This surrender to and acceptance of ourselves as inherently inferior is
often referred to as shame or low self-worth. Call it what you want, the result
is the same: Life kicks you around a little bit, and you feel powerless to stop
it. Therefore, your Feeling Brain concludes that you must deserve it.
Of course, the reverse moral gap must be true as well. If we’re given a
bunch of stuff without earning it (participation trophies and grade inflation
and gold medals for coming in ninth place), we (falsely) come to believe
ourselves inherently superior to what we actually are. We therefore develop a
deluded version of high self-worth, or, as it’s more commonly known, being
an asshole.
Self-worth is contextual. If you were bullied for your geeky glasses and
funny nose as a child, your Feeling Brain will “know” that you’re a dweeb,
even if you grow up to be a flaming sexpot of hotness. People who are raised
in strict religious environments and are punished harshly for their sexual
impulses often grow up with their Feeling Brain “knowing” that sex is wrong,
even though their Thinking Brain has long worked out that sex is natural and
totally awesome.
High and low self-worth appear different on the surface, but they are two
sides of the same counterfeit coin. Because whether you feel as though you’re
better than the rest of the world or worse than the rest of the world, the same
thing is true: you’re imagining yourself as something special, something
separate from the world.
A person who believes he deserves special treatment because of how great
he is isn’t so different from someone who believes she deserves special
treatment because of how shitty she is. Both are narcissistic. Both think
they’re special. Both think the world should make exceptions and cater to
their values and feelings over others’.
Narcissists will oscillate between feelings of superiority and inferiority.^18
Either everyone loves them or everyone hates them. Everything is amazing, or
everything is fucked. An event was either the best moment of their lives or
traumatizing. With the narcissist, there’s no in-between, because to recognize
the nuanced, indecipherable reality before him would require that he
relinquish his privileged view that he is somehow special. Mostly, narcissists
are unbearable to be around. They make everything about them and demand
that people around them do the same.
You’ll see this high/low-self-worth switcheroo everywhere if you keep an
eye out for it: mass murderers, dictators, whiny kids, your obnoxious aunt
who ruins Christmas every year. Hitler preached that the world treated
Germany so poorly after World War I only because it was afraid of German