Almost a decade ago, I took an art class in portraiture.
The teacher was Cecilia Cooney-Wickett and the model was Cecilia's mother, Dorothy Cooney.
The medium was charcoal on what they call "newsprint". Newsprint is a rough, cheap paper ideal for practising or demonstrating.
Perhaps 20 seconds into the demonstration, Cecilia's mother popped out of the page. What I mean by that is, I recognized her mother from the drawing because Cecilia captured her mother's likeness.
Granted, she had probably done thousands of drawings of her mother over the decades, but what surprised me was just how few strokes of the charcoal it took for Dorothy's likeness to appear on the newsprint.
I immediately remarked on it, and Cecilia stopped. We counted the charcoal strokes on the paper and there were no more than 14.
The class continued, and by the end of it some three hours later, we all had renditions of Dorothy's face on our own sketch pads, none of which looked remotely like Dorothy. (Some weeks later, most of us got the hang of it to some degree). Each of us had probably scratched thousands of strokes on the paper that first evening, but no one had captured the model's likeness.
So, I got to thinking.
Perhaps fourteen strokes, or thereabouts, is the minimum number of strokes it takes to capture a person's likeness. For years, Cecilia had practised on her mother and from experience, had learned which strokes were required, at least as far as her mother was concerned, to capture a likeness on paper.
The drawing would have been enough to identify her mother in a line-up of thousands of people.
That class was an education for me. It suggested that lots of messages can be delivered in remarkably few strokes.
I don't have the original of course, but Cecilia might sketch up a new one and post it along side a photo of her mother here.
Let's see.
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
My friend Cecilia's leprechaun is for sale
My friend Cecilia asked for my opinion about a leprechaun statue she made years ago. She is considering selling it, presumably now because St. Patrick's Day is coming up. She asked me if I thought it was realistic looking.
I replied "very realistic...especially the way it bends over like that". I didn't realize it was her husband on the left.
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
The Fat Cats will decide who becomes president
The Fat Cats will decide who gets the presidential nomination for Democratic party. John Edwards and Barack Obama won't get it with all that scary talk about poverty and ending the Iraq war.
Hillary will be the nomination because she won't do anything to disturb the status quo. She won't apologize for voting for the Iraq War five years ago because she is still for it. She is still for it because she wouldn't get the hundreds of millions of election support dollars if she were against it.
The war is a cash cow for the Fat Cats.
Even if they had to pay a billion dollars to get an acquiescent Democratic president into the White House, it'd be worth it to the Fat Cats.
Just think about the tens of billions of dollars that Exxon made in pure profit last year. A paltry billion is but a sliver of that. And that's just one company.
The Fat Cats don't want to hear about alleviating poverty or health care or any other scary, profit-reducing initiative. They want a president that will allow them to continue making grotesque profits while the super poor of America go to bed hungry every night.
Friday, February 23, 2007
Recovering from a boss with Narcissistic Personality Disorder
It was a long time ago.
About two months into having my new boss, it started. At first, I thought, oops, he just got really upset about this little issue ... I didn't understand exactly why he lost his temper so unexpectedly, but heck, everyone has their bad days.
Full disclosure:
I'm not a shrink. This article is just for my own sense of closure and perhaps to offer an indicator to other readers out there who have experienced something similar. And as a human, I'm naturally biased.
And I could be dead wrong about everything.
At the time, I didn't understand what was happening when my new boss lost it over something seemingly small, and lashed out at the two people close by. It wasn't until years later that I would understand that my boss suffered from a condition called Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). Of course, there's always the chance that I'm imaging it, or that I am over-sensitive, or that I'm just plain nuts myself or perhaps all of the above. And as I've said, I'm not a shrink so take my words at face value.
Let's go into the details of what I have learned about how NPD works.
A close friend of mine recently celebrated twelve years off the drink. He attends AA meetings every week and manages the challenge of staying sober very well. He knows he is just a single malt Scotch way from wrecking the great life he has rebuilt for himself and his family in the last dozen years. He says jokingly, but in all seriousness at the same time, "alcoholics don't have friends; they have hostages".
I would add to that: People don't have alcoholism; alcoholism has people.
The same is true of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Bi-polar disorder, Borderline Personality disorder and God knows how many other conditions. People don't have NPD; NPD has people.
Narcissist Personality Disorder does not leave such concrete evidence around like empty bottles, mysterious car dents, drunk-driving charges or visibly injured spouses. No, it feeds on the less concrete aspects of our lives. Damage is visited upon the people around NPD sufferers, and the behavior of the NPD sufferer is explained away using countless plausible rationalizations.
To help my own understanding, I have come up with a metaphor for the disorder and the person who is afflicted by it. The metaphor is one of a puppeteer (the disorder itself) and a puppet (the person with the disorder).
Let's explore the puppet metaphor to help understand how Narcissistic Personality Disorder works.
The puppet metaphor illustrates what I believe is the salient challenge of NPD for those people around it: you think you are dealing directly with a person, but you are not. Instead, you are dealing with someone under the control of NPD. Once I woke up to that basic fact some years ago, everything made sense. It was like a light went on in a dark room and suddenly I knew what I was up against and what I needed to do.
Here is what I have read about and experienced first hand.
The person with Narcissistic Personality Disorder:
There are plenty of people out there who have suffered at the hands of a Narcissist, and extensive research has been done to help you identify it. The Internet is awash with anecdotes, life stories, remedies and the results of research. It is called a disorder because something is broken, not because something is unusual. Don't let others convince you that the person is just "a bit quirky" or "has a bit of an edge". At least be honest with yourself. It doesn't matter what they say, and it also doesn't matter what I say. You have to work it out. One of my favorite places to start reading about the subject is by Joanna M. Ashmun at this location.
The best thing you can do to protect yourself from a Narcissist is to stay away from them. Give it time and Narcissistic Personality Disorder, if you are exposed to it in someone in whom you have personally invested, will hurt you. I guarantee it. It's a slow nibbling-to-death process. First, you're attracted to this striking person because you seem to have so much in common with them, and striking they are, as they weave a web around you. They know exactly how to get attention - they've been perfecting the art since childhood. What's really happening is you are being prepared for dinner. Their dinner. And you are but one of their side-dishes. They don't count how many little folks like you they have consumed over the years. A spider doesn't count the flies he eats and he has no feelings for any of them. The fly is just dinner; that's the fly's place in this world. When you have a relationship with someone under the influence of NPD, you are the fly.
It's very hard to break away from a Narcissist. They've built layers upon layers of dependence upon them. Expect that when you tell your spouse of what is happening at work, he/she may think you are the crazy one. And when you do finally make the break, even if you move state to give yourself some distance from the narcissist, expect trouble.
I remember I got a phone call from the Narcissist some time after I broke away. I saw his number pop up on my cellphone, so I just left it run into voice-mail. He wanted a return call. I never made the return call.
Sure enough, some time later, his message to a close friend of mine, in an effort to send a provocation to one of his ex suppliers (me) of NS (Narcissistic Supply) that I had "lost credibility". Complete fiction of course. If they can't woo you, they'll attack you. Just wait for it.
NPD is a gift that keeps on giving
The apparent preposterousness of what I type here is one of the reasons NPD gets to go on giving for a long, long time. Few will believe believe your story about the Narcissist in your life until they personally get punched in the face by it.
My personal experience of it is that of having had a boss who suffered from it. He was probably a third of the time "high", a third of the time "low" and a third in the middle somewhere, that I could observe.
As my and others' relationships with him evolved over time, I came to see a kind of "ring of fire" around him. If you stayed on the outside of the ring of fire, and some managed to keep that safe distance, you might limit the damage to just being expelled from their life because you did not succumb. But once you moved inside the ring of fire, life changed forever, and you could never return to being on the outside like you used to be. Sometimes, one person "keeping him occupied" allowed others to stay out of the ring and remain relatively safe.
Did you know that lionesses, when they hunt, they pick a single individual prey and they do not deviate from that particular animal until it is either taken down or the hunt is abandoned? Someone under the influence of NPD hunts like that. Once they have identified you as a source of NS (Narcissistic Supply), you're as good as dead. That is, if you hang around long enough.
I remember once where a male employee and he were apparently writing poetry to each other on the last day of the quarter close. From the outside, it was like they were in love or something. Yes, the boss was in love with himself and the marketing guy was playing along. The latter was a seasoned player in the almost hypnotic skill of keeping someone's attention, a real political survivor, and the only person I know to have survived that particular ring of fire, at least outwardly.
NPD as fisherman
A fisherman keeps but a loose grip on the great salmon after the fish has bitten down on the bait. He lets the fish tire out for a while before finally pulling on the line to secure the fishhook inside the fish that is holding it.
My friend tells me that alcoholism can give you the illusion for years that you are in control, then one day it yanks on the line and begins to reel in its catch - the problem of alcoholic addition moves in for the final kill - the human.
Alcoholism, and lots of other addictions are, for all their hosts' clever ways of hiding it, once they move into full swing, pretty easy to diagnose. You find empty whiskey bottles around, or tea in that bottle in the liquor cabinet you thought contained whiskey. Perhaps you see some unexplained dents in your spouse's car, or something big and obvious like your loved one getting booked with their third DUI (Driving Under the Influence). The diagnosis is easy then. You have lots of hard evidence. I'm not saying it gets easier from there, and indeed that's only the beginning, but at least you know there is a problem, and the addict can no longer remain in denial to the same degree. And now you are certain you are not imagining all of it.
NPD destroys relationships, trust, and often whole families, yet still gets to continue in full swing, for a long, long time. There are no empty bottles to point to, no dirty syringes, no black eyes, or unexplained bruises on someone's arm. A person under the control of NPD can behave perfectly normally one moment, just as the puppet sits quietly in the puppet chair while the strings remain loose, then unexpectedly and suddenly, it can turn on you as if you had committed some great crime against them.
One of the hardest things to deal with is that the person under the influence of NPD, while they might believe outwardly that they are "a bit quirky" or "special" or in some way different that gives them permission to behave like they do, the denial around NPD is extraordinary. You simply will never, I mean never, get through to a person with NPD about their condition. They will never admit to having a problem with these kind of symptoms.
Remember, an alcoholic has to wake up in a pool of his own vomit in a police station, after having lost his wife, kids, friends and career, before the denial begins to break down. Even if his "higher self" knows there is a problem, his ego needs to lie in the gutter a few times before the long journey of recovery can begin.
NPD can remain undiagnosed for a long time, because there's no pool of vomit to wake a guy up. I have never heard of a case of a recovering Narcissist. He is about as likely to get treatment for NPD as a fox is likely to look after the safety of the hen house. The fox's job is to eat chickens, and he'll never see anything wrong in doing it.
The Puppet Knows he is a Puppet
I believe that a person under the control of NPD, deep down, knows that something is wrong; that something is very wrong. Their "higher self" knows. Often, and perhaps this is their real curse, such a person is very intelligent. They are good at working things out, and they know something is definitely awry - but they are just the puppet, not the puppeteer - so it continues.
In my experience of working for a narcissist, there were countless situations like this. I remember in the middle of an average meeting with about six of us in the room, my boss just lost it. For some small little thing that was annoying him, he flung a wad of papers at one of my colleagues, from behind I might add. I got the shock of my life - I never saw it coming - but my shock was nothing to the obvious shock of my boss who had lost it. His own action had so frightened him more than anyone else in the room. His own fright told me that he, the person not the disorder, had completely lost control for that moment, because doing so in front of six individuals risked exposing the problem, so he would not have done it deliberately. Everyone missed the undercurrent.
He escaped one more time.
Within about thirty seconds of his explosion, he was displaying a level of apologetic obsequiousness that I have never seen in my life. He didn't apologize. He just behaved as if he knew he had done something terribly wrong. He went from being downright hostile to being super-friendly in a matter of seconds. It was a sight to behold, and showed just how tough it must be to be under the control of NPD when it pulls tightly on the strings.
The Nice Man, The Bully and the Friend.
Imagine a chap by the name of Joe Smith. Joe shares a flat with a bully by the name of Biff. One evening, Joe is entertaining a close friend in the living room and Biff in the kitchen overhears something Joe's friend says in the living room. Biff immediately takes grave offense, storms into the living room in a rage and verbally abuses Joe's friend who gets up to leave because he is deeply hurt from the unexpected verbal assault. Joe sits there in shock about what has just happened. Biff goes upstairs to sleep it off while Joe gets to pick up the pieces, apologizing profusely for his flat mate's outrageous behavior, perhaps even descending into a degree of denial about it all.
Joe is just a regular guy like you or me, Biff is the ever-controlling NPD he suffers from, and Friend is anyone Joe has a relationship with.
NPD is like an unpredictable flat-mate. It might leave the sufferer alone for periods of time, days or sometimes weeks, but it always returns. Just when it looks like it's not really there anymore, it marches into the room and beats your friend up.
NPD will try to invalidate the feelings of those it hurts
"You're too sensitive" is a common attempt at invalidation used by a person under the influence of NPD. They try to invalidate what you are feeling by saying you are "over-reacting" to what has happened. Ironic, really, because the person under NPD starts so many emotional altercations with an overreaction.
Like in that episode of Star Trek where Lazarus was left fighting with himself for eternity, the years of sparring a sufferer lives through with their NPD trains them well. They know how to invalidate the feelings of others.
This is why the Puppet metaphor fits so well for a person under NPD. You think you're talking with a reasonable person. After all, they've got that great degree in physics or medicine - they must be open to reasonable debate, you think.
Wrong.
When you try to reason with them, you will get yourself caught up in their puppet strings, and if you are not careful, will get sucked into their whole messy psycho world. That is -- if you are like most people -- if you have empathic skills.
Since my own experience with a boss under the influence of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, I have had a lot of sympathy for anyone who has a relationship with such a person. Alcoholism is a far better understood illness than NPD, but the diseases have a lot in common. An alcoholic is not in control - his addiction is in control. With NPD, it is the same thing. A person with NPD is addicted to his Narcissistic Supply (NS). At least with alcoholism, they go to the bottle to get their next fix, but with NPD, it is more insidious: they come to you, to drink your spiritual reserves.
When that day comes and you wake up to what you are up against, you must keep reminding yourself that you have not been living with a person - that person has been kidnapped - you have been living with an addiction. I've never been to an Al-Anon meeting (Al-Anon is for the spouses or significant others of alcoholics), but I'll bet any money this is what they talk of a lot of the time: recovering from the damage caused to them by investing in the non-relationship.
Lack of Empathy - the signature of a person under NPD
Somewhere in their past, a person under NPD was left out in the cold. They were neglected in some way that left them hurt and feeling abandoned. Not in a physical sense, but more likely in a way that suggested they were unworthy of love. It might have been their career-conscious parents (or parent) or it could have been triggered by an event or series of events. Instead of growing up emotionally in a more or less normal way, the person under the influence of NPD somehow got "stuck" at an early stage of emotional development.
It is normal for a baby to think they are the center of the universe. It is normal for a seven year old not to fully connect with the teary-eyed adults surrounding the casket of their grandfather. But babies and kids grow up. They grow to learn the emotion of empathy; they grow to take on the adult burden of supporting others in the community, the family and the relationships around them. Persons under NPD are blind to empathy. Sure, they are masters at faking it, but they just cannot feel it. They know how to make themselves look like they're connecting, complete with speeches from the heart and teary-eyed funeral orations. But they are in the game for themselves alone. When you understand that about people who have the disorder, you begin to understand just how vulnerable you are when such a person is close. And you begin to understand how important it is for you to get away from them.
The Long Shadow
There's a great book by an author couple, Friel and Friel titled "Adult Children: the secrets of dysfunctional families" ISBN 978-0932194534. The book is a quick read and is a real eye-opener. It contains a story of a mythical family of ducks that eked out a living on a pond. One duck ventured to another pond to find the water clean and pure. He returned to the pond of origin with the good news and to his surprise, his duck family turned upon him. How dare he suggest there was something wrong with the pond!
Well, the duck left for the new, clean pond. The old duck family readjusted without him. Eventually, another of his duck siblings got sick and followed in his brother's footsteps. And so, the second duck became the new target of abuse. And so on.
It is a tough choice to go against everyone on your own path away from the toxic pond.
Why am I mentioning this story?
When you make a break from the toxic pond -- where the person under the control of NPD exists -- you can expect negative consequences. Those you leave behind may well turn upon you, especially if you leave with the message that the pond is toxic. You will be made out to be the villain. Get ready for that. In the "you scratch my back, I scratch yours" career world we live in, it is certainly difficult to "go public" on your boss' (or ex-boss) mental illness. With NPD, this problem will be particularly acute, because of how Narcissists deal with a challenge to their egotistical Godlike view of themselves.
You may quietly find another job and "slip away in the night", but if there's one thing a Narcissist really detests is to be ignored. Remember, you were once a supplier of their NS (Narcissitic Supply). They'll find a way to get a message to you to try to draw you back in. The message might be positive or it might be negative. The message might be positive at first, and then, if that doesn't get you running back to them, the message may turn negative. Make no mistake. It's a trap. They are the spider and you are the fly.
You are not alone
A lot of the time, I thought, maybe I am imagining all this. Maybe life is supposed to be this hard. I'm feeling this way because there is something wrong with me. You will have those feelings too.
Then one day, you get a phone call. It might be two months after you have finally broken away from the narcissist, but more likely, it will be years. Likely, your narcissist has been visiting pain upon different people years before you met him and since. But some day, you will get that phone call, or you'll bump into someone they also affected. It might be the broken-hearted ex-spouse of the narcissist, a son, another business partner, or a casual acquaintance of his. But their story and your story will match better than the Gabor twins. And when you hear their story, a soothing wave of affirmation will wash over you and a lot of self-doubt will dissipate.
You see, NPD is a specific disease, not a random oddity that makes each sufferer behave is random ways. Its causes, boundaries, stages and effects are well researched and understood. Folks under the influence of NPD behave, ironically, in a predictable way in terms of the disease (not in terms of healthy human behavior).
The disease survives, in part, by making those around it question themselves (a healthy reaction), but meeting another person who had such a similar experience to yours will bring with it a lot of healing.
Keep your eye out for it. In time, that person or persons will show up.
Moving on from the pain...
Eventually, though, you have to move on. As you have probably learned, it is indeed difficult to break away from the Narcissist. It would be easier if there were visible bruises to be seen by everyone around you, as a testament to the suffering that was visited upon you. But no, a person under the influence of NPD leaves no visible scars or bruises on his victims. All of the pain is inside of you. Sometimes even your closest loved ones will stand back in disbelief as you try to explain what you have experienced. But your pain is as real as a sunrise.
So how do you move beyond it and get your life back? You've spent a chunk of your life working or living with this person who is under the influence of NPD and you do want your life back, don't you?
Well, let's look at the four basic stages you, the VoNPD (Victim of Narcissistic Personality Disorder), usually goes through during recovery. To spell out what I feel is the most important step for you, I have added a fifth stage.
The fifth stage is Forgiveness. Forgiveness is the step that finally severs from you that which hurt you so much. Before you get upset by my suggesting you forgive, read on...
I believe that forgivenesses are queued up, not presented to you to be cherry-picked those which you wish to process on a given day, leaving some never to be dealt with. In other words, if you don't forgive your alcoholic father for the abuse he visited upon you, it will be difficult for you to forgive yourself later in life for the mistakes your own mistakes, or to forgive others for the many little hurts they visit upon you on an average day of a normal life.
Forgiving doesn't mean that you call them on the phone and tell them "I forgive you" or send them flowers with a little card to tell them how you feel. No, forgiveness is a gift you give to yourself. A corollary of this axiom is the famous quote "resentment is a poison you ingest expecting someone else to fall ill".
Forgiving doesn't mean forgetting. Forgiving is a personal decision you make inside your heart to stop pointing an emotional finger inside your head at the person who has hurt you. It does not diminish in the slightest from the evil the other person has visited upon you.
There are many ways to forgive. With some people it simply a private thought, while others might talk to their friends at length about their forgiveness. Others go to church and pray their forgiveness in a structured way, offering it all up to God to deal with as only God can.
In most cases, forgiveness takes several attempts before you get it right. You might consider the first attempts "dress rehearsals" for the real thing. It will likely take a parallel course to your the grieving process you are going through. Give yourself the time, space and iterations to accomplish it, but sooner or later, you must do it. You must do it for yourself.
Love is easy when someone is kind to you, or when your "emotional tank" is full. Loving your spouse is easy when they've bought you a gift, told you how much they appreciate you, or when they look like a million dollars in that new dress. Love is hard when you've been hurt, but the greatest love is what you give even when you are wounded. And it is the single greatest spiritual growth opportunity you will ever be offered.
Love is a measure of you, not a measure of the person you love.
Like forgiveness, love is also a gift which, the more of it you give away, the more of it you have. Strange that, I know. But that is how it seems to work. And forgiving someone is all about love. You don't need to like a person, or want to be with them in order to love them. And it is difficult to truly love one person while you harbor resentment for another, even if the two persons are unconnected.
And so, you must love the person who hurt you. You survived. The one who hurt you is, with little doubt, now working over others in his life. For you to rebuild your own life, you must reach deep into your heart and find empathy for those others like you that have been hurt, and continue to be hurt, by the very same person who hurt you. And you must forgive.
Set aside the resentment, the thoughts of revenge and the Schadenfreude (a German word for pleasure felt at someone else's misfortune). It is forgiveness that will finally, finally set you free of the pain that someone else has visited upon you.
A final note...
If it's all very confusing, and you are skeptical about such amateur psychoanalysis like this and other blogs that can be found on the net, this might help make it all make sense:
A major difference between Attachment and Addiction is that with Attachment, it's just unpleasant having to give the thing up (like a cream cheese bagel with your latte every morning) whereas with Addiction, the addict is not in control; the object of the addiction is in control. (Perhaps that's why they call it the "demon drink"). Worse, the addict is usually not consciously aware of it for a long, long time. Just ask any recovering alcoholic.
With NPD, the object of the addiction is Narcissistic Supply, a beverage every bit as intoxicating to the addict as a fine single malt Scotch is to a drunk.
When you're trying to reason with a Narcissist, you think you're communicating with a human.
You're not.
You're communicating with an addiction.
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For more information, Google'ing "NPD" or "Narcissistic Personality Disorder" will give you more material than you can shake a stick at. Or go read the following page:
http://samvak.tripod.com/faq80.html
Another great source is a well-written blog by a lady recovering from a narcissistic mother. It is remarkable to me just how similar her experiences were to my own with my ex-boss:
http://narcissists-suck.blogspot.com
I particularly like her post on narcissists' Disproportionate Response. It's very encouraging. It is SO LIKE my experience of a narcissist, it reads like she must have known him before she wrote it! Here it is:
http://narcissists-suck.blogspot.com/2007/03/disproportional-responses-or-when-crime.html
Another great resource:
http://narc-attack.blogspot.com
Add a comment, anonymous or otherwise, if you like. Or if you prefer, send me an email at liam.scanlan@gmail.com with your own story and I'll add it if it's G-rated.
Best as always.
Liam
PS - here's an update on May 13, 2007 - a post forwarded to me by a friend:
An interesting perspective from Dr. Paul Minot, a psychiatrist in Waterville, Maine George Bush's "irrational" consideration of a "surge" in the wake of the Iraq Study Group report -- which apparently defies all credible counsel-has begun to generate speculation regarding his sanity. References to Bush's "delusions" have appeared in the mainstream media and throughout the blogosphere.
As a psychiatrist, I understandably get concerned when I see clinical terminology bandied about in political discourse, and thought it might be of interest to share a professional perspective on this question. I have a distinct clinical impression that I think explains much of Mr. Bush's visible pathology.
First and foremost, George W. Bush has a Narcissistic Personality Disorder. What this means, is that he has rather desperate insecurities about himself, and compensates by constructing a grandiose self-image. Most of his relationships are either mirroring relationships -- people who flatter him and reinforce his grandiosity -- or idealized self-objects -- people that he himself thinks a lot of, and hence feels flattered by his association with them. Some likely perform both functions. Hence his weakness for sycophants like Harriet Miers, and powerful personalities like Dick Cheney. Even as a narcissist, Bush knows he isn't a great intellect, and compensates by dismissing the value of intellect altogether. Hence his disses of Gore's bookishness, and any other intellectual that isn't flattering him.
Bush knows that his greatest personal strength is projecting personal affability, and tries to utilize it even in the most inappropriate settings. That's why he gives impromptu backrubs to the German Chancellor in a diplomatic meeting -- he's insecure intellectually, and tries to make everyone into a "buddy" so he can feel more secure. The most disturbing aspect about narcissists, however, is their pathological inability to empathize with others, with the exception of those who either mirror them, or whom they idealize. Hence Bush's horrifying insensitivity to the Katrina victims, his callous jokes when visiting grievously injured soldiers, and numerous other instances. He simply has no capacity to feel for others in that way. When LBJ was losing Vietnam, he developed a haunted expression that anybody could recognize as indicative of underlying anguish. For all his faults, you just knew he was losing sleep over it. By the same token, we know just as well that Bush isn't losing any sleep over dead American soldiers, to say nothing of dead Iraqis. He didn't exhibit any sign of significant concern until his own political popularity was sliding --because THAT'S something he CAN feel. Which brings us to his recent "delusion."
To be blunt, I don't see any indication that Bush has any sort of psychotic disorder whatsoever. The lapses in reality-testing that he exhibits are the sort that can be readily explained by his characterological insensitivity to the feelings and perceptions of others, due to his persistently self-centered frame of reference. Mr. Bush knows that things aren't going his way in Iraq, and he knows that it is damaging him politically. He also sees that it is likely to get worse no matter what he does, and in fact it may be a lost cause. However, he recognizes that if he follows the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, that Iraq will almost certainly evolve into a puppet state of Iran, and given his treatment of Iran he will completely lose control of the situation -- and he will be politically discredited for this outcome. The ONLY chance that he has to avoid this political disaster, and save his political skin, is to hope agai nst hope for "victory" in Iraq.
Advancing the "surge" idea offers Bush two political advantages over following the ISG recommendations. One is that if it is implemented, maybe, just maybe, he can pull out some sort of nominal "victory" out of the situation. The chances are exceedingly slim, granted, but slim is better to him than the alternative (none). Alternately, if the "surge" is politically rejected, he gains some political cover, so when things inevitably go bad, he can say "I told you so" and blame the "surrender monkeys" for the outcome. Most people probably won't buy it, but some (his core base) will.
Now, I know what many of you are thinking -- is George Bush willing to risk the lives of hundreds, maybe thousands more American soldiers, on an outside chance to save his political skin, in a half-baked plan that even he knows probably won't work at all? Yes, he is. Because George Bush is that narcissistic, that desperate, and yes, that sociopathic as well.
Especially interesting about Mr. Bush, but quite common, Narcissistic Personality Disorder is frequently associated with alcoholism. The insufferable "holier than thou" attitude associated with "Dry Drunk Syndrome" is indicative of underlying narcissism. Also, the way that Bush embraces Christianity is characteristically narcissistic. Rather than incorporating the lessons of humility and empathy modeled by Jesus, Bush uses his Christian faith to reinforce his grandiosity. Jesus is his powerful ally, his idealized "buddy" who gives a rubber stamp to anything he thinks.
Finally -- and this will sound VERY familiar to many readers -- those persons with NPD are notoriously unable to say they're sorry. Admitting error is fundamentally incompatible with their precarious efforts to maintain their sense of order. Anyone having this particular character flaw almost certainly has NPD.
ALLAN SCHNAIBERG Professor of Sociology & Faculty Associate,
Institute for Policy Research Northwestern University
1812 Chicago Avenue, room 108
Evanston, IL 60208
About two months into having my new boss, it started. At first, I thought, oops, he just got really upset about this little issue ... I didn't understand exactly why he lost his temper so unexpectedly, but heck, everyone has their bad days.Full disclosure:
I'm not a shrink. This article is just for my own sense of closure and perhaps to offer an indicator to other readers out there who have experienced something similar. And as a human, I'm naturally biased.
And I could be dead wrong about everything.
At the time, I didn't understand what was happening when my new boss lost it over something seemingly small, and lashed out at the two people close by. It wasn't until years later that I would understand that my boss suffered from a condition called Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). Of course, there's always the chance that I'm imaging it, or that I am over-sensitive, or that I'm just plain nuts myself or perhaps all of the above. And as I've said, I'm not a shrink so take my words at face value.
Let's go into the details of what I have learned about how NPD works.
A close friend of mine recently celebrated twelve years off the drink. He attends AA meetings every week and manages the challenge of staying sober very well. He knows he is just a single malt Scotch way from wrecking the great life he has rebuilt for himself and his family in the last dozen years. He says jokingly, but in all seriousness at the same time, "alcoholics don't have friends; they have hostages".
I would add to that: People don't have alcoholism; alcoholism has people.
The same is true of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, Bi-polar disorder, Borderline Personality disorder and God knows how many other conditions. People don't have NPD; NPD has people.Narcissist Personality Disorder does not leave such concrete evidence around like empty bottles, mysterious car dents, drunk-driving charges or visibly injured spouses. No, it feeds on the less concrete aspects of our lives. Damage is visited upon the people around NPD sufferers, and the behavior of the NPD sufferer is explained away using countless plausible rationalizations.
To help my own understanding, I have come up with a metaphor for the disorder and the person who is afflicted by it. The metaphor is one of a puppeteer (the disorder itself) and a puppet (the person with the disorder).
Let's explore the puppet metaphor to help understand how Narcissistic Personality Disorder works.
The puppet metaphor illustrates what I believe is the salient challenge of NPD for those people around it: you think you are dealing directly with a person, but you are not. Instead, you are dealing with someone under the control of NPD. Once I woke up to that basic fact some years ago, everything made sense. It was like a light went on in a dark room and suddenly I knew what I was up against and what I needed to do.
Here is what I have read about and experienced first hand.
The person with Narcissistic Personality Disorder:
- Lacks the ability to empathize. They can fake it on and off, but if you have enough exposure to the person, eventually you will see this pattern clearly. They may show zero emotion when hearing news of, for example, deep suffering of huge numbers of people.
- Loves attention, even bad attention. At one point, several of us in the office challenged our NPD boss with his behavior. We did it in a meeting. There were about eight of us there, and those of us who didn't know what we were about to do were visible shocked, even by our super-polite and respectful way of confronting the boss. Well, he just soaked it up. Now that he was the center of attention, again, among all these people, he astounded me with just how much he was enjoying himself. He was like a 7 year old who becomes exhilarated about the shocked reaction of his parents to something he had done wrong.
- As psychiatrist Thom Hartmann says, they "Kiss up and Kick Down", meaning they are incapable of having truly healthy relationships. They regard other humans as a kind of resource to be used for their own ends. People they have relationships with become part of their "pyramid marketing scheme downline".
- Loathes himself. Extensive research shows that NPD is rooted in denied love at the very early stage of the sufferer's life, and they spend the rest of their life devouring others in a futile attempt to fill this void.
- Goes from incredible highs to deep lows. When they are high, they might not be able to stop talking. When they are low, they struggle to say good morning.
- May fly into a rage at the slightest provocation on some days. And at other times, they seem impervious even to the most brutal attack. They might stay awake all night wrestling with a single innocuous thing you said to them the day before, and then launch at you the next day with some bizarre logical conclusion of it.
- When you challenge their behavior, you may quickly move from Friend to Enemy. Sufferers of NPD think in black-and-white terms. You are either "with them or against them".
- Ultimately, they are at the center of the universe. Just like an alcoholic, they will risk a lot to get their next fix.
- Their relationships with newcomers go through three stages that I have identified: (1) Enchantment to (2) Disenchantment to (3) Contempt. They might hire someone believing that the new arrival is the cure for the organization's ills (Enchantment stage), but soon, when the new arrival is discovered to be less than perfect, or when they discover the new person does not adore them, the NPD sufferer becomes disillusioned (the Disenchantment stage), sometimes overnight, as they flip from one extreme to the other. A justification process follows which leads to the NPD sufferer writing off the new person (the Contempt stage). They may go directly to the Contempt stage if the new person show no signs of adoration or reverence early on.
- Often respond in the opposite way to what you might expect. My boss fired who was at the the top performer at the company. This top performer became a serious threat and was, because of his outstanding work, took some of the spotlight away from his boss. Even though the boss had a LOT to gain by keeping this star onboard, the threat of distraction away from a Narcissist can be an overwhelming threat and must be eliminated at all costs.
- They are attracted to positions of power and particularly those where their decisions are rarely questioned. They regard themselves as "the decider". They often just don't get that others may have a contribution to make to the decision process. You can see that in their language. They talk as if they have the facts. They begin sentences like this "the reality is..." and "the fact is..." and so on.
- NPD starts early and its sufferers have over decades developed an impressive range of dis-empowerment skills, from "you are being too sensitive" to talk about a person being a "good person" or a "bad person". (Who are they to judge!).
- They are masters at setting one person against another, and they construct a culture of distrust and hostility.
- They always believe they are right. I find that part ironic, considering they loathe themselves so much. My belief is that the intense arrogance on the surface mirrors the "self loathing" beneath the surface.
There are plenty of people out there who have suffered at the hands of a Narcissist, and extensive research has been done to help you identify it. The Internet is awash with anecdotes, life stories, remedies and the results of research. It is called a disorder because something is broken, not because something is unusual. Don't let others convince you that the person is just "a bit quirky" or "has a bit of an edge". At least be honest with yourself. It doesn't matter what they say, and it also doesn't matter what I say. You have to work it out. One of my favorite places to start reading about the subject is by Joanna M. Ashmun at this location.
The best thing you can do to protect yourself from a Narcissist is to stay away from them. Give it time and Narcissistic Personality Disorder, if you are exposed to it in someone in whom you have personally invested, will hurt you. I guarantee it. It's a slow nibbling-to-death process. First, you're attracted to this striking person because you seem to have so much in common with them, and striking they are, as they weave a web around you. They know exactly how to get attention - they've been perfecting the art since childhood. What's really happening is you are being prepared for dinner. Their dinner. And you are but one of their side-dishes. They don't count how many little folks like you they have consumed over the years. A spider doesn't count the flies he eats and he has no feelings for any of them. The fly is just dinner; that's the fly's place in this world. When you have a relationship with someone under the influence of NPD, you are the fly.
It's very hard to break away from a Narcissist. They've built layers upon layers of dependence upon them. Expect that when you tell your spouse of what is happening at work, he/she may think you are the crazy one. And when you do finally make the break, even if you move state to give yourself some distance from the narcissist, expect trouble.
I remember I got a phone call from the Narcissist some time after I broke away. I saw his number pop up on my cellphone, so I just left it run into voice-mail. He wanted a return call. I never made the return call.
Sure enough, some time later, his message to a close friend of mine, in an effort to send a provocation to one of his ex suppliers (me) of NS (Narcissistic Supply) that I had "lost credibility". Complete fiction of course. If they can't woo you, they'll attack you. Just wait for it.
NPD is a gift that keeps on giving
The apparent preposterousness of what I type here is one of the reasons NPD gets to go on giving for a long, long time. Few will believe believe your story about the Narcissist in your life until they personally get punched in the face by it.
My personal experience of it is that of having had a boss who suffered from it. He was probably a third of the time "high", a third of the time "low" and a third in the middle somewhere, that I could observe.
As my and others' relationships with him evolved over time, I came to see a kind of "ring of fire" around him. If you stayed on the outside of the ring of fire, and some managed to keep that safe distance, you might limit the damage to just being expelled from their life because you did not succumb. But once you moved inside the ring of fire, life changed forever, and you could never return to being on the outside like you used to be. Sometimes, one person "keeping him occupied" allowed others to stay out of the ring and remain relatively safe.
Did you know that lionesses, when they hunt, they pick a single individual prey and they do not deviate from that particular animal until it is either taken down or the hunt is abandoned? Someone under the influence of NPD hunts like that. Once they have identified you as a source of NS (Narcissistic Supply), you're as good as dead. That is, if you hang around long enough.
I remember once where a male employee and he were apparently writing poetry to each other on the last day of the quarter close. From the outside, it was like they were in love or something. Yes, the boss was in love with himself and the marketing guy was playing along. The latter was a seasoned player in the almost hypnotic skill of keeping someone's attention, a real political survivor, and the only person I know to have survived that particular ring of fire, at least outwardly.
NPD as fisherman
A fisherman keeps but a loose grip on the great salmon after the fish has bitten down on the bait. He lets the fish tire out for a while before finally pulling on the line to secure the fishhook inside the fish that is holding it.
My friend tells me that alcoholism can give you the illusion for years that you are in control, then one day it yanks on the line and begins to reel in its catch - the problem of alcoholic addition moves in for the final kill - the human.
Alcoholism, and lots of other addictions are, for all their hosts' clever ways of hiding it, once they move into full swing, pretty easy to diagnose. You find empty whiskey bottles around, or tea in that bottle in the liquor cabinet you thought contained whiskey. Perhaps you see some unexplained dents in your spouse's car, or something big and obvious like your loved one getting booked with their third DUI (Driving Under the Influence). The diagnosis is easy then. You have lots of hard evidence. I'm not saying it gets easier from there, and indeed that's only the beginning, but at least you know there is a problem, and the addict can no longer remain in denial to the same degree. And now you are certain you are not imagining all of it.
NPD destroys relationships, trust, and often whole families, yet still gets to continue in full swing, for a long, long time. There are no empty bottles to point to, no dirty syringes, no black eyes, or unexplained bruises on someone's arm. A person under the control of NPD can behave perfectly normally one moment, just as the puppet sits quietly in the puppet chair while the strings remain loose, then unexpectedly and suddenly, it can turn on you as if you had committed some great crime against them.
One of the hardest things to deal with is that the person under the influence of NPD, while they might believe outwardly that they are "a bit quirky" or "special" or in some way different that gives them permission to behave like they do, the denial around NPD is extraordinary. You simply will never, I mean never, get through to a person with NPD about their condition. They will never admit to having a problem with these kind of symptoms.
Remember, an alcoholic has to wake up in a pool of his own vomit in a police station, after having lost his wife, kids, friends and career, before the denial begins to break down. Even if his "higher self" knows there is a problem, his ego needs to lie in the gutter a few times before the long journey of recovery can begin.
NPD can remain undiagnosed for a long time, because there's no pool of vomit to wake a guy up. I have never heard of a case of a recovering Narcissist. He is about as likely to get treatment for NPD as a fox is likely to look after the safety of the hen house. The fox's job is to eat chickens, and he'll never see anything wrong in doing it.
The Puppet Knows he is a Puppet
I believe that a person under the control of NPD, deep down, knows that something is wrong; that something is very wrong. Their "higher self" knows. Often, and perhaps this is their real curse, such a person is very intelligent. They are good at working things out, and they know something is definitely awry - but they are just the puppet, not the puppeteer - so it continues.
In my experience of working for a narcissist, there were countless situations like this. I remember in the middle of an average meeting with about six of us in the room, my boss just lost it. For some small little thing that was annoying him, he flung a wad of papers at one of my colleagues, from behind I might add. I got the shock of my life - I never saw it coming - but my shock was nothing to the obvious shock of my boss who had lost it. His own action had so frightened him more than anyone else in the room. His own fright told me that he, the person not the disorder, had completely lost control for that moment, because doing so in front of six individuals risked exposing the problem, so he would not have done it deliberately. Everyone missed the undercurrent.
He escaped one more time.
Within about thirty seconds of his explosion, he was displaying a level of apologetic obsequiousness that I have never seen in my life. He didn't apologize. He just behaved as if he knew he had done something terribly wrong. He went from being downright hostile to being super-friendly in a matter of seconds. It was a sight to behold, and showed just how tough it must be to be under the control of NPD when it pulls tightly on the strings.
The Nice Man, The Bully and the Friend.
Imagine a chap by the name of Joe Smith. Joe shares a flat with a bully by the name of Biff. One evening, Joe is entertaining a close friend in the living room and Biff in the kitchen overhears something Joe's friend says in the living room. Biff immediately takes grave offense, storms into the living room in a rage and verbally abuses Joe's friend who gets up to leave because he is deeply hurt from the unexpected verbal assault. Joe sits there in shock about what has just happened. Biff goes upstairs to sleep it off while Joe gets to pick up the pieces, apologizing profusely for his flat mate's outrageous behavior, perhaps even descending into a degree of denial about it all.
Joe is just a regular guy like you or me, Biff is the ever-controlling NPD he suffers from, and Friend is anyone Joe has a relationship with.
NPD is like an unpredictable flat-mate. It might leave the sufferer alone for periods of time, days or sometimes weeks, but it always returns. Just when it looks like it's not really there anymore, it marches into the room and beats your friend up.
NPD will try to invalidate the feelings of those it hurts
"You're too sensitive" is a common attempt at invalidation used by a person under the influence of NPD. They try to invalidate what you are feeling by saying you are "over-reacting" to what has happened. Ironic, really, because the person under NPD starts so many emotional altercations with an overreaction.
Like in that episode of Star Trek where Lazarus was left fighting with himself for eternity, the years of sparring a sufferer lives through with their NPD trains them well. They know how to invalidate the feelings of others.
This is why the Puppet metaphor fits so well for a person under NPD. You think you're talking with a reasonable person. After all, they've got that great degree in physics or medicine - they must be open to reasonable debate, you think.
Wrong.
When you try to reason with them, you will get yourself caught up in their puppet strings, and if you are not careful, will get sucked into their whole messy psycho world. That is -- if you are like most people -- if you have empathic skills.
Since my own experience with a boss under the influence of Narcissistic Personality Disorder, I have had a lot of sympathy for anyone who has a relationship with such a person. Alcoholism is a far better understood illness than NPD, but the diseases have a lot in common. An alcoholic is not in control - his addiction is in control. With NPD, it is the same thing. A person with NPD is addicted to his Narcissistic Supply (NS). At least with alcoholism, they go to the bottle to get their next fix, but with NPD, it is more insidious: they come to you, to drink your spiritual reserves.
When that day comes and you wake up to what you are up against, you must keep reminding yourself that you have not been living with a person - that person has been kidnapped - you have been living with an addiction. I've never been to an Al-Anon meeting (Al-Anon is for the spouses or significant others of alcoholics), but I'll bet any money this is what they talk of a lot of the time: recovering from the damage caused to them by investing in the non-relationship.
Lack of Empathy - the signature of a person under NPD
Somewhere in their past, a person under NPD was left out in the cold. They were neglected in some way that left them hurt and feeling abandoned. Not in a physical sense, but more likely in a way that suggested they were unworthy of love. It might have been their career-conscious parents (or parent) or it could have been triggered by an event or series of events. Instead of growing up emotionally in a more or less normal way, the person under the influence of NPD somehow got "stuck" at an early stage of emotional development.
It is normal for a baby to think they are the center of the universe. It is normal for a seven year old not to fully connect with the teary-eyed adults surrounding the casket of their grandfather. But babies and kids grow up. They grow to learn the emotion of empathy; they grow to take on the adult burden of supporting others in the community, the family and the relationships around them. Persons under NPD are blind to empathy. Sure, they are masters at faking it, but they just cannot feel it. They know how to make themselves look like they're connecting, complete with speeches from the heart and teary-eyed funeral orations. But they are in the game for themselves alone. When you understand that about people who have the disorder, you begin to understand just how vulnerable you are when such a person is close. And you begin to understand how important it is for you to get away from them.
"Complete possession is proved only by giving. All you are unable to give possesses you. "
- Andre Gide
[a blog entry relating to empathy]- Andre Gide
The Long Shadow
There's a great book by an author couple, Friel and Friel titled "Adult Children: the secrets of dysfunctional families" ISBN 978-0932194534. The book is a quick read and is a real eye-opener. It contains a story of a mythical family of ducks that eked out a living on a pond. One duck ventured to another pond to find the water clean and pure. He returned to the pond of origin with the good news and to his surprise, his duck family turned upon him. How dare he suggest there was something wrong with the pond!
Well, the duck left for the new, clean pond. The old duck family readjusted without him. Eventually, another of his duck siblings got sick and followed in his brother's footsteps. And so, the second duck became the new target of abuse. And so on.
It is a tough choice to go against everyone on your own path away from the toxic pond.
Why am I mentioning this story?
When you make a break from the toxic pond -- where the person under the control of NPD exists -- you can expect negative consequences. Those you leave behind may well turn upon you, especially if you leave with the message that the pond is toxic. You will be made out to be the villain. Get ready for that. In the "you scratch my back, I scratch yours" career world we live in, it is certainly difficult to "go public" on your boss' (or ex-boss) mental illness. With NPD, this problem will be particularly acute, because of how Narcissists deal with a challenge to their egotistical Godlike view of themselves.
You may quietly find another job and "slip away in the night", but if there's one thing a Narcissist really detests is to be ignored. Remember, you were once a supplier of their NS (Narcissitic Supply). They'll find a way to get a message to you to try to draw you back in. The message might be positive or it might be negative. The message might be positive at first, and then, if that doesn't get you running back to them, the message may turn negative. Make no mistake. It's a trap. They are the spider and you are the fly.
You are not alone
A lot of the time, I thought, maybe I am imagining all this. Maybe life is supposed to be this hard. I'm feeling this way because there is something wrong with me. You will have those feelings too.
Then one day, you get a phone call. It might be two months after you have finally broken away from the narcissist, but more likely, it will be years. Likely, your narcissist has been visiting pain upon different people years before you met him and since. But some day, you will get that phone call, or you'll bump into someone they also affected. It might be the broken-hearted ex-spouse of the narcissist, a son, another business partner, or a casual acquaintance of his. But their story and your story will match better than the Gabor twins. And when you hear their story, a soothing wave of affirmation will wash over you and a lot of self-doubt will dissipate.
You see, NPD is a specific disease, not a random oddity that makes each sufferer behave is random ways. Its causes, boundaries, stages and effects are well researched and understood. Folks under the influence of NPD behave, ironically, in a predictable way in terms of the disease (not in terms of healthy human behavior).
The disease survives, in part, by making those around it question themselves (a healthy reaction), but meeting another person who had such a similar experience to yours will bring with it a lot of healing.
Keep your eye out for it. In time, that person or persons will show up.
Moving on from the pain...
Eventually, though, you have to move on. As you have probably learned, it is indeed difficult to break away from the Narcissist. It would be easier if there were visible bruises to be seen by everyone around you, as a testament to the suffering that was visited upon you. But no, a person under the influence of NPD leaves no visible scars or bruises on his victims. All of the pain is inside of you. Sometimes even your closest loved ones will stand back in disbelief as you try to explain what you have experienced. But your pain is as real as a sunrise.
So how do you move beyond it and get your life back? You've spent a chunk of your life working or living with this person who is under the influence of NPD and you do want your life back, don't you?
Well, let's look at the four basic stages you, the VoNPD (Victim of Narcissistic Personality Disorder), usually goes through during recovery. To spell out what I feel is the most important step for you, I have added a fifth stage.
- Stage 1 - Denial: You may know there is a problem in the relationship, but you are still entangled in it and you are still in pain. You've come up with some great rationalizations for keeping the status quo, for example ,"I need to keep my salary coming in" or "I'm staying with him for the sake of the kids" or "It's just me - I'm too sensitive".
- Stage 2 - Anger: You have physically broken out of the relationship (you've moved out, or kicked him out, or you've got a new job) and are beginning to see just how much wreckage there is around you. You're angry with the person and angry with yourself.
- Stage 3 - Sadness: It might even result in a degree of depression or any of a host of grieving and mourning emotions, and possibly even physical symptoms.
- Stage 4 - Acceptance: You understand the extent of what has happened in your life, and you have made some good progress in grieving the person, the relationship and a host of expectations surrounding all of it. With luck, there is no permanent damage to your physical, emotional, mental or spiritual self. You've grown from the whole experience and have made progress building and rebuilding good relationships around you.
The fifth stage is Forgiveness. Forgiveness is the step that finally severs from you that which hurt you so much. Before you get upset by my suggesting you forgive, read on...
I believe that forgivenesses are queued up, not presented to you to be cherry-picked those which you wish to process on a given day, leaving some never to be dealt with. In other words, if you don't forgive your alcoholic father for the abuse he visited upon you, it will be difficult for you to forgive yourself later in life for the mistakes your own mistakes, or to forgive others for the many little hurts they visit upon you on an average day of a normal life.
Forgiving doesn't mean that you call them on the phone and tell them "I forgive you" or send them flowers with a little card to tell them how you feel. No, forgiveness is a gift you give to yourself. A corollary of this axiom is the famous quote "resentment is a poison you ingest expecting someone else to fall ill".
Forgiving doesn't mean forgetting. Forgiving is a personal decision you make inside your heart to stop pointing an emotional finger inside your head at the person who has hurt you. It does not diminish in the slightest from the evil the other person has visited upon you.
There are many ways to forgive. With some people it simply a private thought, while others might talk to their friends at length about their forgiveness. Others go to church and pray their forgiveness in a structured way, offering it all up to God to deal with as only God can.
In most cases, forgiveness takes several attempts before you get it right. You might consider the first attempts "dress rehearsals" for the real thing. It will likely take a parallel course to your the grieving process you are going through. Give yourself the time, space and iterations to accomplish it, but sooner or later, you must do it. You must do it for yourself.
Love is easy when someone is kind to you, or when your "emotional tank" is full. Loving your spouse is easy when they've bought you a gift, told you how much they appreciate you, or when they look like a million dollars in that new dress. Love is hard when you've been hurt, but the greatest love is what you give even when you are wounded. And it is the single greatest spiritual growth opportunity you will ever be offered.
Love is a measure of you, not a measure of the person you love.
Like forgiveness, love is also a gift which, the more of it you give away, the more of it you have. Strange that, I know. But that is how it seems to work. And forgiving someone is all about love. You don't need to like a person, or want to be with them in order to love them. And it is difficult to truly love one person while you harbor resentment for another, even if the two persons are unconnected.
And so, you must love the person who hurt you. You survived. The one who hurt you is, with little doubt, now working over others in his life. For you to rebuild your own life, you must reach deep into your heart and find empathy for those others like you that have been hurt, and continue to be hurt, by the very same person who hurt you. And you must forgive.
Set aside the resentment, the thoughts of revenge and the Schadenfreude (a German word for pleasure felt at someone else's misfortune). It is forgiveness that will finally, finally set you free of the pain that someone else has visited upon you.
A final note...
If it's all very confusing, and you are skeptical about such amateur psychoanalysis like this and other blogs that can be found on the net, this might help make it all make sense:
A major difference between Attachment and Addiction is that with Attachment, it's just unpleasant having to give the thing up (like a cream cheese bagel with your latte every morning) whereas with Addiction, the addict is not in control; the object of the addiction is in control. (Perhaps that's why they call it the "demon drink"). Worse, the addict is usually not consciously aware of it for a long, long time. Just ask any recovering alcoholic.
With NPD, the object of the addiction is Narcissistic Supply, a beverage every bit as intoxicating to the addict as a fine single malt Scotch is to a drunk.
When you're trying to reason with a Narcissist, you think you're communicating with a human.
You're not.
You're communicating with an addiction.
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For more information, Google'ing "NPD" or "Narcissistic Personality Disorder" will give you more material than you can shake a stick at. Or go read the following page:
http://samvak.tripod.com/faq80.html
Another great source is a well-written blog by a lady recovering from a narcissistic mother. It is remarkable to me just how similar her experiences were to my own with my ex-boss:
http://narcissists-suck.blogspot.com
I particularly like her post on narcissists' Disproportionate Response. It's very encouraging. It is SO LIKE my experience of a narcissist, it reads like she must have known him before she wrote it! Here it is:
http://narcissists-suck.blogspot.com/2007/03/disproportional-responses-or-when-crime.html
Another great resource:
http://narc-attack.blogspot.com
Add a comment, anonymous or otherwise, if you like. Or if you prefer, send me an email at liam.scanlan@gmail.com with your own story and I'll add it if it's G-rated.
Best as always.
Liam
PS - here's an update on May 13, 2007 - a post forwarded to me by a friend:
An interesting perspective from Dr. Paul Minot, a psychiatrist in Waterville, Maine George Bush's "irrational" consideration of a "surge" in the wake of the Iraq Study Group report -- which apparently defies all credible counsel-has begun to generate speculation regarding his sanity. References to Bush's "delusions" have appeared in the mainstream media and throughout the blogosphere.
As a psychiatrist, I understandably get concerned when I see clinical terminology bandied about in political discourse, and thought it might be of interest to share a professional perspective on this question. I have a distinct clinical impression that I think explains much of Mr. Bush's visible pathology.
First and foremost, George W. Bush has a Narcissistic Personality Disorder. What this means, is that he has rather desperate insecurities about himself, and compensates by constructing a grandiose self-image. Most of his relationships are either mirroring relationships -- people who flatter him and reinforce his grandiosity -- or idealized self-objects -- people that he himself thinks a lot of, and hence feels flattered by his association with them. Some likely perform both functions. Hence his weakness for sycophants like Harriet Miers, and powerful personalities like Dick Cheney. Even as a narcissist, Bush knows he isn't a great intellect, and compensates by dismissing the value of intellect altogether. Hence his disses of Gore's bookishness, and any other intellectual that isn't flattering him.
Bush knows that his greatest personal strength is projecting personal affability, and tries to utilize it even in the most inappropriate settings. That's why he gives impromptu backrubs to the German Chancellor in a diplomatic meeting -- he's insecure intellectually, and tries to make everyone into a "buddy" so he can feel more secure. The most disturbing aspect about narcissists, however, is their pathological inability to empathize with others, with the exception of those who either mirror them, or whom they idealize. Hence Bush's horrifying insensitivity to the Katrina victims, his callous jokes when visiting grievously injured soldiers, and numerous other instances. He simply has no capacity to feel for others in that way. When LBJ was losing Vietnam, he developed a haunted expression that anybody could recognize as indicative of underlying anguish. For all his faults, you just knew he was losing sleep over it. By the same token, we know just as well that Bush isn't losing any sleep over dead American soldiers, to say nothing of dead Iraqis. He didn't exhibit any sign of significant concern until his own political popularity was sliding --because THAT'S something he CAN feel. Which brings us to his recent "delusion."
To be blunt, I don't see any indication that Bush has any sort of psychotic disorder whatsoever. The lapses in reality-testing that he exhibits are the sort that can be readily explained by his characterological insensitivity to the feelings and perceptions of others, due to his persistently self-centered frame of reference. Mr. Bush knows that things aren't going his way in Iraq, and he knows that it is damaging him politically. He also sees that it is likely to get worse no matter what he does, and in fact it may be a lost cause. However, he recognizes that if he follows the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, that Iraq will almost certainly evolve into a puppet state of Iran, and given his treatment of Iran he will completely lose control of the situation -- and he will be politically discredited for this outcome. The ONLY chance that he has to avoid this political disaster, and save his political skin, is to hope agai nst hope for "victory" in Iraq.
Advancing the "surge" idea offers Bush two political advantages over following the ISG recommendations. One is that if it is implemented, maybe, just maybe, he can pull out some sort of nominal "victory" out of the situation. The chances are exceedingly slim, granted, but slim is better to him than the alternative (none). Alternately, if the "surge" is politically rejected, he gains some political cover, so when things inevitably go bad, he can say "I told you so" and blame the "surrender monkeys" for the outcome. Most people probably won't buy it, but some (his core base) will.
Now, I know what many of you are thinking -- is George Bush willing to risk the lives of hundreds, maybe thousands more American soldiers, on an outside chance to save his political skin, in a half-baked plan that even he knows probably won't work at all? Yes, he is. Because George Bush is that narcissistic, that desperate, and yes, that sociopathic as well.
Especially interesting about Mr. Bush, but quite common, Narcissistic Personality Disorder is frequently associated with alcoholism. The insufferable "holier than thou" attitude associated with "Dry Drunk Syndrome" is indicative of underlying narcissism. Also, the way that Bush embraces Christianity is characteristically narcissistic. Rather than incorporating the lessons of humility and empathy modeled by Jesus, Bush uses his Christian faith to reinforce his grandiosity. Jesus is his powerful ally, his idealized "buddy" who gives a rubber stamp to anything he thinks.
Finally -- and this will sound VERY familiar to many readers -- those persons with NPD are notoriously unable to say they're sorry. Admitting error is fundamentally incompatible with their precarious efforts to maintain their sense of order. Anyone having this particular character flaw almost certainly has NPD.
ALLAN SCHNAIBERG Professor of Sociology & Faculty Associate,
Institute for Policy Research Northwestern University
1812 Chicago Avenue, room 108
Evanston, IL 60208
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
Life is a shadow of God's hand
Isn't it amazing just how long it took for humans to work out that the earth revolved round the sun and the moon around the earth, and that the earth was not flat? You'd think, heck it's pretty obvious. Just sit around for enough hours watching the progress of things, and you'd have to work it out eventually. Ascend a high mountain and an educated person (there were always some of them around) would, you'd think, sooner or later, work out that the world was not flat. Once they worked that out, the concept of orbits would be a much easier leap.
Of course, I am speaking from the point of view of having all that knowledge taught to me at an early age, and to have that whole set of physics theories reinforced daily. It's all obvious to me and the rest of us. But until someone presents that "bigger picture" of it all, it's actually very hard to work out, despite the abundance of evidence all round us.
Everyone has watched someone make a "rabbit" shadow puppet using a projector. You see the puppet and you look round to see the hand shapes that made it. Ah ha, you think, that makes sense. For the computer programmers among you, you might say you look at the "source code" of the shadow, and the shadow then makes complete sense.
Have you ever thought about what the first thoughts you will have when you enter the afterlife might be? (Assuming you believe an afterlife awaits us).
The older I get, and the closer I get to the Big Day, the more I think about it. I imagine it might be sort of like "ah ha! Now I understand. Yes, that all makes sense at last! Why wasn't I able to deduce it from all the facts presented to me during my life!" And so on.
You see, our lives and everything we know and see are shadows of God's hand. He lives in many more dimensions than we do, and when that Big Day comes, and you get to see The Hand that makes the shadows, it will all make sense. A shadow is evidence, and perhaps someday someone will prove the shape of The Hand if they get enough such evidence to do the calculations, and on that day we'll all have one of those ah-ha moments.
But right now, we must all be content to be the Shadow.
Of course, I am speaking from the point of view of having all that knowledge taught to me at an early age, and to have that whole set of physics theories reinforced daily. It's all obvious to me and the rest of us. But until someone presents that "bigger picture" of it all, it's actually very hard to work out, despite the abundance of evidence all round us.
Everyone has watched someone make a "rabbit" shadow puppet using a projector. You see the puppet and you look round to see the hand shapes that made it. Ah ha, you think, that makes sense. For the computer programmers among you, you might say you look at the "source code" of the shadow, and the shadow then makes complete sense.
Have you ever thought about what the first thoughts you will have when you enter the afterlife might be? (Assuming you believe an afterlife awaits us).
The older I get, and the closer I get to the Big Day, the more I think about it. I imagine it might be sort of like "ah ha! Now I understand. Yes, that all makes sense at last! Why wasn't I able to deduce it from all the facts presented to me during my life!" And so on.
You see, our lives and everything we know and see are shadows of God's hand. He lives in many more dimensions than we do, and when that Big Day comes, and you get to see The Hand that makes the shadows, it will all make sense. A shadow is evidence, and perhaps someday someone will prove the shape of The Hand if they get enough such evidence to do the calculations, and on that day we'll all have one of those ah-ha moments.
But right now, we must all be content to be the Shadow.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Evidence that an intelligent God exists
People tell me, "hey look at that incredible flower. It's proof that God exists". I never bought into that argument, mostly because, having studied the theory of evolution and having thought about it for decades, evolution satisfies me for having been responsible for beautiful flowers, people and other life; at least, as far as evolving from a bacterium to a flower over billions of years is concerned.
What I do struggle with on a daily basis is how the universe appears to be architected. Just when it looks like all new ideas are accounted for and all possible inventions have been filed at the patent office, the universe laughs, opens a door and introduces us to another wave of possibilities.
For the universe to have simply "fallen together" in such a way is simply too much of a stretch for me.
On the one hand, there is a handful of "rules" to constrain what we do: the speed of light, gravity, equal and opposite reactions, etc., etc.. Then on the other hand, there appears to be no end of ways to mold plastic, write poetry or bore people with blogs on the Internet.
Whatever clever gadget you create, even when you think no one can do better (or a LOT better), think again. God did not leave you at the edge of the universe. He left you somewhere in the middle, surrounded by an endless ocean of possibilities, too many to contemplate -- to your right, to your left, behind you, above you -- in every direction and every dimension you can think of and then some.
The universe is like some grand existential Lego set, with the letters "GOD" embossed on each protrusion to remind you of where the big toy came from. Your own mind is the only real limiter.
Go invent something. The answers are written in the physics. You just have to look hard enough.
What I do struggle with on a daily basis is how the universe appears to be architected. Just when it looks like all new ideas are accounted for and all possible inventions have been filed at the patent office, the universe laughs, opens a door and introduces us to another wave of possibilities.
For the universe to have simply "fallen together" in such a way is simply too much of a stretch for me.
On the one hand, there is a handful of "rules" to constrain what we do: the speed of light, gravity, equal and opposite reactions, etc., etc.. Then on the other hand, there appears to be no end of ways to mold plastic, write poetry or bore people with blogs on the Internet.
Whatever clever gadget you create, even when you think no one can do better (or a LOT better), think again. God did not leave you at the edge of the universe. He left you somewhere in the middle, surrounded by an endless ocean of possibilities, too many to contemplate -- to your right, to your left, behind you, above you -- in every direction and every dimension you can think of and then some.
The universe is like some grand existential Lego set, with the letters "GOD" embossed on each protrusion to remind you of where the big toy came from. Your own mind is the only real limiter.
Go invent something. The answers are written in the physics. You just have to look hard enough.
Friday, February 16, 2007
The Spirit of a Nation is Either Male or Female
Spirit of a Nation
The stereotypical female spirit is nurturing, contemplative, communicative and empathic. The stereotypical male spirit, on the other hand is competitive, aggressive, penetrating, domineering. On the face of it, that seems like a slam of men everywhere, but both "sides" are needed to keep things in balance. "If women ruled the world", someone once said to me, "we'd still be living in straw huts". That might be true, and I'm not even sure it would be a bad thing, but if men ruled the world, we might have annihilated ourselves by now.
Again, neither polarity is right or wrong. Each simply is.
So, what has all that got to do with nations?
The spirit of a nation is either male or female. It cannot be both. When it tries to be both, it struggles, usually in the form of a civil war, until it decides which it is going to be. Sometimes, a nation can be "forced" to exist in both spiritual realms by a heavy-handed dictatorship or military regime, but it does so under duress for as long as that difficult situation is maintained.
People the world over love their country of origin. It is the love of country by millions of poeple, and the common set of values that goes with it, that creates the spirit of a nation.
The spirit of a nation is a reflection of shared values. Perhaps that is why marriage guidance counselors ask struggling couple early on what their values are. The degree to which a couple struggles might be measured by the degree to which their values differ. In other words, the more two people wan to achieved different goals, the more difficult it will be for them to achieve a common result.
My brother said to me many years ago, you can't tell what a person is thinking by what they say. You can tell what they're thinking by what they are doing.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess which gender each country is. You can tell by its values. Oh, and by the way, not by its stated values, but by it's behavioral values.
Put another way, if you want to know what a person wants to do, just look at what they are doing. If they're working in a tough corporate environment and spend their evening whining about it, remember that they are there because they made (and continue to make) the choice to do so.
Countries that are "male" tend to have had a history of colonialism or other aggressive behavior, but that alone does not make their national spirit "male". Do not simply look at whether women are allowed to vote or not, or whether they have lots of legal protections in place.
A good indicator of which group a nation belongs to is to examine how much familial and community power women have. And don't ask women that question -- countries where women have familial and community power often express that they are disempowered -- you have to look a little deeper that that.
I would argue that the family is the atomic building block of a nation. A family unit may have just one person, or may be a same-sex relationship - that's a family too, or it may be a traditions wife+husband+kids structure.
To see which group a country belongs to, look at how power is brokered within the family, and to do that, you might follow the money.
In Italy, for example, where the men have a reputation for being slapped around by the women folks, look at who controls the family finances. In a "female" nation, it tends to be the woman of the house. The man is not "King" in the house. In a male nation, you often see a type of reverence for the man about the house, and a society where strength, power and control are respected more than nurturing, community and cooperation.
"Male" countries:
Northern Ireland, Palestine/Israel and Iraq are three places where it is being attempted to "mix" the two spirits within the borders of a single country. Remember that a national spirit cannot be both, or at least, cannot maintain a stable nation being both.
The Sunni Arabs of Iraq (if Iraq is still a country when you read this) have more in common, in terms of national spirit, with the Israelis that they do with their fellow countrymen, the Iraqi Shias. Sunnis, if left to their devices, would create a nation with a male spirit. The Shias would create a nation with a female spirit.
The protestants of Northern Ireland? Male. The catholics? Female.
The spirit of the Palestine nation is female. The spirit of the nation of Israel is male.
The national spirit of the United States is male. Before the American civil war, the South was female and the north was male. Their respective values were in conflict. (We can debate which was "right" and which was "wrong" but it doesn't matter for these purposes). Because of the conflict, the north and the south went to war. The north won and the "male" spiritual values of the north prevailed across the land ever since.
And here's my prediction. At some point in the future, the powers within the European Union will try to steer its peoples in one general direction - a direction that is meant to reflect a common and consistent set of spiritual values for the future - the question is, will those values be male or female in character, and what will the people who disagree do?
There is going to be another big fight when they try to make that happen.
The stereotypical female spirit is nurturing, contemplative, communicative and empathic. The stereotypical male spirit, on the other hand is competitive, aggressive, penetrating, domineering. On the face of it, that seems like a slam of men everywhere, but both "sides" are needed to keep things in balance. "If women ruled the world", someone once said to me, "we'd still be living in straw huts". That might be true, and I'm not even sure it would be a bad thing, but if men ruled the world, we might have annihilated ourselves by now.
Again, neither polarity is right or wrong. Each simply is.
So, what has all that got to do with nations?
The spirit of a nation is either male or female. It cannot be both. When it tries to be both, it struggles, usually in the form of a civil war, until it decides which it is going to be. Sometimes, a nation can be "forced" to exist in both spiritual realms by a heavy-handed dictatorship or military regime, but it does so under duress for as long as that difficult situation is maintained.
People the world over love their country of origin. It is the love of country by millions of poeple, and the common set of values that goes with it, that creates the spirit of a nation.
The spirit of a nation is a reflection of shared values. Perhaps that is why marriage guidance counselors ask struggling couple early on what their values are. The degree to which a couple struggles might be measured by the degree to which their values differ. In other words, the more two people wan to achieved different goals, the more difficult it will be for them to achieve a common result.
My brother said to me many years ago, you can't tell what a person is thinking by what they say. You can tell what they're thinking by what they are doing.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess which gender each country is. You can tell by its values. Oh, and by the way, not by its stated values, but by it's behavioral values.
Put another way, if you want to know what a person wants to do, just look at what they are doing. If they're working in a tough corporate environment and spend their evening whining about it, remember that they are there because they made (and continue to make) the choice to do so.
Countries that are "male" tend to have had a history of colonialism or other aggressive behavior, but that alone does not make their national spirit "male". Do not simply look at whether women are allowed to vote or not, or whether they have lots of legal protections in place.
A good indicator of which group a nation belongs to is to examine how much familial and community power women have. And don't ask women that question -- countries where women have familial and community power often express that they are disempowered -- you have to look a little deeper that that.
I would argue that the family is the atomic building block of a nation. A family unit may have just one person, or may be a same-sex relationship - that's a family too, or it may be a traditions wife+husband+kids structure.
To see which group a country belongs to, look at how power is brokered within the family, and to do that, you might follow the money.
In Italy, for example, where the men have a reputation for being slapped around by the women folks, look at who controls the family finances. In a "female" nation, it tends to be the woman of the house. The man is not "King" in the house. In a male nation, you often see a type of reverence for the man about the house, and a society where strength, power and control are respected more than nurturing, community and cooperation.
"Male" countries:
- United Kingdom
- United States
- Germany
- Israel
- Switzerland
- Austria
- Australia
- South Africa
- New Zealand
- Saudi Arabia
- The Netherlands
- Russia
- Ukraine
- Japan
- North Korea
- France
- Italy
- Ireland
- Spain
- Denmark
- Sweden
- Norway
- Finland
- South Korea
- Thailand
- Philippines
Northern Ireland, Palestine/Israel and Iraq are three places where it is being attempted to "mix" the two spirits within the borders of a single country. Remember that a national spirit cannot be both, or at least, cannot maintain a stable nation being both.
The Sunni Arabs of Iraq (if Iraq is still a country when you read this) have more in common, in terms of national spirit, with the Israelis that they do with their fellow countrymen, the Iraqi Shias. Sunnis, if left to their devices, would create a nation with a male spirit. The Shias would create a nation with a female spirit.
The protestants of Northern Ireland? Male. The catholics? Female.
The spirit of the Palestine nation is female. The spirit of the nation of Israel is male.
The national spirit of the United States is male. Before the American civil war, the South was female and the north was male. Their respective values were in conflict. (We can debate which was "right" and which was "wrong" but it doesn't matter for these purposes). Because of the conflict, the north and the south went to war. The north won and the "male" spiritual values of the north prevailed across the land ever since.
And here's my prediction. At some point in the future, the powers within the European Union will try to steer its peoples in one general direction - a direction that is meant to reflect a common and consistent set of spiritual values for the future - the question is, will those values be male or female in character, and what will the people who disagree do?
There is going to be another big fight when they try to make that happen.
Abortion and the Iraq War
What is the connection between abortion and the Iraq War? I'll get to the answer in a moment, but first, I want to talk a bit about how the anti-war crowd feels, at least, as far as I can tell.
By now, most Americans are against the idea of continuing the Iraq War. They probably don't want a precipitous withdrawal, but most folks believe that the war is largely "unwinnable", and that belief is what is driving the thoughts around cutting our losses by doing a controlled pull-out over the next year or so. They'd probably be fine with it if the war was on a course to victory, even with the casualties.
A subset of the anti-war crowd has been against the war since before it ever started. They never trusted the White House's rationale, and they had deep concern that a war could be a huge disaster. Their worst fears were realized over the last four years as the US-led forces across Iraq got themselves stuck in a quagmire that has no apparent end. The anti-war people are deeply saddened by the huge numbers of innocent and military alike who have lost life and limb, and that there seems to be no end in sight.
The Big Thing for this core of anti-war people is the loss of life. They just can't understand why people could ever support it, either four years ago or today. They see the bloodshed and suffering. They ask themselves, Why on earth can't the pro-war crowd see the insanity of this?
My guess is, the "pro-war" crowd are not really thinking about it all that much. It's just not a big thing in their lives. It's an SEP (Someone Else's Problem).
Now, about abortion.
I was listening to a so-called "pro-life" speaker on the radio in my car this morning. He was saying how shocked he was that so many people passively supported abortion despite the clear evidence that so many nameless, innocent humans "suffered a brutal death to accomodate someone else's needs". He was articulate and he reiterated his view that if people just looked at the facts, they'd see how wrong it all was: the rationale, the means, the benefits, the morality, the consequences.
I thought to myself, hey, you could swap out the anti-abortion argument for the anti-war argument and the similarities would be striking. Let's look at the salient characteristics one by one:
Here are the anti-war and the the anti-abortion arguments:
Perhaps it is because I am male, I bought into the ad hominem argument that I had little right to have a strong opinion. Perhaps that is how the Iraq War began and has been allowed to continue for so long: Enough folks just thought it wasn't any of their business. As Edmund Burke once said "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
You've probably guessed that I am among that original anti-war crowd, and for all the reasons listed above.
That chap on the radio sure got me thinking. How can I be anti-war and still on the fence with respect to abortion?
I don't have the answer yet, but I'm working on it...
By now, most Americans are against the idea of continuing the Iraq War. They probably don't want a precipitous withdrawal, but most folks believe that the war is largely "unwinnable", and that belief is what is driving the thoughts around cutting our losses by doing a controlled pull-out over the next year or so. They'd probably be fine with it if the war was on a course to victory, even with the casualties.
A subset of the anti-war crowd has been against the war since before it ever started. They never trusted the White House's rationale, and they had deep concern that a war could be a huge disaster. Their worst fears were realized over the last four years as the US-led forces across Iraq got themselves stuck in a quagmire that has no apparent end. The anti-war people are deeply saddened by the huge numbers of innocent and military alike who have lost life and limb, and that there seems to be no end in sight.
The Big Thing for this core of anti-war people is the loss of life. They just can't understand why people could ever support it, either four years ago or today. They see the bloodshed and suffering. They ask themselves, Why on earth can't the pro-war crowd see the insanity of this?
My guess is, the "pro-war" crowd are not really thinking about it all that much. It's just not a big thing in their lives. It's an SEP (Someone Else's Problem).
Now, about abortion.
I was listening to a so-called "pro-life" speaker on the radio in my car this morning. He was saying how shocked he was that so many people passively supported abortion despite the clear evidence that so many nameless, innocent humans "suffered a brutal death to accomodate someone else's needs". He was articulate and he reiterated his view that if people just looked at the facts, they'd see how wrong it all was: the rationale, the means, the benefits, the morality, the consequences.
I thought to myself, hey, you could swap out the anti-abortion argument for the anti-war argument and the similarities would be striking. Let's look at the salient characteristics one by one:
Here are the anti-war and the the anti-abortion arguments:
- Consequences will be worse that you expect.
- Real humans, who have done nothing wrong, pay the biggest price.
- There are excellent alternatives.
- It looks easy. It isn't.
- It's immoral.
- It's irreversible.
- If it is not done, my/our life/livelihood will be at risk.
- We were violated, so we're fixing the problem.
- I have a right to take control of my circumstances.
- It's for their own good.
Perhaps it is because I am male, I bought into the ad hominem argument that I had little right to have a strong opinion. Perhaps that is how the Iraq War began and has been allowed to continue for so long: Enough folks just thought it wasn't any of their business. As Edmund Burke once said "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."
You've probably guessed that I am among that original anti-war crowd, and for all the reasons listed above.
That chap on the radio sure got me thinking. How can I be anti-war and still on the fence with respect to abortion?
I don't have the answer yet, but I'm working on it...
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
What Republicans have in common
Question: What do Republicans have in common?
Answer: They believe in the concept or "head of household".
For years I have struggled with why on earth a Republican could be a Republican. Democrats are not my favorite bunch either, but Republicanism is a tough sell for me.
Before the Iraq War started, it was a mystery to me why anyone with half a brain could swallow the whole rationale for the war. It just made no sense to me. I wore one of those "Iraq War NO" badges all day every day for an entire year. Some stranger came up to me in a food court, prodded the badge angrily and said to me (talking about himself) "I should have a badge that says Iraq War Yes".
Brain-dead or what.
I replied to him, "but you won't. Because to support the war you simply have to do nothing."
Even if I don't agree with it, I usually understand why someone might do such-and-such in even the oddest of situations, but millions of Americans buying into the war was something I never got my head around.
Then one day, I saw one of those pieces of direct mail on our kitchen table. The first line of the address label read "Head of Household". I thought, "we don't have one". My mother was a feminist (still is) and I'm certainly no head of my new family household, nor do I wish or need to be. And neither is my wife. Or anyone else in the house. (Although my 13-year-old daughter probably thinks she is).
Some folks have a real problem with the notion that one person in a marriage relationship is the "head".
Next time someone tells you that "a man needs to show leadership at home", my money says you've got yourself a Republican. You see, Republicans believe people need to be controlled, managed, led. From speaking on behalf of their family all the way up to deposing dictators who won't get in line, your True Republican thinks domination is the currency of civilization.
The important thing to remember is, a Republican's point of view isn't wrong just because you or I have a problem with. Perhaps the man should be the head. Perhaps people really do need to be snapped back into place when they get out of line. Perhaps the world would fall apart if someone didn't rush in and "take charge".
I think it's baloney.
Just before they outlawed men hitting their wives, there were plenty of folks who thought the family and society would collapse if a man couldn't "slap some sense into the woman". Right before they gave voting rights to women, there were those who said civilization would fall apart if women were allowed to vote.
And by the way, that's the way many talk about hitting/spanking children. "You have to hit children for their own safety" they'll tell you. (You might ask your Republican friends how they feel about spanking).
It's all pretty standard male value stuff. Take control. Be in charge. And the other side of these male values coin is not to question authority. That's the one thing I've noticed a lot of in die-hard Republicans: they have this cowering puppy-like reverence for authority. Either their own authority, or someone else's.
That's why it's easier to support a president making decisions that don't make sense. You see, a Republican does not encourage himself to think too much about the orders coming down; he just has to follow them. Just stick a "Support Our Troops" sticker on the back of your car, and you're a patriot. (I'll do more on bumper stickers in a few weeks.) They think the power needs to, and does come from the top.
It's why there was so much focus on taking out Saddam. Once the "head of the snake" was neutralized, the snake would die.
It's why so much focus is put on so-called "Leaders" of companies, countries and other organizations.
It's why Dr. Phil is called Dr. Phil and not "Nightly Advice Hour". For all the pretense around helping others, the Dr. Phil program is about one thing: Dr. Phil.
It's why so many corporate controlled TV stations (FOX, etc.) name their programs after the main character. When you have a Republican mindset, it's about the Big Guy at the top, and all the little people sucking up to him.
Bring 'em on.
Let's look at the signature of a Republican:
1. Believes in the notion of "Head of Household"
2. Has a blind reverence for authority (either his or someone else's - that's where "I'm the decider" comes from).
3. Believes a man is weak if he is not "above" his wife.
4. Has blind faith in a number of other things, too.
I was at a cocktail party last year, and my wife and I were chatting to a nice Republican couple. (I do mean it. They were decent people). I said "the thing Republicans all have in common is they believe in the notion of Head of Household". Both of them responded at the same time. He said "exactly!" She said "that's not true".
And here's the last little piece of the jigsaw. Republicans believe the Head of Household is not the woman.
Typically domineering male values (and remember women can be just as domineering as the typical man, but they are generally not so) encourage a man to push and shove his way to the "top of the family". Wives often get coaxed into the whole arrangement, perhaps because they are not willing to focus on it or are not willing to duke it out with their husband. Generally speaking, women don't usually see a marriage as a competition.
Next time you're at a cocktail party, if you want to stir up the do-do with some nice Republican couple you know and love, tell them Republicans believe in the notion of Head of Household. My bet: he'll agree; she won't. At the very least, you'll succeed in getting two Republicans to fight among each other.
And that must be worth something.
Answer: They believe in the concept or "head of household".
For years I have struggled with why on earth a Republican could be a Republican. Democrats are not my favorite bunch either, but Republicanism is a tough sell for me.
Before the Iraq War started, it was a mystery to me why anyone with half a brain could swallow the whole rationale for the war. It just made no sense to me. I wore one of those "Iraq War NO" badges all day every day for an entire year. Some stranger came up to me in a food court, prodded the badge angrily and said to me (talking about himself) "I should have a badge that says Iraq War Yes".
Brain-dead or what.
I replied to him, "but you won't. Because to support the war you simply have to do nothing."
Even if I don't agree with it, I usually understand why someone might do such-and-such in even the oddest of situations, but millions of Americans buying into the war was something I never got my head around.
Then one day, I saw one of those pieces of direct mail on our kitchen table. The first line of the address label read "Head of Household". I thought, "we don't have one". My mother was a feminist (still is) and I'm certainly no head of my new family household, nor do I wish or need to be. And neither is my wife. Or anyone else in the house. (Although my 13-year-old daughter probably thinks she is).
Some folks have a real problem with the notion that one person in a marriage relationship is the "head".
Next time someone tells you that "a man needs to show leadership at home", my money says you've got yourself a Republican. You see, Republicans believe people need to be controlled, managed, led. From speaking on behalf of their family all the way up to deposing dictators who won't get in line, your True Republican thinks domination is the currency of civilization.
The important thing to remember is, a Republican's point of view isn't wrong just because you or I have a problem with. Perhaps the man should be the head. Perhaps people really do need to be snapped back into place when they get out of line. Perhaps the world would fall apart if someone didn't rush in and "take charge".
I think it's baloney.
Just before they outlawed men hitting their wives, there were plenty of folks who thought the family and society would collapse if a man couldn't "slap some sense into the woman". Right before they gave voting rights to women, there were those who said civilization would fall apart if women were allowed to vote.
And by the way, that's the way many talk about hitting/spanking children. "You have to hit children for their own safety" they'll tell you. (You might ask your Republican friends how they feel about spanking).
It's all pretty standard male value stuff. Take control. Be in charge. And the other side of these male values coin is not to question authority. That's the one thing I've noticed a lot of in die-hard Republicans: they have this cowering puppy-like reverence for authority. Either their own authority, or someone else's.
That's why it's easier to support a president making decisions that don't make sense. You see, a Republican does not encourage himself to think too much about the orders coming down; he just has to follow them. Just stick a "Support Our Troops" sticker on the back of your car, and you're a patriot. (I'll do more on bumper stickers in a few weeks.) They think the power needs to, and does come from the top.
It's why there was so much focus on taking out Saddam. Once the "head of the snake" was neutralized, the snake would die.
It's why so much focus is put on so-called "Leaders" of companies, countries and other organizations.
It's why Dr. Phil is called Dr. Phil and not "Nightly Advice Hour". For all the pretense around helping others, the Dr. Phil program is about one thing: Dr. Phil.
It's why so many corporate controlled TV stations (FOX, etc.) name their programs after the main character. When you have a Republican mindset, it's about the Big Guy at the top, and all the little people sucking up to him.
Bring 'em on.
Let's look at the signature of a Republican:
1. Believes in the notion of "Head of Household"
2. Has a blind reverence for authority (either his or someone else's - that's where "I'm the decider" comes from).
3. Believes a man is weak if he is not "above" his wife.
4. Has blind faith in a number of other things, too.
I was at a cocktail party last year, and my wife and I were chatting to a nice Republican couple. (I do mean it. They were decent people). I said "the thing Republicans all have in common is they believe in the notion of Head of Household". Both of them responded at the same time. He said "exactly!" She said "that's not true".
And here's the last little piece of the jigsaw. Republicans believe the Head of Household is not the woman.
Typically domineering male values (and remember women can be just as domineering as the typical man, but they are generally not so) encourage a man to push and shove his way to the "top of the family". Wives often get coaxed into the whole arrangement, perhaps because they are not willing to focus on it or are not willing to duke it out with their husband. Generally speaking, women don't usually see a marriage as a competition.
Next time you're at a cocktail party, if you want to stir up the do-do with some nice Republican couple you know and love, tell them Republicans believe in the notion of Head of Household. My bet: he'll agree; she won't. At the very least, you'll succeed in getting two Republicans to fight among each other.
And that must be worth something.
The Power of Spin. Why the White House prefers it to reality
It's all about what my life coach brother calls Consensus Reality. But I'll get back to that a few paragraphs down.
Since it took office, the Administration of George W Bush has been obsessed with spin. From prancing on aircraft carriers to shutting down reporters, they have focused more on how things looked than on how things really were. It was as if they could change reality by simply talking it away with stories from the land of wishful thinking. Perhaps most egregious of all was the denial around the gathering threat of an insurgency with a few months of Bush's crotch-bulge photo op on board the carrier. Instead of tackling the problem head-on from the first day of its appearance, the Bush team thought it a more valuable investment of resources to focus on their "victory".
There is some sense to that strategy. Not a lot, but some. And this is how it works:
Consensus Reality, or "groupthink", is what we humans willingly do when we get together in large numbers. And in many cases, it does lead to reality. If everyone in Australia were to decide tomorrow that Australia was a drive-on-the-right nation, it would become one.
Many things become reality if enough folks are willing to believe. It's the way powerful brands are born and continue to prosper. I guess that's mostly benign. Who really cares if Fairy Liquid is better than Palmolive Detergent.
Other things are not so clearly benign.
Imagine you are working for a weapons manufacturer. Everyone in the company has bought into the noble notion that the weapons are used to defend democracy, protect the innocent and neutralize the enemy. One day, you discover that your employer's products are being used to incinerate civilians in some far away land, perhaps to keep the supply of uranium flowing back to your free country.
The moment you bring it up, you are labeled in some dis-empowering way. The facts might be there for all to see. You might be making complete sense. But it conflicts with Consensus Reality, in which your colleagues have invested a lot over the years, so you get the bullet.
Consensus Reality can reduce empires to rubble, which is what it has done in the past, and it will do again.
Consensus Reality stops a company from creating new products.
Consensus Reality is like a built-in self-destruct system in the human race. It is, after all, easier to believe that Global Warming is not real because it allows you to continue driving to work. Everyone else is doing it, so why not! I'll start taking the bus to work, or I'll buy a hybrid when the proof is in.
So, next time you see someone in your group that seems to be facing a different direction that everyone else in the group is facing, you might turn your head and take a very close look.
OK. end of rant for today.
Since it took office, the Administration of George W Bush has been obsessed with spin. From prancing on aircraft carriers to shutting down reporters, they have focused more on how things looked than on how things really were. It was as if they could change reality by simply talking it away with stories from the land of wishful thinking. Perhaps most egregious of all was the denial around the gathering threat of an insurgency with a few months of Bush's crotch-bulge photo op on board the carrier. Instead of tackling the problem head-on from the first day of its appearance, the Bush team thought it a more valuable investment of resources to focus on their "victory".
There is some sense to that strategy. Not a lot, but some. And this is how it works:
Consensus Reality, or "groupthink", is what we humans willingly do when we get together in large numbers. And in many cases, it does lead to reality. If everyone in Australia were to decide tomorrow that Australia was a drive-on-the-right nation, it would become one.
Many things become reality if enough folks are willing to believe. It's the way powerful brands are born and continue to prosper. I guess that's mostly benign. Who really cares if Fairy Liquid is better than Palmolive Detergent.
Other things are not so clearly benign.
Imagine you are working for a weapons manufacturer. Everyone in the company has bought into the noble notion that the weapons are used to defend democracy, protect the innocent and neutralize the enemy. One day, you discover that your employer's products are being used to incinerate civilians in some far away land, perhaps to keep the supply of uranium flowing back to your free country.
The moment you bring it up, you are labeled in some dis-empowering way. The facts might be there for all to see. You might be making complete sense. But it conflicts with Consensus Reality, in which your colleagues have invested a lot over the years, so you get the bullet.
Consensus Reality can reduce empires to rubble, which is what it has done in the past, and it will do again.
Consensus Reality stops a company from creating new products.
Consensus Reality is like a built-in self-destruct system in the human race. It is, after all, easier to believe that Global Warming is not real because it allows you to continue driving to work. Everyone else is doing it, so why not! I'll start taking the bus to work, or I'll buy a hybrid when the proof is in.
So, next time you see someone in your group that seems to be facing a different direction that everyone else in the group is facing, you might turn your head and take a very close look.
OK. end of rant for today.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Being an entrepreneur is like hiking off-trail.
Imagine yourself hiking through the woods with a big group of people. The trail is well marked, well trodden and everyone feels pretty safe, protected by their numbers and the predictability of the wide, soft-under-foot trail.
Then some crazy idea occurs to you. For some reason, you believe that you might be going around in circles or that the trail leads nowhere - nowhere, at least, you'd ever want to be. You decide to go off-trail. You make a 90-degree turn and head out through the thicket. It's not long before you've picked up a few scratches and bruises as you hack your way through the undergrowth. By the time you've lost sight of the trail, you're breaking quite a sweat. Doubts begin to creep into your mind, your stomach is rumbling and the sun is setting.
That is what it is like during the early stages of being a full-time entrepreneur.
In time, though, some interesting things happen. You develop a knack for avoiding the worst of the briars and other prickly plants. You also notice more fruit, fresh water and perhaps even potential prey. That's because no other sane person has passed this way, perhaps ever. There's nothing like the feeling of eating food you picked up along the way - it sure beats lugging a backpack full of trail snacks for miles.
More time passes and you develop a sense of direction you didn't know you had. Certainly, you probably took a few steps in the wrong direction early on, but now you are beginning to get the hang of your human built-in direction finder. You see, humans have been hunter-gatherers for almost all of their existence. It is only a few thousand years ago that we stopped relying on our instincts for direction; a mere wink of an eye on an anthropological timescale. For most of existence, we humans wandered in search of the next meal. No wonder it is when we master the notion that life really is a journey, that we are most at peace.
More later...
Then some crazy idea occurs to you. For some reason, you believe that you might be going around in circles or that the trail leads nowhere - nowhere, at least, you'd ever want to be. You decide to go off-trail. You make a 90-degree turn and head out through the thicket. It's not long before you've picked up a few scratches and bruises as you hack your way through the undergrowth. By the time you've lost sight of the trail, you're breaking quite a sweat. Doubts begin to creep into your mind, your stomach is rumbling and the sun is setting.
That is what it is like during the early stages of being a full-time entrepreneur.
In time, though, some interesting things happen. You develop a knack for avoiding the worst of the briars and other prickly plants. You also notice more fruit, fresh water and perhaps even potential prey. That's because no other sane person has passed this way, perhaps ever. There's nothing like the feeling of eating food you picked up along the way - it sure beats lugging a backpack full of trail snacks for miles.
More time passes and you develop a sense of direction you didn't know you had. Certainly, you probably took a few steps in the wrong direction early on, but now you are beginning to get the hang of your human built-in direction finder. You see, humans have been hunter-gatherers for almost all of their existence. It is only a few thousand years ago that we stopped relying on our instincts for direction; a mere wink of an eye on an anthropological timescale. For most of existence, we humans wandered in search of the next meal. No wonder it is when we master the notion that life really is a journey, that we are most at peace.
More later...
Saturday, February 10, 2007
The 8 Ingredients of a Portfolio Life
- Follow your passion - Stick to what makes you jump out of bed in the morning, but...
- Keep your day job if it allows you to feed your passion at least a bit every day.
- Be patient - it'll take ten years to get moving.
- Focus on creating value for other people first - Your needs will be met later.
- Cut out all frivolous spending.
- Wear your old socks until they fall apart.
- Keep your car until it dies. Get rid of it if you can live without one.
- Always keep your eye open for a Creative Moment.
Portfolio Living - or how to have a real life
Final result: Communism 0:1 Capitalism
Now what?
Let's face it: there is no longer any such thing as job security - if there ever was.
No, today each of us can be expected to manage our career as if it were its own corporation of sorts. An employee has become, in the eyes of most employers, an interchangeable resource, like a spark-plug in an automobile. In fact, spark-plugs can be expected these days to last longer than the average employee.
The notion of being employed by the same employer your whole life has become more of a fantasy than a reality. Staying with one employer for a few years seems to be the new norm, and while employees used to frown at resumes containing a series of three-year job stints, they look upon them with favor today.
Being an employee in the New Economy is like being homeless; you hang out at one corner for a while, try to fill your pockets, then move on to another corner, living from hand to mouth. And every now and then you get to sleep in a cardboard box.
So, what can you do about it? How can you live a real life under these circumstances?
I have a family, including 4 dependents and three children aged between 7 and 13.
My solution is to build a Portfolio Life.
I begin with a dream of how to live.
My dream life is to not to just work for a single employer, but to generate a modest living by being involved in several different activities, some of which bring in a little cash, others of which feed that part of your soul that are invisible to the Big Corporate Players.
I've made a start. Almost two years ago I started a company called Aqualocks that makes and sells a snap-together kit that protects garden ponds from predators like raccoons and herons.
Last year I wrote two short books, Product Trajectory and From Paper to Plastic. I'm working on a third book, Web 2.0 Revolution, which will be available hopefully some time summer 2007. Beyond that, I have a plan for a calendar and a few other books. And I will always do a little software work on the side.
It's almost impossible to make a living from writing books, that's for sure, but if I succeed in selling a couple of books each week, I will consider it all a major success. To that, I add a modest revenue from my Aqualocks business, and I will be happy to work until the end of my days.
If I can make all this work, I am prepared to cut out a lot of extras, like the occasional new car, fancy clothes and vacations. Tough, of course, but what a life if you can make it happen!
It is already paying some small but real dividends.
I will show you my progress as I make this journey.
Best regards.
Liam Scanlan
February 2007
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