Amazing experience. Just finishing up Carol Dweck's Mindset, directly on the heels of finishing Michael A. Singer's The Surrender Experiment. Both books dropped into my life, both spectacularly well timed.
BACKGROUND - To this day, I remember how it felt discovering the definition of "narcissistic." That was many years ago. A sister-in-law had informed me that I was the MOST psychotic person she'd ever come across, which sparked me to find out just what psychotic means. One definition describe it as abnormal behavior. Yeah, I could understand how my s-i-l experienced me as psychotic, because my behaviors have always been waaaay outside my family's mainstream. (For which I am forever grateful.)
My delving also brought me into contact with narcissistic. In a definition read those many years ago, it noted that narcissists might have a peculiar form of tunnel vision, only registering what involves them in the moment, that once needs are met, the context can be forgotten, as if it never happened. I remember slightly drawing back in surprise & relief. When I had experienced an important other in my life acting that way, I'd been confused & hurt. It had a root cause. It was a condition, not just an uncaring reaction.
That's exactly how I felt reading "entitled, dependent & fragile" in Mindset. Carol used the words to describe the result of over-praising children, but I almost gasped, recognizing personalities that had touched my life in ways I'd never been able to understand. In a flash, they made sense. Just like with narcissistic, lives that had always been beyond my comprehension (and my ability to help) became clear. It's easier to deal with hurtful behaviors when they have context than when they just keep showing up, keep doing great damage to the person & those dearest to him or her.
This is my long overdue thank you to my s-i-l for labeling me psychotic. Yeah, it felt like a total slam, but can understand how she could experience my behaviors as totally outside the familial norm - they were. By tagging me with that label, she sent me hunting for its meaning & across the definition for narcissistic. Out of her judgment came clarity about something that had disturbed me all of my life.
This is my heartfelt thank you to Carol Dweck for entitled dependent fragile. Dear brilliant woman, those three words took massively cock-eyed portions of my life & aligned them into insight, awareness, fresh compassion. Thanks, thanks & more thanks!
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