Envy is the most destructive emotion I have ever come across. It’s a dangerous concoction of different emotions – anger, fear, sadness, and hatred. While anger, fear, and sadness may have a negative impact on us, envy is the fire from hell. Most often, we are envious of people we know and admire. That makes it much more complicated. How does envy affect our personal lives?
- Envy makes us blind to our happiness. No matter what we do or what we achieve, envy makes it all null. It’s because you are coveting the life of another person, which is obviously not going to become yours.
- Envy makes us blind to people we love. In an attempt to replicate someone else’s life, success, and relationships, we often forget people in our life. We don’t find value in them, because we want them to be someone else or something else.
- Envy destroys our self-respect. When we are struggling to achieve someone else’s life, we will never be able to appreciate ourselves. We will only have an eye for our shortcomings.
- Envy makes us bitter and wastes our lives.
In this era of social media, it’s a constant parade of achievements, beauty, happiness, and bliss. It’s easy to feel envious to other people – especially when we see people from almost our backgrounds achieving their dreams and leading a blissful life. So, how to get out of this horrible feeling? How to stop being envious of someone?
- Observe when you envy someone. Be conscious of that feeling. The first step towards getting out of envy is accepting that you are feeling it. Every time you feel envious of someone, tell yourself that “this is me, being envious of someone,”
- Understand that people and social media often display only the glorious moments. Every person has their own share of bitter experiences. They work hard, make sacrifices, compromises, lose relationships on the way to attaining glory. But when you only see the spotlight, their glory, you are blind to all these backstories.
- Find something meaningful. Often we feel envy not because we are greedy. It’s because we are dissatisfied in our relationships, work, or life in general. So, a good remedy for envy is trying to mend our lives. Try to make the wrong thing right. Find out something that satisfies you.
- Learn to appreciate and applaud others. Understand the fact that every person’s achievement is enriching our world in some or the other way. When a friend gets an award or a sparkling job, you have a powerful person in your circle. Making friends with successful/powerful people has its perks. So, consider that their success and achievement is going to enrich your life too.
- Get out of your head and look around. For a change, think about someone else other than yourself.
Envy isn’t an easy emotion to get out of. However, when you are in that emotion, your life becomes so stagnant. You won’t be able to find a path forward. It’s important not to stay in envy for so long. So, if you are envious of someone, start the attempt to get out of that. You will thank yourself for the struggle.
Salini Vineeth 
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