On: The "Other" Deadly Sin
This article is best enjoyed whilst listening to the song "Two Hands" by Passenger - https://youtu.be/ptH0C8b1ra0
Quite recently I discovered that I had an “unspoken rule” to my friendships. It's a rule that's rooted in a word so bastardized, if you weren't careful even in reading this, you'd think of me as an asshole (not saying, I'm not a peaceful asshole though, on some days). So, what is this "unspoken rule" you may ask? Well, it's simple:
I tend to only be good, nay, great friends with people I can be jealous of.
Hard as it might be to imagine, I have always been the kind of friend who by some definitions one might consider a "harmless hater". I see my friends’ successes or goodwill and wish it for myself. I see them getting promotions at work or finding love and I'm behind them with my head in the clouds, swapping lives just so I could be the one living that reality. It's one of the many comforts for me too. I spend so much time in my own head it becomes so easy to relive the amazing moments of joy, happiness, and achievement in my friends’ lives as mine. And as weird as it sounds, it's not a habit that I plan on stopping any time soon.
I have my reasons too. The first would be…
Jealousy is beautiful
Yes, you read that right. It is. It is an emotion where you can pine for someone else's best moments and not have to feel like you owed them an explanation as to why. With being jealous, I can hop off a call with a friend who just got a pay-raise, and instead of going back to my computer and working, I can take long moments to reimagine myself in their shoes, celebrating that raise and doing some mental mathematics on how much the new bump in salary would boost my ego. My friend on the other hand would never need to know (although seeing as I am writing this, they will now) or even have any inkling that in my own head I wanted what he/she has so badly. They'd go about their own lives and I'd be reliving their moments as though they were mine. It's basically like reincarnation but without the “dying and being reborn” crap. So, yes, I believe jealousy as an emotion is beautiful.
My second reason is probably my least favorite. And this is because it stems from a bit of self-reflection (I loathe self-reflections and their innate self-righteousness, despite how much I have them). Indeed, I think one of the reasons being jealous of my friends’ greatest moments is such a thing for me, is that…
Jealousy keeps me grounded
How so, you ask? Because I am always aware of the fact that no matter how far my mind wanders and swims in the ocean of delirium, reliving their greatest moments for myself, I am always tethered to the truth that whenever I'm done being jealous, my own existence – in whatever state I had left it – awaits me.
Truthfully, I've never thought of being jealous of my friends’ greatest moments as bad because I have never not genuinely wished them well in such moments. I am typically the kind of person that when a friend informs me that they got a pay-raise, for instance, I can be found leaping and jumping for joy, naked; and my excitement and joy for them wouldn’t be a tiny bit sinister. I genuinely feel gladness in my heart for them, most times owing to the fact that, as a friend, I am often privy to how much they may have waited to get such great news or update and how receiving such was about to transform their lives. Nevertheless, what my being jealous, after the fact, does for me is that in my private moment, after having joyfully celebrated their victories, it allows me to escape my own losses. In wishing, nay, wanting to be the one who had just gotten the pay-raise or that new car or new love interest, I am able to step away from whatever blandness my life is plagued with.
I know that it might not seem like much to anyone else but that emotion – the seething feeling of jealousy that runs through my veins – often brings me relief and comfort. I indeed want their happiest and greatest moments for myself but only enough to want to create my own fictional reality where I am the main character of whatever their stories might be. And in all honesty, this desire to court jealousy so keenly stems from the fact that all of the people I actually call "friends" are incredibly special and talented and awesome in their own right.
I'm writing this now and a few names come to mind. I'll be damned if I can't say I was incredibly jealous of my friend, IB, Writer, Poet, and peace connoisseur, when he told me he'd found love and shared some gorgeous pictures of him and his beloved. That update from him back then was the highlight of my day, and I stay forever being jealous of him finding the wholesomeness of such companionship.
When KO told me he was working on his Ph.D. thesis during the last call we had, best believe I was super jealous of him and I mentally swapped our lives just to know what it would feel like if I had such cerebral stamina where I could be dedicated to studying and gaining academic knowledge as he had.
Another friend, Dennis, was at my house a few days back and made mention of his MacBook while I had my HP laptop in front of me and best believe in that moment of jealousy, what I had in front of me wasn't my HP laptop anymore.
In fact, I remember when my dearest Tomi bought her first house and I–
Fuck it! At this point, I guess it's safe to say you get the gist.
I know it may not be a conscious thing but I believe when I make friends, I go to do so with the awareness that there's always something worth being jealous of in the other person. And in a way, I honestly believe my jealousy helps me not only appreciate the greatest moments of my friends’ lives even better, but it also ensures I am able to see them as the better versions of themselves – versions I can only dream of being.
Our lives are so different it is impossible to not have something great or monumental happening in a friend's life that isn't happening in mine. Even with shared dreams and values, there's never really anything shared besides the idea of that friendship. And I know that this might sound like I am trying to whitewash what most of us may have held as a preconceived idea of what "jealousy" or "being jealous" implies, but nothing could be farther from the truth...or at least, my truth.
Notwithstanding, if indeed I am trying to sell [read: whitewash] any ideas here, then it would only be my own understanding or definition of jealousy. For me, jealousy is not me blindly wishing I had the greatest moments of my friends’ lives as my own to the point of bitter envy and resentment, but rather it is recognizing that just as I can wholeheartedly celebrate such amazing moments with them, without malice, I can easily relive the possibility of having such moments as my own in the comfort of my own mind; even if it is for the sole purpose of escaping my own reality.
Maybe I am wrong in thinking of jealousy this way, who knows? But I do know that when my friends win in life and have great moments to share, it feels much better knowing that I can share those moments with them and later on relive them as mine without the limiting judgment of what it conventionally means to be a jealous person.
And honestly, that is a deadly sin I think I can live with.
Cheers!
You turned something negative into something positive. That, my friend, is gold.
Its amazing how your words always feel so real...I Know i dont get to read your writing everytime but when i do it always feel so good.. honestly i think most of us are guilty of "the other Deadly sin".