This past weekend, I watched Kobe Bryant win his fourth National Basketball Association title as his team, the Los Angeles Lakers, defeated their opponent, the Orlando Magic, four games to one in a best of seven series. While the victory was definitely a team effort, Bryant, who was voted MVP of the play-offs, stood out above the rest, not only for his incredible performance, but more significantly for the maturity and leadership that he demonstrated throughout the arduous 100+ game journey that led to the championships.

To be honest, I have never been a Kobe fan. For most of his career he has exhibited a kind of brash arrogance on the court that has often repulsed both his opponents and his teammates and his controversial escapades off the court have won him little praise in the public eye. But something was different about him in this series. Maybe it was a matter of time and maturity (it was his thirteenth season in the league…a long career for an NBA player). Maybe it was the fact that he helped to lead the USA basketball team—a collection of the world’s best players—to a gold medal in this past summer’s Olympic games. But it was clear that Kobe had changed, and he exhibited a kind of responsibility for all of his teammates that was downright touching. In the post game interviews and celebrations, he consistently referred to how hard they had all worked for this and how much they had sacrificed to make it happen.

But while seeing anyone come into their own in any context is inspiring, watching Kobe during the play-offs was significant for another reason.

Earlier in the week, our editor in chief, Andrew Cohen, and I interviewed San Diego State University psychology professor Jean M. Twenge about her new book, The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement , for an article in the upcoming issue of EnlightenNext magazine. In the book, Twenge gives a shocking overview of all of the data she’s collected that proves, statistically, that we are in the midst of a kind of narcissistic renaissance—born by the boomers in the 60s and flowering in their Gen-X and Gen-Y children—in which more and more of us think we’re better than we actually are and have put our own needs and desires higher than just about anything else in the universe. As she says in the book:

A narcissist has an overinflated view of his own abilities, similar to a kitten that sees himself as a lion on the popular poster. Narcissists are not just confident, they’re overconfident. In short, narcissists admire themselves too much.

This cultural affliction is problematic for many reasons. As Twenge told us in the interview, it inhibits our ability to have intimate relationships with others, it leads to the kind of irresponsible spending that helped to drive the current financial bust, and many other issues. But perhaps most tragically, the self-inflated narcissistic bubbles, or “mePods” as my fellow editor Tom Huston calls them, that most of us walk around in keep us safely ignorant of the many ways in which we could all be infinitely better human beings—more aware, more efficient, more ethical, and more awake to a higher moral context. If everyone is great, then what impetus is there to strive to become any better?

That brings me back to Kobe Bryant. What struck me most about watching him win this past week was that he and I are the same age. I just turned thirty this past December, several months after Bryant also entered his fourth decade. And while I haven’t exactly spent my life on the couch, I can’t say that I’ve put out anything near the dedication, sacrifice, and commitment it has taken to bring Bryant to where he is today. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not suggesting that Kobe is some kind of angelic, highly-evolved, non-narcissistic saint of a man that we should all strive to emulate. But for a typical product of the narcissism epidemic like myself, the simple fact that a man like Bryant has accomplished so much in as much time on the planet as me and with what have most likely been less opportunities to succeed as me, is a perfect antidote for my own deeply-conditioned tendency towards unearned, self-ascribed greatness. And if any of us are going to be able to kick the narcissism bug in order to be able to develop the kind of humanity that this world requires of us right now, I think it’s imperative that we have the humbling experience of comparing ourselves to others a heck of a lot more often.

If you want to see Kobe in action, check out the video below of some of his best plays during this year’s play-offs: