As social media lovers, we’re able to follow celebrities and other glamorous people on networks like Twitter and Instagram. Slowly, we start to realize a lot of the people we follow are successful: investors, musicians, models, etc. We even follow well-known people at our school. But you can’t help but get a little jealous of their lives, right?
I remember my friends in high school who used to be jealous of girls who were in amazing relationships or people who were accepted to Ivy League universities. They would say, “why her and not me?”
Jealousy is a useless emotion. You waste so much time creeping on others’ social media accounts being jealous of them. But it won’t get you anywhere. The first step to overcoming jealousy is to be aware of your jealousy. Then, think about how the person you are jealous of got to where he or she is right now.
If you’re jealous of a student in your political science class because he got into Harvard Law, think about how he got there. Was he involved? What were his leadership positions? Take a look at how he got accepted into Harvard Law instead of feeling the empty and upsetting emotion of jealousy. Once you figure out how a particular person accomplished he or her goals, try to use it as motivation to accomplish your own goals.
The people you get jealous of have clues to what you want to have or be like. Use your jealousy as fuel to accomplish what your personal goals. When used properly, jealousy is a signal for yourself to become aware of both yourself and your surroundings.
