within the dominant barrier or firewall. One could even conceive of the dominant type to be a kind of protective barrier, a kind of defense against the recessive type. Very often in the etiology or the patho etiology of narcissism, in the developmental trajectory of narcissism, the narcissist develops a protective layer, a protective set of functions to deny and to repress and to ignore the recessive type. Because something in the recessive type threatens the narcissist, challenges the narcissist, cognitive distortions and grandiosity, the narcissist narrative, something there doesn't fit. For example, if the narcissist has a self-image as a good, moral, helpful, loving, compassionate, caring, empathic person, this kind of narcissist would try to deny his covert narcissism. He would try to pretend to be a codependent or a victim of narcissistic abuse or an empath. But he would try to deny his covert narcissism. Similarly, an overt grandiose narcissist would try to deny his codependency because it's humiliating to be dependent on other people. It flies in the face of his self-perception as godlike and omnipotent and omniscient. The dominant type definitely can be conceptualized as a massive rigid defense against the true type which had become suppressed, latent, hidden and recessive until it is brought to light surfaces in Iraq when the right circumstances and the appropriate environment provide for it. This is an ongoing dissonance, it's an ongoing battle between dominant type and recessive type. Everything we see online, all those YouTubers and coaches and victims and you name it, an empath, they are just an acting for us this inner conflict between recessive and dominant type. They're all narcissists, no exception in my view. But they are just enacting this amazing process of narcissistic tunneling.