There’s a ton of good stuff out there about narcissism, but let’s be like good parents dealing with trying children.  Just say “No.” Good parenting is not enabling destructive behavior.  Enabling is easy, like any sin.  You just bow to the sin. 

Years ago I got enough of a narcissist in my life and when I crossed this person they came at me, fists clenched.  I stood my ground.  “Go ahead,” I said.  “Hit me.”  That stopped them.  I then said, “Nothing I ever do is right.  Nothing I do is good enough.”

In other words, I stopped performing, stopped being manipulated, stopped responding.

The most unkind thing we can do to a  narcissist is dance to their tune.  We, as the more “well” person in the relationship, are called to put on a new song.  They can learn to sing along, or they can get along.

Someone, telling me about someone else being mad, as though that was important, was happily surprised when I said, “He can get glad in the same clothes he got mad in.”  I have to not care.  I have to be healed, set free, even delivered of the  need to please, to keep the peace. 

It seems to me that narcissistic adults are, just like brat two-year-olds, begging for someone to draw some boundaries, help them learn to behave and therefore get along in this life. 

But labels—no.  Once you decide your mom, mate, boss, friend, or pastor is a narcissist, you will see everything they think, do and say through that lens.  YOU ARE JUDGING AND WHAT YOU JUDGE WILL, IN SOME FORM OR FASHION, COME ON YOU.  You will see them as fatally flawed, and just someone to leave in the dust.  You will stop praying for them, stop letting God have say-so, and lose all your power.

So examine the relationship.  Where have you enabled?  When have you bowed to their nonsense because you’re afraid of a bit of conflict? 

Isn’t it disgusting when you see moms asking permission from a toddler  for the day’s activity?  And when she tries to give him whatever he wants to stop the whining, does he stop?  No, he whines all the more, and eventually starts yelling and screaming.  He’s absolutely begging for some non-negotiable boundaries, for someone he can trust to help him be a better person. 

Well, you can’t spank your neighbor, or your mate, right?  No, but you can get to the end of your rope, stop trying the tired things you’ve been trying for ever, and that have never and will never work.

Oh, you wanna back up to that spanking part?  You want to so self-righteously tell me you don’t believe in “hitting” your child.  Well, if you think spanking is hitting, you definitely should not spank, but that’s for another time.    

So, don’t call your kid a brat, don’t call your mate a narcissist.  Call yourself brave and wise and finished with the nonsense.

And remember this:  We often see in others what we dislike in ourselves.  Yes, that gal in the mirror may be a work in progress as well.  Let’s just all get out of God’s way, and get in His ways.  Can I get an Amen?  Amen!

Talking to myself today, because when I start listening to too much YouTube  and getting all  brilliant about everyone else’s issues, I can really get all up in God’s business, and forget all about love and forgiveness, and walking in all the fruits of the Spiritl. INSTEAD I just get miserable, mad, and pathetic.  Like a two-year-old or a narcissist who needs the “gift of No” and maybe a nap. (I HEARD ABOUT THE GIFT OF NO FROM TIM HAWKINS.)

Think of that when that person is being impossible.  What’s really going on?  What do they really need from you?  It’s not enabling, that much is for sure. 

But it’s also not getting all in the flesh because you’re the latest expert on narcissism and you’re going to tell them off right this minute.  Pray and wait.  God really wants to help us all, deliver us all, set us all free to enjoy each other.

This will help:  Think of a new label, and make it one you want TO SEE BECOME REALITY.  Your two-year-old, because of your excellent training, is “a fine young man”, for instance.  Your drama queen teenager is a “deep and good-hearted woman IN THE MAKING”, your know-it-all grouch husband is a “Dearly Beloved Child of God.”

Someone in my house called someone else in my house “such an ass” and I said, “Do not call my child names.”  So, how about we just, as I said in the beginning of this diatribe, stop with the labeling.  It doesn’t help at all.  It harms. STOP WITH THE FINGER POINTING, AND PUT YOUR HANDS TOGETHER AND LIFT YOUR EYES—GETTING THEM OFF NARCISSISTIC BEHAVIOR AND ON THE HEALING LOVE OF JESUS.