“Parasites are not our enemies; they are reminders of our precarious place in the natural world.” —Carl Zimmer, author of Parasite Rex
Hookworms, Public Domain
Last week I came across an article: America is the Narcissist of the World. Over the past few decades, extreme narcissism and other psychological disorders have proliferated in modern-day society. Some of us have also noticed a codependent-narcissistic relationship between the government and the people. A few years ago, I wanted to write a novel about it, and posted my intention on Twitter. This comment got lots of likes and affirmative responses from former victims of narcissistic abuse. Persons who have loved extreme narcissists, and have healed themselves from the emotional damage caused by loving these kind of people, are vigilant now and have a higher level of awareness.
Good idea and maybe a book where the protagonist is a middle aged woman who came through a relationship that almost killed her with a sociopath narcissist, and she now sees the same manipulative tactics now from governments. Nuances between both.
— Wendy S. Williamson ⭐️ (@wswilliamson) January 18, 2022
Narcissism, a term that’s thrown around a lot these days, is an attitude, a character type, a way of being, a mode of thinking and feeling that appears to exalt the self and dehumanize other people. It’s like a syndrome where the main symptom appears to be an inflated sense of self, or excessive self confidence. But like so many ideas convoluted by modern society, narcissism is better understood in the context of nature. In the natural world, narcissistic abuse mimics the process by which a parasite survives. Therefore, narcissists are to people as parasites are to their hosts.
Parasites are not “bad guys” in nature. They are just organisms that live on, in, or with other organisms. While they often feed, grow, and multiply in a way that harms and sickens their host, they can also help their host in many ways. After all, their survival is dependent on their hosts flourishing. Parasitic worms, for example, may help with autoimmune disease, allergies, and inflammation. It’s now common knowledge that a greater diversity of gut microbiota usually is better for our health than fewer species. What’s more, we depend on bacteria for our survival.
Parasites are a natural and essential part of complex ecosystems. In fact, they make up half or more of all life’s diversity. According to Lynn Margulis, it is abundance and scarcity that drives natural selection in microorganisms. When resources are scarce, organisms that are parasitic become mutualistic, for survival. The same thing happens in human populations…adult kids move in with their parents to save money, people carpool instead of driving their kids individually to school, etc. Individuals collaborate more during periods of scarcity, and good collaborators tend to do better.
When resources are abundant, organisms that depend on those resources proliferate. They grow slowly at first, and then exponentially, becoming more and more self-absorbed in their relationships. There are lots of reasons why this happens, but it’s completely natural. It goes back to how ecosystems work, to how cycles work, to how enantiodromia works, to how reality really works, contrary to what people like to believe. If parasitic relationships become mutualistic when resources are scarce, then mutualistic relationships become parasitic when resources are abundant. Don’t you think?
So back to the extreme narcissist who is like a parasite. Contrary to what society suggests, extreme narcissists are very insecure. Extreme narcissism is extreme insecurity, preying on other people who are insecure. Dr. Ramani called it “pathological” insecurity. America, being overrun by narcissists, is a sign that America, and the Western world in general, is being driven by insecurities. From Merriam-Webster, an insecurity is “a state or feeling of anxiety, fear, or self-doubt,” as well as lack of safety, protection, dependability, and certainty.
Extreme narcissists are just trying to feel good about themselves. Because they don’t have insight into themselves, they need other people’s validation to artificially replicate a sense of self-confidence. They look for people who are curious, loving, and kind, but also have vulnerabilities that they can exploit. In this way, they can keep their host engaged in the process of validating them. Note, they do not do any of this on a conscious level; remember, they have virtually no real insight into themselves. The process is completely and totally driven by a void of self-security.
So they idealize you at first, and you feel amazing because of it. You fall in love and develop a strong attachment to them by how they make you feel. When their true colors start popping up here and there, or you say or do something that triggers their low self-esteem, or your validation of them starts to diminish, or you don’t make them feel the way they want to feel, then they devalue you severely, wherever they know you are vulnerable. This creates immense confusion in the host, a Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde phenomenon. The vulnerable host just wants things to go back the way they were before, when they were beautiful and fun. He/she tries and tries, and keeps trying endlessly.
After extreme narcissists idealize you, devalue you, idealize you, devalue you, idealize you, devalue you for a long time, it breaks down your self-security and you start to depend on the host to tell you who you are and give you a sense of self. When you are so beat-up that you can no longer validate them because you’ve lost yourself, and you’ve lost the sense of self they gave you, they discard you like a piece of trash. What’s left is an empty shell of what you used to be…And the long arduous process of reconstructing yourself, your self love and confidence is necessary to heal and move on with your life. Many victims of narcissistic abuse never fully get back to where they were before.
I use the word “extreme” in this abusive relationship because it is the extreme of a natural process. Some people do better at giving than receiving in certain areas, and others do better at receiving in certain areas than giving. To some extent, this fuels attraction similar to masculine-feminine energy or yin-yang. It’s also the nature of a mutually beneficial relationship between a parasite and its host. This sounds harsh, but babies have a parasitic relationship with their mothers—it’s how they survive. But as babies get older, their relationship changes and should become more mutualistic. Then, when the parents are old and incapable, they become parasitic and depend on their adult children.
Extreme takers and extreme givers are attracted to one another. This is, in essence, the dance we see between codependency and narcissism. While narcissists need validation from codependents to feel a sense of self-security, codependents need the narcissist to need them, in order to feel loved and wanted. It gives them their self worth. If the narcissist is not getting validation from the codependent, and the codependent is not feeling loved and wanted by the narcissist, then neither of them feel alive or complete. Without each other, both are void of themselves. Of course, this comes from a broken society where people lose touch with themselves and their purpose in life.
Returning to the idea of America as the narcissist of the world. It is no coincidence that America is also the most indebted country in the world. Extreme narcissism and codependence in human relationships, and in systemic relationships between government and people, is a sign of peak resource abundance, peak prosperity, and peak population. Like parasites in the natural world, the population of narcissists will fall off a cliff when resource scarcity returns through a sovereign debt crisis. People will be forced to move from a broken society, which has driven them further away from themselves and their planet, to a sense of purpose through restoration. In the long run, this will reinstate a healthy self-awareness and security.
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