Transcription
There's a certain type of person who just does not crack under pressure. They don't spiral from feeling embarrassed. In fact, they don't spiral from anything. And they certainly do not hesitate when it comes to making ruthless decisions.
So, today I'm breaking down seven traits that make psychopaths so seemingly successful in life and explore why that is. The disclaimer is coming, by the way. Just give me a second, guys.
As a society, we love consuming media about people who gain endless leverage through making ruthless decisions on their way to the top and doing that in a very Macavalian type of way. And maybe there's something that we can learn from that while still remaining grounded in our values. And the more you open your eyes and analyze the world around us, the clearer you will see that the world's inherently unfair. For example, we live very different lives simply by being born in a different country or into a certain type of family. And because we live in a system of capitalism, performance culture, social and power hierarchy, these aren't exactly systems that reward goodness and humanity as much as I would like it to be. Instead, these systems tend to reward certain personality traits that psychologists may call antisocial. And a lot of that actually falls within one clinical umbrella called psychopathy. That's why you'll see a higher percentage of CEOs, billionaires, basically people who are in positions of power who have psychopathic traits.
I wanted to objectively look into why that is and how people who don't have these personality types can actually benefit from implementing some of these traits and find their own version of success in our society. And here's the truth. Psychopathy does exist on the spectrum or to quote Alice in Wonderland, we're all mad here to various degrees. So, I'm not a psychopath. I have way too much anxiety for that and you're going to see why that is. But I have been close to people who are and they move through life like chess players.
However, there are a few disclaimers to be said here, and this is important. Please do not twist my words because I'm approaching this topic very objectively. I'm not glorifying psychopathy or any personality disorders in general. I'm also not glorifying capitalism because that's just simply the system that we live in. And I'm not saying that in order to be successful that you have to become a psychopath or to say that something or someone is good or bad. Everyone has their own set of moral values. Like for example, in my opinion, it's not cool to screw somebody over. But then there's also people who say that in order to get to a certain point in life, like to become a billionaire for example, there has to be some kind of exploitation involved to make it to that point and to make that amount of money. So certain people might be okay with doing that, whereas others might also low-key do it if they don't have to do it themselves or to see it from themselves. So as you can see, the topic that I'm talking about today is not that clear-cut. People can interpret this a thousand different ways. It may not necessarily be my own interpretation of it. Like, let's talk about it, right? But today, we're not discussing morality. It's about understanding a certain personality framework, where it's successful at, where it fails, and what we can learn from it. And when I say things like finding success in life, I don't mean finding fulfillment or a strong community or a high level of self-awareness or finding love and all of that. In this video, I mean success as defined by capitalism, gaining leverage, winning, outperforming everyone else, getting power over everything and everyone. Basically, wealth and status.
So, how can we harvest these traits so that we can live better lives? If you guys are new to my channel, my name is May. I'm all about self-improvement. Whatever it is you're looking to level up at, whether that's physical, mental, or spiritual, I'm here for you. Now, I'm going to tell you guys the truth. I had a very hard time with the corporate world for this exact reason. Because not only do I have to perform my job well, I also have to tell everyone how good I am at my job and just didn't feel natural to me. I just want to do a good job at the end of the day. But then eventually I was screwed over by people who are very good at performing their job and then they wanted to get rid of me and they were okay with that.
So you see psychopaths often excel at rising within these types of structures but they may also fail catastrophically in others. Like for example, when it comes to maintaining good relationships with people, when it comes to developing strong familial ties or obeying the law, people with these traits can climb fast but also crash out really hard. And you will find more psychopaths in positions of power as much as you will also find them in prison. So I'm going to get into what psychopathy actually is, how it compares with other dark triad personalities versus the light triad personalities, and then explore the seven traits that we can learn from. This is based off a book that I read called The Wisdom of Psychopaths by Kevin Dutton. And it's actually a very fascinating read because he interviews a lot of people who are in very successful places in life, so-called successful who also identify as psychopaths and then you can read how their mind works.
So in my childhood and throughout my life, I have dealt with people including my own family members who have personality disorders and because they were unhealed, not self-aware and didn't have access to mental health, their actions actually ended up affecting me in ways that caused a ripple effect throughout my life. And I had to learn how to heal from that. And if I'm aware of this now and yet continue to not work on myself and heal myself, you can see how that will actually turn into even more generational trauma that someday my great-grandchildren will have to heal from. I'm not a victim and I don't want other people to become victimized because of me just because I didn't work on myself. And lately, I've been thinking about how much I had built as a result of having to survive these situations. And even now, I still catch myself reacting to an event that happened in childhood or a traumatic thing and bringing forward certain behaviors that I have learned as a result of that. I found myself overexplaining certain things. I felt I had to prove myself to people or to fix things for other people. I've been working through these issues in therapy, but therapy did not erase this overnight. However, it did give me the tools to manage all of these tendencies, break out of certain loops, and actually give myself more space to think about what actually happened. What is my truth or is that just a distortion? How do I want to react instead of just spiraling? Like I said, it wasn't a dramatic shift that happened, but it was a very, very real change. And over time, it became life-changing for me. I feel way more control of myself because I gain more self-awareness.
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So, what is psychopathy? Psychopathy is a personality disorder with certain antisocial traits such as emotional detachment, impulsivity, superficial charm, fearlessness, and a lack of guilt or empathy or remorse. But it's not just one single trait. And also psychopathic is not a diagnosis in the DSM5, but it's more like a personality construct of all kinds of various tendencies. They may be very calculative or even manipulative which might make them influential and smooth talkers, very persuasive, maybe even likable because they're chess players like I said where everyone in their life is a pawn and serves some kind of purpose to them. So in that case it definitely helps to be likable and magnetic. There may be an air of entitlement involved like they may see themselves as perhaps better than other people. They may think that they're above the law or maybe naturally rebellious. So they like to break the rules. They're okay with doing certain antisocial things such as lying or hurting people because they may not feel bad about that. But then they might also perform an apology to fix their reputation. But as for whether they feel sorry for it or not, who knows? But because of this, they tend to experience more of a limited range of emotions and have a distinct lack of emotional connection with other people, which isn't the same as autism because autism is more so of a sensory overload when it comes to emotions and connections with people, as in like it's just too much for them to process. Psychopaths also tend to be more highstakes risk-takers who live a more of a hedenistic lifestyle. Like they might not be thinking about long-term effects or what they're doing or the meaning of your life or finding a purpose. They might also be exploitative to a certain degree. Not everyone has these traits. You have to know that some are more high functional than others which if you're a very high functional psychopath, you might actually help you succeed in life in certain ways or you know if you're not very high functional then they might actually end up becoming criminals. Like I said, right, it's a spectrum. And I have seen some self-proclaimed psychopaths describe their tendencies as like, you know, they're not constantly clouded with emotions all the time in their head. So, they might be able to think more logically than others. And it's not like their brain is more powerful or anything. It's just that they may not have the same kind of emotional capacity, which when it comes to certain areas in life, might give them an advantage. And then others might put it more bluntly and say that like to a psychopath, there are no clouds in the sky, only silver linings. They see an opportunity to get ahead in anything and everything.
So you have to understand that psychopathy is only a third of what is called the dark tri of personalities. The first one is called narcissism which is basically a craving for admiration and belief in one's superiority over others. And then this macro valinism which is cold manipulation and strategic self-interest. And then the third which is psychopathy which is impulsivity, emotional indifference and a lack of remorse. So together all of these traits may show up in different ways especially in people who tend to bend social norms and maybe even evade it altogether and depending on what their goals are they may succeed in certain environments but then the opposite will be the light tribe of personalities for example the first one will be humanism which is the belief in the dignity and the worth of every person and then there's faith in humanity which is optimism in people's capacity for goodness and then lastly there's tensionism which is treating others as the end and not the means to an end for example that means if I find the love of my life that person is my happily ever doctor. There's some research that show that people who score very high in the light triad spectrum tend to be happier, more fulfilled in their lives, and more likely to find fulfilling and healthy relationships. They're also more likely to be motivated by self-trcending value, so to speak.
So, what are the seven traits that give psychopaths an edge? The first one is the fact that their fearlessness is a superpower. Psychopaths have a very distinct trait and that is their biological resistance to fear. They might not feel that. Remember what I said before how a psychopath may have less capacity for emotions? There's research using the hair psychopathy checklist which is the gold standard for basically spotting these psychopathic traits in people and identifying them because like I said it's not just something that you can diagnose with a DSM5 right and that research actually shows a reduced amdela activation in their brains which means psychopaths may not have the same anxiety responses that most people will feel in certain high pressure situations. Kevin Dutton refers to this as high functional psychopathy, which is the ability to stay calm while everything is falling apart. That's why you see this play out especially in people who are trauma surgeons, special forces, or CEOs who are handling multi-million dollar PR disasters. Depending on what your job is, you may need a certain level of depersonalization in order to do that job effectively. You're like this meme of the dog where everything is fine but then the whole place is on fire, but then we got to keep it going. And I have to say for certain occupations like if you're an ER surgeon for example, you're doing lifesaving work and we absolutely need people who can excel in this field as a society. And I greatly respect that. Although I also say in certain situations you might actually want a bit of fear in you. Like if you're going cliff diving for example or that if there are sharks in the water like psychopaths may not have the same level of fear as someone who isn't. On top of their appetite for risk could possibly put them in dangerous situations. The lesson here is that so-called regular people can learn to self-regulate some of these moments of fear and high stress that can help anyone excel at their jobs.
The second trait will be charm as a skill set. And psychopaths aren't always charismatic, but they can certainly learn how to become charismatic because like I always say, charm can come naturally to certain kinds of people who were raised that way. But first of all, it is a skill that can be learned and then it will come naturally to you as a personality trait the more you do it. When psychopaths are charismatic, it's because of that combination of fearlessness and emotional detachment actually makes it a lot easier to become confident or at least project that confidence. And they know how much confidence can benefit them in society. It is a social tool that they can use by masking certain emotions and blending it into certain types of social settings. And they know how to act a certain way in order to get what they want because they learn it as a skill set. This is called impression management, which is a strategic use of body language, eye contact, verbal rhythm, and emotional mimicry to make people feel safe, feel seen, and be impressed by them, that is not always a bad thing, guys. I made quite a few videos on my channel about social magnetism and attractive body language and so on. And while yes, toxic manipulation is bad and it can be destructive, but the lighter version of impression management means that you're basically good at communication. You're persuasive and influential. And good leadership requires good people skills and communication. All these things like reading a room, mirroring certain cues, and modulating your tone can all be trained. You don't need to be manipulative at all in order to become magnetic. Psychopaths may use charm to disarm and impress people, but you can also use it to inspire people, bring communities together, and be a good leader.
The third trait will be ruthless focus. Psychopaths tend to not be distracted by emotions or guilt or relationships with other people. They do not second guessess themselves. They won't ruminate on something that already happened or emotionally spiral. And they can be very focused individuals and they definitely will not take their own failures personally. But if they do, then maybe it's in the veins of like, how do I move on from this? How can I become even better and more successful next time? So this lack of internal noise actually gives them razor sharp focus and they're very clear on their goals and that's the pattern. Psychopaths often excel in environments where the emotional cost of decision-m may slow other people down but not them. So back when I used to have a corporate job, I would feel bad about firing someone and be bogged down by that. Whereas a psychopath might actually probably instead focus on how to make themselves look good while they fire someone. In that book, Dutton actually describes your mind as tuned for tunnel vision. This is what actually allows highstakes professionals like hedge fund managers, surgeons or litigators basically stay emotionally detached and locked in to the outcomes even when those outcomes require making cold decisions that may hurt people. They don't care if they're wellliked. They care if they win. So this type of focus in moderation can be very powerful for the rest of us of blocking out the noise, ignoring distractions, and training your attention to become sharp like a weapon. Technically, that's really how we make progress, right? By staying focused, not from multitasking and being distracted, but from being locked in.
And then there's confidence over competence. People with psychopathic tendencies may often show a massive amount of confidence even when the entire world is against them or if there's receipts out there saying otherwise. Even if they're caught completely red-handed, they will still try to talk their way out of certain things and be completely unfaced. It's like a complete lack of the fear response that we were talking about from before. Like a normal person will be very nervous about that, but a psychopath would just keep on talking and talking like there's nothing wrong with it. That's the sense of entitlement that I was talking about that's coming into play here. Like they will walk in like they already own the place. And that level of confidence, even when it's not earned, can actually override people's perception of whether they're capable or not. and their ability to push forward in situations where other people might doubt themselves is simply because they don't fear judgment. They don't fear failure and they're certainly definitely not embarrassed or ashamed about who they are and what they do. In performance culture that reads as power and resilience and they're basically getting out of their own way and eliminating distractions to focus on their goals. And I know for a fact just by charming people and being super confident that look can get you jobs and get you into certain doors. And that freedom from feeling shame or cringe actually allows them to recover effortlessly and just keep going and going. And that's something that regular folks have to learn to adopt as a way to kind of like turn off a part of their brain. And they have to learn that as a skill. But then the people who don't have built-in fears simply can just do that however they want and whenever they want, even if they're not good at something or if what they're doing might be considered wrong.
And then this calculated risk-taking. Many psychopaths who are successful at being psychopaths have a type of controlled impulsivity which is the ability to make fast decisions in certain scenarios without getting trapped and overthinking it. There was one researcher in the book where he wrote that humans are pathologically risk adverse. But a lot of these emotional mechanisms are not well adapted to modern life and that psychopaths simply do not have that kind of hesitation. They don't sit around and feel scared about things. So that becomes extra useful in those careers that can reward high states pivoting or for making like crazy leverage decisions but only if they can control that impulse because for them controlling impulsivity is the entire line between being successful and being not successful. And as research has pointed out the absence of an erratic and so-called messy style that differentiates successful people from the ones who self-destruct. I think of American Psycho as an example where you have this main character who lives a very highly controlled and optimized life when it comes to certain things but then doesn't seem to have the same kind of impulse control when it comes to his other psychopathic tendencies. The big lesson here is risk isn't the enemy. In action is a true enemy and a combination of fearlessness and restraint is the real key here. The cost of freezing up and not doing anything as a result of that might actually be greater than the cost of making a mistake. And with most things in life, especially when it comes to capitalism, the faster you move, the bigger the advantage, even if you make mistakes along the way, that's still better than not doing anything at all and staying exactly where you are.
And then there's empathy as a dial. And we're taught that empathy is always good, but what if it actually depends on the context, right? Some psychopaths have the ability to modulate that the emotional switch and turn on that so-called emotional switch on and off. like they know how you feel, but they just might not necessarily feel it with you. They also don't feel obligated to absorb other people's feelings. They might not feel bad about doing or saying potentially hurtful things. However, some people might actually describe that as a sense of not feeling socially stimulated or not feeling connected with people or even a type of chronic loneliness and that is the cost of having this trait. While that's terrifying in one context, it's actually very useful in another context, right? Like yes, a lack of emotional connection can greatly affect personal relationships, but it's also incredibly useful in business, in surgery, and even crisis leadership for making decisions in chaotic situations. And that's also why only a certain type of people can thrive in certain kinds of professions, very high-risk, high stress professions, and that most people can't or they won't last long in it. But learning to modulate that sense of empathy and knowing when to care deeply and when to pull back and detach might be a very smart strategy. And I have videos on how to detach and not care so much, which doesn't mean that you shouldn't care at all, but it's more so about like detaching your feelings from the outcome and surrendering to certain things and just letting things be instead of like being in the weeds and caring about everything and trying to fix and control everything. I think that the ability to explore emotional connection is so precious and it helps with understanding people around us on a whole other level. And I can tell you for a fact that for emotional people like me, like I'm just simply not built for that kind of high pressure job like in an ER for example, or even for most of capitalist society if I have to be honest with you. But if you can get good at that, then it becomes a very valuable tool because listen, it's like a dog eat dog world out there. You either eat or be eaten. And like honestly, I just rather be at the beach and go swimming. And that's just my way of detaching.
And then there's the perceived flaws that fuel your success. And guys, I really want you to sit with this. And a lot of the personalities that we see here, like things like being emotionally cold, being very detached and being very intense and blunt, maybe even manipulative in a way that can also fuel clarity, performance, and leadership when you channel it correctly and in moderation. Like I said before, we all fall somewhere in the psychopathy spectrum, whether it's very psychopathic or very tiny little bit as a treat. And now that I think about it, a lot of these traits I'm talking about is actually what people strive to be like when it comes to self-improvement. But we can't lose our humanity or lose our emotions in human connection. That's what I think. The truth is if we didn't have any of these tendencies at all, like 0% then we'll be a completely dysfunctional society. Like we won't have any kind of useful output. You know what I mean? And there are studies that basically confirm that moderate levels of psychopathy and in particular those traits I was talking about of fearlessness, charisma, you know, ability to emotionally regulate, all of these traits can actually correlate with professional success, especially when you pair it alongside intelligence and self-restraint. Like I said before in the chapter about risk-taking, it's all about that fine line between being very sharp and being very disciplined versus being destructive and in denial. If we want to become highly successful in society without betraying our values and only you know what your values are then we have to write that razor's edge between taking the positives and leaving behind the negatives. So you need to understand it's not about like in order to become successful you need to become colder, you need to be mean or you need to emotionally disconnect. You can have strategy and also be soft at the same time. And sometimes the things that we're taught to hide, like our level of intensity or even sometimes being very passionate about something, might actually be the same traits that elevate us and make us different and protect us, especially protect us from society. That way, we'll understand how to play that game and win without trying to become the villain of the game. Because in this unfair world that we live in, we need to know how to play that game well so that we can rise up without burning out. And if we have to adopt certain traits like become more fearless, more disciplined and a little bit detached about certain things, then so be it.
So let me know in the comments what resonates with you the most. And I make videos like these every week to level up your life. So I'll see you in the next one. [Music]