A terrible thing?

The green-eyed monster could just be misunderstood

Even the word seems quite horrible. Jealousy, originally from the Greek “zelos” that could mean zealous as well as jealousy. When I looked that up I was even less happy. If there’s one thing I hate more than jealousy, it’s zealots. But there we go, often the bad things in life stick together.

I’ll be honest: I can be a very jealous person.

And it’s not just about the big things, like someone getting better results than me, but little things too, like someone getting a hug from a mutual friend when I only get a handshake.

Growing up, I always wanted what my sister had. It didn’t matter if I didn’t want to play with it; I just wanted it because she had it. Like the lovely older sister she was she would hand over whatever toy it was, only to watch me throw it away: but then as soon as she picked it up again, I wanted it.

As I got older the jealousy didn’t really stop, although I obviously got a lot better at hiding it. I no longer screamed and stamped my foot, but the envy was there, just seething below the surface.

It’s stupid, and I don’t like it. But it’s the truth.

Thinking of this I was worried about coming to university: so many more people to be jealous of and so many more reasons to be jealous. In Freshers’ Week it was peoples’ confidence I envied. Then, as I joined societies and got out more, I began to be jealous of people for more specific things. She was so tall: jealous! He had a hell of a lot of spare cash: jealous! Oh, how does she fit into this set so much better than me? Jealous!

Then of course there was my course. I’d come from a not-so-great country comprehensive. My education had been nothing special and at my school I was widely regarded as one of the best in the subjects I’d taken. So, okay, I knew I’d encounter people much smarter than me once I reached a national university. That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. I was suddenly encountering people that worked half as much as me and still got better grades. People who could write a better essay than me in an energy drunk fuelled night than I could in a calm two weeks. It just wasn’t fair.

And now I have a new jealousy. A friend of mine has beaten me to the mark in a mutual pursuit. Both writers, it was inevitable that we would clash somewhere. This time however my response was different.

Instead of setting off to match, and hopefully exceed him, I decided I probably wasn’t going to try and compete. I already had my own outlets for my work, I didn’t really have time for another. And, so what if he was getting paid for his work – in my mind I equated that with selling out to some extent – he didn’t have the chance to write about anything thought-provoking or vaguely interesting to any but a select audience (not that I’m saying anything of mine really is).

And then I realised that what I wasn’t feeling was envy. It was detachment. I decided I didn’t need to be jealous. I’d just work harder at my own writing and be safe in the knowledge that I don’t need to justify myself to him or to anybody else.

So jealously doesn’t have to be so terrible.

In my relationships with people, because I’m so jealous I find myself more attuned to situations in which they may be jealous of something or someone. This helps me to form or deepen bonds that may have been broken or ignored. As well, if I can learn to use my jealousy as a further push to my work ethic I could probably do great things. If I can learn to look at someone else’s work and see, not just how wonderful they’ve done for themselves, but how fantastic I could do if I tried just a little bit harder, then jealousy could be a constructive part of my life.

Ironically, once I’d got over my silly pettiness, I could see some of those people I had envied were actually pretty amazing: one of them turned out to be a best friend.

So I guess there’s hope for me yet.

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