You catch the eye of your loved one tangled with a stranger and you feel a sudden urge to punch that person. Is that jealousy? Your colleague just received a promotion, which you had dreamt about since you joined the company. Are you envious of your work-mate acquiring that position? In both these situations, can we identify our complex emotional responses attributing to either jealousy or envy? Or do we think that our response involve features of both? Everyone did a great job of stripping both these words down to understand what they actually mean in various contexts. Our verdict is that these words have a very subtle difference and that both jealousy and envy can be at play in a given situation. Jealousy or envy is a secondary emotion; it is a combination of certain base emotions (anger, sadness, fear). Jealousy is more personal, it is directed inwards whereas envy is projected outwards. We get jealous when the “object” in question belongs to us - an element of possessiveness. We get jealous when we feel threatened by the loss of our object (not every loss can be classified as jealousy though), for example sibling rivalry over parents attention. Envy stems from the desire to achieve/acquire someone/something that does not belong to us. An excellent example by one of our members was that envy is the lifeblood of capitalism. You want more; you want what others have. What is so sinful about jealousy/envy? The news is always red with Crimes of passion. Violence, burglary, manipulating others are some of the atrocities we commit so that we can acquire what we don’t have. Does this deadly sin have a positive aspect? Maybe! You are envious of your classmate achieving high grades; you work hard and start achieving the same grades! Depends on how you channelize these emotions. It is not so easy though when you are blinded with rage! We were only able to discuss one deadly sin in detail and we hope to come back – sin by sin! I leave you with a quote from a classic tragedy with jealousy being the central theme: “O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-eyd monster, which doth mock The meat it feeds on.” ― William Shakespeare, Othello
Posted on: Sun, 19 Oct 2014 02:58:32 +0000
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