haha dude you picked an odd website to talk about all this weird stuff dyhppy

 

lol u said jiz..

 

I'm perfect so I have nothing to be jealous over.

 

My wife and I retired in our thirties so we haven't had to go to work in almost 10 years. I get to wear shorts and t-shirts and flip flops everyday. I see the wage slaves stuck on the freeway and I think that sucks to be them. My kids are set as well ,they can work if they want to or just enjoy life. Life is good, my wifes helps kids with disabilities so that keeps her grounded, me I'm just a anti-social bastard who only cares about me so I never worry about others or what they have.


Life lesson kids,use your brain, invest well or just get to like getting up early till your old and gray.

 

you are certainly correct that is board is a odd choice to discuss these topics. the "response research" is added to responses gathered from other sources. it began under the guise that s2k owners were intelligent people. now, it's just an aimless habit.

If I wanted to hear about how every responder was mentally healthy with no feelings of jealousy, than I would have said so. The original query was about how you process the concept in reality. simply saying, "i know tons of people who are better off than me, but im not at all envious of them" is as useful as a sack of shit. it must feel good to constantly tout how mentally evolved you are on anonymous internet boards.

regardless, i'm the idiot who posed the question to the wrong crowd.

 

just because life comes at me, i'm sometimes forced by situation to either be sad/frustrated/jealous or to reevaluate my views. i try to always choose to change myself. i like to think of that as growth or progress. as a benefit, this type of growth/progress usually makes me a more likeable person, a better husband at home, and a better friend to others.

if you want to know how i personally accomplish that type of change, it's hard to describe. i think the process for me is the same for jealousy, anger, lust, pride, or anything else that's undesired emotional behaviour. i find there's usually a duality in these things, such as love/lust and pride/self-respect, where there is both good and bad. the fact that you feel strong emotion means you have capability to be both good and bad intensely. if you feel no emotion, the good or bad compulsion is gone and you simply act on logic alone. (that sounded good to me once, but not after i did it for a while)

i was laid off last week from a job i loved, and they owe me over two months wages to add to it. i haven't had as much success as i expected in getting another job because we aren't in a position to move, and we may be required to in a year. it's been very stressful/frustrating. yesterday i was just pissed and had no real understanding of why. so i walked around downtown and was angry for a while until i processed enough of the frustration to let the emotion go. for a while i felt like i wanted to punch somebody for no real reason. it got better after an hour or so, but it wasnt done until i had a heart to heart with my wife. talking with my wife i discovered i seemed to feel that after finishing college (BSME), in addition to my degree, i had earned a stable career. obviously in reality, i earned a degree, and thats it. but emotionally, i hadnt processed it that way--the career was an expectation, and i'd been building on it for years, so when it came out wrong, it came out as a strong negative emotion.

i used to once handle negative emotion essentially by truncating the emotion--deciding to feel nothing rather than happy and/or sad. i actually only tried to get rid of the negative; i just found the good leaves with the bad. but at a certain point, i decided being numb, perfect, and robotic as an ideal state was worse than being flawed for a longer time and having emotion to add to my life's experience. the pleasure and pain together are much better than neither. it's better to have both the bitter and the sweet in life. without the bitter moments, how do you know to treasure the sweet? without pain, what is pleasure?

also, to hone in more on jealously directly, people always adapt and change our perspective. a boy with a new $2 top is often happier than me with my $30k car, even though i really really love my car. and a dancer or singer may be happier with nothing at all--just their skill. and i worked hard and spent all that money, most of which i dont even have, to buy the car to make me happy. maybe i'm a fool, maybe i outgrew the top, maybe we just adapt to our circumstances and reset our emotions to whatever standard we're used to. but there will always be a better just like there will always be a worse, and the real point behind it is to be happy, not better.

 

^nice

 

Perhaps this will be a little clearer, then.

1. As a Christian, my focus is not on material wealth or possessions. My happiness does not stem from having lots of toys or a big house or whatever. I get no particular pleasure from having more than the guy next door (which is probably a good thing since he makes double what I do ) or in the next office. I appreciate how I am blessed in life, period. I know way too many people that have lots of things that could potentially cause jealousy that are completely unhappy. My happiness is founded elsewhere.

2. I am in a position to be more successful (in the long run) than 99% of the population in the USA. In time, I can get just about anything moderately reasonable that I want. So you could say that I point to the future instead of dwelling on the present. What someone has now does not faze me in the least.

3. I use the success of others as a spur to push myself to also raise my success level. I use the success of others as positive reinforcement.

Is that any better?

 

I was going to post in this thread earlier, but now I'm glad I waited. My answer may be more along the lines of what you were looking for......

....but first, as far as material things are concerned, I'm a lot like the others that posted here. If someone has a nicer car, house, etc. than me, than whatever. Good for them. I'm happy with what I have, if I wasn't than I would work harder.

Where jealousy comes into play for me is women. More often than not, whenever I'm interested in a chick I'll do something stupid and get myself put into the friend zone. Inevitably, she'll end up seeing another dude, and I'll get pretty jealous. Most of the time I'll be the good guy that I am and push that shit inward and play it off like it's no big deal. Sometimes I will lash out a little and be a total a$$hole to the chick in question for no particular reason, but most of the time I just keep it to myself. Bottling your feelings up FTW! Alcohol helps.

 

[QUOTE=ozthebum,Jun 12 2008, 08:17 AM]Bottling your feelings up FTW!