What’s on the other side of Jealousy?
Growing up, like most other girls, I looked at other girls with a “lack of something” — This girl is so pretty, wish “I was this pretty” or this girl has such nice eyes, wish “I had such nice eyes”. The narrative I framed when looking at other girls was always in relation to what I lacked in comparison to them, which bred envy and jealousy. This also meant that when other people I knew talked about the girls I envied (or secretly admired), I felt waves of jealousy, secretly wishing they were speaking about me the same way.
It didn’t help that I had friends who nurtured the same habits so we fed of off each other’s frequencies. I remember being in school in the 5th or 6th grade and there was this girl who was so admired by all the teachers and the boys because she was petite, very pretty, had big eyes and always wore the most fashionable clothes for her age. Whereas I was tall, athletic, very low maintenance so barely did anything in terms of beautifying myself, wore clothes I thought looked fashionable but were very dorky to be honest and instead of being content in my uniqueness, I would always end up comparing myself to her. I remember when we went on a school trip and she wore this cute pink swimsuit with Rapunzel painted on it, which was cut out near her waist to reveal her soft pink skin whereas I was carrying a yellow swimwear which extended into shorts with the picture of Garfield on it. I actually cut it out on the sides myself to make it look like hers until all my classmates began to take notice & ask,
“Did you cut this yourself or was it torn?”
Clearly I wasn’t growing up to be a fashion designer!!!
I was always outspoken and fairly confident, given I participated in a lot of debates, public speaking competitions and was a part of drama clubs but a part of me was fairly low confident, constantly pitting myself against other girls whom I envied. At this age, I wasn’t aware of my own value and what that even meant so it was fairly easy to walk all over it because I didn’t know what being in my own skin actually meant. What it felt like was simply inadequate. There is one thing to look at beautiful and inspiring women around you just for self-motivation (which is highly encouraged) which in your head sounds like “She’s a bloody good artist! Let’s go shop for supplies and start painting like her” and yet another when the voice in your head sounds like “She’s a good artist, I get it but doesn’t need to be praised that much. I can probably do that too” — you know Miss Jealousy is back when she doesn’t let you digest another person’s beauty without an unwanted comparison and a little snide comment to dilute it even. Apart from all the stuff Miss Jealousy whispers in your head, feeling your emotions can truly make you distinguish between inspiration and jealousy — the former feels uplifting and energetic, the latter feels bitter and arouses unworthiness.
Fast forward to today, I’ve almost completely overcome the emotion of jealousy. I don’t remember the last day I looked at a woman and thought “I wish I had what she has”. I look at all the beautiful women who trot along the streets turning heads and think “Wow! Is she beautiful!” or all those who own their presence in public events and think “Boy do I hope I can be as confident as her!” or all those who are exceptional leaders and think “That’s the impact I want to make in the future” or all those who are broken and think “I was there — I know what it feels like, let me lend you a shoulder”. It’s either pure love or inspiration or empathy. Things changed 360 degrees for me in the past few years and this has also helped me in building such rock-solid friendships with my own girlfriends who are practically sisters to me.
So what is the magic recipe? There is none, unfortunately. We all have to find our way to it, if that’s even something we truly wish for. Some of us might not want to get rid of the emotion completely and that’s okay. One of the natural extensions of this is that if you have a partner and they have nurturing friendships with other women, it stops to bother you (if anything, you begin to encourage it in hopes they learn from them) so there’s a lot of energy that frees up for other productive uses. You don’t really fight about the narratives that seemed only normal to you earlier like, “Why did you talk to that girl?” or “Why did she text you that?”
If anything, you might begin to appreciate all that different women have to offer to the world so sometimes, Abhay would teach me things through his friendships, and I open up so many vistas for learning.
One of the things that genuinely helped me was the ability to apply myself in different situations which made me develop my own caricature of myself. I traveled solo a lot — trekking in the hills of India and befriending people from local shops to give me shelter, treading the streets of Rome and fleeing away from bus inspectors, finding cafes I loved in the eclectic streets of Prague, finding my way to the AirBnB in a pocket of Italy where no one spoke English. It doesn’t mean that you have to be privileged enough to travel to Europe but it does mean you need to find ways to apply yourself BY YOURSELF. So if I had an assumption that I was independent and street smart, I proved it to myself by applying myself. You need to have assumptions of who you are and what makes you unique and prove it by applying yourself in situations that test those assumptions so you know that you’re not barely relying on people’s opinions but are your own human experiment, creating your own hypothesis and sketching your own character that doesn’t rely on the society’s perception of you.
If any one was to question my independence, I would scoff because I know it within myself that I am fairly independent purely because of how I’ve applied myself in life. To build that inner confidence and worth, you need to find ways to apply yourself in independence of all other people. It’s you getting to know you which is probably one of the most consistent and rewarding things you’ll ever do. Once you have a half-painted picture of yourself, you can start adding colors from all the people you love and admire and truly understand you. That has to come after the process of applying yourself so the definition of you doesn’t change with the wind of the people you meet and you can truly debate your own character and put yourself under the lens. It is also so important to acknowledge that you are always evolving so sometimes, you might need to take a few steps backwards to take a few steps forward but, in the process, be kind to yourself. Through it all, one thing that remains consistent is kindness to yourself because truly the way you treat others is a reflection of the way you treat yourself. I can’t emphasize this enough. All the times I’ve envied someone, I have treated myself with utter disgust and all the times I’ve admired someone, I’ve admired myself twofold.
To all the women who read this — you’re so all beautiful and loved. Never let any one dim down your light and be kind to your struggles and sorrows. When the world weighs your beauty down and that can be women much like yourself, I hope you remember to empathize knowing that she might be a victim of the very same circumstances and the best way to proceed is kindness to yourself and her & all others who need it. You just need to scrap a little bit to find the true beauty that lies inside that’s so vast that lifetimes aren’t enough to explore it.
Ending it with lyrics to one of my favorite songs, Scars to Your Beautiful
“Oh she don’t see, the light that’s shining
Deeper than the eyes can find it
Maybe we have made her blind
So she tries to cover up her pain”…..
