No, the answer is not a bullet to the head.
A few primers before starting:
1) This cure is not guaranteed to work.
2) In this cure a narcissist is defined as someone who thinks they are the main character in their own movie. All other people are supporting character or extras. This is important as to a narcissist everything relates to them, and all other people lack agency of their own. Therefore a narcissist has no compassion, empathy, guilt, etc.
- This is a different understanding of narcissism than the more classic view of people who are overly obsessed with their outward appearance (like a Jersey Shore cast member.) This style of narcissist can be ugly and/or fat, the key is that they think they are the only character in the movie.
- To provide examples of this kind of narcissist. One example of this is a parent who uses children as a prop to communicate their own narcissistic identity to others. In this example, the child does not have agency, obviously as everything relates to the narcissist, a child is only an extension of the parent.http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2012/01/couple_reveals_childs_gender_f.html
- In this other example the narcissist literally says that their life is a movie with themselves as the main character, in case it wasn’t clear. Read it.http://thelastpsychiatrist.com/2010/07/why_parents_hate_parenting.html
In all likelihood a Narcissist is not aware that they are narcissists, and/or will vehemently deny being one when it’s pointed out to them. If this cure is attempted it’s vital that the cure not be presented to the narcissist as a cure for narcissism. The narcissist must be ‘tricked’ into performing the cure.
How to do this?
It’s a fair bet that the narcissist often does not get everything they want, in particular from other people. The narcissist does not understand why the cashier at Subway is rude to them and won’t give them a free cookie. The narcissist does not understand why their child hates them and will not do what they’re told. The narcissist does not understand why everyone at work avoids them. The narcissist likely cannot get people to do what the narcissist wants, which may baffle the narcissist, as after all aren’t they the main character in the movie? Why isn’t the supporting cast and the extras helping to advance the plot?!
Approach the narcissist. Say you want to help the narcissist. They’ll like that; it’s about them after all. Ask the narcissist if they sometimes have trouble getting people to do what they want. Ask the narcissist if they have trouble getting people to like them. If the narcissist says yes to either of those things, then ask the narcissist if they’d like to fix that. Would they like it if they could get people do what they want, and get people to like them?
Ideally the narcissist will say yes. At this point the cure can be suggested.
Suggest to the narcissist that they read the classic self-help book by Dale Carnegie –How to Win Friends and Influence People.
