Jealousy and envy
Jealousy and envy
Many people confuse envy and jealousy.
Jealousy is about the fear of loss, the fear of being left out or abandoned, betrayed, humiliated, or rejected. Jealousy usually involves at least three people. There is always another person or thing that threatens to take from us the attention and affection of someone we rely on or care for. Jealousy is natural (up to a point). Even animals feel jealousy.
Envy is about resentment at not having something, of someone else having something we want but don’t have. Envy only needs two people.
For example, a woman might be jealous of a husband’s attractive secretary because she fears he will give her the attention, admiration, companionship or affection, which the wife considers should be hers alone, or that he will abandon her for the secretary. But the same wife may envy a woman who has nothing to do with her husband if she is better looking say. When she compares herself to a younger, thinner, prettier woman, she feels “less”, feels inferior, because she doesn’t posses the other’s qualities.
We all feel envy and jealousy at times, in varying degrees.
But some people, who are excessively dependent on their partner, may be extremely jealous, controlling and even paranoid, seeing the slightest interest in another or indication of less than total adoration as a sign of potential treachery.
Most of us feel flattered when a partner shows signs of jealousy because we take it as a sign of love. But jealousy can also be about control. The prospect of losing a lover to another makes anyone feel vulnerable and powerless but for some, the fact that a partner could find another interesting is utterly humiliating and infuriating. The thought of being betrayed or abandoned, or even having less than a lover’s total attention is unbearable. Some people are more concerned about their hurt pride and loss of face than loss of their lover.
Some people are not only jealous of romantic rivals but anyone who their lover may share time with. Some even begrudge the time a partner spends on themselves and their interests. With such blurred boundaries these people do not feel complete unless a partner is perpetually available and they have their partner’s full attention. Some people’s jealousy is more about self-love than love of another.
To feel envy is to feel inferior to the envied one. Envy is the driving force behind much vandalism, gossip, violence, spite and malice. Many of history’s greatest villains have been motivated by envy. Envy is an uncomfortable unpleasant state leading to an urge for revenge, to take away, spoil, diminish or destroy the thing that is envied. Envy says, “If I can’t have it then neither should anyone else.”
While we all feel envy at times some people are more likely to feel it more. When your ego is inflated, when you think you are the best, think you deserve whatever you want, then, when someone has what you haven’t or is what you aren’t, it feels like injustice, deprivation, like an insult, a blow to your idea of yourself.
The achievements, success, confidence, possessions and even happiness of others assaults highly narcissistic individuals’ sense of power and superiority. People who believe that there is only a limited supply of everything are especially prone to envy. They cannot be all and have all that they deserve if others have so much.
To egotism and raw narcissism, the existence of someone who has more or is more is a threat to self-esteem. If you have something they want and don’t have, it means you might be better, luckier, or more deserving than they are, which threatens their ego.
Some people harbour secret (or not so secret) resentment of their partner for having qualities, abilities and attributes they lack. Or they may even sense that their partner is a stronger or better person and hate them for it.
One of the things that most attracted “Michael” to “Erin” was that she was happy to let him have his way and be the “star”. Michael is a party animal who often leaves Erin at home alone while he socializes, plays sport or spends time with his friends. To help fill the time when she was left alone Erin took up watercolour painting. She had a natural talent and in only a short time was producing exquisite and intricate botanical works. She was soon selling every painting and had a waiting list of buyers. Erin was pleased that so many people liked her work but Michael was not. He was sneeringly critical, belittling her work, picking out imagined faults, and was sarcastic about the “old fashioned” taste of those who bought her work. Whenever the subject of her painting came up he went into a “mood”, and withdrew from Erin so that she felt punished, as though she was doing something wrong. When a local gallery offered to exhibit her work and take commissions Michael went into a lengthy sulk and treated her with cold contempt, as though she had betrayed or deliberately injured him. Eventually Erin gave up painting. It caused too much trouble. In their relationship only Michael can receive attention or applause and she must not do anything he cannot do, or be anything he cannot be.
Envy is an unpleasant feeling that makes us feel disadvantaged or inferior to the envied one. To defend against such discomfort some people devalue and denigrate the qualities, abilities, assets or achievements that others’ have and that they lack. Or, they show no interest in, or express contempt for anything that they don’t have. If they can’t do something, then it is not worth doing, if they don’t have something, then it is not worth having.
Envy makes some people withhold appreciation for the things other people do for them or give them. Acknowledgment would mean recognizing that other people provide things they need but which they lack. Envy is a universal instinct but it is accentuated and made more destructive by narcissism or egotism.
We need to curb our own jealous and envious feelings and be aware when others’ are adversely affecting us.
© Ultimate-self.com 2007. All rights reserved.
See related articles:
