The Last Psychiatrist explains the lessons that the myth of Narcissus holds for parents: If you want a child who knows himself and can achieve, surround him with mirrors:

“How do you make a child know himself?  You surround him with mirrors. “This is what everyone else sees when you do what you do.  This is who everyone thinks you are.”

You cause him to be tested: this is the kind of person you are, you are good at this but not that. This other person is better than you at this, but not better than you at that.  These are the limits by which you are defined.   Narcissus was never allowed to meet real danger, glory, struggle, honor, success, failure; only artificial versions manipulated by his parents.   He was never allowed to ask, “am I a coward?  Am I a fool?”  To ensure his boring longevity his parents wouldn’t have wanted a definite answer in either direction.

He was allowed to live in a world of speculation, of fantasy, of “someday” and “what if”.   He never had to hear “too bad”, “too little” and “too late.”

When you want a child to become something– you first teach him how to master his impulses, how to live with frustration.  But when a temptation arose Narcissus’s parents either let him have it or hid it from him so he wouldn’t be tempted, so they wouldn’t have to tell him no. They didn’t teach him how to resist temptation, how to deal with lack.  And they most certainly didn’t teach him how NOT to want what he couldn’t have.  They didn’t teach him how to want.

The result was that he stopped having desires and instead desired the feeling of desire.”