Narcissism: the best cook or good times?

Everyone is narcissistic, the difference is only to what extent. Even more dangerous is when we are fed by people that we are the greatest. This is especially the case when we have power, when we are a leader.

I speak of leaders not only in terms of being a CEO or a prime minister of a country, but also in daily situation. We inevitably take a leadership role in our daily lives, e.g. be the head-chef for a farewell dinner occasion. Recently, our house informally hosted cooking sessions. It started out as a bonding session of the LKY students. I observed how leadership was naturally shaped. People with better knowledge on food will naturally rise to the head-chef position. This is especially true for someone who has cultural/historical advantage, such as being an Italian. People of such character will naturally take a lead on what ingredients to buy, how to cook, and everyone else will naturally be a sous-chef. The proximity between commands and feedback is so close that everyone will have to immediately throw compliments to the head-chef on the first taste. Sometimes, saying "this is the best pasta" is a courteous "thanks" rather than "this is really the best pasta I have ever eaten". Such gesture fed the head-chef's ego (even when he shied away). I noticed that the frequency of that person initiated a cooking session increased. In a way, praises he/she received affirm his self-admiration and consequently led him/her to believe that people crave for his food.

I imagine how it goes with big-shots and powerful people in the government who arise into power by formal recognition. Unlike the chef, these people usually have a "letter of acknowledgment" that they are leaders and are authorized to give commands even when the subordinates disagree. With the chef, he/she has to please people's taste bud to received that recognition and he/she cannot force anyone into eating his/her food. Further, I also imagine how much praises and adoration they are showered with in such position.

In the chef example, I imagine how heart-breaking it is for the head-chef when people say that the food is great but they do not finish it. I guess it is just one of the social conventions to be dishonest when it comes to our friends cooking for us. But courtesy aside, the head-chef will always expect people to say "this is the best pasta I have ever had" (even when he/she says I have just started to cook) and "I can't stop eating your food. Do this more often"

I extrapolate two lessons from my previous dinner invitations, (i) we do for ourselves rather than for people and (ii) we constantly need empathy, but not emitting it.

Again, with the cooking example, the dinner invitation started out as a "do for others" event. The head-chef will self-proclaim that the dinner would not have been as fun without him/her. In a way, the event's highlight is the head-chef where everyone will shout "here is our chef"! We showered the head-chef with adoration and gratitude that the dinner is no longer about getting together and making conversation, but about affirming that the food is superb. The head-chef ended up asking everyone how the food is (and by social convention we praise every single dish he/she cooked). The second time I attended that dinner, it is no longer about getting together but the head-chef experimenting on a new dish. Eventually, it became "do for ourselves" rather that "for others".

Another sheer observation I made was that when there are more than two chefs in the house, they tended to fish for my compliments by saying things like "I am just a beginner, Sue (the other chef) is a much better cook". Let's say the dinner's occasion is a farewell party for a colleague. Instead of emitting sympathy for the colleague, the event is more centered to "is my food the greatest" or "how unpleasant the dinner would have been without me". The head-chef constantly needed a reminder (for every single dish) how good he/she is. Sometimes, some dishes are not as good as the previous dishes and the head-chef would rushed back to the kitchen and worked out on another dish. Praises for each dish have to be better than the previous one.