What Healthy Narcissism Looks Like
We all seek a life without regret, which is built on two pillars:
Entitlement: We all have needs. Unless we speak up for what we want and expect outside support to come, we will suffer greatly as our needs go unmet.
Audacity: We all have dreams. To feel like we are going nowhere and that our fortunes will never improve makes life unbearable. We inherently seek transcendence and evolution. We need to express our creativity, ambition and courage in chasing our grand visions.
Audacity and entitlement; these are the two components of healthy narcissism.
Yet what separates healthy narcissism from the unhealthy kind? No sane person likes an entitled brat who steps all over others, and almost nobody likes someone who thinks they are ‘all that’ and who uses others for their own gain.
What anchors and informs healthy narcissism are two things which unhealthy narcissism is missing: shame and reality testing.
Shame: One For All, All For One
Healthy humans feel shame when they disappoint someone they love, or when they fail to live up to expectations, or when they judge themselves to be ‘less than’ or ‘inferior to’ someone else.
At its worst, shame is that burning sense of being a bad person who must hide in a dark hole, of being defective and unworthy of love. Unhealthy shame is often turned against us by abusers, and forces us to ‘stay in our lane’. This lane quickly becomes an oppressive box which kills our dreams and tells us we are illegitimate and unworthy of having our needs met.
