I've been interested in the research my pastoral counselor has specialized in, so yesterday I googled Karl Barth (theologian) and Heinz Kohut as one search. Several pages into the results, I found an article -- commencement address or something, really -- that she had written for the (graduating?) seminary students where she teaches.
I want to preface this with, parts of this may be upsetting for those who grew up with N relatives or anyone with a significant relationship to an N, especially a hurtful one (can we just take it for granted that they're always hurtful?) Please keep in mind that she is addressing students about to go out in the world and become pastoral counselors. She is not talking to you and me; I am sure the compassion toward Ns that she speaks of at the end, is meant for counselors, not for you and me. I'm sure she would tell us to protect ourselves from them (she's already told me that); that it is not our role to heal them or extend the empathic relationship she iis talking about.
That said, I found there were some wonderful nuggets in here for me, and hoped it might speak to others. I particularly liked her whole concept of God-imputed honor to every living being -- and, the concept that for some of us, that honor has been denied. It really spoke to me.
The article was also very moving to me in great part because I came to her seeking help with not just the spiritual damage he had caused (my relationship with God and church), but also to find out how, as a Christian called to be compassionate, I should incorporate him into my life (in absentia, so to speak). At one point during the fifteen months I felt God really spoke to me and called me to be with this guy (not "be" with him) as a vessel of God's love -- so that I something I have really struggled with. I was very touched to read her thoughts. It confirmed that I have found the right person to guide me.
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...Today, instead of focusing on honors attributed to one’s achievements in life, I would like to speak about the honor that God intends for and imputes to each and every individual, the honor that every human being is meant to wear from the very point of birth or even before. I will dare and propose that the absence of this honor implies death.
Death… Hmmmm
Many of us are not very friendly to death. We all know that we will die someday but not too many of us are ready to accept that that someday might be soon. While death is a fact of life, we try to avoid thinking about it as if erasing the inevitable nature of death from our thoughts will somehow guarantee the disappearance of death from the reality of our lives. Do you remember a child who closes his or her eyes in the face of fear? It is also an undeniable fact that constant reminders of our impending deaths surround us in various forms such as deaths of our loved ones as well as strangers caused by the accidents, the natural disasters, and violence among people and nations, and deaths of natural resources such as trees, animals, birds, etc. There are, however, those of us whose own lives are constant reminders of death because the honor imputed by God to them has been refused or denied to them.
This desolate experience of constant threat of death, i.e., a psychological death, can be described as the experiences of what Heinz Kohut, the creator of the psychology of the self, calls the disintegrated self and the opposite experience, i.e., the experience of aliveness, is called the cohesive self. The experience of the disintegrated self, is the experience of fear and panic that my own distinct existence is at risk of disappearing from the life of this world. It is the experience of losing the reassurance that I deserve to exist and my existence is real. It is the experience of both non-existence and one’s disconnectedness to other human beings, the natural world, and the divine. And so it is the experience of the robbing of the honor of one’s own self that God has attributed to all of us. It is the experience of what Sharon Parks calls the “tyranny of the they” in place of the authentic self claiming its God-imputed honor.
On the other hand, the cohesive self is experienced when one experiences his or her connectedness to the surrounding while fully experiencing the realness of his or her own distinct existence. It is the simultaneous experience of one’s own greatness and smallness – one’s own greatness as a unique individual making a claim and contribution to the life of this world and one’s own smallness as a constituent of the far greater reality including human beings, natural world, and spiritual world. It is the experience of one’s surroundings and God to be supportive and sustaining of one’s existence and purpose of one’s existence. It is the experience of owning the honor of one’s own self that God has attributed to all of us regardless of our age, sex/gender, economic and social status, sexual orientation, ethnic background, physical and mental well-being, etc.. It is the experience of the authentic self claiming one’s God-imputed honor.
What do these mean, the disintegrated self and the cohesive self? According to Heinz Kohut, the cohesive self is the mature form of narcissism and I propose that the disintegrated self can be considered to be the most primitive narcissism. In other words, narcissism is understood to have its own developmental line and develop from its primitive form into more a mature form. The cohesive self as a more mature form of narcissism expresses its fruits as the sense of humor, the sense of one’s own finitude, creativity, empathy, and wisdom. What? Mature narcissism? The concept of mature narcissism goes against our conventional understanding of narcissism. Our conventional
understanding about narcissism which is based on Freud’s understanding of it is that narcissism, is that which needs to be purged out, rejected, or discarded so that love for others can be nurtured. While we can not not acknowledge and appreciate Freud’s indelible contribution to psychoanalysis such as his concepts of unconscious and transference, it might be worthwhile for us to pay attention to an alternative interpretation of narcissism suggested by Kohut. Instead of understanding it as love turned into one’s self, narcissism is understood as the state of the feeble self that is in constant search for others who will embrace and nurture it. In other words, narcissism is not about seeking pleasure from attributing exaggerated importance to one’s self or ascribing
superiority of one’s self over others but seeking reassurance that one’s existence is real. What narcissistic people are pursuing is not finding pleasure in feeling superior to others. Instead they are in desperate pursuit of the acknowledgement of the realness of their existence in various forms of empathic responses. They are in ominous and urgent need to receive empathic responses reflecting both their greatness as an individual and smallness as a part of the life of this world so that they can own for themselves the sense of the realness of one’s existence and, more importantly, own a realistic sense of self. What is more, according to Kohut, one’s narcissism can not be helped alone; it is only by another’s initiative and empathy that one’s narcissism can be transformed. In other words, narcissists cannot help themselves but are only at the mercy of others who are willing to engage in empathic relationships with them. They are at the receptive end of another’s empathy.
I hope that this alternative understanding of narcissism encourages us to expand our compassion for arrogant, self-absorbed, and dogmatic people whom we would rather not closely associate with, since they certainly touch our own narcissistic vulnerability. Instead of focusing on how narcissists’ arrogance or self-love are morally wrong or hurting their relationship to us, it might be helpful to remind ourselves of their very real precarious state of self-assurance and their inability to move forward on their own in order for us to be transforming agents for them. This alternative understanding about narcissism may help us be more attuned to the underlying psychological dynamics such as: behind the sadistic and tyrannical nature of demands is the dire nature of their needs and behind their paradoxical roller coaster ride between exaggerated sense of grandiosity and low self-esteem is their lack of sense of a realistic sense of self or the lack of sense of proportion.
Perhaps taking an attitude of anticipation, joy, and pride similar to the attitude we take in a baby’s progress in his or her ability to walk is far more desirable approach in helping narcissists to move forward into more mature narcissism. Just as we embrace each physical growing stage of a child with high anticipation of the next level of growth, we need to take a similar acceptance of each of the child’s steps in the development of primitive narcissism into a more mature one and to anticipate with excitement the next growth in taming his or her primitive narcissistic tendencies. Just as we celebrate in joy and pride the child’s mastery of each stepping stone in physical growth, we also need to celebrate similar stepping stones with joy and pride as narcissists leave behind some
of their narcissistic tendencies.
Today, I am thus asking you to be agents of honor as you move forward into your ministerial or non ministerial leaderships so that those of us whose psychological growth has been arrested at primitive narcissism can make the move toward the wholeness of more mature form of narcissism. As agents of honor, I ask you to consider the dry bones in Ezekiel not only as a metaphor for the nation of Israel or bankruptcy in our spiritual state but also as a metaphor for the psychological emptiness in narcissists. As agents of honor, I ask you to join in with Jesus in saying, “Jesus does not condemn you nor do I condemn you” to those who are suffering with narcissistic inclinations. As agents of honor, I ask you to ask God for, and mobilize, the skills, conviction, and wisdom in empowering others to join in the chorus singing, “Jesus does not condemn you nor do we condemn you” just as Jesus prevented others from condemning the woman who had been caught in adultery. As agents of honor, I ask you to place an emphatic “Yes” to their Go-imputed honor at the foreground and “No” to their narcissistic tendency in the background as Karl Barth would say.
As agents of honor, I ask us not to insist on the exercise of self-will to eliminate one’s narcissistic tendency, but instead to reframe our understanding about our narcissistic tendency to see how lack of empathic responses from us constitutes the denial of an opportunity for the narcissist to develop beyond primitive narcissism. As agents of honor, reframing our understanding about narcissism helps us realize that helping narcissists takes an extension of ourselves so that they can take a shelter in ourselves out of the emptiness of their selves. As agents of honor, our expanded compassion helps us see the urgency of the need for extending our arms to rescue them from their daily or moment-by-moment near-death experiences. As agents of honor, the extension of our arms of rescue can help both us and them to realize how little is the distance that needs to be traveled from the place of near-death to the place of life of joy and pride. As agents of honor, our expanded compassion can restore once-refused God-imputed honor and prevent the occurrence of what Susan Nelson calls “postures of refusal” in those of us enslaved by our primitive narcissistic tendencies. As agents of honor, I ask you to find joy and pride in looking for the noise and signs of their progress just as the dry bones make a noise and a rattling in coming together and show signs of being slowly covered by sinews, flesh, and skin, and having the breath of life blown into them. May God bless each one of us as we undertake our role as agents of honor, so that we shall know that God is not Death but is indeed Living, and we shall know that God is our Lord.
