“They must have taken an easy subject”, “There is no future in anything other than engineering”, “Creative fields do not have money”. There are other examples. I am sure you have heard a few. These comments represent a mindset that is not amenable to change. Such a mindset thrives on ignoring someone’s success, usually because it is too uncomfortable to stomach. It is about ignoring one component of life so that the convenient one can be acknowledged. A great example of this is the distinct lack of support from armchair commentators for India’s Paralympic Games performance. They are the people who flooded social media, demanding a silver for Vineesh Phogat and criticising Neeraj Chopra for not winning gold. Yet, as of writing, when India is in the top-20 in the Paris Paralympic Games, having won 20 medals, three of them gold, few of them are speaking about it. Bravo to the entire paralympic contingent!
Emotion or behaviour?
We have all been jealous. It is a fundamental part of the growing-up experience. We have all had people around us who have been jealous. We have had people blocking out or dismissing our success or happiness because they have been jealous. We have been jealous of others ourselves. So what does being jealous mean?
Jealousy is a complex emotion often involving envy, insecurity and minor to major resentments Shutterstock
Jealousy is a complex emotion that involves our sense of having and not having. It is complex because it encompasses our assessment of situations, our feelings and typically, our actions prompted by these feelings. It often involves envy, insecurity and minor to major resentments. Jealousy is a learned pattern. It starts when people feel threatened because they perceive that the resources they need to survive are going to someone else. A common example of this is when parents spend more time with a sibling or a coach or teacher gives more attention to someone else.
But all jealousy is not equal. Like chips in a packet, jealousy comes in different shapes and sizes. But all the types are linked to wanting something that you feel you deserve. One of the types is associated with love. Not just romantic love, but also love for a sport or a career or similar things. This type more often leads to toxicity, instead of harmonious passion.
The first type is called ‘cognitive jealousy’, which is associated with the thought processes of suspicion or insecurity. This type makes us ‘worried’ or ‘suspicious’ of someone doing something that will benefit them and hurt us. This also makes us look at imagined scenarios. For example, a senior athlete keeps an eye on all the juniors because if one of them matches his performance, then his funding from the government will be threatened. He is even more worried when a hotshot junior bags the silver medal in the nationals. You would think this is made up, but sadly, it isn’t.
‘Doing’ jealousy-driven things at a behavioural level involves actively harming someone or pulling them down to protect oneself Shutterstock
The second type is ‘doing’ jealousy-driven things at a behavioural level. This involves actively harming someone or pulling them down to protect oneself. This type of jealousy forces someone to get over-involved with the people they are insecure about in order to feel good about themselves. This typically comes from an ingrained natural fear of losing (status, love, power, success, etc.). Behavioural jealousy does not offer a sense of security, instead, it stifles freedom and autonomy because the jealous person can escalate matters to harm others. The athlete in the previous example actively conspired against the upcoming junior and got him removed from teams, harming the junior’s career.
The last kind is ‘emotional jealousy’, which springs from a place of love and care. It comes from the human instinct to protect something you hold dear and cherish. In small doses, emotional jealousy shows how invested you are in something. As someone told me yesterday, “this is not the kind of love that will be destructive”. But the excessive presence of emotions and jealousy leads to a kind of attachment that consumes the person. Excessive emotional jealousy leads to the relationship, whether with a sport or a person, becoming self-serving. The bigger picture is forgotten.
Jog beyond jealousy
Accepting and acknowledging hard work is usually last on the list when dealing with jealousy Shutterstock
If you do well, rather than supporting and congratulating you, people will ask themselves and others questions. How did you ‘manage’ it? Did you get lucky? Was there some ‘connection’ helping you out? Accepting and acknowledging your hard work is usually last on the list, if at all. It should be the first on your list and that is all. Jealousy distracts us from our controllable actions and switches our focus to what others are doing. Looking at someone’s car instead of the road while driving leads to a crash. Might be something to think about when we get jealous.
Dr Sahen Gupta is a Kolkata-born, India- and UK-based psychologist who divides his time between mental health support and high-performance coaching. As the founder of Discovery Sport & Performance Lab, he works not only with Olympians and other top-level sportspersons, but also with CEOs and other professionals striving for excellence. Dr Gupta’s mission is to simplify complexities of the mind into actionable and simple ‘doables’ that allow individuals to be mentally fit.