The Green Eyed Monster

Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you riding through the ruts, don't complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don't bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality . Wake Up and Live!
--Bob Marley

Somewhere along my way, I found this creature in my soul--this woman who wanted what someone else had. There was a time when she began to smother me, to take away the joy I had in what I had. She told me that what I had was not enough. I wasn't tall enough, thin enough, smart enough, successful enough. Nothing was enough. I was not enough.

I could be happy for my friends as they accomplished things but certain accomplishments seemed only to punctuate my own inadequacies, or at least the ones that I perceived. Others' weight loss was one of those things. Friends seemed to be able to simply say they were planning on losing weight and POOF! five pounds instantly evaporated from their asses. Meanwhile, I had to fight for every half pound that I lost.

With time, though, I have come to understand that everyone has their own battles and their own victories. While I might look at someone else and think about how unfair it is that they are dropping weight like stones, they might very well be looking at me and wishing their husband looked at them the way that mine looks at me or that they could live as freely as I do. Their journey is not mine. My journey is not theirs. This epiphany came to me quite a while back.

The natural progression of enlightenment from there took a little longer. If my journey is different from another's, why would I expect the points along the way to be similar? Why would I expect the obstacles to be the same? For some reason I did, and at times I still do. Tonight for instance, I noticed that a good friend is really making progress with her weight loss despite the chips and beer and bread and...well, I can't even really tell you what she's actually giving up. My first instinct was to be jealous of her. Her weight loss pace is about 50 times faster than mine despite her being fifteen years older, perimenopausal, and not that chunky to begin with. But her path is not mine. Mine is not hers, so I'll just be thankful for mine. I can only truly be happy for mine when I am not looking at the scenery lining another's.

Now it's me smothering the monster.