Envy is an emotion. It’s a very dangerous emotion at that! If you allow that particular emotion into your life you run the risk of being overtaken by it. Envy will consume you. It will diminish every other part of your life. Envy is a destroyer of all that is good.
Stated another way…envy sucks!
I may not have everything I want in life but I can say with great confidence that I have everything I wanted badly enough to work for.
You see here’s the thing, successful people simply outwork less successful people. They work smarter, harder, and longer than less successful people. Yes, luck also plays a part but the most successful people put themselves in a position to be “lucky” through hard work and determination.
If you’re going to be envious of other people don’t be envious of their “stuff.” If you insist on risking your own happiness by being envious then be envious that they have the discipline to do what you are unwilling to do.
I know that sounds pretty harsh but until you accept that as fact you will continue to limit your own potential for tremendous success. You will also struggle with envy until you define what success looks and feels like in YOUR life.
The life we live comes to us as a result of our choices. Some people choose to sacrifice relationships, family, life balance, and pretty much everything in the pursuit of success. Now I can’t know this for a fact but I’d bet most of that type of person measures success in terms of titles and sizes of bank accounts. If that is how they define success then good for them.
But why in the world would I be envious of them?
One of my life choices was to sacrifice a fancy title and bigger bank account for other things. Faith, family, friends, fun, and health among them. I am 100% certain I’ve made the right choices for me. If given the chance to do my life over I’d make the same choice 100 out of 100 times.
Understanding that what you have, or don’t have, is the logical outcome of your choices in life should help keep The Envy Monster away.
You see, I have no reason to be envious of anyone’s success. I’m as successful as anyone I know, I just define success differently than some others do. I could have easily had the other kind of success, so can you. You can have anything in life you’re willing to work for.
So that means envy is also one of the silliest emotions to carry around with you.
So here’s a huge question for you…How do you define success? I would submit to you that you cannot be successful until you can answer that question. When you can answer that question you may discover that you’ve already achieved all the success in life you’ll ever want.
Known traditionally as one of the seven deadly sins, envy, along with pride, greed, lust, gluttony, wrath, and sloth make for a lot of misery and unhappiness. So why would anyone choose any of those, at least consciously? Hedonism? Just plain ignorance? Selfish self-centeredness, in the extreme, narcissism? Yes, maybe the answer is ego. Get that out of the way and we’re open to an entirely different kind of behavior.
Yep, those sins are deadly in many ways…for one thing they destroy happiness and success. But it is hard for most of us to see those sins in ourselves, thats where any kind of trusted advisor can make a big difference.
I guess sometimes we need to stop and clarify once in a while what is going on on our lives. It takes some courage to make an honest self assesment that leads to responsability… Great post.
Thanks, I absolutely agree that we NEED to just stop sometimes and see what’s going on around us and if it’s an environment that helps or hinders us. Most people do not do that often enough.
As an emotion, envy is difficult to avoid altogether. But I so agree. Reminding ourselves of the things and attributes that we hold valuable to us, defining our “own” success, and closely examining what we are willing to do or give up for that thing that we covet so much, can definitely make a difference. Reframing perspectives is one key. Your post has been helpful. 🙂
Thank you! It truly is a matter of perspective, while we are being jealous of something someone else has, another person is jealous of something that we have that we take for granted.