A cure for jealousy

Jealousy is a horrible feeling. It seems to grip the heart and suffocate the life out of you.

I have fortunately not lived with it for extended periods, but have most definitely experienced it’s destructive power within.

Jealous: ‘feeling or showing an envious resentment of someone or their achievements, possessions, or perceived advantages.‘

Growing up with a sister lends itself to comparison. My sister and I were very different in our abilities and interests, but I often used to be jealous of what she was able to do. Not to mention comparing my physical appearance with hers.

Somehow, we tend to compare ourselves more to people who are more similar to us. People with similar backgrounds, skills or appearance. Those who are very different are harder to compare ourselves with.

I have had a couple friends with whom I have shared abilities and would find myself envious of certain characteristics that I don’t have.

However, as a teenager I was taught an invaluable lesson by a friend of mine. She had been feeling jealous of me for some reason and somehow felt it was appropriate to share that with me. Almost instantly the tides turned. I was surprised that she felt that way and also strangely encouraged by the things she saw in me that she thought were admirable. Probably things that I had not noticed about myself.

From that time on I realised the power that we give jealousy by holding it in. How many of us walk around day by day seeing things we admire about others and allow it to grow within? Jealousy that holds us down, paralyses us and blinds us from our own awesomeness? And how many people are secretly noticing the cool things about us and letting it ruin their own self esteem and peace of mind?

Perhaps the solution is to turn jealousy into encouragement. To tell those people the very things we admire about them.

Too often we do not want to because we believe that they already know it and will become full of themselves. However, it is far more often the case that beautiful, successful, and capable people are never actually affirmed for this reason and also suffer from discouragement and poor self esteem.

Growing up there were a few times I put this approach to the test. I can remember a couple times telling my sister the things I was jealous of her for, or encouraging her in the things she had that I was lacking. And every time that conversation turned into her saying that she had felt a similar way towards me. Every time we would both leave encouraged and freed from the burden of comparison we had been feeling.

So let me not forget. To speak out the good I see in others. To reflect back to people their own beauty, skill, worth and value. The things they have lost sight of. Let me not let jealousy have the power over me, but rather free myself and others in the process!