SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai
What I am about to share here might come across as scandalous or at best may be seen as heretical by some. So, I say, be patient with me as I attempt to unpack my thoughts. I recently saw a YouTube clip titled, “What is The Narcissist’s Evil Hall of Mirrors – Understand To Avoid Entering.” Watching it, it got me thinking of how the abuse one suffers in the hands of a narcissist can be equated to what the mystics refer to as the Dark Night of the Soul. Though the clip mentioned above presents the narcissist as an evil genius who intends to destroy their victim by projecting on the victim all their shadows, along with their virtues, I still see how the narcissist can become the apophatic God who negates our limited understanding of God as simply the all loving or good God. The apophatic God negates all that is spoken of God. If God is good in the domain of the via positiva, then the via negativa can simply refer to God as the God that is not.
That said, the victim of narcissistic abuse has similar experiences with one who is on their journey of discipleship and to enter into a deeper relationship with God. Both persons embody some form of existential naivete. They come to their respective relationships with an underdeveloped understanding of the complexities defining human existence, and the way evil plays out in our fallen world. They both see in the other a utopia of love without asking the fundamental question, how does evil manifest itself in our lives? Without taking seriously this question, the victim of narcissistic abuse is lured into the narcissistic room of mirrors. At first, the narcissist, who has mastered the craft of manipulation, shows its victim all the virtues and talents that the victim naturally possesses. Being idolized, the victim feels so much alive. He is love bombed like there is no tomorrow. Without a clear understanding of themselves, they are carried away and become canvasses upon which the narcissist mirrors themselves. The narcissist knows that all the mirroring they are doing is actually from their victim. When the victim sees on the narcissism similar talents and virtues, they let their guards down and fall deeply in love with the narcissist. It is too fast and too aggressive. These are red flags that must never be ignored. Because the room is itself a room of mirrors intended to deceive, the deception is first grounded in truth and then exaggerated into the world of fantasy. As the victim looks closely at the mirrors, they also see some distortions, which are aspects of themselves that need to be improved upon. Because they trust the narcissist whom they have regarded as their companion in life, they accept these flaws. But it is an unhealthy acceptance because it is done too fast and in an aggressive manner. There is no room for authentic and deep reflection. Since the narcissist only knows how to devalue people and destroy them from within and from without through manipulations, they employ the devaluation process whereby they move the mirrors around to allow for grandiose distortions of their victim. The victim looks at the mirrors and slowly notices that they are looking at reflections of a monster. This shocks them. They keep gazing and trying to find again that beautiful image of themselves they encountered when they first gazed at the mirrors. The image is gone and replaced with this monster looking back at them. They also want to see the narcissist whom they still do not yet know is a narcissist and they notice that they are also missing from the reflection of the mirrors. Their persistent gaze begins a process of ruminations and an experience of existential crisis. They no longer know who they are. What they see in the mirrors is an exaggeration of who they are. Their faults are accentuated in a grandiose manner. The sad truth of the image of the monster that gazes back at them is that it is the totality of how they are perceived by all who have encountered them until that moment. Within that hidden monster lies the beautiful image but it is hidden by the exaggerated imperfections of the victim.
How can the victim redeem himself? It is only through the persistent gaze at the mirrors that the flickers of the virtuous image pierces slowly through the monster in the mirrors for them to see, even though it might be a brief process. This occurs through the gift of memory. Memory becomes the graced pathway of self-discovery. But it is not simply a discovery of the past. What was in the past had some deformities, hence the narcissist was able to distort it and hold it captive in their room of mirrors. The memory I am speaking of here is one that orients the victim to abandon even the identity of victimhood and to summon all the strength they have, while resting on the shoulders of memory. They go forward and destroy the mirrors. In the first place, a healthy sense of self does not need mirrors for validation. As they destroy the mirrors, they must then build a new self. This time, it is what they want it to be that it must be. Validations become like rain drops on a rock. They do not need to penetrate the rock because the rock is confident in itself as a rock. The new self now knows that there are narcissists in the world, and that evil is part of this world. The new self is slow to judge but wise to observe. The new self is grounded in the spirit of discernment. The new self is formidable and can achieve all that they choose to embrace.
In the mystical life of discipleship, God chooses to become a narcissist in God’s apophatic mode of being when God encounters each of us. God takes us to our respective Garden of Gethsemane as did Satan lead Jesus Christ on the night before he was crucified. In that Garden, the one who has embraced the vocation of discipleship is shown their virtues and the potentials in them in their yet Adamic nature. Since it is an Adamic body that they still possess, they are saturated with vices as well. Trusting in the friendship of God, the would-be disciple chooses to look closely at the self-reflection occurring at their own existential Gethsemane, and they begin to see an accentuated reflection of their fallenness. They are tempted to despair. In this condition, they look around and call on God to be a God of comfort to them. But God is silent! God is nowhere to be found. God has become the absent God. As they lament the absence of God, they are not yet aware that this absence of God is the source of their liberation and new life in Christ. In their condition, they continue to look around, and slowly, they see a reflection of themselves that they are familiar with. But it is also very unfamiliar. This movement between the familiar and the unfamiliar is itself the possibility for them to embody both a cataphatic and apophatic modes of being in the world. But because they are not yet fully matured in who they are as disciples, their apophatic manifestation is seen as something negative.
Rather than flee their Gethsemane, they must remain there and summon the voice of faith to call on God to save them from themselves. Only in that plea can God make Godself accessible to them. This is because the saving process is all about being pruned. They will be pruned of their fallenness. In Gethsemane they will come to embrace a new humanity that does not need to be flattered. They will become more aware that discipleship has a strong side of interiority to it. They will understand that if they are to follow God, the focus must be on God and not on themselves. Holiness is all about being comfortable in oneself as an embodiment of God’s wholeness. When they leave Gethsemane, which they must do because Gethsemane is a place of self-discovery and not for self-living, they will come to know that God was always present in their time of need in the form of hidden presence. What does this mean for their own journey with God in the world?
Through their experience of God as a god that is present through hiddenness, they will understand that their role as agents of God’s life in the world is to be God’s hand of life for others without drawing attention to themselves. All that they do and stand for must be oriented towards being agents of abundant life for others, including themselves.
Hiddenness is a ritualized form of existential humility. This is at the core of apophaticism. While the cataphatic God has been embraced as the God of power and might, the apophatic God is the vulnerable God who rejects power and might. The disciple of God is known for their virtues and good works in their cataphatic modes of being. Yet, in their apophatic mode of existence, they are always ontologically oriented towards the helplessness that defines those who have been reduced to the peripheries of goodness. With the sinner they must be in solidarity. They must reject the temptation to judge because they have also been made to see closely their own imperfections.
Finally, the narcissist becomes the instrument of grace which leads to self-transformation in a manner one can never experience elsewhere. Since the narcissist does this, their transformed victim must learn to forgive them in a manner that allows for the transformation to be authentic. The new self does not need to punish the narcissist for it to feel whole. Wholeness is now ontological and does not need external affirmation. In forgiving the narcissist, the new self is inviting the narcissist to allow themselves to be transformed as well. Similarly, the disciple who undergoes the experience of the dark night must come see God in a deeper manner. They must see their new identity as one closely linked to the God that is both cataphatic and apophatic. Apophaticism is how God completes the work of redemption in them and to gift them with their new humanity. The only authentic response must be complete gratitude.
Reflection – February 1, 2024
NOTE: Here is the link to the YouTube mentioned above: https://youtu.be/plcryxXiq8w?si=zA0jQ81t3oaYHVk7
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