“I don’t think it would have been done if I had not been there”………Lord Wellington after the battle of Waterloo defeating Napoleon.
This above line is words of a narcissist who thought that he and he alone could win the detrimental war against Napoleon. A man of unyielding arrogance with a bloated ego, craving power and adoration he did not realise that the victory was due to external forces in his favour. Napoleon Bonaparte lost because he was power-hungry and wanted to be emperor of Europe. History is replete with cases when control-freaks who have won and lost.
The best examples of the last century are Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi who redeemed a nation because of his trust in the people of a nation and Hitler who betrayed his country with his personal Nazi nationalism. It needs a team with committed leadership with an open mind to carry forward ideas, not a control-freak who dominates, forcing his ideas on others.
Man is born with an “EGO” that satiates his self and self-worth, but its needs to be the realisation and capability, to satiate needs of the self and others; not the self alone. Control-freaks are narcissists who exaggerate their importance and yearn for a superior acceptance in society. They lie about their achievements, associate with peers and look down on others. They are arrogant to the limit of lying and usually demanding on others taking for granted that their dictum is final. They put down other ideas by hook or crook, and stay in control. This is a personality disorder, manifesting authoritarianism. A control-freak shuts his mind from the world and if given the authority, will force his words upon others, ignoring consequences, not realising that any work affecting community needs support from others.
Everyday life brings us face to face with such freaks who dominate on all they survey. The world is their alone and all others are vassals. Doom is always round the corner for them. They watch over the shoulders of those they control and punish them on the turn of a screw. They are driven by the ego – the big “I”. This is a trait that seeps into the mind of every living human once in a while, in a way or another. But is everyone a control freak? The answer is a big “YES”. It starts taking effect in individuals from a young age, the instinct to dominate. Control freaks always think that there is something wrong in others’ thoughts and action. If anyone imagines a perfect society then they are wrong too; that is Utopia. Control-freaks carry a judgemental attitude and find wrong in everything, without justifying their thoughts and make others responsible for the results of even their action. Narcissism cannot be thrown out the window at will. It needs a realisation that others could be suffering and are at the receiving end of dominance. No one is going to tell you that you are a Narcissist or a control-freak for they are afraid of your whiplash retort.
Take a holiday and see how others have fared in your absence. If they are better off without you, then you have a problem of being a control-freak. What right do you have to have others suffer because of you? The ego that satiates the self alone is narcissistic and there is no way out for a narcissist other than self-realisation.
But how do you control the control-freak in you? That is up to you, not me, because doom is around the corner for you, for “a man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still; but if you listen, you will hear the voice, the voice of ‘Conscience’ ”.
