Jealousy and envy are often depicted like ugly little gremlins. It’s not a great feeling, to be envious.
I think envy is probably one of the most common covert emotions experienced from being online. We’re entering into the place of photos, videos, posts, and shorts, there is exposure to literally everyone and anyone and all of it is evidence that we are lacking compared to others in a thousand different ways.
For envy to occur, we are taking in the sight of someone, and then we’re mentally assessing them as better than us in some way, or having or achieving something we innately desire. This emotion reaction of envy also implies that there in a lack in ourselves in the first place, and that the presence of this person is a threat to our sense of okay-ness.
This doesn’t feel good. Common responses to envy are to quickly put the person down in some way, to repel feelings of not okay-ness.
Hidden envy might look like having internal thoughts like:
Wow, they look like like they have a lot of money. I bet they are super shallow on the inside. I feel sorry for them.
Maybe thoughts like these don’t reach or hurt that person, but these thoughts make us pretty harsh critics. I’ve heard many, many times, the way we look at others is the way we look at ourselves. If we are judgmental, we covertly judgmental to our own selves.
Okay so- We are walking around in the world, taking in sights of other people all the time, in-person or online- What happens with all this accumulated envy inside us?
If envy is left untouched and unacknowledged, it gradually makes us feel smaller and smaller, like our lives are a disappointment. We feel like we’re not doing enough, and we can’t keep up. Envy rarely actually affects the person that the feeling is towards, it usually just affects the feeler. The burden of envy feels, to me, like feelings of resentment, bitterness, judgemental thoughts, and underneath all that, feelings of embarrassment and shame about aspects of myself and my life.
Unchecked, envy is making us judgemental and grouchy. It’s not helpful if we don’t address it.
So what are we to do about envy?
Here are my tips for freeing yourself from the pressing weight of envy.
1) Envy is like a metal detector. Pay attention to the beeping sounds, and use it as tool to understand ourselves and what we care about most.
The really interesting thing about envy is that we may experience it often, but we’re not experiencing it every second of every day, ALL the time. Next time you’re out and about, notice that the metal detector on envy doesn’t beep for every single person you see. (If you are, that’s very good data, stay tuned for why).
Here’s the key: Envy is our intuition communicating to us.
We know this because there is discernment in our envy, meaning that in the crowd of people online and in-person, our envy is showing us like spotlight what we long for in our lives most deeply.
For example, I don’t feel any twinge of envy when I hear people talking about going skiing/snowboarding, or rock climbing. I have tried these things out and I’m just not into those activities.
But! As soon as someone mentions taking dancing lessons, art classes, or writing a book, or traveling, I feel a flare of envy that comes from my chest and stomach area, because those are things I love, that matter to me, and those are areas of expression that I want to pursue fully in my life. And maybe, in this moment I encounter someone who is talking about their pursuits, I’m not listening to my inner yearnings. Boom, envy.
So whenever you notice you’re feeling a strong feeling of envy, remember…
2) Envy is admiration that has become warped, and there is something about this particular person that you admire.
To utilize envy as a helpful, guiding emotion, we have to take a minute to think and feel through what the envy is bringing up.
Here is a walk through on how to move through envy and turn it into meaningful information:
– Recognize the feeling of envy as it surfaces
– What is it exactly that I admire about this person? Get really specific, and list out the specific things you admire on paper or in your head. Hint: It’s not always what you think it is.
– What are some small ways I could begin to integrate what I admire into my own life?
For example, in my own life,
There was a woman who worked at a local restaurant where I live and I would frequent often when I’d bring a client there, and I always noticed her in particular. I had feelings of envy because she was so beautiful, and put-together looking.
But when I thought about it later- what exactly was it about her that I envied, and therefore, admired? I reflected and realized that it wasn’t exactly her beauty I was envious of, it was the way she carried herself. She was very strong looking, great posture, she had visible muscles, and she looked like she put a lot of time and dedication into lifting weights.
At this point, I had stopped lifting weights for several years. I realized I was feeling envy because I missed the feeling of being strong. Once I realized feeling strong actually matters to me and positively impacts my life, I started to incorporate going to the gym again.
Once I realized this is what the envy was about, I could turn this insight into something useful instead of staying in the pit of self- depreciation and feeling shame.
The whole goal is to consciously move your thoughts away from the downward spiral of envy and comparison, and towards the upward spiral of admiration, possibility, inspiration, and taking action towards the things that are setting off your envy detector.
