I have recently been struggling with the idea of being myself and being “normal”. When you look at me I seem like a normal person, however my life situation is anything but the norm in my culture (or so it seems). Seeing everyone hit their “milestones” of getting engaged, having babies, starting a career, etc. at the “right” time becomes a temptation to become envious. But let’s think about this…. How many of those couples uploading photos of their Diamond-Bling are the real thing? Well, we don’t know and we probably never will. The point of life is not to squander and stalk for scraps of knowledge in other people’s lives. The point is to be grateful in everything you are and appreciating other people.
I STILL GET JEALOUS
Let’s be honest here: The other night I saw someone that was so beautiful with this one purse I have dying to have for years (the YSL bag if you must know). I found myself envious of that purse and that person’s beauty. Being a little bit dramatic, I became envious and just added that to my list of “Nothingness that I wish I had.” Ugh, doesn’t that sound exhausting? My goodness it is exhausting trying to keep up with the green-eyed monster in my head instead of just being grateful for what I have and happy for the other person.
BE THE OUTLIER
Now I did a little experiment. I said to myself, “I am sick and tired of trying to be like everyone else and follow the crowd. I am going to just be grateful for them and try to live my own life the way I want to live it.” Lo and behold! A few days later my attitude changed, my stress pimples disappeared, I was a lot happier about myself, and nicer to my friends. J I know myself well enough to understand what I want and need at this stage in my life. I am confident all of us who truly know our own selves can say the same. The challenge is sticking to it. Be different!
WHEN WE BECOME BLIND
When we become envious of others we lose sight of what is in front of us. When the shiny things are being dangled in front of us it becomes difficult to see the wonderful things we already hold in our hands. Sometimes we become envious, other times we bully each other online, or we even become passive aggressive to people because we think they do not deserve what they have. How dare we judge others on what they seem to have? We are not them! We do not know what they go home to, what stresses are in their minds, and how they go to sleep at night. We only know what we experience (and unfortunately what we see on our social media).With social media being a completely awesome and unavoidable nuisance in our lives we have created a “filtered” perspective of our “realities”. With all of the Snapchats and uploads please do remember that most people do not upload a picture of themselves crying when they are sad or sitting in their anger management classes. They only post the “high and fly” stuff. Posting is how people want to be seen.
KEEP IN MIND YOUR OWN TRUTH!
We are all living in this world at the same time. We must encourage one another to not take this stuff too seriously or envy others because who knows – they might have used someone else’s purse to borrow that night or took a photo of someone else’s table at the club.When those feelings of sadness and envy start to rise replace those envious green eyes with kind and grateful ones. See how your perspective starts to shift when you see things in a different way.
