He leaps at us, hurts us, puts us in a headlock like a bright green dwarf with the grimace of a kung fu fighter. No wonder envy is often an uninvited guest in our lives. In addition, because he prefers to appear in situations in which we should actually be happy. When your best friend raves about your new, great boyfriend. Or when the colleague talks about her promotion. Sure, the feeling of envy actually tastes bitter.
It has been associated with poison and green bile since ancient times. Still, we shouldn’t push it away or sit out the attack until it’s over. Because feelings of envy can also have their good side, give us strength and be a first step on the way to change. A new study by Tilburg University has just shown that students who are made jealous of a successful fellow student with a eulogy made more effort and performed significantly better after the lecture.
Envy has advantages – if we take it
as a sport Whether we deal primarily with white constructive envy or black destructive envy in our lives ultimately depends on how we deal with the first impulses to envy. The Frankfurt social psychologist and psychoanalyst Rolf Haubl found out that we deal with envy in three basic ways: with anger, depression or ambition. While women often become sad after attacks of envy, men are more likely to switch to the angry-that-the-guy-didn’t-deserve-that-mode. Both reactions are part of black envy, so in the end they don’t get us any further.
The third option is much more productive: taking envy in a sporty way rather than being driven and challenged. According to the motto: I would also like to have what he or she has – so I’ll get on with it! Then envy can charge us with new energy and move us forward. In this country, that is an unfamiliar point of view.
While Americans are veritable champions when it comes to white envy and congratulate their neighbors on their big new car with a saying like “Nice car, I’ll drive that one too sometime”, in Germany people take a critical look at what others have. The culture of envy goes so far that we wish our neighbor would soon lose his fancy car again. So instead of seeing the little sting as a spur to enter into healthy competition with the person we envy, we go deeper and deeper into envy. We can learn from the Americans on that point. How to turn black envy white permanently? From now on, if you have jealous feelings, stop thinking about whether something is just or unjust. Instead, act confidently, believe more in your own performance and become active.
The envy trap: women compare themselves very strongly with other women
, especially when it comes to relationship issues. A study by the University of Tübingen shows that women compare themselves very strongly with other women. For example, if you see someone of the same sex on the street with a Brad Pitt cut in your arms, don’t look dreamily at the attractive man, but appraise the woman and look for answers to the “What does she have that I don’t have?” question .
Men react in the opposite way: If another man comes towards them with a suburban Angelina Jolie, their eyes will stick to the woman. You ask yourself: how can I conquer such a beauty? According to this, men are more competitive than women when it comes to relationships. But what if the envy is deeper? Presumably, someone who was disadvantaged in the family as a child and repeatedly experienced preferential treatment for a brother or sister experiences more painful feelings of envy than a family sunshine that is loved by all.
Psychology professor Rolf Haubl also found another type of envious people: “Anyone who was rewarded in childhood and adolescence primarily for performance and perfect functioning is at high risk.” over time, her envy of people who pursue their dreams and build a life that suits them grows.
These strong envy attacks are a warning, an expression of the lack of self-determination. Then it’s time to understand envy as a signpost for your own desires. This is not necessarily easy, because most women who have long followed the ideas of others do not know exactly what they want. It helps to look closely at what we’re really jealous of. Anyone who envies the girlfriend who takes time off from work to attend a yoga teacher course in India does not want to teach yoga themselves , but should also allow themselves more time for themselves. Whether it also has to be a long-distance trip is questionable. Taking one family-free evening a week can be enough. Or do fun things more often.
Man is simply a comparison
machine. On the other hand, squinting at others is part of life. “People are comparison machines,” says Cologne-based cognitive psychologist Thomas Mussweiler. The psychology professor found out that we are almost constantly measuring ourselves against others. Mainly because we want to know where we are in life. Because only the comparison brings clarity and information. For example, if you get a score of 130 on an intelligence test, you might just shrug your shoulders when the result is announced. But if he then learns that only two percent of people are just as smart, he will almost burst with pride. So it’s very human to classify and scan others. If we win the comparison, we’ll be proud. If we lose, we’re jealous.
That makes it complicated in everyday life:
we are particularly sensitive to comparisons with people who are close to us. Catherine Mountbatten-Windsor’s luck doesn’t bother us, she can look dazzling and be happy with her Prince William. But when our best friend gets hold of a small management position, we are angry or frustrated at first. Because with people who are close or similar to us, we automatically think that we are entitled to what they have. Be it a loving man, a penthouse with a roof terrace or a top figure. But as soon as we have seen through the pattern that our loved ones often make us violently jealous, we can quickly forget the bilious feelings.
