Let it go

When I have felt those green twinges of jealousy, I have stopped and thought deeply about what I'm feeling and why.  In every instance it turns out that at that moment in time, I am unhappy with myself for whatever reason and when I think long and deep enough, I discover what it is that I am unhappy with myself about.  This, in turn, allows me to grow in my passage.  The same applies to every "negative" emotion, anger, depression, etc. Going through this process for long enough has led me to become fairly (yeah, okay...very) happy with myself and my spiritual growth.

I don't think I've felt jealous since I was pretty young.  Been too busy going after what I want or need to focus on what others have that I don't.  I used to think jealousy was a necessary part of our development but I think it's only useful while we are young and impressionable.  In my mind, and in my life, I don't think it could serve any purpose.

We are the landlord of the space between our ears.  We chose what we allow to rent in this space.

I once wanted to bungee jump.  Never did.

Having not done it, I don't know what I missed. 

Now I'm too old.  I no longer care about it.

For me it is usually a matter of the road not taken.  I didn't have kids and I'm glad I chose that path. But when I see a woman holding a newborn, or a friend posts a photo of her house full of young adults there is something. Not every time but those are my triggers. Am I jealous? I dunno. But I don't know what else to call it.

http://www.radioparadise.com/rp_2.php#name=Journal&file=show_entry&jid=13400&from=kmh

Kind of a recurring theme?

Can you be jealous of something you don't want? 

In my experience...  no.  Though my memory experience there is limited to that of the desirability of a relationship with a particular person. I can't say I've ever experienced jealousy about material things or the acquisition thereof - but perhaps that's as I'm not especially materialistic by nature.

Or if you feel jealousy there is a part of you that DOES want it?

There wouldn't be jealousy if some part of you did not explicitly desire what you saw/admired.

I have a quote: "Feelings are completely amoral, but behavior is absolutely beholden to it."

Not sure if this is the same, but there's someone who is very rich and even a little famous (I once saw a brief clip of him on Jon Stewart). I'm a bit jealous/envious of him.
His wife has been in a few films and is a good looking, happy personality. They live in a big ole place overlooking the city.
He's a sought after speaker and seems to still be branching out.

But - I don't want to be him at all. Because we went to junior high and high school together, and he was a bully. I doubt he's much different now, and likely bullies people into business decisions. And, he's a member of the CoS, which I suspect both helps his success - but puts significant demands on him.

So, I'm jealous of his success - and I want no part of it. 

not to be a semantic over here, but you likely mean "envious." 

I've actually given this a lot of thought. I think that jealousy and envy are some hard/ugly feelings to have, that society doesnt support them as appropriate feelings, and so we tend to deny either the feeling of envy "I don't care" or the fact that we actually want the thing that we're feeling envious about "Doesnt matter, I wouldnt want that anyway"
Bottom line (to me anyway,) is that it IS a feeling, a valid one at that, but as with most negative emotion, one can't hang out in the feeling for very long without feeling worse. So, I say it's a good thing to say something like "Having some strong feelings here, maybe even envy, makes sense that I'd have that feeling, and at the same time, it's not providing me with much in the way of peace....so, lemme let it go"
Love you K, feel free to PM me.....     

Sure. We're not jealous of things, anyway. We're jealous of the people who have those things; our imagination lets us think those things mean they're happier or better off in their situation than we might be in ours.