Jealousy Is a Wasted Emotion

Jealousy Is a Wasted Emotion We all get jealous, dont we? Actually, no, not everyone experiences jealousy as an emotion. I dont get jealous. Its true: I dont experience jealously as an emotion. Yes, I experience sadness, happiness, anger, euphoria, and a plethora of other emotionsâ€"but not jealousy. Why? Because, unlike many emotions, we can choose to not experience jealousy. After years of observing people getting jealous in myriad ways, I understand that our culture is riddled with jealousy, envy, and greed, all of which are by-products of our competitive, consumer-driven culture. Whats worse is that its far more pernicious than we think. Competition breeds jealousy, though we often give it prettier labels like competitive spirit or stick-to-itiveness or ambition. But the truth is that jealousy leads to certain cultural imperativesâ€"what we commonly refer to as keeping up with the Joneses. Thus, we envy Mr. and Mrs. Jones for their money and large house and luxury cars and big boat and weekend retreat and fancy vacations and all the trappings of our heavily mediated society. But of course we dont get jealous solely over material possessions. We also get jealous over our relationships. We think our friends dont spend enough time with us, our lovers dont care about us as much as they should, our customers arent loyal enough. It all revolves around us: He doesnt spend enough time with me. She doesnt care enough about me. We think this way because its hard to back away from ourselves, its hard to realize I am not the center of the universe. There is good news, though. Like our televisions, we can chose to turn it off. We can choose to remove jealousy from our emotional arsenal. And like TV, its not always easy to turn off (it sure seems interesting sometimes, doesnt it?). But turning off jealousy can significantly improve ones emotional health. Because, at the end of the day, jealousy is never useful. Many negative emotions can be usefulâ€"pain tells us something is wrong, fear tells us to look before we leapâ€"but jealousy, no matter how jealous we get, will never help. But how? The easiest way to turn jealousy off is to stop questioning other peoples intentions. We often get jealous because we think a person meant one thing by their actions, when they meant something totally different. And the truth is that youll never know someones real intent, so its a waste of time to question it. If youre struggling with questioning someones intent, you can do one of two things: Ask them what they meant by their actions or words. Or accept that you will never know their true intent, no matter how much you question it. The bottom line with jealousy: you can turn it off. Jealousy is ugly: it is never a way to express we careâ€"it’s only a channel through which we broadcast our insecurities. Let it goâ€"a better life is waiting on the other side of jealousy. Subscribe to The Minimalists via email.