It’s spring; a time to acknowledge the shadows of emotions and transform the stress they bring to the soul into a bright Light that guides us to live peacefully and harmoniously.
Jealousy is the shadow in the soul that resides where there is love, attraction or attachment to a person, or an object we would like to call our own.
But my first challenge to you is, can you actually claim anyone or anything your own? Are you yourself your own person or are you just a channel through which Life unfolds into a thing of beauty? And what about your children? Are they not the same?
And what are possessions if not means to honour our living by offering wellbeing? But wellbeing is within us anyway; we just need to be aware of it and keep in touch with it. Any attachment to an external possession is a tool to turn us into slaves, robbing us of our very own and pure source of love and joy.
Jealousy is a force of gravity present in all humankind. But not every person decides or is free to allow it the same place in their life. Despite the negative connotations we may have about jealousy, there is a reason why it resides in our souls. It measures the value we hold for another person or desire. Handled with consciousness, isn’t that enough motivation to work toward achieving what we want and ensuring we act in the best practice to keep that what we desire?
The manoeuvre here is not to turn that motivation into a cage, where our self, our soul, our freedom are sacrificed to hold on to what we have made into a need without which we cannot live in peace. Like harmony, jealousy needs balance to give us what we need and the weight that balances its force is the strength to be brave and let go. At the end, will not that what is ours come back to us? If it doesn’t, it never was and it is not worth investing our energies on someone, or something that does not appreciate the value of our love.
In its pure form, jealousy protects us from exposing our loved ones to the greed of others who may not share the same amount of love for the person or object we love. It is the gauge that keeps us on our toes to ensure we give our loved one/s the sense of trust and confidence that ensure loyalty.
Take a child. Children are born jealous of their parents and instinctively they wouldn’t want to share them as they want to have all their love and attention. It is a parent’s difficult task to develop this strong emotion in the child into trust and confidence – a knowledge that sits deep in the soul of the child that even when the parent is engaged in another activity with another human being, their offspring is and remains their priority until death does them part. When this beautiful transformation happens, jealousy has not been eradicated; it has been channelled and tamed by a stronger feeling of trust. Jealousy is still there, but it is managed and contained in a soul that feels comfort in unconditional love and respect towards the obligation between the two people.
In less ideal situations, individuals feel eaten by jealousy. To make corrections to this shadow, you need to rise above it. The solution is love. Expose yourself to love where it touches your heart and gives you warmth. That is what melts jealousy. And love has to be unconditional because only that pure love has the power to support you to let go of the pain of possession and feel the peace in the freedom of emotions stirred by attachments.
What is important to remember is that jealousy is a shadow and if you concentrate your energies on that negativity you lose sight of Light. Once you operate from the shadow, you are bound to attract more threatening darkness, increasing the potency of jealousy. In moments like these, you need to reflect and go within; search your Light within you and above you and focus on that power; that deactivates jealousy.
While jealousy is the other side of love, envy is the need to possess. However, while ambition is a drive to help us move forward toward higher achievements, envy comes from a space of lack. It also transmits a lack of appreciation and gratitude for what we have. When we concentrate on someone else’s possession and feel the negative nudge that what they have is more than what we have, we first of all fail to see the beauty of that object of desire for what it is, in its full glory. Furthermore, we are giving the message to our soul that who we are and what we have is not good and is not enough. That is very painful for the soul and applies the law of attraction in reverse – rather than attracting love and abundance, you attract a feeling of inadequacy, insecurity and inferiority. That is a dishonour to the self and disrespect to the very life that created us.
That is why it is so crucial to keep jealousy in check and the moment it surfaces, you throw Light on feeling gratitude for life and love. What you have is what you need. Being thankful for that radiates an attraction that brings you more abundance in your life.
On a practical level, if you are jealous of your partner, do not act on it by restricting their movements unless they are being unfaithful. In that case you need to turn away rather than hold on. Focus on the other sources of love in your life and feel its warmth. Embrace the energy of your family, your friends, any satisfaction you achieve through work or other activities that give you pleasure and consciously let go of that nagging feeling of doubt which is associated with jealousy. You are your number one; treat yourself like that. If you let yourself be overcome by the force of jealousy, be aware that it has the power to destroy you, your values, your sanity, your reason, your harmony. And these are your obligations and duties, towards yourself, in gratitude towards the life that created you. Out of respect for that, you have no permission to give these values away to jealousy or to someone who plays around with them. Let go.
Understanding jealousy is understanding also what it tries to achieve. It is the desire to control. It is the desires to have, irrespective where it is coming from. That idea of having someone, something, at all costs is very dangerous. It defies morals which are the boundaries that protect us. Is it ok to desire a man, or a woman, who is already in a relationship? If the person is unhappy in their relationship, rise above jealousy and allow them the space to let themselves free so that your love is received from a free heart, with no fear or guilt.
But if the person shows no sign of unhappiness but just some excitement of having something new in their life, then you do not belong there to offer your love. You are setting yourself up to disappointment, jealousy for someone who cannot be yours and there is no space for your love to be number one. You generate hate and sadness for being in this blind spot. You hate what hinders you to achieve what you want and that hate keeps you away from seeing the opportunities that can actually make you happy. And the soul is trapped and suffers.
There comes your strength. Look beyond and see the beauty. Open yourself up to the people who can receive your love and appreciate what you have to give.
What jealousy indicates is that you want someone, or something. For you, that desire is important and makes your soul excited. It encourages you to invest in that desire and you are willing to invest your greatest asset – love. If all this positive energy somehow turns into a painful emotion which darkens the soul, then even there jealousy is telling you something – you are not loving yourself enough to secure peace in your heart. Your first obligation is towards your heart and it demands your protection. That is the first port of your energy. Take care of that first and if it is of benefit to you, love and desire will come to you freely, unconditionally and effortlessly. But it requires courage to step back from desire and take the energy out of jealousy. If you stay in the middle, it is ammunition for war, between souls, with negative forces pulling their weight. It is a recipe for pain. And the heart and soul are the casualties.
The universe is our best example. Trees live in harmony next to each other. They are not jealous of each other, even if one is taller than the other. To grow they need to receive their own light and have their own space to expand and complete their life cycle. In the same soil you can actually have a flower growing next to a big tree. They’re both beautiful in their own right. And they are not jealous; just growing peacefully so long as they have soil, light and water. And they are wide open to receive these elements; they do not shut themselves down from this wellbeing to concentrate on other trees or flowers and let themselves feel miserable as they do not get the attention or feel less beautiful. On the other hand, because they are happy to live, they do not hurt each other, they give a nice smell and they are a pleasure to anyone in their presence.
Distance is important. Distance creates balance in life. Sometimes, when you are overwhelmed with jealousy, you only need to resort to the simple and what is so basically beautiful in life to find the balance, peace and joy. That simple form of energy will bring to you offerings that you never imagined existed.
Let us take another scenario. Sometimes you love a woman so much you want to keep her only to yourself. You want no one to see her as she is so beautiful someone might steal her away. This is your imagination and it can have the power to destroy you. If she wants to be unfaithful she will find a way.
So what can you do? You look after her, give her a place where to live, buy her clothes and make love to her to keep her happy. Give her attention, communicate and share your feelings. These seeds of love need to be planted every day, making the time to take care of your woman, speaking to her. This creates trust. She can be very beautiful but she will never betray you. But if you fail in these duties, you are allowing the space for another man to do what you are failing to do. Will you then be jealous of this competition?
Comparing your abilities to those of other people is a recipe for suffering, frustration and failure. Your duty is not to outdo the person but to dedicate your love and passion to do things well in your own time. If someone is doing something better and you feel jealousy nipping you, it is telling you something. It is encouraging you to push gently your limits to improve on what you’re doing. That is healthy. That is channelling jealousy in the right direction for your own self-development which will ultimately benefit humankind. This is not about money. It goes beyond. Once this high level is achieved, money is bound to follow.
Along the way, love the love you love. This is a way how not to expect anything in return. But you need to understand that when you give, even if you do not expect, you will receive, not necessarily the same thing from the same source. The same argument goes about honouring a love for something, without necessarily receiving the same love back. If I love a flower for its beauty, its smell, its colour, does it have to love me back to enjoy it? But I allow myself the pleasure to appreciate that flower. The unconditional love exchanged between us will manifest with other people who sense my happiness and fulfilment. That will allow me to receive their love and gratitude for being the happy person I am.
So I invite you to let go of jealousy and look within yourself and open yourself to life. Feel gratitude for what you have and open yourself to what is attracted to you. That makes you complete. You don’t need to envy the grass of your neighbour to realise yours is green too. Look after it, honour it, feel the love for it and it will only attract what you do not even know you want.
Be Blessed,
With Love and Light.
The Admor