Does a Narcissist Actually Know They’re Lying? A Former Detective Answers
A lot of heroin, so they would spend a lot of time in jail. That kid who threw it was someone I had charged before. Every time, he did the same thing: he made a big deal out of it, calling me a liar and questioning everything I had just seen with my own eyes.
The way he argued made me wonder if he really thought he didn’t do what I had seen him do.
That scene played over and over again. People and details would change, but the idea would stay the same. People who strongly denied many times that they did things I had seen and often recorded on surveillance.
But their tone didn’t change at all, not even with the video.
After talking to these people, it was clear that many of them had most, if not all, of the symptoms of Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). It looked like these people believed the lies they were telling.
I knew these people weren’t lying after many years hadn’t passed.
Not in their minds, anyway.
Most of us think that lying is easy. Either something is true or it’s not; we either did something or we didn’t. Not with a narcissist, though. What they see as “true” is anything that keeps the image of themselves they’ve made safe. That’s why what they’re saying is “true,” and they’ll stand up for it.
Think about what it’s like to have such a weak sense of self that the truth is almost always a threat.
The brain of someone with NPD really does work to protect a false version of themselves—one that can’t be wrong, weak, or responsible. It feels like an attack when that image is threatened. People usually fight back when they are attacked.
That’s why they can argue so strongly: it’s about their very lives.
It took me years of questioning to fully understand this: the conviction in their voice isn’t a performance. It’s defence. Most of us think that a narcissist is planning a lie by sitting there quietly and deciding to lie. They’re making up stories about themselves to show the world the real person they want to be.
The difference is more important than it looks.
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