Some people equate words of criticism with the denial of love. Some people just want love, and their refusal to take criticism is merely because they haven’t the love necessary to handle it without being broken.

Dense and overgrown bushes, wild and alive, can handle garden shears being taken to refine and cut them back down. But some haven’t yet had the opportunity to blossom and flourish in such a way that they can handle being reduced, as they’ve been made small their whole life. Some plants are so desperate for water and light, already withering, that words of criticism seem a raised machete ready to cut them from their weakening central stem. Why wouldn’t they defend themselves?

In this case, defensive behaviors occurring after receiving criticism aren’t about the denial of accountability, but rather about ensuring that they are still worthy of love.

Some people just need love, and go about it in god-awful ways, each attempt at receiving it pushing those around them away evermore.

In this way, sometimes seeming “narcissism,” often equated with a megalomanic ego, is actually the product of a great, weeping smallness, and a desperate desire to grow larger. How can they handle being made to feel any smaller than they already feel?

People just need love — period. The cycle breakers of families are those who quest outward — and inward — in search of that holy grail. 

Go and bear water, Aquarius. Take your dowsing rods and find the water this drought-laden world so desperately needs. Bring it back, and let the thirsty drink.

But know you cannot find the aquifer without leaving home to do so.