Narcissists and narcissistic people, in general, are world-famous for being difficult personalities, but did you know they are — for the most part — intentionally unable to be pleased? It’s a defining characteristic of self-centered thinkers, the propensity to use and abuse those who show them the most hospitality relentlessly and without conscience.
In the biblical sense, those people who fail to show kindness and mercy to others with regard to appreciation are one of the coldest and most callous of all sycophantic groups. Using and abusing others as a lifestyle choice compelled by habit, no good deed done by another is ever good enough or goes unpunished. The unappreciative Narcissist abuses other people’s kind nature religiously while striving to “teach them a moral lesson” that in order to succeed in life, human beings must compete.
Those raised by toxic parents are most likely to, by default, become what is commonly known in self-help social circles as “People Pleasers” and are the most likely candidates to be targeted by Cluster B personality types or narcissistic people in general for use and abuse.
Conditioned from birth to solve emotional and physical needs problems for other people rather than themselves, such people — typically in an attempt to secure a position of emotional safety as well as to provide compassionate care to people who clearly are unable to self-soothe effectively — tend to become the helpers, the healers, and the problem-solvers of the world.
For those who follow the Christian faith or who actively read religious theology for the purpose of studying world history, ethics, or philosophy, Paul and Timothy both shared similar sentiments about narcissistic or selfish people, noting that during the “end times” or times of great difficulty that boastful and self-aggrandizing rulers, family leaders, and just plain confused and toxic individuals would all succumb to egocentric, self-promoting thinking.
Sadly, however, in the eyes of these great biblical thinkers, the false self (meaning the ego) would drive such people to irrational, illogical, and just plain detrimental conclusions about their own self-importance and spiritual “rightness”.
Unappreciative of other people’s efforts to please them, such personality types love nothing more than letting a people-pleasing person know that no matter how hard that person tries to help them meet their own needs and selfish desires, that they never quite measure up. It’s a carrot dangled before the face of a willing workhorse. The People Pleaser, seeking to self-actualize in a productive and (for them) healthy way perceives another human being with unmet needs. Logically, following a moral impetus to “do the right thing” by striving to help alleviate any pain, discomfort, or perception of lack in another individual, People Pleasers rise to the task of striving to succeed.
Success, for a people-pleasing person, comes when another person’s needs are met — most oftentimes without any care, concern, or regard for the short or long term interest of the problem solver themselves.
This is when the ethics and psychology of helping other people can get very dicey, noting that when someone who strives to do nice things for other people from a sense of pure empathy and without expectation of any moral reward other than a person in pain thanking them for relief when and if a problem or void issue can be abated, an immense feeling of frustration comes over the helper when and if a narcy person fails to validate someone even tried — let alone succeeded — in meeting their previously unmet need.
In an article titled “What does the Bible say about Narcissism” by the writers of AFTER NARCISSISTIC ABUSE, concepts of religious doctrine from the perspective of true Christians versus errant self-aggrandizers is compared to modern Cluster B psychological terms. The website author(s) shared the following insight about people who have Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) or whose thought patterns reflect egocentric and abusive thinking by sharing the following passage about appreciation — specifically regarding the clinically diagnosed Narcissist’s lack thereof.
They write:
Psychology says: Because of their immense sense and expectation of superior entitlement, narcissists are ungrateful and unthankful for whatever they have been given in life. Because they regard themselves as “special”, they seriously believe that they are entitled to have whatever they are given. Generally, with such an exaggerated sense of self importance, their actual levels of achievements are not in accord with their fantasy. Because the narcissist is addicted to excessive amounts of admiration, they come to expect preferential treatment when dealing with others. In short, they live in a world of fantasy, a world in which they are brilliant, powerful and successful in every way imaginable. They expect people to dance around then, so why should they be thankful for anything; actually, it is others who should be thankful to be in the service of such resplendence. If one is silly enough to tell them that they are “ungrateful”, they will defend their right to their entitlement to the very end. They will be outraged by your criticism, and they will insist on a full repayment from you before they will ever consider forgiving you, and if they don’t get it, they will hold a grudge on principle, their need for revenge will be high, and you are likely to be alienated.
A People-Pleaser is a person who strives to help others. But a person who is narcissistic and ungrateful by nature will not place any moral value on the helper’s EFFORTS.
Note that “effort” is a concept put forward as a moral noun in this sense, meaning it is a thing to be lauded in and of itself (in most instances). People who are NOT narcissistic or egocentric by nature (prone to using and abusing others for fun, profit, or sport) typically will intuitively recognize that simply trying to help another human being takes effort. For that reason, 80% of the world’s population will spontaneously say thank you and mean it to a person who, for whatever reason, arrives in life at just the right time necessary to literally be there and try to help.
Whether or not success in meeting, say, a material need, is ever accomplished is superfluous to the concept of appreciation. Noting that effort problem solving as a donation of charitable labor is something valuable in itself, People Pleasers who even bother to try tend to feel a sense of spiritual success when and if a person they care about or have tried to help notices and validates them for simply being willing to help.
If a People Pleaser fails to meet the needs or help improve a life situation for a person who shows them gratitude for caring enough to risk trying, a sense of self-actualization occurs in the emotional and psychological body of the empathic person themselves. Helping is a charitable act that needs not succeed in third-dimensional terms to be considered valuable according to most known cultures — except for among the small, yet growing in number, a subset of people who live their lives as wholly self-interested and egocentric competitors.
Spiritual Narcissists, those who subscribe to following false prophets like church leaders who seek to promote entitlement thinking and mobbing, are some of the most brutally abusive personality types. Not only will they take moral, physical, and intellectual advantage of any person who displays empathy for their fellow man and desire to please (as in “problem-solve”), they will do so while actively promoting fear-mongering and the use of caustic hate speech.
Unappreciative of any person who uses their god-given intellect or emotional capacity to interact socially with other human beings based on a functional ability to come from a place of respect and empathy, they will loudly boast and pontificate about the state of the world — calling people “liberals”, “freeloaders”, and “pansies” for doing such things as being honest humanitarians willing to help other people (as well as themselves) succeed. Care and concern, as well as compassionate acts of selfless service, are actively ridiculed openly, mocking not only God’s wisdom (as creator) but striving to game heaven competitively.
A full-blown Narcissist lacks the emotional intelligence to perceive value in doing nice things for other people — or in the intrinsic value of having the privilege of having social interaction with people in the world in general who strive to help, respect, or otherwise please them. Because every decent thing they do for others they do so for a reward or based on a price, they simply miss the intellectual point of why humans who behave in such ways that are collaborative (rather than competitively) have merit as human beings.
Narcy people will play a mind control game with any person they perceive as emotionally weak. Such groups include kind and loving people, Empaths, and yes — most of all — People Pleasers. By bringing up a negative at every opportunity when discussing a success, the antagonistic and unappreciative narcissist effectively cuts friendly people off at the emotional, spiritual, and proverbial knees.
Noting that People Pleasers are problem solvers who focus on being of service to others in a loving, fastidious, and conscientious manner, gaming to vex them psychologically and emotionally is easy. All a Narcissist has to do to hurt a People Pleaser is to fail to acknowledge the value of their care or concern; to truly damage them while creating a “hook” to keep them willingly engaged, failing to further acknowledge that they have had any success pleasing them (as a second verb-like component additional to the noun concept of effort) works like a charm right up until the point a People Pleaser is educated about Cluster B and becomes savvy.
[Think “Savvy big big?” a la Johnny Depp in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie series, the a-ha moment that comes realizing some toxic self-aggrandizing and self-promoting drek of a human being has been doing nothing but running a horse-carrot dangle style con on a nice person to see how much they can “get” or wring out of them physically, spiritually, or emotionally.]
Appreciation for effort, when not shown by a person who is on the receiving end of a benefit, is one of the biggest red flags that they are actively guilty of toxic thinking. To be a toxic thinker, one does not have to by necessity be crippled by the “lack of an empathy gene” that affects people who are NPD or Cluster B by nature. One simply has to care more about their own self than they do about the needs, efforts, or feelings of other people with regard to offering social reciprocity.
In a functional human relationship, all social engagements require a reciprocal exchange of willingness to engage as Party A followed by a decision to show interest by Party B. When Party A is the helper, Party B’s “right” or proper social response — in a healthy interaction — includes recognizing with a sense of appreciation that another person seeks to assist or do a nice thing followed by appropriately having feelings of empathy-inspired gratitude.
Gratitude (or appreciation) as a moral concept, then, is actually an essential component of relationship concepts in general, noting that giving the gift of being an involved family member, friend, lover, or simply a stranger passing someone on the street and saying hello or offering a smile are all acts of kindness and small courtesies human beings in general can and should be grateful for (in the simplest form of recognition as a validation form). Without reciprocity, a person who smiles at another and is met by an avoidant or cold gaze is functionally prohibited from being able to self-actualize having proffered unsolicited a kind or truly godly act.
Thwarted in their attempt to offer a social pleasantry, whoever sought to spark a kind interaction may feel hurt, like a social failure, and morally incomplete.
This is the exact response a narcissistic person with a toxic or unhealthy sense of self-seeks to produce in their prey. The person who strives to be nice or pleasant, who shows empathy for others, and strives at all times to do the right thing to make the world, in general, a better place commonly offends their sense of superiority.
Because a Narcissist or Cluster B personality type is functionally unable to perceive the world in such a way that their empathy for other people or the collective is ever experienced or acknowledged, they see someone caring about the collective or seeking a reciprocal “please and thank you” sort of helper-helpee exchange as something called “Narcissistic Injury”. Egocentrism coupled with an extreme sense of superiority drives them to expect special treatment, always at the expense of someone else in order for them to consider the treatment of value.
A People Pleaser who dotes on their every need in the hopes of seeking personal gain, special favoritism, or reward is seen as the ideal minion or as “Narcissistic Supply Source”, but there’s a huge problem with that concept for both the person who serves and for the user themselves. Namely, because People Pleasers strive to help everyone, when the Narcissist realizes that interest in helping others does not exclusively apply to them, they feel (for lack of better terms) offended and slighted.
Narcy people all suffer from delusions of grandeur. All tend to on a very core and fundamental level believe they are better than others and deserving of special rights and attention not afforded to other human beings.
The more toxic the thinker, the more likely they are to truly operate from a twisted, “Cognitive Distortion” perspective that the world truly revolves around them. At all times, they expect to have their own needs met and themselves promoted both over and at the expense of other human beings in a vertical (rather than lateral, collaborative move) is something to which they are uncompromisingly entitled.
Make a Narcissist wait for their dinner when and if you are caught in traffic or helping another? God forbid.
Don’t pick up a call and come running the first millisecond a narcissistic predator demands? Scourge of the earth, you are… surely deserving of the silent treatment or some other bizarre form of social torment.
But appreciate a person trying to help them have their social, physical, financial, or emotional needs met? HELL NO proudly declares the obstinate, angry, irrational, and just plain illogical Narcissist.
Proud to declare statements like, “Why should I feel grateful?” or to openly and provocatively name call anyone a “freeloader” who — get this — voluntarily donates time, money, and labor efforts to make the world a better place, is a far too common social, personal, and political stance of ALL narcissistic personality types. Spouting they are unquestionably going to game God by offering charitable service in order to secure favor in heaven or because they attend weekly church services and participate in the act of tithing, the moral lunatic misses the point of “being” an actual Christian entirely.
Paul (from the Bible) knew egocentric behavior was repellent and morally wrong. So did Timothy.
God, as a concept both male and female and present in all things natural as well as conscious, requires only one true leap of faith to engage with divine mind actively. That Kierkegaardian step is inextricably tied not with “getting” a concept in such a way that once you recognize it you apprehend a notion of GOD like property.
In order to actually have a relationship with God, one must not only recognize that God (as a divine essence or entity) is present in the Christian Science sense of the term but also that a human being, upon recognizing the existence of higher power, reflects back with an attitude of appreciation and gratitude for the mere existence of their own cosmic sense of smiling or nodding at someone when passing on the street.
Showing appreciation for another human being’s willingness to help or care for others is the microcosm. Recognizing the existence of a higher power that shows human beings hospitality by providing a world in which to live as well as being (most likely) the spark of divine essence from which all logic, conscience, or emotion comes as a wellspring, in and of itself should logically produce in a truly good person an immediate physical sensation of wonder that radiates both in and out towards self and Godly power without hesitation or a compulsion to compete with or “use” anybody or anything.
A narcy person will look around at the world and think having dominion over the earth means they can use and abuse rather than care-take. The same arrogant level of selfish tunnel vision makes them twist words like “Honor thy mother and thy father” into something that means let mommy and daddy act like tyrannical, heartless, gluttonous, and spiritually greedy bastards — taking advantage of God’s kingdom, all that is in it, and any failure to appreciate other sentient human being’s hospitality.
This includes failing to be grateful to God for their own existence, polluting their body with things like tobacco, drugs, and alcohol regularly, killing the environment with pollution and waste, as well as truly “wrecking up the place” for other human beings both alive today (by treating them disrespectfully and abusively) and for future generations (by leaving only a legacy of garbage personalities as well as trashing literally everything).
Entitlement, meaning having a belief they are entitled to act morally and socially reprehensibly, tends to be the core belief nurtured by toxic thinkers. When such leaders have religious or social authority in a home or related cultural organization, they tend to do the most damage by literally striving to recruit other people to follow them who are weaker Narcissists or who have Cluster B personality tendencies.
By banding together in groups and fear-mongering, they frighten the most people using manipulative dialogue to influence less strong personality types into buying what they are selling. Promising things like enemies and people they don’t like will go to hell and burn for all eternity while the person with a vendetta agenda is able to sneak past the observant eyes of God and through the gates of Saint Peter, they spend their human incarnation doing nothing but pandering to and promoting the Golden Calf of EGOISM (rather than truly honoring God by striving to improve themselves and the world, making it a better place by promoting systems theory acts of harmony).
The abusive Patriarch tells other people all the reasons why they are sinners, “bad people” who don’t do enough and demands pledges of fidelity and loyalty to a parent or family of origin no matter how toxic. The abusive Matriarch rules the roost with an iron fist, demanding her needs be prioritized above everyone else’s in the community and home without question, justification or reflection.
Both personality types — the misogynistic male and enabling female — show little to no awareness that even having a family or community to socialize with collaboratively is a gift. Because they only see value in people who have something material or status-oriented that they esteem or those they can manipulate and use, they miss the moral, psychological, and just plain socially pragmatic point that all humans rely on one another to succeed in the world.
It is only when unrepentant Narcissism flourishes that civilizations fall.
Looking back historically over time, biblical stories like why God allegedly flooded the earth, why God allegedly issued a social Darwinian-inspired “10 Commandments” as a guideline for striving to improve culture, for the true reason civilizations founded in Athens, Greece, and Rome, Italy fell (as well as the Third Reich in Nazi Germany), all can be quite logically and philosophically correlated with the cultural rise of Narcissism. As each societal group became more focused on doing (to achieve), they psychologically lost their spiritual root connection to the concept of living in the present or NOW moment appreciatively.
Without even remotely claiming that the creationist account of the Garden of Eden story is factually accurate with regard to their being only a man and a woman named Adam and Eve, the story can (from an intellectual, philosophical point of view) be used as an example of how human beings have missed the spiritual point of existence comprehensively since ancient times, sincerely.
If God created mankind (meaning male and female) in the divine mind’s own essence and image, creating the Garden of Eden (meaning a natural habitat that as a system exists to meet all human needs as well as plant, animal, and material form’s needs for a “platform” simultaneously), then God — in essence — must BY NATURE not only be capable of creating as a divine being, but he/she/it must also have a heightened sense of empathy. Such a complex emotion reflects the spirit, intellect, and emotion working in unison to complete — literally — a seamless, collaborative, working essence of spiritual unity, noting that once expressed by a God or godlike form becomes truly the first act of true charitable hospitality.
Failing to recognize that the platform of existence was never offered competitively, the narcissistic person — biologically impaired and a lesser organism (from a biological perspective with regard to evolutionary perspective defined as a hierarchy of awareness constant rather than an act of socially dynamic, upward mobility) — is both caustic to others as well as to his or her social and natural environment completely. Not only are they typically socially destructive and greedy people who displace the spiritual trajectories of people who strive to do good things in the world on an everyday basis by insulting, offending, undermining, and socially terrorizing them, their absolute psychological refusal to even entertain the notion that they simply cannot bully their way into heaven by abusing every person, place, or thing they come into contact with makes them one of the most socially corrupt influences on society at large.
By displaying competitive (rather than collaborative) ethics at all times and constantly striving to GET, they set in motion a perpetual downward thinking spiral that literally manifests as a concept of lack. From there, not only do they demand God’s plan be to disenfranchise some at the expense of others, they insult the divine intelligence of god in having created a harmonious systems environment where every creature’s needs (great or small) are without struggle or effort met.
People living in the 21st century who follow religious teachings, live life with an attitude of gratitude, and have faith in God live by an entirely different “Law of Attraction” mindset. If you have not yet watched the movie titled “The Secret” that routinely is harbored on Netflix, it’s truly worth doing some research into the concept.
From a spiritual perspective that aligns with modern science, the Law of Attraction focuses on the concept that what you place your focus on creating is literally what you are most likely to manifest. For a narcy person, this is likely to be making yourself feel “all-powerful”, greater and smarter than God, in essence, based on lying, manipulating, using other people without offering sincere thanks, and old fashioned bullying. But if you are a kind person, the experience of self-actualizing as a helper, healer, People Pleaser, or Empath is likely to produce a totally different world view as well as life experience.
While the toad or sloth-like moral actor who grumbles, grouches, or refuses to engage in fast action to help others or save themselves feels quite proud for doing nothing but moving at a snail’s pace with regard to social progress, the more godly person has no desire to sit around and wait for the fates to change or to gluttonously gobble up innocent flies. The socially dynamic person sees a problem in the world and strives to make a change.
The person who appreciates the life God or some creative force has gifted to them as essence understands that in order to be of God, one must reflect the true nature of God in spiritual form. Does that mean one must consider themselves to be equal to or smarter than a deity as the Narcissistic frequently postures themselves as being?
No.
What it does mean is if you make a mistake and realize it, strive to improve. What is does mean is if you or your culture has done social or physical damage to the environment or another sentient being in the past, one strives to make amends while offering the only true apology of CHANGED BEHAVIOR.
Once a human being knows something is wrong or that a principle of the social justice of metaphysics has been misaligned or misinterpreted, if they are of Goodwill nature(from a philosophical sense) then there is an implicit imperative to honor our collective mothers and fathers (generationally) by striving to DO better. In no way, shape, or form did God most likely intend for children of biologically deficient or toxically influenced socially, emotionally, or physically abusive parents to take abuse on the proverbial chin.
Likewise, it’s wholly unlikely that God, as a creative being, would perceive the pursuit of creating a world of appreciative, loving, and harmony-seeking beings as the kind of lot to kick out of (rather than be granted dominion over in the caretaker sense) of his/her/its “Garden” — meaning this tiny blue marble of a unique world orbiting about amongst the galaxies.
Narcissistic people are predators by nature. They engage in and promote predatory pack animal behavior.
Right on thinking of themselves as socially influential but wrong on ethics, they create harm and discord. What’s more, their “original sin” of failing to trust God’s system’s theory plan that all creatures needs would be harmoniously socially and physically met is likely to have been the first metaphorical domino push that created the perpetual motion downward spiral humans throughout time have allegorically described as the great fall.
Had narcissistic people been able to appreciate the gift and magic of all natural creation and treated organisms with respect rather than abusing both nature and one another, there never would have come into the human mind a conceptualized notion of hierarchy ( in a competitive rather than differentiated sense). Humans in a Garden of Eden setting were tasked with the challenge of appreciating God’s hospitality — tasked with the challenge of simply being rather than being driven to do.
Concepts like work as a tedious challenge rather than joyous effort all stem from narcissistic thinkers who fail to have true faith in God or a divine power that at any given time their needs will be met. Great thinkers who appreciate life have throughout history tended to suggest to truly faith-seeking people that intellectual beliefs arising from fear and lack of faith are at the core of human misery.
Buddha thought desire was the cause of all suffering, and in many senses he was right. However, something is lost in translation between Western Culture and Eastern traditions with regard to the concept of desire — as desire (in contemporary American vernacular) is a phrase commonly used to define a sensual or sensory need, while in Buddhist and Hindu teachings it tends to be used with an implication that there is a perceived notion of need that is likely to be at all times partially or wholly unmet.
Desire, as a word reflecting a yearning to feel powerful or in control over a 3rd-dimensional sensation, is then a state of hyper-awareness that magnifies a the spiritual as well as psychological belief in the existence of lack. The less in control a human feels, the less likely they are to feel able to have their Maslow’s hierarchy of needs paradigms met.
For a power and control hungry, insecure, hostile, and selfish thinker like a Narcissist, the state of emotional and psychological dysregulation produced by a stalwart belief in the concept that God put them on the face of the earth in order to compete with other human beings like animals in order to alleviate a perpetual and un-“satable” feeling of physical and spiritual impoverishment has, generationally speaking over thousands of years of culturally progressive time, left a percentage of the human population with a worldview that is fundamentally different from that of humans who have the functional capacity to conceptualize God himself, herself, or itself, with empathy.
As Dante Alighieri noted, betrayal of hospitality by friends, family, and those closest to a person is the worst kind of human sin imaginable. When a narcissistic person engages in acts of social competitiveness against other human beings rather than seeking win-win situations with an attitude of gratitude for the mere existence of others in the mortal coil, they turn their backs on the very nature of a loving or hospitable God in the most arrogant and short-sighted of ways as is truly humanly imaginable.
When a Cluster B person abuses a friend or family member, a stranger in passing, or a group they target for social destruction or disenfranchisement, their moral nature as an agent who engages in a deliberate act of social terrorism is to let fly in the face of God with ruthless and morally spiteful antagonism. If God (whatever that word means) is a sentient being, it seems logical that if he/she/it knows all and exists as the personification of goodness, moral rightness, and the ultimate judge of character that such socially and morally repugnant offenses are not likely to be overlooked in the afterlife — let alone socially or spiritually rewarded.
As such, noting that people who act like grab me gotchas and “gimme gimmes” without ever offering to give any social or emotional hospitality back are likely to be called to the carpet by systems theory nature or a creator at some point in their soul’s existence is likely. For many such individuals, life is lived as a living hell like that Thomas Hobbes once described as nasty, brutish, poor, and short. For others who appreciatively ascribe to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s “Noble Savage” theory, life is likely to be lived more like the way creator-God may have originally intended — harmoniously working with the land and one another based on affection and appreciation of existence — rather than it’s abhorrence.
Thus, appreciating nature, social opportunity to relate, and existence are the human tasks at hand likely to be the “next step” in humankind’s spiritual and physical evolution. As humanity, as a collective, seeking to explore and colonize outer space has become not only a pipe dream but an actual activity and the rise of the internet has created a global community of sorts that allows human beings from all walks of life and parts of the earth to socially connect, the pragmatism of promoting intense nationalism competitions is waning. So too is the social advantage of acting in groups or alone like bullies, targeting.
Why?
Because in a space-exploring culture, humans are likely to need to band together regardless of race, religion, gender, age, or sexual orientation. In a civilization tasked with the challenge of preserving a planet to come home to toxic combative or abuse-themed manipulative social dynamics are likely to be even less prudent to indulge in as single ego thinkers or as mobbing groups.
Will unappreciative Christians who abuse other people daily while they pridefully and without remorse insult the intelligent nature of God, betraying his hospitality challenge by abusing one another and “HIS” (meaning God’s) dominion ultimately face negative spiritual or measurable karmic consequences?
One can say that in their poverty of faith, their lives are already doomed to be spent living on an everyday basis lost and riddled with unanswered cosmic questions about why it is they are fueled by anger and comprehensively riddled with emotional despair.
To recognize there is a better way to do, be, act, or think is not to dishonor toxic parents, friends, families, or even sociopolitical rules. It is to accept personal responsibility for lifestyle actions and moral choices with a fond appreciation for God and all the world’s magical and magnificent wonders created.
You are who you decide to be. Never forget that fact — spiritually, mentally, purposefully, emotionally… but most of all PSYCHOLOGICALLY.
In humanitarian terms, that means humans of any sex or gender identification and all ages should aspire to right wrongs, to strive at all times to leave the world a little better place than you found it, but most of all to learn how to show respect and sincere appreciation for the existence of other human beings of GOODWILL regardless of their socio-economic status, race, religion, gender, age, or ability to directly be used for something.
Live life with an attitude of gratitude and watch the quality of your own life and those around you change dramatically.
Stop giving in to narcissistic people’s demands for the attention they do not (from a humanitarian perspective alone) deserve or need. What’s more, if you are a People Pleaser or Empath by nature, it’s crucially important to not buy into the notion they are selling…. namely that a loving God put human beings on the face of the earth in order to do one another harm or to be forced by divine right action to strive socially, physically, and emotionally inequitably to compete.
