.
.
Between the Sun and the Moon
.
Between silhouette and shadow
.
Between father and mother
.
Between child and adult
.
Between past and future
.
Between here and there
.
Between us and them
.
Between him and her
.
Between hero and villain
.
Between Beauty and the Beast
.
Between left and right
.
Between right and wrong
.
Between good and bad
.
Between black and white
.
Between sound and silence
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Between love and hate
.
Between heart and mind
.
Between sane and insane
.
Between order and disorder
.
Between war and peace
.
Between life and death
.
Between rich and poor
.
Between more and less
.
Between everything and nothing
.
Between…
.
Many extremes
To be
In between
.
In the between…
.
Between worlds
.
Between realities
.
.
That’s where I have always been.
.
Seen and unseen.
.
.
BPD Awareness – Rebecca Coleman
An Upturned Soul 
So true and intense. Before finishing the last lines, I thought, ” I have always been in between”. Ti ringrazio, mi ha commosso. Ti abbraccio forte,xxx
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Mille grazie ❤
…nel mezzo c'è il punto dolce…
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It can be grey or not being one thing or the other.I feel hard to define.When I was studying fine arts, I needed reading philosophy to give bulk to art, and when I ended up among the books without pictures:) I needed painting to nourish my emotional self. It’s very hard for me to subscribe with something entirely; that’s why I am an eccentric..Seeing the world as two opposite poles reminds me of a gloomy manicheism.The sweet point, as you say, it’s maybe the human way of living expériences, isn’t it? I still need to work on accepting my shortcomings and protecting myself. I am still born without skin, not yet myself…just in between.
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Last night I was watching the season finale of a TV series – Penny Dreadful. It’s an intriguing show, mostly built around the characters, who are inspired by the fiction of authors whose creations have come to life in the minds and hearts of all of us. Shadows and symbols which have always been a part of human stories. Vampires, demons, werewolves, monsters, etc. In it the mysterious heroine after a very harrowing experience with something that she has been struggling with most of her life goes to seek to have what possesses her removed from her, and the person whose help she seeks asks her – Are you certain that you want to be normal?
We all succumb at some point to the wish to be someone other than who we are, this is part of who we are, but who is this someone else whom we wish to be… is it not a creation of who we are? Even if the someone else is someone real… are we really perceiving who they are or who they seem to be seen through our eyes?
So when we look at our perceived flaws, shortcomings, are they really what they appear to us to be. Is our perception accurate, perhaps these flaws are intrinsic to our unique and individual talents, talents which we may think are anything but talents. Or maybe we think our talents are flaws because someone else, maybe several someone else’s, told us they were, but are they?
What you described, the mix of art and philosophy, of image and words, thoughts… perception in its myriad forms all working together to create. Beautiful description, beautiful experience. Your perceived eccentricity is a beautiful talent ❤
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No, I don’t want to be normal at the core, but I’d like to be myself and for several different reasons, most of the times I can’t: expressing myself is the main thing to me, but not only when it’s related to others, but for myself. For instance, I am prey to anxiety these days, I have been bottling up my feelings for a fortnight now and indeed , after hours, nights and days spent on investigating the reason why, I can tell why and I get the whole picture, therefore on a rational and intellectual plan, the trouble is now out of its shell. But along with this nosy affair of finding why, my creative side has withdrawn completely and I have not put pen to paper in a long while; some thoughts are lost, some feelings unexplored-as the philosophical mind and the creative act don’t lead to the same conclusions or accomplishments- and I feel as a thirsty plant. Who the hell is responsible for it? ME!!!!
I have no discipline whatsoever, you are super wonderfully disciplined, you write as musicians play their instrument, I am in awe.
Have you got a special secret you can share about it? I am reading a funny book, Daily rituals-how great minds make time, find inspiration and get to work, by M. Currey.
He missed you:)))) but I laughed my head off while reading that Harold Pinter had to chain himself to his chair to get his writing done!( how lousy of me).
Alas, I am just viciously lazy, a sort of Oblomov lying on the couch, thinking all the time…I accept your compliment with joy (I am progressing, hey?).
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I am very glad to hear that your genii (genius) is unbottled and flowing now (re: your comment on Seize the Fray)! Carpe Frayem 🙂
That sounds like a wonderful book to read, food for curiosity, learning about others and their ways of dealing with being human and such. Sometimes I roam through the tidbits of advice which creatives give about letting the creative juices flow and come together, it’s always fascinating, but I suspect that they’re keeping their true secret hidden, while whispering ‘my precious’.
My ‘special secret’ is to be undisciplined because that’s who I am, a ball of chaos which does not like to be contained and causes havoc when it is contained, but let it loose and it’s really quite a cute ball of chaos which enjoys being creative. I’m at my happiest when I’m doing something and I have no idea what I’m doing or why I’m doing it but it just feels like the thing to do – going with the flow in a manner similar to what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi described in his notion about Flow.
My fav piece of advice about writing, which can be applied to all forms of self-expression, is Hemingway’s – “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.”
Easier said than done of course because – “Artists are people driven by the tension between the desire to communicate and the desire to hide.” Donald Winnicott
I think that laziness is an art form which requires much artistry, not everyone can do it, you know. Being ‘viciously lazy’ sounds rather delicious, maybe the perceived vice is actually a virtue… or something in between!
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Reality is connected somehow to a past where at any minute an existential crises looms behind a dark door, and with specific pathology we can never interiorly understand or perceive because of who we are now, and what we never were (evil), and ironically, influences and even haunts us throughout our life like an ancient myth; see Joseph Campbell on myth, must notably Hero with a Thousand Faces.
Your latest instantly brought to mind that everything exists between the extremes, as in any lifecycle, and that a conscience has no real boundaries, no ends or beginnings, only an infinite now, which is always transforming, nothing is solid. Boundaries (in art and love) and indeed many things in life are constructs of ego, which seem bewildering at times, until measured with conscience (spirit).
Also thought you may find this article refreshing, although somewhat off-topic, it’s one of the best I’ve come across form a philosophical perspective on NPD; a supplement to Vaknin’s work, never mind it is by a catholic philosopher and Deacon; but come to think of it who better to understand NPD.
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/religion/re0933.htm
peace baby
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Thank you for the link 🙂 Loads of words in the article, so I briefly skimmed, will read it properly later. My eyes landed on the bit about what we think lies behind the beautiful facade of posh houses, which is very pertinent – we often accuse narcissists of fooling us with their facade, but how much of the fooling was done by them and how much of it was done by us. That creates the most complex of confusing conflicts, both internal and external.
Children of narcissists exist in an in between realm of NPD – we’re both victims of the narcissist’s facade, and also privy to what lies behind it. We’re affected by it personally and also see how it affects others. We see its inner and outer workings, which creates much turmoil for us, we are torn between paths, options, views, etc.
My parents were different in their NPD. My father was more aware of how he was, who he was and what he did. He had an awareness of his NPD which my mother completely lacked. He also had an awareness of how much those with NPD rely on others to maintain, support and encourage the narc-illusion. He had a tendency to offer people an option of choosing the facade or choosing to see what was behind it to either confirm if what was on the facade was what lay underneath it too or if it didn’t. He often dropped his mask deliberately, obviously, and called attention to it challenging people to see him as he actually was rather than who they needed him to be for them.
Narcissists are as trapped by what they say and do as others are trapped by it.
It’s that moment when you realise that other people can’t see you as you see yourself, that they are projecting themselves onto you, or an ideal onto you, or whatever they want you to be for them, that what they see when they look at you is more about them than it is about you. We all have these moments, over and over again.
Those moments can seem innocuous. Someone asks us how we are. We say we’re fine, while making it obvious that ‘fine’ is just a mask we are wearing – will the someone who asked us how we are choose our mask or choose to look behind it? Of course the responsibility lies with both people – saying we’re ‘fine’ when we’re not, and expecting the other person to see behind the mask, to want to look behind it… we’re playing games, being slightly manipulative. We’re testing their level of caring for us… and most of us know this, so why do we do it? Why not just say how we really feel… because we know that we may be rejected if we do? Or because we experience empathy and know that the other person may be carrying a burden which doesn’t need ours added to it at this time or maybe ever?
How narcs and non-narcs experience those moments is different. Non-narcs have empathy – the ability to see things from the perspective of others. Non-narcs know that we all ask others how they are without necessarily wanting an honest answer, it’s a question which says – I care about you, but please care for me too. That kind of mutual flow which needs the understanding of empathy. Narcs don’t have empathy, not that kind of empathy (they do have a ‘bad’ kind of empathy, but that’s different, used differently). So a narc tends to strengthen their contempt for others in those moments, those moments confirm their NPD for them. They go with – you don’t care for me so why should I care for you… and how can I use this to care for myself (in a totally twisted manner)?
There are many philosophies which highlight this paradox, and how we choose to deal with it – the crossroads and our selection of path.
I particularly enjoy the Zen approach, with all those riddles. And the Buddhist concept of ‘glamour’ and ‘attachment’.
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Yes it is a long one, although considering the subject maybe not long enough. Your father and mother sound very much like mine, father generally unavailable emotionally with a dark covert narcissistic character that put on like a uniform, and mom old-school codependent do anything for him and us to protect grandiose façade. She was such an incredibly strong and beautiful career women, who was regularly demeaned in front of us as some kind of status and manipulation play. Which fucked us up in the head as young boys. But I eventually began standing up for which only served to galvanize me as the scapegoat I was already being groomed to be, mostly because I was more like her, emotional whole.
Although lately I’m confused between how much she actually cared and protected vs. how much she just bribed to protect the image, either way she was still amazing. And I’m still trying to grasp how so much good energy (light) existed near such a black emotional hole, like some astronomical freak of nature. But I now understand how refined and scary his manipulation was, like you mention, the ultimatum was there, and I think because we felt there was love and emotions at stake, it was very scary, and still is. It’s also why I have such anger and contempt for narc evil. They use “the love,” like Coffee says (Michael Clark Duncan) in the Green Mile; to manipulate and abuse the innocent.
But we did have the big houses, boats, yachts, seaplanes, even an island home with a miniature train running around the perimeter. The good side of my father projected a strange mix of conservative eclectic entrepreneurial creative energy, which I had naturally perceived as a positive thing coming from a freedom of spirit and goodness, but was actually part of the façade as I would come to find.
It’s like trying to define nothing and silence, a lacking. In science they say there is no cold or darkness, only a lack of heat and light. I too I’m drawn to Buddhism and Taoism, Native American culture, which I guess is no surprise; I often wonder if everyone that is nice has been abused, part of emotional scare, misanthropy of humans.
Thanks again for writing, you have helped me understand yet another facet of this F%$#@%! thing and I truly appreciate it, you are truly wise…and have a sexy smile too
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Thank you 🙂
My mother is a Covert Narcissist of the martyr variety. Her favourite role is the damsel in distress, but her distress is complex, caused by dragons but often the knight in shining armour is the dragon… and really all she wants is for others to see her dignity in the face of adversity (adversity which is of her own making). She wore a halo which needed everyone else to wear horns for her halo to shine brightly. Whereas my father was more of an Overt Narcissist. He wore his horns with a certain honest flair. Both of them were more cerebral than somatic narcissists, although my father had somatic tendencies but they were secondary tendencies – a part of the all together of the emperor for others to see because others wanted to see it.
Classification is inexact because where NPD is concerned the lines are always blurred. Sometimes I think people’s effort (including my own) to grasp NPD play straight into the hands of the disorder itself. The more we know the less we know about it and those who have it… which is where NPD likes us to be.
The interplay between my parents was NPD at its best (?) and worst. Two narcissist playing games with each other, neither one ever managing to win because of all the cards secreted up their sleeves, all the twists and turns, the sleights of hand. The war between them was their favourite game, love/hate all the way from start to finish with no end in sight. And even though my father has now died, the war is still going on, partly because he died making sure it would be that way and partly because for my mother he’s not allowed to die, without him she is no one. Typical narc paradox.
Without a devil how can a narc be an angel? It’s all about the end game, the end of days game.
Neither of my parents ever gave a shit about me or anyone else, including each other – but they could pretend like their life depended on it when their persona, ego, depended on it… for them. For a narcissist, all roads lead to Rome and they are Rome.
Native American culture is deeply insightful, the symbolism and totems are rich with meaning which delves to the core of human nature. Also insightful is what happened to the Native Americans once the Americas were ‘discovered’. The Native American history from the point where the pilgrims turned up is the history of how NPD affects others in many ways. Everything can be perceived as an allegory, a metaphor, an archetype of nature + ‘nurture’. History in particular is a fascinating subject to study, it’s everything human rolled into one – including how history gets written and who gets to write it.
One of the philosophical concepts I enjoy the most is – crazy wisdom.
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Paradox!
Wow, born in a narcissistic crucible a lotus blooms, such a good writer, and teacher; which begs the question of the narc paradox; that through this “special” suffering we gain special salvation, like the “law” of dependent arising (cause and affect) give our origins special meaning and purpose to our lives.
I wonder about life without wasting my time trying to “win” recognition from my father; as mom cheered, but never was out of his control, no real advice or deeper family rational ever was mentioned, which enable and strengthened the dysfunction and helped delay the outward effect of the “disease.” She was a very good nurse after all, but it was her husband that was “sick,” not her family image.
I acted out early on trying to fill the family “void” with sound and fury and random acts of stupidity, mostly normal really, until I was abused, but then later with achievements never acknowledge by father dearest: Lesson #1: The scapegoat or patient child must never outperform the golden child or it will cause “narcissistic injury” and compounds the dynamic, indeed a behavior they do not won’t–who knew. So silly me goes and unknowingly outperformed my abusive golden man/child sibling in almost everything, especially in being a whole loving human being—still working on that though. This got me covertly excluded–scapegoated–from the family business as my father secretly gave everything to golden boy who froze me out of the business after a soul draining eleven years in their small business empire—I picture them like little wizards in a darkened castle basement plotting their ugly reign, emotional dwarfs hiding behind a tall paper-thin wall.
But onward we go, keep keeping on, and I’m reminded of a bible story (my own interpretation) where mankind struggles with god until finally understanding he is ultimately struggling against “himself.”
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I read an interesting overview of the different ways people react to a disordered family dynamic – http://www.angriesout.com/grown20.htm – I would say that you went the way of – The Wise, Resilient Child.
In my family the golden child versus scapegoat dynamic played out differently due to my being an only child. When I read up on how the dynamic works in Narc families with more than one child, I can’t quite relate however I can see something similar in my family dynamic. I can see that those roles existed, as they are a part of the interior dynamic of those with NPD, but they were not conclusively assigned in my family.
There was a constant switching of roles. The roles reflected whatever drama in my parents’ repertory was playing out at any given time. Sometimes it was like a three-ring circus, with multiple dramas playing out at the same time, therefore role changes were chaotic. One second you’re the scapegoat, the next you’re the golden child, then neither, then both. One second you’re the villain, then you’re the hero, then you’re just a hapless villager. My parents liked being the golden child themselves, so more often than not I was the scapegoat, but things could change at any second.
In some ways both the scapegoat and the golden child are a fantasy. One which seems very real as long as we are trapped in the reality of a narcissist.
When we think about out Narc families we often end up comparing them to myths, fairytales, and such. When they were children, when their NPD developed, they wandered into the land of make believe and got stuck there. And as adults they’re still stuck there, dragging everyone else into to it (because they can’t get out so others have to be brought in for company). They give birth to children inside their make believe… some of those children stay there, others seek a way to get out and become real.
One of the most interesting theories I explored was that we choose our parents before we are born, choose the challenges which we are to face in life. Except for some reason we forget this choice once we’re born, don’t give ourselves a memo about it or a guide book with a chapter titled – These are your quests and side quests (this is the mess you’ve chosen to handle and learn from). We set all of this up, every aspect of it, then promptly forgot… and curse fate and such.
I liked this idea. It gave me personal power during a time when I felt completely powerless. If I chose all of this, then I must have had a reason, even if it is just my usual reason – do things the hard way and only realise later that an easy way existed.
And maybe… the before birth me who chose my family and life challenges was a narcissist and needed to learn how not to be one.
I also like the theory that we’re all just atoms studying ourselves and this is all one big atomic experiment 😉
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What an awesome article! Resiliently crashing into recovery here with you and this “writing cure” guidance, now in the middle of the triangle (again) noticing the connections of an ever present conscience (a centeredness of love) that was here before we “chose our parents.” Amazing what one good reading can do. Thanks for that love!
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