is always felt deeply—and remembered—by our body. To the body, trauma is invariably experienced as an assault, whether physical, emotional, verbal, psychological, sexual, or spiritual.
When most of us think of trauma, we think of extremely painful events such as incest, abuse, rape, war, assault, serious injury, severe betrayal, extreme neglect, or great and unexpected loss. However, trauma can also result from small, painful incidents that get repeated many times. This is often the case with the everyday narcissism most of us are exposed to as children.
EN can be seen as a form of neglect, in which a child’s emotional (and sometimes physical) needs are ignored in favor of those of adults. Through EN, day after day and year after year, most of us experienced a slow, repetitive grinding down of our self-worth, self-confidence, and self-trust.
CASSIE AND HER GRANDMOTHER
Four-year-old girl Cassie is told by her mother to give Grandma a kiss goodbye. Cassie doesn’t want to because Grandma just hurt her feelings. Nevertheless, her mother insists—with annoyance in her voice—and tells her, “If you don’t kiss Grandma, she’ll be hurt.’”
This is a classic and common example of how we teach our kids Myths 1 and 3. Although Cassie is only four, she is taught that she is responsible for how Grandma feels—and how Grandma feels is important, while how Cassie feels is not.
Cassie’s mom is trying to teach her something important: to be sensitive to others’ feelings. However, what Cassie is actually beginning to learn is to be sensitive to others’ feelings and to ignore her own.
Because of the incident, Cassie hurts. She doesn’t have a terrible wound, of course; it’s more like a paper cut. However, when this same lesson is repeated over and over, in many different contexts, it becomes a damaging wound.
I call this hazy trauma. It’s not the result of a single big event. It’s the cumulative effect of many emotional paper cuts. It’s also a form of neglect because Cassie’s own feelings get repeatedly ignored, discounted, or pushed aside.
As psychologist Patrick Carnes has noted, neglect can be harder to recover from than incest or physical abuse—precisely because there is no single big, causal incident. Instead, the trauma is hazy and hard to clearly identify because it is made up of many smaller, recurring events. And, in the case of EN, these events are seen as normal (or even instructive and beneficial) by most adults, whereas incest and physical abuse are not—and, indeed, are against the law.
Our normal response to trauma has several aspects. First, our body experiences fear in the limbic part of our brain. When this occurs, the amygdala (within the limbic system) kicks in, creating a fight, flight, or freeze response. At the same time, our left prefrontal cortex—the thinking, organizing, sequencing, and impulse controlling part of our brain—shuts off. Our survival instincts and emotions are now in charge. Rational thinking is literally not available to us because the rational part of our brain has been temporarily unplugged (or, as some therapists say, overruled or hijacked).
This is why, when we see that our kitchen curtains are on fire, we automatically start moving toward safety. We don’t sit still and thoughtfully analyze the cause of the fire or what possessions to save.
Trauma may also impact other parts of our brain. As a result, we may have little or no conscious memory of the cause of the trauma, especially if it occurred in preverbal childhood, when we didn’t have words to remember or explain our experience.
Usually, though, our body remembers the sights, sounds, tastes, smells, or other sensory information associated with any trauma. When we later experience a similar sight or sound or taste, our body may automatically get triggered and shift into a trauma response. Suddenly, we will feel or act as if the original trauma is happening right now, in the present moment.
. . . intense and abrupt emotional reactions are usually trauma responses from an old wound that just got triggered.
Our body never forgets. It continues to react to those triggers, whenever and wherever they appear, until the trauma is healed. A classic case is the war veteran who, while playing with his kids in his own backyard, hears a car backfire. Because the sound reminds his body of a gunshot, fear kicks in, and his amygdala takes over. Without thinking, he dives for cover. As we will see, the trauma of everyday narcissism has similar effects on most of us when we re-experience—or are reminded of—painful sights, sounds, smells, and feelings from our childhood.
Have you ever had a sudden, strong emotional reaction to a seemingly small incident, comment, or gesture? You yourself may have been surprised by the intensity of your reaction. These intense and abrupt emotional reactions are usually trauma responses from an old wound that just got triggered—the result of the EN we were taught as children.
The Takeaway
This book will help you understand how everyday narcissism manifests in your own life, and it will teach you to recognize it and heal it.
As a result, you will grow into a life of greater happiness; more fulfilling relationships; less reactivity; greater responsiveness to the people and things that matter to you; and more meaning. You’ll also learn to recognize everyday narcissism in others and respond to their EN in healthy ways. Best of all, you will begin to understand your life in a whole new way. You will learn to recognize more choices and greater freedom in your life. You will begin to relax and enjoy your life more. You will rediscover your true self and live a life of greater joy.
Everyday Narcissism vs. Clinical Narcissism
“When the healthy pursuit of self-interest and self-realization turns into self-absorption, other people can lose their intrinsic value in our eyes and become mere means to the fulfillment of our needs and desires.”
P.M. Forni
It’s important to understand the difference between everyday narcissism and what is often called clinical narcissism.
Clinical narcissism, technically known as narcissistic personality disorder, is a diagnosable mental illness, one of ten types of personality disorders. The Mayo Clinic offers the following definition of a personality disorder:
A personality disorder is a type of mental disorder in which you have a rigid and unhealthy pattern of thinking, functioning, and behaving. A person with a personality disorder has trouble perceiving and relating to situations and to people. This causes significant problems and limitations in relationships, social encounters, work, and school.
Personality disorders are divided into three groups: anxious, suspicious, and emotional/impulsive. Clinical narcissism is an emotional/impulsive personality disorder.
Everyday narcissism, however, is not a personality disorder—and not something that can be diagnosed by a therapist. It’s a familiar outcome of being raised by less-than-perfect parents in a less-than-Utopian society. It’s not healthy, yet it’s extremely common.
In recent years, the words narcissism
