The Preservation of Self 自体的保存 While the pathology of narcissism can be so graphically illustrated in these cases, we should not allow ourselves to be deceived into thinking that the concerns over narcissism are limited to such pathological manifestations. Rather they form a fundamental human concern from the cradle to the grave. Human psychology is a constant struggle to preserve narcissism. From earliest childhood to the last gasp of dying breath, human beings are caught up in the preservation of a sense of self-esteem which remains highly vulnerable and fragile and open to attack. Whatever threatens our status in life, whatever throws into question our accomplishments and attainments, whatever threatens us or limits us, or prevents us from attaining the object of our desires, all these and more are forthright assaults on our narcissism. All this brings our self-esteem into question and makes us feel vulnerable and defeated and humiliated. We must struggle to find ways to protect ourselves, to sustain a threatened sense of selfhood within us, to preserve and support in whatever way possible the diminished sense of self-esteem which accompanies such attacks. All of us are the possessors of an embattled narcissism. 虽然自恋的病理可以在这些案例中如此生动地加以说明，但我们不应该让自己误以为对自恋的关注仅限于这些病理表现。相反，它们构成了人类从摇篮到坟墓的基本关怀。人类的心理是一场持续的维护自恋的斗争。从最早的童年到奄奄一息的最后一口气，人类都沉浸在对自尊的保存之中，这种自尊高度脆弱、易受攻击。无论什么威胁着我们在生活中的地位，无论什么质疑着我们的造诣和成就，无论什么威胁着我们或限制着我们，或阻止我们达到我们所渴望的目标，所有这些(以及更多)都是对我们自恋的直接攻击。所有这些都让我们的自尊受到质疑，让我们感到脆弱、挫败和羞辱。我们必须努力找到保护自己的方法，在我们内部维持一种受到威胁的自我意识，以任何可能的方式保护和支持这种被贬低的自尊感。我们所有人都是四面楚歌的自恋者。 From the very beginning of his experience, the child is dependent on his relationship with significant others for the building and maintaining of the sense of self. The child's ontological security rests on a fundamental commitment to others, along with a basically sensed and realized commitment of others to him. Whatever the subsequent developmental history of such relationships, we nonetheless cling to them as to a taproot of our existence. As Rochlin has commented so well: 从一个人经历的最初开始，孩子就依赖于他与他人的关系来建立和维持自我意识。孩子的本体论安全感建立在对他人的基本承诺，以及他人对他的基本感觉到和已实现的承诺之上。不管这种关系后来的发展历史如何，我们仍然把它们当作我们存在的根源。正如Rochlin所说: To lose them would mean to give up our demands for imperishable relationships, and to acknowledge the transience of all things and therefore of ourselves. It would signify too a willingness to forego denials of vulnerability and thereby relinquish our religious beliefs, renounce our expectation of altering reality, and thus in consequence abandon wishes for fulfillment. We would also forego a sense of the future toward which we strive and would remain confined to the limits of a present dissociated from the past. There is nothing in the human condition to indicate that we are likely to follow such a course (1973, p. 3). 失去它们就意味着放弃我们对永恒关系的需求，承认所有事物和我们自己的短暂性。这也意味着我们愿意放弃对脆弱的否定，从而放弃我们的宗教信仰，放弃改变现实的期望，从而放弃成功的愿望。我们也会放弃一种我们为之奋斗的未来感，并将继续局限于一个与过去分离的现在。在人类的状况中，没有任何迹象表明我们可能会走上这样的道路(1973年，第3页)。 The force that opposes any such relinquishment is the power of narcissism. Any separation from the things or the objects which we value is poorly tolerated. One way in which the child clings defensively and desperately to his objects is through the process of introjection. The loss of the loved object inflicts a deprivation upon our narcissism so that self-esteem is placed in jeopardy. Patients with narcissistic personality disorders are highly susceptible to the fear of loss of objects, of love, or of the symbolic losses of castration anxiety. But in the narcissistic disorders, the fear of the loss of the object takes first place (Kohut, 1971). A narcissistic investment of self in objects sets the stage for the susceptibility to loss. The result is a narcissistic disequilibrium which disrupts the sense of self-cohesiveness and self-esteem which has come to depend on the presence, the approval, or other narcissistic gratifications derived from the object. The diminution of self-esteem is a major parameter and signpost of narcissistic injury. 反对任何这种放弃的力量是自恋的力量。任何与我们珍视的事物或客体的分离都是难以容忍的。孩子防卫性和绝望性地依附于他的客体的一种方式是通过内摄的过程。失去所爱的客体会剥夺我们的自恋，使自尊处于危险之中。患有自恋型人格障碍的患者非常容易对失去客体、失去爱或阉割焦虑的象征性损失产生恐惧。但是在自恋障碍中，对失去客体的恐惧是第一位的(Kohut, 1971)。自我对客体的自恋投资为失去的易感性奠定了基础。结果是一种自恋的不平衡，它破坏了自我内聚和自尊的感觉，而这依赖于存在、认可或来自客体的其他自恋满足感。自尊的降低是自恋伤害的主要特征和标志。