HMMM. NARCISSISM AND INFLUENCING

 

(from September 2017 read and revised 2026) 

September 2017:  I found out recently that I have an enemy.  I have lived a long life and never had an enemy before.  Well maybe once when A girl in 5th grade pulled my hair so hard that I can still today conjure-up the sting on my scalp. She had told everyone that she was a princess and a friend and I made fun of her.  We were wrong and she let us know it.  My friend and I knew nothing about difficult families in 5th grade. The fact that I remember this shows how cruel it was of us.  Partly I remember it because by Junior year she was pregnant.  What if my friend and I had been kind to her?  It's a question that lingers.  

But back to the present.  It's the enemy I have today that is the surprise.  It is a strange feeling to know someone who intentionally caused you emotional distress, even after explanation.  My grown-up experience with enemies has always been through the Psalms.  The authors of the Psalms are besieged by enemies--wicked people and liars, gossip-bearers and false tale-bearers--from whom they seek deliverance and rescue.  "Silence all my enemies and destroy all my foes." Psalm 143. 

Someone who chooses to be an enemy is deeply flawed and narcissistic. She is not used to being thwarted.  She feels superior, writing to a colleague, "Let's get together and discuss our innate superiority,"  mentioning her "Hollywood hair," her adorableness.  

So, someone who behaves as an enemy has colleagues, family, even followers. Narcissism may be her hallmark.  Now, years later, I accidentally see that this person pumps her "Merch."  She videos herself with sweatshirts, coffee mugs, etc. all for sale.  She survived a catastrophic health scare and built a business/persona on it.  She blesses this and that person online (a blessing for those whose Mondays are Difficult, or Who Work too Hard. . . )  Marketing 101.  But no one should waste their time this way, acting only in service to oneself no matter how cleverly disguised. 

In my life, all these years later, this enemy has disappeared.  The disappearance was immediate. If you have an enemy, shut the door.  The door of an enemy leads to nowhere. 

          Nina Naomi