Ego is Good; Checking Yourself for Narcissism

     So I know I do a lot of self-disclosure, both on this blog, and in general in my day to day life. I remember when I was still more active on tumblr seeing posts going around describing how difficult it is to draw the threshold of when you become A Narcissist, versus when you're actually just contributing to a conversation in a healthy way. To this day, I have a difficult time distinguishing where that threshold is. Because of my history and my heritage and background, I feel as though I'm constantly having to check myself for narcissism, because I recognize myself as being liable. I also recognize myself as being somewhat liable to enact problematic behaviors other than simple excessive attention to myself, such as really subtle racism, and previously personally acknowledged misandry. As my view of myself develops, so too does my psychscape, and I'm finding more and more steep slopes and cliffs than I had realized could be present.
     I typically don't view myself as someone with an addictive personality, but on the other hand, I recognize that I am someone who becomes attached rather effectively, and who is prone to obsessions. These aren't terrible characteristics, aside from when those attachments and obsessions fall on other people, which unfortunately tends to be the case.
     Having been raised as the youngest of five children in an arguably broken home, at least for a time, I always had my physical needs met, but after hearing my sister tell me about this book she's reading about attachment and how to cultivate a healthy and appropriate attachment between your child and you (a mother or parent), it finally occurred to me that much of my attachment had been displaced, and that it wasn't at all an overreaction for my to have become so desperately attached to my first serious boyfriend. Everyone in my family was so preoccupied by their own lives--which they had every right to give their attention to, and I don't blame them in any way--that as a toddler, a six through eight year old, and even as a tween and teenager, I had my attachment needs neglected, and I myself, despite how naive and ignorant I was, did my best to take care of that need myself. My sister mentioned that our generation was raised with a significant emphasis on independence, and she alluded that "attachment" had become stigmatized as something that needed to be reduced.
     Despite the fact that this sister and I are not necessarily compatible for an intimate relationship, I do look up to her greatly as an example, because from what I can see of the way she lives her life and the kinds of feelings she appears to have most of the time, I can tell that she knows how to do things I don't, and I want to learn from her. I fancy myself a humanist, which in my case also makes me a pantheist, but my one sister seems to have truly humanist views, while also being an agnostic atheist, from what I understand. She has a unique ability to find her exact niche and roll with it on the first attempt. I, on the other hand, have a strange need to put my metaphorical hands into the heart of hot fires just to see how hot they are. I have a habit of biting off more than I can chew, because like my mother used to say (and I'm sure my own isn't the only mother to say this), my eyes tend to be bigger than my stomach.
     I'm not sure if I've mentioned this is any previous posts, but I was raised Mormon in Utah from when I turned eleven, and before that my family lived in Arizona, where we were also all active Mormons, possibly with the exception of my oldest sister. I remember once, I was... probably about five or six, I was in my mom's room, and she let me borrow this little planner pad she had, and there was a sketch app. I used to draw like many kids do, and when she allowed my to play with this particular thing, I remember wondering if my mom would talk about me in church on fast Sunday, when the podium was left open for members to go up and share their testimonies, as I drew my best rendition of him at the time, and wrote on the pad, "I love Jesus." Even until recent days, my standing relationship with this supernatural entity, the Messiah, our supposed Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ, had been one of my trying to be like him. There's even a children's hymn in Mormonism all about how "I'm trying to be like Jesus." It's been stuck in my head lately. This same old habit of metaphorically biting off more than I can chew has struck me deeply in this regard. For a while, I really actually wanted to be like the new Jesus. I viewed him as a real human, potentially as a prophet, but mostly as a miracle worker. I was convinced that it was readily possible for me to achieve Christ consciousness in my lifetime--and I'm still working towards it, but it's more like when a sailor picks a spot on the horizon and says, "I'm gonna go there."
     Having been raised Mormon has hugely influenced me and the way that I am today, and not only in ways I'm still proud of. For example, I remember learning in Seminary that when the Second Coming occurs, there will be mass destruction like an apocalypse, and that following this apocalypse, there would be a Millennium of heaven on earth, and it would only be for those most righteous, and most correct, and only for Mormons, because in Mormonism, you're taught that this church is the only church that has the Whole Truth, and that while other religions may have goodness in them, only true believing Mormons will be saved. You have to put your faith in God, and Jesus, and any messages you may receive from the Holy Ghost. You have to put your faith in tithing, and you're not meant to ask questions. Now, I definitely have some qualms about this, and I disagree with there being any "one most true church," because in my life lately, I've grown to believe in things that put red flags all over this lifestyle. However, I was raised believing these things, and your beliefs tend to give way for your behaviors. As a child in the Mormon church, I was taught that my people, myself and other active, worthy members, were the best, and this led me to believe that others were less correct, less good, less worthy. Of what? I wasn't meant to ask. But they just were.
     I currently worry about the habits I developed while I still believed these things rearing their heads today. I recognize the inherent narcissism in this worldview, and I recognize that that is absolutely where I'm coming from. Much in the same way that a complete lack of exposure to a culture can make it into something that will shock you when you are finally exposed to it, unlearning these habits of viewing myself as being better than others is difficult, sometimes to a shocking degree. I know with my logic that few people, if any at all, are "better" or "worse" than anyone else. But my behavior and my feelings sometimes tell me otherwise.
     I've heard it said that your first reaction is what you've been taught or conditioned to think or feel, but your second reaction and your afterthoughts are a reflection of who you really are. I have to hold onto this idea dearly, because there are times where my initial reaction is outward and obvious, and all too visible to others, because I'm not proud of all the ways I've been all my life. I feel like I've been through a lot, much in the same way that most everyone has been through a vast number of either severe or mild traumas in their lives. This brings me back to an older post on here, wherein I describe how trauma is a natural hazard of having relationships. Everyone holds their own little bag of traumas and experiences that have forced them to change, sometimes drastically. In regards to myself, my traumas have been mild, but stretched out into things more severe than they seem. For example, the lack of attachment I experienced with my immediate family growing up was just a little bit traumatic, but the severance of my first significant attachment was much more traumatic for me. Now, I have to think about it whenever I think about any of my existing relationships. In my head it's, Careful not to rely on this person too much. You don't need them, you just like having them around. Don't get attached. Don't get attached. Don't get attached, because if you get attached, it will hurt you when they inevitably leave.
     This feels like an unhealthy train of thought, but it happens every time I start to get closer to a new person. I'm terrified of becoming attached to people, and I am even mortified of having others become attached to me. I hate to be needed so much so that when my primary partner and I decided to get a dog, I almost immediately resented this creature for becoming so desperately attached to us (because he was a shelter dog) that the one time we slipped and left this poor dog alone in our apartment for a few hours, he virtually destroyed the bottom half of our front door, and ripped up the carpet trying to dig his way out of the isolation. We found a different home for him. I couldn't handle how severely attached to me, to us, this animal had become, and it became a cesspool of blame, resentment, and frustration--in me.
     This old habit of my aversion to attachment is... difficult for me to deal with. It will occasionally become a phobia, in that I can't bring myself to make statements that commit myself to another person. I don't think I'll ever get legally married, although a lighthearted and modern (or old fashioned, depending on where your focus is) religious wedding is a possibility.
     The thought of giving birth to an actual human infant terrifies me, and I think that fear stems from my own lack of attachment to my immediate family, and to my mother. She was almost entirely present and available, but because of the judgement that's so hard to keep at bay when you're Mormon, I didn't feel entirely safe telling her about the kinds of hardships I was experiencing when I was still in her care. I worry so much about whatever my own child might experience, because the only circumstances I can imagine I might ever follow through with a pregnancy would be if I were the right age (in my head this means thirty at the very least, or as old as 45 or fifty), and it happened "accidentally." Even if I bear a child under the circumstances I've set out, what does that mean for my child? It just feels like such a gamble, and one I'm largely unwilling to take.
     I know I'm not the only member of my generation to opt out of having biological children. I believe what's happening is that the symptoms of overpopulation are beginning to seriously corrode our collective psychological well being. We recognize that there are so many of us, and that the wealth and resources are so unevenly distributed, that the backlash of how we've set ourselves up in society is causing generally people my age to self terminate their bloodlines, simply because there are too many of us, and instead of working to redistribute the wealth, we're taking what matters we can into our own hands, and working to reduce our numbers so that those of us who do reproduce or especially those of us who already exist and are in need of care and rearing get a chance to live the quality of life that humanity has achieved for some. These are all just theories though. Sometimes I get out of my depth.
     But I feel as though the difference between narcissism and simple self-preservation is in essence, whether or not you take those who and what support you for granted. If you have more wanting from and for other people than you do for growth and understanding, you become a parasite to your own species. Unfortunately, this kind of behavior is widespread, like an epidemic, and it's hard to talk about on a personal level, because it is so literally personal. I've been reminding myself lately that there's more than one way to thrive in life, and what works for me may not work for others. I've been working on just listening, and especially on finding things in others that enable them to feel more valid, and I've been coercing people into opening up, just to tell me about themselves, to get into those high and bright and dark and heavy conversations where people really learn from each other. It's tricky though, because some are mostly just content with keeping to themselves, staying inside their self, and saying less, being smaller, more invisible. It's hard for me when every time I ask someone how they are, their answer is, "Tired," because it feels like such a subtle symptom, but when I was tired, all day, every day, I was unwell. For others, though, this may be normal, and that could contribute to how they thrive. Convincing me of this might take a great deal of effort, but I'm learning to respect others' feelings even when I see them as being feelings that signify that there is healing to be done. I'm not Jesus, despite how badly and for how long I wanted to be him. I'm Aderyn, and I'm small, and I'm growing, but I have a long way to go if I'm gonna become Jesus and suffer the children unto me, and feed the masses with only a little, and teach doctrine that will influence the way of life that we live.
     So I don't think I really have much to worry about in regards to narcissism, because I have a lot of drive, and while I recognize that trying too hard is a vice, I can work hard to be as helpful as I hope I can be, to as many as I can. Anytime I do check myself for narcissism, it's really mostly just me checking my ego, and making sure it doesn't get out of hand. This is an old habit that I don't think will ever die, because it isn't meant to. As a human, I have the privilege of an advanced memory, despite how faulty mine may feel to me at times, and I have the supernatural ability to reflect on myself and process cognitively, and to distinguish between my self, and others, and these are all simple functions of the ego, which had been evolved for the purpose of self preservation. Sometimes when I have some small realization like this, I feel outright silly, because it seems so simple that I want to laugh out loud. Ego is Good, and it's easy to get too much of a good thing when that thing is non-physical and is able to grow exponentially. But we need our egos, and although there are some that have gotten so big that they're like sinkholes for attention and validation, yours matters too. You're a drop in a bucket, but a drop nonetheless. One could even say that what's "dropping" into this metaphorical bucket is seeds, and not water.