Why I've spent 5 years unravelling my narcissism.

I feel immense resistance writing this one. I want to write it, and I don’t. I want to go into my other pieces and deflect into another topic. But I fucking can’t. It’s on the cusp of my mind and for all my efforts, I am unable to move away from it. So I might as well grind it up and bare it all.

About a fortnight ago, I attended a workshop that focused on authentic communication. There were a half dozen exercises over 2 days, among them relating, communication, and listening.

I came into the event with a clear head and clear conscience. It was a familiar challenge to be vulnerable in front of strangers, and I was ready to dive into it head on. Inside though, deep in my gut, I was detecting an angst, a familiar uneasiness, one that I decided needed clarity and resolution.

You see, I attended this event, not just for my own personal growth, but because I was exploring a return to facilitation. It was time. But the anxiety I felt was a palpable resistance. It was the same resistance I had felt for the past 5 years. It was the same resistance that stopped me from working every night. It’s the same resistance that is coming to me now.

It’s 4am as I write this, and I want to stop. I’m seeking little distractions to take me away from the screen. But I’m persisting, because I am afraid of it.

There are some things that I know I do particularly well.

But in me, there was a great conflict and contradicting arising. I realised that there was a gap in my ability: which when worded, sounded like this:

“I can protect people from the ouside world, but I cannot protect them from myself”

I love pushing myself to the edge of my comfort zone. I love finding the part of me that torments me, confronting it, conversing with it, consolidating it. The edge, teetering on fear and power, it is a rush that I experience several times a day.

Likewise, I enjoyed the process of taking a client to these depths, especially with men. Putting forward piercing questions, challenging them, taking them down into darkness. I loved the breakthroughs they experienced when they pushed themselves through the fire.

I could not get clear on whether I was pushing them to the edge for their benefit, or for my own gratification.

This began to bother me frequently, because I felt I had devoted myself to the art of facilitation. Indeed, facilitation is rewarding in itself. But what would happen if my needs were in conflict with theirs? What would I choose during this emotional arousal?

If I made a mistake, chose the wrong path, and put my needs first, I could do irreperable damage.

“I will take a break”, I said to myself. “I’ll untangle this before I continue.”
That was 5 years ago.

There are no words that express the place I go to when I explore this in myself, because there, no words exist. They cannot exist. It is impossible. To do so would see me start to waffle.

Such is the beauty of it, I cannot seem to shake off its calling. To share this experience with others so they can marvel in it.

The pathway towards it is treacherous, rugged, painful and frightening. It is stressful watching myself disintegrate in meditation. My narcissism existed to shield me from the required humility. I believed I needed it to survive.

This was my way of deflecting the terror of death.

And yet the bliss still called out to me. It gnawed at me, unwilling to let go.
I shed my skills as a facilitator and replaced it with a new obsession.
Dance. Tango. Divine and humbling. Blissful and frustating. Oneness and segregation.

I’m returning to facilitation because it calls me back. Ignoring it is eating me alive. And exposing what my narcissism wanted to stay protected.
There was great resistance, which is why this piece was a week late.
I’ll probably keep it minimally edited.

Regular schedule to resume next week.