Narcissism Counterparts: Are You an Empath, an Altruist, or an Echoist?

• Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is characterized by a lack of empathy and a tendency to be ultra-focused on the self.
• Opposites of NPD might include empathism, echoism, and altruism, which are all heavily focused on others, and less focused on the self.
• You might be the opposite of a narcissist if you’re incredibly self-sacrificing and compassionate, or if you hate the limelight.

What Is Narcissism?

Narcissism refers to a personality disorder linked to a lack of empathy. Before we launch into an analysis of the different opposites of narcissism, let’s talk about narcissism itself. Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a mental health condition characterized by extreme lack of empathy for others, and extreme focus on the self. Everyone is narcissistic occasionally, but NPD refers to narcissism in its most severe form. People with NPD struggle with a cripplingly low sense of self-esteem. This influences them to continually put their own wants and needs ahead of others’ and to have a consistent need to be seen and admired. NPD is believed to develop from early relationships with friends and family, childhood trauma, genetics, hypersensitivity to textures, noise, or light in childhood, or general personality and temperament.

Narcissism Opposites

Empaths Of the 3 personality types that might be considered “opposite” to narcissism, empathism is probably the most ubiquitous. Empaths are people who…well, have loads of empathy! Unlike narcissists, empaths continually put others’ needs and wants ahead of their own. They are brimming with compassion for others, including narcissists, and are extremely sensitive to the feelings of people around them. Though the term “empath” is pretty prevalent on the internet, and while empathy has been fairly widely studied by psychologists, “empath” itself as a personality type has yet to really be adopted by the psychology community.

Echoists Echoists refer to people who shun the spotlight, as opposed to narcissists, who seek it out. People who have echoism suffer from a fear of being perceived as narcissistic in any way. They dread being a burden to anyone, and often default to others’ preferences (in other words, they “echo” others’ preferences) not out of empathy, as an empath would, but out of severe anxiety. The word “echoist” was coined by Craig Malkin in his 2016 book Rethinking Narcissism as a counterpart to the classic narcissist. He took the term from the myth of Narcissus and Echo. In Greek myth, Narcissus (who gave us the term “narcissism”) was an incredibly self-absorbed man, and Echo was a shy nymph who was in love with him. But Narcissus was only in love with his own reflection, and he drowned after leaning too far over the surface of a river to see his reflection.

Altruists Altruism refers to performing acts of exceedingly good will towards others. Altruists are selfless: they continually go out of their way to do favors for other people, sometimes even at their own expense. They’re likely to be the first to offer help when it’s needed, and they commonly donate to charity and participate in volunteer organizations. But just like with echoism and empathism, altruists' non-narcissistic traits may be linked to anxiety: altruists may place a great deal of their sense of self in their ability to help others. Just as with narcissism, everyone is altruistic sometimes, but altruists are regularly self-sacrificing. Altruism as a personality is far less studied than narcissism, meaning an altruist's motives may be varied: some altruists may be self-sacrificing or even martyrish because they believe their self-worth rides on their selflessness, while others may be altruistic just because they are genuinely selfless.

Signs You’re the Opposite of a Narcissist

You put others before yourself. Self-absorption is a narcissist’s M.O., so if you constantly put others ahead of yourself, congratulations—you’re probably not a narcissist! Putting others first is a classic trait of empaths, altruists, and echoists alike.

You have a tendency to lose yourself in relationships. Prioritizing relationships is a good quality to possess. Unfortunately, for people with opposite personality types to narcissists, "prioritizing the relationship" can quickly become "losing yourself in the relationship." Putting your friends or partner or the relationship itself ahead of your own independence is a sign you may struggle with codependence—a trait common to empaths, echoists, and altruists. Codependency, sometimes referred to as "relationship addiction," refers to a relationship dynamic in which one or both parties relies on the other for their sense of identity. Empaths, echoists, and altruists may have a tendency to put their ability to be selfless ahead of their actual wants and needs, making it easy for them to slip into codependent relationships, especially with narcissists, who can be very demanding.

You dread being perceived as narcissistic. If you've spent any time at all around narcissists, or know people who have, you definitely don't want to be one. But if you suffer from a crippling fear of being perceived as narcissistic, to the point you don't stand up for yourself and defer to others' needs and wants, you might be an echoist. Ironically, the fear of being perceived as narcissistic can have you dwelling on yourself and your behavior and how it might come off to others (which is, itself, somewhat narcissistic).

You’re incredibly emotionally sensitive. Narcissists often struggle to see beyond their own nose, and are so wrapped up in self-consciousness that they find it hard to understand how otters are feeling (if they make the attempt at all). Empaths, on the other hand, are so in tune with the thoughts and feelings of others, it’s like they’re one person sometimes. If this describes you, you might be an empath.

You hide from the limelight. A movie star, you ain’t. If you go out of your way to avoid attention, whether positive or negative, you might not only not be a narcissist—you might be suffering from echoism.

You struggle to set boundaries. Because altruists, empaths, and echoists may struggle to separate their worth from what they can give to others, setting healthy boundaries with other people can be extremely difficult. This can make it easy for them to be taken advantage of—and narcissists are exactly the sort of person to do that! You can practice setting healthier boundaries by checking in with yourself before automatically saying "yes!" to something. Saying "no" can be scary, but taking a moment to pause before conceding to something will help you understand your own wants and needs and learn to prioritize them over time.

You go out of your way to do good. While a narcissist will be hard-pressed to perform acts of good will and is likely to only do so when it benefits them, if you’re always doing what you can to be kind and helpful to others, you’re probably not a narcissist. In fact, you might be an altruist.

You need lots of alone time. As an extremely sensitive person, you probably need lots of alone time to recuperate and relax. Empaths, altruists, and echoists may struggle with sensory overload after spending time with other people, especially demanding people like narcissists, and may benefit from quiet solo time to reflect. These personality types may not only need more alone time than other people, but they may also struggle to express their needs, making it all the more difficult for them to get the solo time they require to thrive.