An aspect of my persistent unhappiness is rooted in envy. This envy is rooted in self-hatred. How can I see the brave and as a coward not be envious? See the beautiful and as the ugly not envy it? How can I be happy with, settle for, come to terms with, all the desirable traits I lack? I try to accept what I can’t change and see the futility of this envy but it doesn’t go away. What I hate the most about this existence is I can only be myself. What a horrible truth.
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And we’re basically supposed to just disregard all that somehow and be content with our lives. As if erasing any and all comparisons with others was simple and obvious.
Exactly. This envy persists in the face of reason. It’s in the limbic system and is affirmed daily by those who possess what you desire.
Those that have things you lack didn’t start from the same place as you, nor can you ever be entirely aware of the price paid for those things.
I have a friend who is constantly bringing up what I have and doesn’t see what she has that I don’t. I have quite a bit of material goods, which are enviable I suppose. On the other hand she has three children, while though I long to have some it just hasn’t happened. Prices were paid for everything, and not always by the person who has it.
I don’t know how to stop wanting things, because desire is keeping me going. All I know is that looking at what others have isn’t productive. When I consider the people that I want to be like I notice they don’t look anywhere else for value. They are the only source of valuation, the source of the definition.
It’s difficult to resist. It’s a cold snake that creeps chillingly and constricts suddenly. I think the crucial thing is understanding that envy originates from self-dislike. However miserable you are you can at least take pride in the struggle you’ve endured to work with the hand life dealt you and the choices you’ve made. And with that pride you can resist self loathing.
That in itself is a skill, and a difficult one. The pressures of life always crush us back to those primal sins which lead back into unhappiness and are entirely natural to our kind.
This is just what helps me. I have no idea how you or anyone else can eliminate envy from your lives and i certainly haven’t.
I personally don’t feel any envy towards the rich or beautiful, I’m just angry at my parents for not passing on those desirable things to me (which they didn’t possess).
To an extent, I was considered attractive by some people so I know what it feels like to be on both sides of the fence. However, I was definitely not born beautiful like some people are and that’s a gift I really wish I had. People tend to treat you better when you’re good looking and you’re able to date others that you consider to be very attractive.
And that’s partly why I hate myself because I wasn’t more attractive and instead have imperfections that I can’t do much about. In fact that alone, esp in my teen years was enough to make me want to seriously end my life.
However I got over it because I really had no choice. I realized I could obsess about my looks and lament that I didn’t look better or wasn’t as perfect as I wanted to be and waste away my years in pain and misery, or forget the whole thing and just focus on my education/career and enjoying other aspects of life.
And as mentioned it wasn’t all bad because I was able to date some very pretty girls (despite feeling not attractive myself) and that somewhat made up for it but it doesn’t get rid of the loathing and hate I feel for myself. I still don’t like my looks to this day but I go on.
As for being well off, it’s another goal I’m working on. I believe I have the brains/skills to get close to my target but I’m a long way off from that right now. Also, I think once I am more successful then it’ll be easier to attract the type of girls I’m into. While I can’t do much about my own looks, I do like the company of beautiful women (who doesn’t?) and they seem to enjoy mine.
I think those who lack beauty on the outside sometimes become beautiful on the inside because they realize there are other types of beauty also. For instance, the truth is beautiful. I’ve read some mind-blowing philosophy and poetry books that could bring you to tears because they’re so exquisitely written. I think that in turn inspires one to think and act with greater elegance and behave more morally/graciously towards others because it reflects well on one’s own character.
At times I was very impatient, foolish, arrogant, temperamental but I recognized these ugly characteristics within myself and I learned to be more humble, patient and know when to take issue with something or let it slide. So these desirable qualities also make one ‘beautiful’ in sense-esp when compared to people who act on their basest desires/emotions.
Also physical beauty can be overrated-such individuals can be superficial, dumb, selfish, intolerant and some of them can even be nasty people and they don’t go very far in life either. Additionally, when you’re attractive, you could end up getting stuck with kids when that’s not something you ever wanted and you basically fell into another person’s trap. I know a girl who got pregnant to basically force a certain good-looking guy to marry her.
If unattractive people stopped having kids then humanity could at least get rid of this problem but we know they won’t. Plus they also do jobs many of us probably wouldn’t do. So it’s a catch-22 situation. However I’d rather be beautiful than not, it’d be one less misery I’d have to deal with in life.