Kerry: [00:00:00] Did you know that your emotional intelligence could actually be a vulnerability in a narcissistic relationship? Today, Dr. Erin Leonard, expert and therapist who wrote a new book, How to Outsmart a Narcissist, joins me to talk about resiliency, vulnerability, attachment, and narcissism.
So I'm super excited to have Dr. Erin Leonard on. I just recently came across her TikTok page and she has a new book out. And I love the title, it's called How to Outsmart a Narcissist, which isn't that what we all would love to do. And so, first of all, tell us a little bit about yourself, Dr. Leonard, who you are and how you got into this topic.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Sure. So, I've been a psychotherapist for about 28 years. I love what I do and in that 28 years, I've found more and more people have come to me who are, you know, just really struggling with a relationship and they have no idea that they're being emotionally abused or even that it's narcissistic abuse and In my [00:01:00] personal life, I've had, unfortunately, quite a few experiences with some, narcissistic abuse.
And so, really, that connection between my deep understanding of what it is like and so many of my clients experiences. I really found that it's something in our culture that we have to address and we have to kind of correct and right the course because it's really, really destructive to us collectively as a people even.
Kerry: One of the chapters in the book is that emotional intelligence is actually can be a vulnerability. Describe what emotional intelligence is and let's talk more about the fact that it's not always a superpower. Sometimes it can actually be a kryptonite.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Emotional intelligence is really a great strength and being emotionally available and having the capacity for empathy and self awareness, insight, being able to be selfless at times when you need to in your relationships.
Those things are absolutely wonderful and every human being desire to be [00:02:00] understood. And when you have empathy, you really seek to understand. You don't seek to teach or be right. You really seek to understand at a profound level, which makes a loved one feel less alone in their plight.
And when they feel less alone, they feel more empowered. And so empathy is very empowering. But emotional intelligence initially can make you very vulnerable to a narcissist because emotionally intelligent people see the good, they naturally trust, they have faith in human beings, which means they do trust.
They often have tremendous empathy. And so sometimes when you're just getting to know someone, Empathy, it's a great thing, but what it can do is, is it can make you kind of excuse red flags. So empathy, you're like, well, you know, I could understand why that happened. And when you excuse red flags or kind of sweep them under the rug, there's a chance that someone who does play the victim or is exploiting your empathy can really manipulate you.
And so The book is about how to understand your emotional intelligence, embrace the gift, also know how initially [00:03:00] in any relationship it can make you very vulnerable to manipulation.
Kerry: Would you say that the narcissistic personality traits or style is the opposite of an emotionally intelligent person?
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yes, but it's very deceptive. Because narcissists are charming, they are funny, and they are dynamic in ways. And quite honestly, a lot of them are extremely interesting.
Kerry: The other thing that kind of trips me up, or it tripped me up in the past, is that if you've heard of this called by Dr. David Schnarch, mind mapping, they're very good at anticipating people's innate needs and wants and desires.
They're really good at knowing what, what you want, where your hot buttons are. I know for me, I mistaken that as self reflection and insight and awareness when it really actually wasn't any reflection of that at all.
Dr. Erin Leonard: You're 100 percent correct. And narcissists a lot of times will ask a ton of questions in the beginning, not because they actually want to get to know you and are interested in you, but because they want data.
To have something that makes them feel more secure to have over [00:04:00] you and they, they love control. They don't want closeness. They want control. So they want to know everything about you and initially you're thinking, Oh, they're so interested in me. They're asking all these questions.
And so that, that can be very confusing. And narcissists love to be the hero., this dynamic is probably more common than you'd think. You're getting over narcissistic abuse. You find someone that is listening and asking you questions and jumps on your side and you think, well, they can't be a narcissist.
It can't be a narcissist. But, narcissists love to be the hero. And they love to jump on your side and call someone the bad guy. But, as soon as you invest, they do the same thing to you. And so often, there's this tendency from someone to kind of jump from narcissist to narcissist, not because they're being silly or naive, but because the narcissist is really being their white knight.
Narcissists love to be the hero. They love to be the hero so they have something to hold over you. They love to broadcast it, look at how great I am, look what a great partner I am, and they love to make someone else the bad guy . [00:05:00] So it's really kind of this fertile breeding ground for another kind of problematic relationship.
Kerry: I almost liken it to they're fantastic at marketing, but they, they cannot. carry out the job once you hire them and then everything falls apart. They can never deliver on the
Dr. Erin Leonard: product. And what they do when they can't deliver on the product, they hide and disguise their emotional unavailability with blaming you.
Kerry: Yes.
Dr. Erin Leonard: And they throw, they throw you off the track from catching on to their inadequacies emotionally by blaming you and you go, Oh gosh, is it me? Right. And you're, you're so busy thinking about what you've done or your part in it that you forget that. Wow, they're really accountable over here.
Kerry: Right. Right.
How does emotional intelligence get developed?
Dr. Erin Leonard: So the predictor of emotional intelligence is a secure attachment. And attachment is, is largely misunderstood because if you think about the phrase secure attachment, you think, oh, well that person always feels secure. But it is actually an emotionally intelligent person that is quite aware of their insecurities.
So if you're [00:06:00] aware of your insecurities and you are in a relationship and you do feel insecure. It may be because your partner, is narcissistic , but because you feel deeply insecure and you're aware of your insecurities, you might think, well, I have insecure attachments, but that, that may not be true.
So a narcissist is unaware of their insecurities. They don't have a profound understanding of their insecurities. They're too defended. They defend against knowing it because it hurts too much. They're too fragile. And so yeah, they defend against any insecurities and then project and then say, you're insecure, you're insecure.
So a secure attachment style is it's important to fully understand in an insecure avoidant attachment style That's the predictor of narcissism.
Kerry: I was going to ask you because i've seen pretty anxious Narcissist pretty it almost feels anxiously attached. Do you think they're always avoidant?
Dr. Erin Leonard: So no, I think there's probably a little bit of a range there. But, you know, a lot of the times they do play the victim and narcissists are profoundly insecure, but you'll never hear a [00:07:00] narcissist say, you know, I am really nervous about my ability to, be vulnerable in, in a relationship.
They defend against it by projecting, deflecting, playing the victim. And so all of those things are defense mechanisms, cognitive distortions that, that That really keep everything out there and so they can't dig deep and pull out an insecurity. But they will say that they're very anxious and they, and a lot of them are very anxious and it's this generalized anxiety, right?
So an EI person can say, I'm really anxious when I have a meeting with this particular colleague because sometimes I feel like they say backhanded things and then I get embarrassed and I get caught off guard. But it take a narcissist and they're just generally anxious. I'm not going to any meetings. They can't pinpoint why .
And so that general anxiety is from a profound insecurity, but they have no access to actually identifying and understanding what it is so they can cope with it better.
Kerry: So what you're saying is, it's not that having an [00:08:00] insecurity means that we're healthy or secure, it's our awareness of it and what we do with it then says this is maturity versus immaturity.
Is that what you're saying? A hundred percent. Okay. Fascinating. So why don't you, for a moment, for those who are not familiar with the attachment theory at all, why don't you identify the different types? It could almost pretend like there is a t shirt that they had a slogan on their front. What would each attachment style have on its front of the t shirt as a slogan?
Dr. Erin Leonard: Okay. So a securely attached person is empath. So that's a big part of a secure attachment. They have internalized a caregiver's love and they have felt loved and worthwhile and responded to so they trust in others and they're strong enough to be aware of their insecurities and they're strong enough to identify them.
And then work on them. And so they actually take responsibility for their insecurities. And that's a big deal. Instead of having sympathy for people and wanting to be the hero, they want to understand human to human . So instead of teaching someone or telling [00:09:00] someone, they seek to understand.
A securely attached person has insight. And so they look at themselves and they look in the mirror and securely attached people are fairly humble. And they are also very introspective, accountable, and sometimes overly accountable. And so they'll take responsibility for someone so that person doesn't have to feel bad because they have empathy and they don't want that person So securely attracted people are pretty grounded and they do get very anxious in many situations where there is someone who may be kind of targeting them unfairly or, saying devaluing things, things like that.
Kerry: They could be avoidant too, right? they could say, you know what, I really, I, I don't really need this relationship. I'm going to withdraw and maybe focus on myself, but it's not a defensive style. It's just. It's more of a proactive self caring style, wouldn't you
Dr. Erin Leonard: say? That's a huge, great distinction. Of course everyone gets defensive , and your defenses go up and you don't do great things and then they go back down and you go, oh, I didn't do great [00:10:00] things, I feel bad.
Right, right. You know, and they feel remorse, they want to repair a mistake, they have a strong conscience. And so all of those elements and, and they are less defensive, but then you take someone with an insecure attachment style, insecure, avoidant, disorganized, and they're very defensive and they won't look at themselves.
And, they do play the victim to get out of taking responsibility from themselves or to exploit someone else. They do not pause and go, wait, what is my part in it? They literally don't have that capacity. It's. Oh, no, absolutely not. You did that. You did that. You did that. And the blame shifting and deflecting and projecting.
And so, so they're missing this introspective piece. And that's very difficult too, because if you have one person in this relationship that's automatically looking at themselves naturally, not even knowing they're doing it, going, okay, I'm going to perspective taking. And then you have someone else in the relationship that never does that and is always like, it's your fault.
There's this massive. Kind of exploitation of the emotionally [00:11:00] intelligent person.
Kerry: We're even using the word defensive and I, I know that we kind of talk that out casually as if everybody knows what we're talking about. I would define it this way and I'd love to hear what your definition, but to me, defensiveness is the ability to be okay with being imperfect.
Person who's not defensive is a person who's able to be okay with themselves being imperfect . They know how to handle failure. They can accept blame. They aren't, don't crash when something goes wrong. They kind of know how to pivot and make something good out of it. That's what I would say a non defensive person is like.
Would you agree with that?
Dr. Erin Leonard: I think that's very accurate. I do think that sometimes because emotionally intelligent people do feel so deeply that they have a momentary emotional crash, like, yeah. You know, but they're so resilient. They may stay down for a second, but they get up and they keep running. They can recover and then get stronger.
Kerry: Yes, recovery. That's a big work. Whereas to me, a defensive person is a person who cannot accept responsibility or blame, cannot be at fault, doesn't allow themselves to see themselves as imperfect, fears, [00:12:00] insecurity, fears, rejection. And essentially hides through their projections, through the blaming of other people, offloading responsibility, denying any responsibility, justifying what they do, all these things that they do, they're avoiding basically being seen as human.
Dr. Erin Leonard: And they're avoiding any threat to their self esteem or their ego. Yeah. They're too fragile to handle it, so everything has to be out there. And I love what you said, I think that that's right on, and believe it or not, narcissism is a defense mechanism, and narcissism is universal, just like emotionally intelligent people function with a little bit of reaction formation, a little bit of
Kerry: We, we justify.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yeah. Justify, rationalize. I mean we have defense mechanisms. Everyone does. A narcissist has more maladaptive defense mechanisms for sure, splitting, projection, deflection. But narcissism is a universal defense mechanism. When we felt small as a child, we had to imagine ourselves as being bigger.
And so sometimes [00:13:00] everyone has a little bit of narcissism. A narcissist has a great deal of narcissism, so much so, and the defensiveness is so robust that they can't look at themselves. No insight, not a lot of empathy, not a lot of grappling with deep and uncomfortable emotions. And so it's just out there.
And a lot of the times I'll tell people that it feels good to be accepted. It feels good to be validated. And everybody has a little bit of vanity. All of that is very human. And narcissism, often it comes from our attachment relationships. When our parents didn't see a very important part of us and never recognized it or validated that.
When we get out and people in the world do, it's like, it feels so good, you know? And so people will think, well, that's narcissistic. No, it's not. Right. It's just a universal kind of defense mechanism. When it's in extremes, that's when it's NPD.
Kerry: Yeah. And to me, the extreme, if I was to summarize it, I would say the extreme form of narcissism or pathological or deep narcissism, whatever word you want to use is, it's the narcissist's rejection of themselves.
They're saying, [00:14:00] I can't be who I really am because if I don't like me, I reject me. So I'm going to show up and then the way you want it so that I can be seen as this really wonderful all perfect person so that you and I are in the same page is that we like the facade , cause we're rejecting the interior person, which actually never gets really fully developed.
I don't think they really do a whole lot of work on themselves.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Right. It's character logical. And narcissists don't, don't really know, they're, all those defense mechanisms and cognitive distortions are unconscious. Yes. So all they really know is, honestly, I think they have this profound belief that if they have control of another, that that's actually closeness and love
so they seek. They seek to have control and they go about getting control, idealization, devaluation, that cycle of I love you, I hate you, and so I'm going to emotionally abandon you once I know you're invested and then I'm going to love bomb you. And all of that, they get emotional control. And so I don't think they have not a lot of self awareness.
Kerry: Not only is it unconscious, it's pre [00:15:00] verbal. Yes.
So there's not, there's not even language to use to talk about it. That's the other people will say, well, why can't they change? Well, how do you change something that's such an intrinsic core that happens so early that you don't even have words to describe the experience to even define it?
I mean, how do you get your arms around that? Right. I don't know how you do that. Right. Yes. Yeah. Well, and on top of it, I just, I did some looking into the literature on neurological differences in their brain and then their brain structure. I don't know which comes first, the chicken or the egg. Is the brain structure born different?
And then it just continues to grow differently or is it, is that early experiences such a profound experience that it gets capitalized on and their brains continue to develop in a different way? Well, but, but by the time we get into adulthood, you've got a different style of brain that's functioning and seeing the world differently.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yes. And all human beings, healthy human beings come into this world hardwired neurologically. And biologically, physiologically, genetically to [00:16:00] attach. And so cross culturally, all human infants are born with all the same things to attract caregivers, to maintain caregivers. If you think about it, it's pretty impressive.
Like it's almost imprinting, like a, a gosling would imprint. So they're hardwired to attach. It's their mission in life, a human baby. When they get what they need, their development flourishes, their brain flourishes, the mirror neurons are firing, the neurological pathways when a baby is stimulated in a positive way by their caregiver, whether it's mirroring or playing or, you know, anything like that, what happens is their neurotransmitters are fired and they build neurological pathways throughout their brain.
And if you take a baby who's been emotionally neglected or left in prolonged periods of distress for routinely for a very long time, that baby doesn't have those neurotransmitters that are firing and building those neurological pathways, nor do they have the mirror neurons firing. And so what you're saying is 100 percent correct.
[00:17:00] And that attachment style in infancy, it becomes their working model of attachment in adulthood. And that's why there's such a connection between EI and a secure attachment and narcissism and an insecure avoidant.
Kerry: I do sometimes think though, because I tend to fall in more in the bio social explanation of narcissism, that it's a combination of genetic predispositions and vulnerabilities capitalized on top of early environmental experiences.
And I know we all like to say, Oh, it's trauma. No, I'm not saying it's trauma, although, I mean, define trauma, I mean, we could have big discussion even what trauma is, but, but I do think it's this kind of this connection. It's over, very hard to weave out which came first because I think they're so, so dynamic.
You have a child who is easily overwhelmed by emotions, does not know how to self regulate very well, but you could have a fantastic caregiver who's great at knowing how to cope with that dysregulation. Knows how to provide a really fantastic comforting environment, then over time begins to help the child learn how to instill that in [00:18:00] themselves.
But you can also have another child who's really great at it, but having such a chaotic overstimulating environment that overwhelms them consistently, and they then eventually don't know how to do it very well. They kind of lose the ability because of the chaos and the intensity and the overstimulation.
In other words, There's so many dynamics. I think what I, what I struggle with the most when I talk to people is we really want a simple answer and there isn't a simple answer about how this happens. There's so many variables that can go wrong that it's not just, Oh, they were abused. There was domestic violence in the home or, Oh, they were sexually abused or whatever.
There's so many variables that are highly sensitive and dependent on the interactions between the child's makeup. And what their needs were and what that environment was able to do or not able to do. That it's just very difficult to explain.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yes,
and if you have a caregiver who's EI, who's empathic and can soothe and comfort and help that baby regulate, because that's how a baby learns how to emotionally regulate is their comfort, their soothe, then they [00:19:00] can sustain states of distress for a longer period of time because they're getting practice at it.
They know they're know that they trust that they will be helped. And those babies who actually have a secure attachment are resilient. So even though they may have trauma in their early life or, say the EI caregiver for some reason goes away if that attachment is formed at two, they have a great chance.
They're resilient. They can overcome trauma. And that is because they have access to the troubling feelings that that trauma caused. It impacted their identity. It impacted their mental health. And so they can recover and they can use therapy. They can use empathy from another, you know, they can do these.
things, but a narcissist is, it's what you said. Exactly. They are the epitome of not being resilient. They are not resilient. Trauma breaks them. And you see EI people even if they have ongoing trauma, they figure out a way to recover, repair their identity, move on, they get stronger, and they get better every day they're on this earth.
And you see narcissists devolve. You see this kind of devolvement where they end up making really bad decisions, you know, [00:20:00] and they're
Kerry: after bad decision after bad decision. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We, we didn't do that. Slogan of the. Four different types of attachments. So I want to circle back because I'm sure people are like, where is that?
They didn't do that. So let's you and I have fun for a moment as we wrap up today, talking about the four types. We talked a lot about the secure. So to me, I'm going to throw out what I think my slogan would be on that t shirt for a secure person that is I'm human and I'm okay with it and we'll all survive or something like that.
What do you think that t shirt would say?
Dr. Erin Leonard: For a for a secure attachment. Yeah, I'm human. And yeah, and and I know what I feel. Yeah, and I'm okay. I'm okay talking about it. And yeah,
Kerry: I'm not I love that.
Dr. Erin Leonard: I think maybe what you said before to not perfect.
Kerry: Exactly. I'm human. I'm not perfect, but we'll all be okay about it.
Yeah, I think for the anxious attachment, which is the clingy, Fears rejection, fears abandonment. When you say, am I kind of describing it accurately, this is a person who goes out of their way to make sure the other person's okay to keep that [00:21:00] person close. So what do you think their slogan would say?
Dr. Erin Leonard: I want to love you, but I can't because I'm too scared. yeah.
Kerry: I would almost add that I wanna love you, so don't leave me because I'm really scared. Yeah. They don't want you to, they don't want you to go, go anywhere or away. I mean, they, they're trying to keep you super close. Yeah. And the avoidant, so the avoidant person is a person who's comes to the place where they think nobody's safe.
Nobody really shows up. They don't really trust relationships. So they've learned to give up. They approach all relationships on this hopeless, helpless place. Like it's not going to work. So I'm not even going to try.
Dr. Erin Leonard: I think you just nailed it with that last sentence.
I think they're ambivalent. So it's like, they're so ambivalent that it's any way the wind blows. And, and they can like, it's like, I, I give this metaphor to some people, like You know how there's those weeds in your yard that are super easy to pull? You could just pull them out with your pinky practically.
, I feel like that's an ambivalent attachment style. , any way the wind blows they unplug and replug, unplug and replug. Whereas a securely attached person has deep and profound attachments. Yeah, yeah. Even if a narcissist can't attach deeply to them, it's more [00:22:00] superficial and it's more control.
Yeah. And even though intellectually they know it's not a great relationship, they are still deeply attached and they feel mortally wounded when that relationship ends. Yeah. Whereas, you know, an ambivalent attachment style or avoidant attachment style is totally ambivalent. Like, one day you're in their life and the next day they cut you out and like, I mean.
Kerry: Yeah. I would say their slogan is nobody ever stays, so I'm not even going to try. And then the disorganized one. Uh huh. That to me, this is the best I know how to describe it, that person learns that everybody's inconsistent. Yeah. So people show up and then people leave and so they don't really trust because they're always waiting for the shoe to drop.
Would you think that's a fair way to describe that?
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yes. One
hundred percent. And very impeded in their ability to be consistent in a relationship. Also I would say is inconsistent in their ability to accept and integrate empathies. So I don't know if you've ever known anybody like this, but you know, you dig deep, you seek to understand, you empathize and they go, no, no, no, that's not it.
You'll never get it. [00:23:00] Yes. And you're like, I think I nailed it.
Kerry: I once had a client say, you sound very frustrated. No, I'm irritated. Like, what is the difference between frustrated and irritated? They're kind of really close to the same.
That's exactly. Okay, you're
irritated. You,
you're irritated.
That's
Dr. Erin Leonard: right.
Kerry: So I would say an, an ambivalent or a disorganized attachment is a person who says, I'm, I, that's a harder one to define. What would their slogan be?
Dr. Erin Leonard: I would say, maybe, maybe somewhere in it would be, nobody will ever understand me. Because they're,
they're wanting to be understood.
Kerry: Yeah, yeah, like maybe, I trust you, but everybody lets me down.
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yes, that's the one.
Kerry: Yeah, because it's always like, yeah, you're good for today, but you won't be good tomorrow, I know that. So I'm going to already anticipate the failure for tomorrow. Yes. Yeah. Well, this has been so wonderful having you on today and we're about going to jump over to do the podcast extra interview and what I want to talk to you about what you think is the narcissistic abuse survivors biggest [00:24:00] vulnerability when it comes to spotting a narcissist.
And how can we approach that in a less vulnerable way? Approach ourselves, our characteristics in a less vulnerable way. So thank you so much for being on. How can people find you on social media if they want to know more about you? Can you give us your handles?
Dr. Erin Leonard: Yep. So my handle for Tiktok is @Dr_Erin_Leonard and then I write for psychology today my site there is called peaceful parenting when I write mostly about EI and recourse counseling is my website and Dr.
Erin Leonard.
Kerry: We'll be sure to put all those in the show notes. Thank you so much for being on and congratulations on the new book. It's so exciting. That's a big deal. Yeah, you're welcome. Well, that's a wrap for this week's episode. Are you following me on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube? Find me at Kerry McAvoy PhD.
And whether you're in, consider leaving, or have left a narcissistic relationship, find community support at my Toxic Free Relationship Club. You can learn about this resource as well as others at [00:25:00] KerryMcAvoyPhD. com. And I'll see you back here next week.