Narcisist?

Hi.

I've been struggling with something all my life.  I had a wonderful childhood.  Truly loving and supportive parents who were great role models.  Lot's of experiences and opportunities and the freedom to explore who I was in order to become who I was 'meant' destined to be.

But....

I heard or read the other day a throw away comment that struck a chord and reminded me of something that's been getting in my way.  I'll share that in a tic.

As you may know I struggle to reconcile my potential with my actual.  I live a pretty good life and am reasonably successful at whatever I attempt to do.  That was my rationale voice speaking there.  I still however strive for better.  Leaner.  Fitter.  Faster.  More successful.  Healthier.  More productive.  More responsible.  More socially aware.  etc etc.  When I'm not doing things that contribute to those 'mores'  I often feel bad about myself and start 'shoulding' myself.  I should do more.  I should be more.  I should be healthier, cleaner, more productive or whatever.  This means I don't take pleasure from the things I DO do and rather focus on the things I DON'T do.  Not good.

Here's the comment.

"more people are fucked up as a result of being told they are better, great or have more potential than there are who are fucked up because they're told they are crap, shit and no good."

It got me to wondering.  Now there is probably a scale of 'fuct' up at play here (and that's not a referenced or even valid source) and I'm definitely not one to say my problems are more serious than anyone else's.  In fact, the reality of anyone's problems is purely subjective.  The rich kid worrying about his relationship with his peers is as real as the kid worrying about his next meal.  To them anyway.  You, me and many others may actually rate those worries differently.  The point is that the worry is real to the individual.  ANyway, I digress.  I think I fit that statement.  I was told many positive things which account for many wonderful things, and yet I feel fucked up.  I was thinking about the deeply held belief (or is it just an expectation external or otherwise), instilled and reinforced by devoted, loving parents, that I was wonderful, intelligent, bound for success etc that has placed a pressure on me (or I have placed it on myself, either way its there) to be exactly that.  So, when I seem to fall into (what by those grandiose expectations) seems to be a normal existence, I feel bad.    Part of me recognises that this 'angst' for betterment is what drives me forward and another part recognises that it stops me from living in the now, appreciating the moment and (as many of my friends would say, indeed have said) lightening up on myself.

Truth be told.  I'm no longer sure what to think.  Should I strive for betterment or be content with who I am?  How do I enjoy the moment if it's not where I think I should be?  How do I relax and be still when there's work to be done?  How do I turn off those friggen voices that raise these questions?

I was running a workshop today and in a vulnerability exercise several participants expressed their greatest childhood challenge (which in all cases transferred to their adult experience) was that of purpose. Meaning.  Why am I here?  Two things happened. 1) I realised I'm not alone in asking that question. 2) It exacerbated the experience for me by making my own situation 'real'.

I'm gunna post this right away as if I edit it I may chicken out of sharing it.

To give some context, I've had a few drinks and have been battling with these issues for several days now.  I need to get this off my chest.  I hope I haven't dragged you into my mire.

Till next time,

Be happy.

oh yeah  Before I go.  What's this got to do with Narcism... (have a quick read and I'll get back to you)

Campbell and Foster (2007) review the literature on narcissism. They argue that narcissists possess the following "basic ingredients":

• Positive: Narcissists think they are better than others.^[15]
• Inflated: Narcissists' views tend to be contrary to reality. In measures that compare self-report to objective measures, narcissists' self-views tend to be greatly exaggerated.^[16]
• Agentic: Narcissists’ views tend to be most exaggerated in the agentic domain, relative to the communion domain.^[15][16]
• Special: Narcissists perceive themselves to be unique and special people.^[17]
• Selfish: Research upon narcissists’ behaviour in resource dilemmas supports the case for narcissists as being selfish.^[18]
• Oriented toward success: Narcissists are oriented towards success by being, for example, approach oriented.^[1

Ok, so what does all of this have to do with me?  Thankfully, very little actually.  There is healthy and unhealthy narcism.  While I think I may, from time to time, display some of the above characteristics (I do sometimes think I'm better than others, although I don't express that - except just now; I have been called selfish and would sometimes describe my behaviour that way and I am definitely oriented towards success).  I'm not looking for reassurance about my potential for narcism or not.  I was hopeful that there was a 'diagnosis' for my state.  Unfortunately, I have come to the conclusion that my state is what is otherwise known as 'the human condition'.

Nite all.

I'm baa-aack

Hi guys,

In case you've been wondering where I've been I'm now back from holidays.  Quite an interesting experience actually.  I was in Japan for the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear melt-down (never in any real danger but there nonetheless) and then in Thailand for a wedding and was stranded by unseasonal typhoons that cancelled ferries, ruined airports, caused landslides and resulted in an aircraft carrier being despatched by the Thai Govt to evacuate stranded travellers.  Fun times.

It was an interesting demonstration of resilience and I enjoyed watching how my various friends coped with adversity, uncertainty and the challenges associated with communicating in a foreign country.  It was also interesting too to see how the locals, who were much more seriously affected than we were (I mean we could eventually go home) responded.  I've no doubt they must've thought us Westerners to be rather precious.

Hey, have any of you had a near death experience?  I've often been a little envious of the characters you hear about who have such an experience and then go on to make radical transformations in their lives.  I've often enviously thought "if only that could happen to me, then I could finally make those changes stick"  pffst!  Now I know the stupidity of that thought.  I now think that the change they made and the effort required to make would still be just as hard as it is for the rest of us on any normal day.  Maybe their motivation is different, I don't know?   Anyway I tell you about mine.   When our 12th floor Tokyo hotel room was caught in an aftershock and the building was creaking and groaning and the curtains swinging like crazy I seriously thought I was going to die.  Seriously.  I was shitting myself.  Grabbed my passport and all I wanted to do was get the hell out of dodge!!!  The feeling of helplessness when I realised that I couldn't was pretty confronting.  To cut a long story short, my near death (in actual fact I was never in any danger at all but I didn't know that at the time) experience hasn't really changed my perspective on things, or my ability to make changes so I guess I can stop wishing for some external bolt of lightening to make changes for me and take some responsibility for making the changes myself.  Now, if I can just work out what changes I want to make....

I am however refreshed after my holiday and keen to get back into some regular training.  It looks like work is picking up too which is great.  I can't begin to tell you how depressing it has been to be selling services that no-one wants.  Particularly when the service is you (me).   And just to clarify.... I'm not a gigalo.  I'm a facilitator and work predominantly in the public sector.  First the GFC then a recent spate of natural disasters has seriously slowed my business down.  I haven't really talked about it much.  Two reasons really.  One,  I didn't want to give voice to my more negative thoughts and two, my rationale brain (yes I do have some rationale in there somewhere) knew that things would turn around.... eventually.

Ok.  Bye for now.  Next time I'm going to talk about something that's been really messing with my head.  Why am I here?

Be Happy