It’s been a while…far too long…since I’ve posted anything significant in ‘Killing Me Softly.’ At some point, I’ve gradually entered a comfort zone. A safe zone. At which point, my soul and spirit have felt free and unfettered. And then…another turning point…which didn’t take place in an instant, but over months. Months of reflection and confusion. Life has changed, as it is bound to do, for better or for worse. Mine changed for the better in recent years, as I have cast off the shackles of narcissistic abuse and control…and I basque in this peace, consolation and freedom. Who’d have thought, way back then? Who’d have thought that I might have freed myself from a narcissistic and abusive relationship…only to find that beyond that milestone, lay others, equally complex, yet I confess, far less painful?

I have reached a point where I can unequivocally say…all changes are beneficial, if we delve deep enough to find the nuggets of truth. In the words of Viktor Frankl, philosopher, psychiatrist and World War II concentration camp survivor, ‘Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.‘ Even if the only choice left to us is how we choose to die. Do we do so with grace and dignity? Or not?

As I recall, from my reading of Viktor Frankl’s publication, ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’, he encountered people at all points on the spectrum during the time he spent shuffled between four different concentration camps in Nazi Germany. He encountered those who fought over, and killed for, the last scrap of food, and those who gave their last scrap of food away, only to die of starvation. In the end, it is always a choice.

And so it is for narcissists. They are no more exempt from conscious choice than the rest of us. They would just have us believe it is so…that they are victims of circumstances so ‘special’, and of intelligence and value so unique, that they are exempt from moral responsibility. Don’t buy the lie. These are lazy, self-centered, cruel and vicious human beings (if they are indeed, fully human), utterly devoid of empathy and social responsibility. Their world exists only to serve them. They make gods of themselves, and sadly we find them at the helm of far too many religious organizations; far too many families and far too many political parties. Narcissism has risen tenfold in as many years.

They are yesterday’s despots, yesterday’s tyrants. They are today’s mainstream leaders in all walks of life. Don’t buy the lie.