We all want to feel confident. We want to be able to walk into a room and feel like we own it, like we stand out, and like we’re sure of ourselves. This is a good wish to have and a good thing to pursue! But it can easily get out of hand if your confidence starts to grow unchecked.
There’s a fine line between healthy comfort in your skills, appearance, or overall self and having a superiority complex, where you fully believe you’re better than the people around you.
It’s easy to be confident when you know what’s coming in your future, the knowledge you can gain just from looking at the stars.
Above The Rest
Superiority complexes feel like they’d be something that’s easy to spot. They tend to be loud and obnoxious, but there are cases of a superiority complex being hidden, masked by confidence or other traits that ‘make up’ for their worse behavior.
Here, you’ll find a list of traits that are a dead giveaway for superiority complexes. If you can see these traits for what they are amid their cushioning behavior, you’ll finally have a read on them, and you’ll know whether or not they’re worth your time.
1. Endless Name Dropping
People with superiority complexes often feel the need to constantly remind others of their perceived importance. They’ll frequently mention the names of influential people they claim to know or have met, even if the connection is tenuous at best, wanting to impress others with their so-called social status.
In addition to name-dropping, they may also exaggerate their relationships with these notable figures, claiming to be close friends with people who consider them an acquaintance at best. Anything to make them appear more important than they are.
2. Making Every Conversation About Themselves
Those with superiority complexes often struggle to listen attentively to others, believing their own thoughts and experiences are intrinsically more valuable. They may frequently interrupt conversations to interject their own opinions or share personal anecdotes, even if they’re not totally relevant.
They’ll monopolize conversations, steering them solely toward topics that let them showcase their knowledge, experience, or accomplishments. They might even dismiss or belittle anyone else’s contributions, implying that their own experiences are more interesting. They can’t imagine anyone else having anything exciting to say if they’re not somehow involved.
3. Giving Unsolicited Advice And Criticism
People with superiority complexes often believe they know better than everyone else and feel compelled to share this ‘wisdom,’ even when no one asked for it. They’ll offer unsolicited advice, sometimes even criticism, framing it as ‘constructive feedback.’
While their intentions may seem good on the surface, their behavior comes across as more condescending or intrusive than helpful. They don’t realize that their advice is unwanted or inappropriate, though, and they genuinely believe they are doing others a favor by sharing their superior insights.
4. Exagerating Their Accomplishments
Superiority complexes will skew a person’s perceptions of their own accomplishments in relation to those of others. They’ll downplay the achievements of their peers, colleagues, or even friends while simultaneously gassing up the importance of their own successes.
In social or professional settings, they might respond to others’ good news with lukewarm enthusiasm or quickly shift the conversation back to their own lives. They may also exaggerate their own achievements, embellishing stories or taking credit for group efforts. This attitude creates an air of competition that only frustrates everyone around them.
5. Never Taking Responsibility
Those with superiority complexes struggle to acknowledge their own mistakes or shortcomings. They’ll go to great lengths to avoid taking responsibility for their actions, even going so far as to deflect blame onto others instead, throwing them under the bus.
If they’re ever confronted with evidence of their mistakes, they’ll immediately become defensive, make excuses, or attempt to rationalize their behavior. They might even resort to tactics like gaslighting, trying to convince others that their perception of what’s going on is objectively incorrect.
6. Unable To Empathize
Having a superiority complex can leave someone struggling to empathize with others. They believe their own experiences and feelings to be more significant, important, or valid. They view other people’s lives as trivial compared to their own, not worth paying attention to as they don’t concern them.
In conversations about personal difficulties or societal issues, they’ll respond with dismissive comments or attempt to one-up others by sharing their own, supposedly more significant, problems. They’ll accept no advice or attempts at help, either believing they’re doomed to live this life that’s far more tragic than everyone else’s or being far too confident, thinking they can solve everything perfectly by themselves.
7. Being Extremely Stubborn
Finally, people with superiority complexes often struggle to accept that they can learn from others or that others’ perspectives may have merit. They dismiss any new idea that challenges their existing beliefs, assuming that their own knowledge and opinions are inherently superior.
They’re extremely stubborn in any sort of discussion or debate, refusing to consider opposing arguments or evidence that contradicts their views. They’re also quick to dismiss the expertise of others, still thinking they know better even in fields where they have limited knowledge.
The Root Of It All
What this list of traits can’t convey is that superiority complexes, like all forms of narcissistic thinking, usually stem from deeply rooted insecurity. They’re behaviors born from pain and used as a shield to keep themselves from being hurt again.
That doesn’t make what they do okay, though. No matter the origin, no matter the reason, treating other people poorly to boost your own ego is never right. The only way we can grow is by learning from other people, but if someone doesn’t even allow themselves that, how can they expect to get better?
