Covert Narcissism and Seeking Comfort in the Past

For many of us, nostalgia can be a wonderful thing. It is defined as the longing or sentimental feelings we have about our past. These can include our childhood home, our first car, our favorite vacation, or graduating from college with friends. We all feel nostalgic sometimes, and most of us have gone back to a place we had nostalgia for at one time or another in our lives. Many can relate to scrolling through old photos, revisiting an old playlist, or rehashing the “good old days” with friends or family. For most people, nostalgia is comforting, and provides us a pathway towards shared connection and belonging.

Nostalgia In Narcissism

However, for a person higher in a covert narcissistic traits, revisiting the past can be used as a tool in order to relive a time in their lives where they felt powerful, adored, or exceptional. In this dynamic, nostalgia is not expressed as a way of re-experiencing connection or belongingness with someone, but is used for reinstating an ideal self-image, for agentic references and reflections on self-agency.²

Thus, narcissistic individuals experience nostalgia in an ego-stabilizing way; revisiting memories, achievements, routines, or places are not about reconnecting with others associated with those memories and experiences, but in momentarily reliving how those experiences made them feel powerful, loved, admired, or as their ideal self.

Because covert narcissism includes having a fragile ego, and an equally fragile self-identity, “who” a person is at any given time is tied into the quality they place on the people in their life admiring them, mirroring them, or providing high-value reinforcement.^1,2 People high in covert narcissistic traits are sensitive to environmental changes that can trigger ego-instability such as a partner asking for space, a job loss, or when responsibilities of adult life threaten their internalized feelings of grandiosity. Without consistent external validation, many experience a withdrawn state where they can feel vulnerable and fragmented, prompting them to revisit “happier times” when they felt good about themselves and had more control over their identity.³ Revisiting their old life may also operate as a way of trying to prevent a narcissistic collapse.

In covert narcissism, nostalgia is not about recalling fond memories of others; it’s based on emotional self-soothing. When they engage in nostalgia, they are attempting to access their idealized version of themselves, or the version of themselves they once saw as powerful, “seen” by someone they idealized who reflected their greatness, or a person who made them feel exceptional.

However, the issues arises when they try to revisit old places, things, routines, or experiences to recreate how they once felt about themselves, as these do not operate as a mirror, which is necessary for experiencing an idealized self. Without the person (“the mirror”) who reflected back to them their idealized version of themselves, nostalgia becomes a shallow and superficial self-soothing dynamic.

Pattern Recognition and Healing

A desire for nostalgia and to retreat into the past often shows up in behavior. Signs may include: withdrawing from others, retreating into dissociative states (endless phone scrolling, bingeing on technology, or escaping into daydreams), flat affect, revisiting familiar or idealized places, scrolling through old photos, or digging up keepsakes and mementos from the past. As with all behavior, it does not happen in a vacuum and is not random; it can reflect how a person is responding to stressors in their life or in their need to try and regain a sense of control and ego-stability.

These kind of behaviors serve as a temporary emotional bandage, and are often turned to as a maladaptive way of avoiding deeper issues and pain. For narcissistic personalities, returning to routines, places, or familiar objects may provide a brief sense of comfort, but they cannot restore the person to the ‘idealized’ version of themselves they are trying to recapture, nor sustain any feelings of self-worth, or personal fulfillment . The more this pattern replays by turning to nostalgia as emotional anesthesia, the greater the probability it will reinforce cycles of avoidance behavior, which is counterintuitive to healing and growth.