Green With Envy
Lately my reactions have been getting uglier. Disgusting emotions are flooding me, especially the jade kind. Seeing people successful in a field I wish to be, even one I haven’t actually done any work in fills me up with darkness and longing. I suffer from both sides:
- Wishing success/knowledge/interest in too many areas (My Reach Exceeds My Grasp);
- Feeling like a failure for not having done the impossible;
It’s a no win situation that has me trapped, with the bright moments of joyful productivity shot dead by recurring spurts of depression. Ruinous thoughts that state my ineptitude and make it all the more probable, a seditious self fulfilling prophecy. Although aware of it, fighting back proves all too difficult.
It’s a un ugly synaptic reaction that I’ve fallen pray to for too long. Our brains are insanely plastic and I intend to utilize that. But before I start work on changing, I need to figure out why it’s happening to me and how I’ve built up the habit (synaptic paths).
Immediacy
Immediacy has dominated my key formative years, so much so that arguing against it is like arguing against the rising sun. Cultural osmosis is irresistible and when capitalist meditation is overwhelming, escaping it seems nigh impossible.
Such internalizing has poisoned my every thought and interaction, degrading my every experience. Instead of searching for joy and engagement, my mind has been corrupted to think of usefulness, scalability, profitability, relevance, market fit, return... Metrics are everywhere and I stare at them every chance I get. Even if this is supposed to be a hobby, done for the fun of it, for rest and play, the joys I claim make life worth it.
Race ’n Chase
Which then gets me looking at people who are doing better at me on those metrics. Leading to a zero sum mentality, where life is a race and I am behind on all of it. They are winning, all of them. And I’m stuck in place. A thought that makes it’s self fulfilling prophecy all the more likely.
But it’s not a race and life is not zero sum. We can all win and broad comparisons are futile, especially on metrics that look objective. Someone is not better than you because they are more popular than you. Because they make more money, are more buff, eat healthier or write better. They are just better at you at that one particular thing. They’ve probably spent much more time cultivating that skill and building that audience. They might’ve gotten lucky, but that’s only a part of it. It takes commitment, dedication and skill to make something lasting.
Just because I’m not there yet doesn’t mean I’m are worse. It’s just a yet and if I want to be there, I have to take every step I can to get there. There’s a joke about the guy praying to god to win the lottery everyday and when he finally dies god just asks “Why’d you never buy a ticket?” Do what you can and life will find a way forward.
My envy is just a base, hideous reaction to the waiting period. It might be elevated by ADHD, but it’s nothing special. But by fighting it, I can prevail and get where I want.