After being prodded after reading a friends' newsletter to consider the idea of narcissism as something beyond what I felt I understood, I first looked online for a baseline of info to build from.
Mayo Clinic's website left me astonished with ultimately no conclusions as to what causes this awful problem. I felt like I already knew SO much about it probably, and felt elation as well as feeling competely startled as I consider possibly I had what others in the professional world did not: four decades of intimate experience with the thing. Although I wasn't certain, a dim suspicious was growing that it had been 100% of my life for all of my 43 years...and so I began one of the biggest and most challenging research projects of my life.
The following book was the first official one I found.
Page 17: "If children are grossly mistreated for small errors in behavior, and if they are ignored or sometimes rewarded when they behave perfectly (according to someone else's perception - their parents'), they may develop a basic dynamic of feeling safe when others perceive them as perfect, and feeling very, very threatened when they think others will perceive them as deficient."
As I dug through this book, something began to surface which I did not expect: I began to feel compassion towards this problem. As I continued, it became plain to me that our culture has entirely ERRONEOUS ideas about the whole thing! This really was exciting...and so I pressed through my disgust and hopeless despair, feeling like there was some nugget of golden truth I was hunting for.
Page 25: "N's are characterized as lacking empathy. Actually, it is impossible to really know what normal intensity emotions a N has, because there are simply overwhelmed by the overriding fear of being found imperfect."
The principles (ways things are, because that's how Creator made it) I found in here made me feel completely sick to my stomach, as I faced what looked like an absolutely BLEAK future, surrounded by people who had no capacity for empathy, and who were likely to continue that cycle on and on for generations.
This was fueled by what had jolted me of hearing Dr. Jim Wilder's mention that 75% of our current culture is at toddler level of maturity (which is when regulation of the healthy shame message can be learned), and another generation would be engulfed by narcissistic adults who lack the ability to face healthy shame messages... I felt compelled to continue on in what felt like a Holy Spirit led search. Gentle Protectors know how to feel healthy embarrassment, and can call it out in community so it can thrive. According to Dr Wilder, communities where this does not happen will always fall apart (my words not his).
Having long been reared with my Dad's definition and regular banter about narcissistic people, I began to adjust to what felt like tremendously NEW data...and rather than seeing N as someone who was in love with themselves, what I learned in this book was that it is EXACTLY the opposite.
While I continued to learn for several years, before the Confirmation came, this book was what pointed me to the possibility that there was HOPE...and being on the scent of something new was motivation to keep digging, in between lots of breaks, time with family, and focusing on raising our children while in the midst of signifiant physical limitations (another story for a different day).
Looking back, I can see how my ENFJ personality is completely wired to learn to understand even when the person in front of me is hurting me so much. (insert Frank James' video on how each of the 16 handle bullies...the ENFJ is perfect!)
