I have become aware of a family trait that runs thick through my bloodline, it is the trait of competition.
Competition is good in some ways. It is a motivator for excellence and it is why I strive to be the best at what I do.
Competition has dangerous tentacles, though, which can wrap around your heart and squeeze the very joy out of life.
One of the tentacles is jealousy. I know that my mother has been jealous of me at different times in my life and I find it a very horrible demon to do battle with.
Lately I have found the same tentacle wrapping around my heart in relation to my daughter.
She is in love. The idealistic reality which has eluded me for many years if not my entire life.
She comes home only occasionally at this point in time but when she does come home she is beaming with joy. This young man has swept her off of her feet, has invited her into his lavish home and shared his lovely friends with her.
Meanwhile her poor, decrepit mother is isolating herself at home and feeling sorry for herself. I have chosen the road that I am walking on presently and yet I blame her for my misery?
I have confessed this jealousy to God. It is not the first confession of jealousy either,merely one in a line of many confessions due to my intrinsic nature of competition.
Yesterday she came home for a moment to clean up and pack up again to go to Prince Charming’s house and I asked her about what she had been doing.
She told me all of the fun she had had and the fun she was intending to have. I rejoiced with her and shared in her joy. I was truly happy that she was happy. She deserves it.
When a person is jealous of another they close doors to joy and happiness.
When you are looking at someone else’s life with envy you are blinded to the wonder of your own life.
If you are jealous of another person’s success you may think it was a walk in the park to achieve that success.
I have found that others who have been jealous of my success may not have survived the treacherous walk that I have walked to get to the end point of success.
Jealousy chooses not to look at the sacrifices that are characteristic of successful people. It chooses only to look at the reward for all of the sacrifice.
The main objective of jealousy is to steal joy. Instead of being jealous of my daughter and her Prince Charming I have chosen to be thankful to God that she has chosen a man wisely. One who honors and loves her with such fortitude that she beams like a ray of sunshine when she comes home from time with him.
If you exchange jealousy for gratitude a lot of wonderful things will happen. The first thing will be that you will stop being green with envy like the Grinch who stole Christmas. Really… you didn’t look that good in green anyway.
