These classes, the movement and the Video Holo-Therapy help you discover the
mythologies of the self-objectification and the object relationships that perpetuate your
suffering and self loathing. You then have an opportunity to just stop the suffering and
connect with your innate nature, which is conscious, happy, free and unlimited.
Pathological envy – the second deadly sin – is a compounded emotion. It is brought on
by the realization of some lack, deficiency, or inadequacy in oneself. It is the result of
unfavorably comparing oneself to others: to their success, their reputation, their
possessions, their luck, their qualities. It is misery and humiliation and impotent rage
and a tortuous, slippery path to nowhere. The effort to break the padded walls of this
self-visited purgatory often leads to attacks on the perceived source of frustration.
There is a spectrum of reactions to this pernicious and cognitively distorting emotion:
Subsuming the Object of Envy Through Imitation
Some narcissists seek to imitate or even emulate their ever changing role models. It is
as if by imitating the object of his envy, the narcissist becomes that object. So, narcissists
are likely to adopt their boss’ typical gestures, the vocabulary of a successful politician,
the dress code of a movie star, the views of an esteemed tycoon, even the countenance
and actions of the fictitious hero of a movie or a novel.
In his pursuit of peace of mind, in his frantic effort to alleviate the burden of consuming
jealousy, the narcissist often deteriorates to conspicuous and ostentatious consumption,
impulsive and reckless behaviors, and substance abuse.
In extreme cases, to get rich quick through schemes of crime and corruption, to out-wit
the system, to prevail, is thought by these people to be the epitome of cleverness,
providing one does not get caught, the sport of living, a winked at vice, a spice.
Destroying the Frustrating Object
Other narcissists “choose” to destroy the object that gives them so much grief by
provoking in them feelings of inadequacy and frustration. They display obsessive,
blind animosity and engage in compulsive acts of rivalry often at the cost of self-
destruction and self-isolation.
This behavior manifests in many forms. From scratching the paint of new cars and
flattening their types, to spreading vicious gossip, to media-hyped arrests of successful
and rich businessmen, to wars against advantaged neighbors.
The stifling, condensed vapors of envy cannot be dispersed. They invade their victims,
their rageful eyes, their calculating souls, they guide their hands in evil doings and dip
their tongues in vitriol. The envious narcissist’s existence is a constant hiss, a tangible
malice, the piercing of a thousand eyes. The imminence and immanence of violence.
The poisoned joy of depriving the other of that which you don’t or cannot have.
Self-Deprecation
There are those narcissists who idealize the successful and the rich and the lucky. They
attribute to them super-human, almost divine, qualities.
In an effort to justify the agonizing disparities between themselves and others, they
humble themselves as they elevate the others. They reduce and diminish their own
gifts, they disparage their own achievements, they degrade their own possessions and
look with disdain and contempt upon their nearest and dearest, who are unable to
discern their fundamental shortcomings. They feel worthy only of abasement and
punishment. Besieged by guilt and remorse, voided of self-esteem, perpetually self-
hating and self-deprecating, this is by far the more dangerous species of narcissist.
For he who derives contentment from his own humiliation cannot but derive happiness
from the downfall of others. Indeed, most of them end up driving the objects of their
own devotion and adulation to destruction and decrepitude.
Cognitive Dissonance
The most common reaction is cognitive dissonance. It is to believe that the grapes are
sour rather than to admit that they are craved.
These people devalue the source of their frustration and envy. They find faults,
unattractive features, high costs to pay, immorality in everything they really most
desire and aspire to and in everyone who has attained that which they so often can’t.
They walk amongst us, critical and self-righteous, inflated with a justice of their making
and secure in the wisdom of being what they are rather than what they could have been
and really wish to be. They make a virtue of virtuous abstention, of wishful
constipation, of judgmental neutrality, this oxymoron, the favorite of the disabled.
Avoidance – The Schizoid Solution
And then, of course, there is avoidance. To witness the success and joy of others is too
painful and too high a price to pay. So, the narcissist stays away, alone and
incommunicado. He inhabits the artificial bubble that is his world where he is king and
country, law and yardstick, the one and only. The narcissist becomes the resident of his
own burgeoning delusions. He is happy and soothed.
However, the narcissist must justify to himself – on those rare occasions that he does
catch a glimpse of his internal turmoil – why all this hatred and why the envy. The
object of envy and hatred has to be magnified, glorified, idealized, demonized or
elevated to superhuman levels to account for the narcissist’s strong negative emotions.
Outstanding qualities, skills and abilities are imputed to it and the object of these
emotions is perceived to possess all the traits that the narcissist would have liked to
have but doesn’t.
This is very different from the purer, healthier, forms of hate directed at an object,
which is genuinely – or is genuinely perceived to be – ominous, dangerous, or sadistic.
In this healthy reaction, the properties of the hated object are not ones the person doing
the hating would have liked to possess!
Hatred is thus used to eliminate a source of frustration, which sadistically attacks the
self. Jealousy is aimed at another person, who sadistically – or provocatively – prevents
the jealous self from obtaining what it desires.
