53. Envy their ass... or Pity their ass?

I get jealous, you get jealous, we all get a bit jealous every now and then.

And without any stats or data to back this up (ever the credible site, this!), I imagine that we’ve seen a pretty significant increase in that particular emotion over the last 20 years or so. 

I mean, it takes about 4 seconds on Instagram to be reminded of the millions of people who are younger, fitter, funnier, richer, cleverer, happier, cooler, more popular and generally much better at life than us.  

We’re constantly being hit with a barrage of hand-picked, crafted, and unrepresentative-of-peoples-actual-lives highlight reels that show everyone else smashing life… and leaving us to fester in our own sad little existence. 

So yeah, I imagine this is pretty normal.

And despite the slightly cynical tone of this post so far, I don’t actually think that that’s necessarily a completely bad thing. 

If we see someone smashing it in a certain area of life (or at least appearing to be - as we know, there’s not always a correlation between how people look like they’re doing, and how they’re actually doing…), it can be quite inspiring and motivating. 

Selfishly, I generally (some exceptions…) really like seeing other people do well, as I find that it gives me a little bit more drive. Other people’s successes can pave the way for us to go and do the same.

This is a similar idea to ‘The Bannister Effect’, that you may have heard of. 

In short, pre-1954, it was the general consensus that running a sub-4 minute mile was physiologically impossible. Despite our best efforts, the human body simply wasn’t capable of doing it. 

Then on May 6th 1954, Sir Roger Bannister ran a mile in 3:59.4, and the game changed. 

Since then, what was once seen as impossible, has now been achieved by around 2,000 different people. 

The exact same thing happened with Mount Everest. 

Bizarrely, almost a year to the day before Bannister’s efforts (on May 29th, 1953), Sir Edmund Hillary & his sherpa Tenzing Norgay (which, fun fact, is who the Tenzing energy drink is named after) became the first people to reach the summit of Everest, despite people trying to do so for decades beforehand. 

Since then, just under 7,000 people have now done it (thank you, Google).

We see success, and it can inspire us to up our game. 

Of course, I’m not saying that all the subsequent achievers of these milestones were fuelled by raging jealousy, but someone else being better at us than something can clearly be used in a constructive and positive way. 

So again, I do think that it can be a good thing.

However, as I’m sure we’ve all felt, jealousy can also be a not so good thing. 

It can spark off a range of other negative emotions. Bitterness, resent, wanting other’s to fail, and generally feeling fucking miserable in ourselves, to name a few.

As they say, Envy is the only one of the seven deadly sins that doesn’t feel good.

Probably not ideal.

I like Entrepreneur, investor and Zen King Naval Ravikant's take on jealousy:  

“I realized that all these people that I was jealous of, I couldn't just cherry-pick and choose little aspects of their life. I couldn't say I want his body; I want her money; I want his personality. You have to be that person. Do you want to actually be that person with all of their reactions, their desires, their family, their happiness level, their outlook on life, their self-image? If you're not willing to do a wholesale, 24/7, 100% swap with who that person is, then there is no point in being jealous."

Easier said than done, but makes sense. 

Basically, it’s impossible to just have all the good of someone’s life without any of the costs. It's:

• Wanting that CEO’s status and salary - but none of the stress, responsibility, rarely seeing their kids, and potential feelings of insufficiency that’s driving them

• Wanting that Insta influencer’s rig - but none of the hours in the gym, bland diet, potential body dysmorphia, and insecurity & guilt that plague them when they’re not working out 

• Wanting that pal’s side hustle - but without the early rises, additional work on top of their day job, sacrifice of social plans, and potential desperate escape that they need from the rest of their lives 

Of course, I’m not saying that all these types of people are driven by, and face, these exact challenges.

However, I do think that there’s always a significant, and often unseen, price that needs to be paid to be the person that we’re jealous of. 

Which I suppose, begs the question that the title of this blog post asks...

As I say, the goal of this post isn’t to completely shit on jealousy as an emotion. 

If used constructively, I do think it can have (short-term at least) benefits. 

However, it can also, unhelpfully and pretty nonsensically, leave us feeling fairly miserable. 

When we think about the people that we're jealous of, we can often just think about the one or two strands of their lives that they selectively choose to show the world, and completely neglect the rest of their existence.

Though it's in this 'rest of their existence' where we may find that the price that they need to pay for whatever it is that we're jealous of, may actually not be one that we're willing to chin.

Especially if you’re as tight as some of my mates... 🙂