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Today's
quotation:
Jealousy
is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often
mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the
greater
the jealousy-- in fact, they are almost incompatible; one emotion
hardly leaves room for the other.
Robert A. Heinlein
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Today's
Meditation:
It's
very painful to watch jealous people, not just because you
see them damaging themselves and going through agony, but
more when you see them harming others through their
jealousy, making others feel weak and frustrated and
controlled because they're not able to control their own
emotions. I think that what makes me feel the worst
is the fact that jealousy is wholly avoidable, yet it's
something that makes many people very miserable every hour
of every day.
I
don't know that envy counts as jealousy-- if you have a new
car and I feel that I want the same thing, I believe that
we're talking about envy. But if you're my
significant other and I see you talking to someone other
than me and I freak out about it because you should be
talking to only me, well then, that's jealousy. I
had a friend once whose husband was incredibly jealous,
and he controlled her constantly, making her miserable any
time that she happened to talk to someone whom he saw as a
threat to his "relationship" with her.
I
feel fortunate that jealousy hasn't ever really been a
part of my psyche. In many ways, my ability to avoid
jealousy is a result of decisions that are made
constantly. I'm married to a woman whom I trust
completely-- and she can trust me completely, so neither of
us have to deal with jealousy concerning other
people. When I decided to teach for a living, I knew
that I wouldn't be earning nearly as much money as other
people, and that knowledge keeps me from being jealous
when I see other people taking extravagant vacations and
such (though again, this is probably much closer to envy).
Don't
make yourself unhappy over worrying constantly what other
people-- your spouse of friend or significant other-- are
doing, or whom they're seeing. Make yourself happy
over the realization that what you have is amazing in
itself, and that there are millions of people on this
planet who would love to have what you have. Your
jealousy will never serve you nor anyone else well, so do
not make it a part of your life.
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