On Envy

Unlike the unrealistic resolutions people make every year to get to the gym or to stop drinking, for 2017, I have set myself a manageable task to stop using the word, "jealous," when I actually mean, "envious." It is a common mistake in our society, a product of the ever-changing English language, but I can be very literal at times, and this is one of those circumstances. Perhaps the most highly defined reason for this is my own personal obsession with envy. I am envious of the world while simultaneously believing the world is envious of myself, despite there being no logical reasoning behind either instance.

I must confess, I loathe happiness. Not the concept, mind you, but I do have a hit out on the joy of others around me. I am so paranoid of my own happiness being a precursor to something equally terrible happening in my life that I am no longer comfortable with a smile on my face. The semi-stability I see in people's lives blinds me like the sun, leaving me agitated and eager to reenter the darkness from which I was forced. I see a couple laughing with each other, biting each other's lips, tussling each other's hair, and I enter a frenzy. That comfortable level of happiness infuriates me purely because I am not sure I will ever experience that same level of pleasure.

There is a hungering void at my core, screaming out for sustenance, but no matter how it may get fed, there is no sating its rampage on my soul. I stuff the infinitely expanding darkness with every vice known to man, all to no avail. Though other people compliment me, telling me how great I look, I cannot help but notice the all too real fact that the void is turning on me, stealing the light from my skin, leaving a husk that cannot tell the difference between fantasy and reality. Worse still, when this black hole is fed true accomplishment, the kind that comes from hard work and determination, there is still no reaction.

It is not simply a matter of me trying to fill this hole with sex, drugs, and material possessions, but rather that nothing seems to stimulate my existence anymore. I can spend weeks, even months, busting my ass towards self-betterment and progression towards self-sustainment, and when that end is achieved, I feel nothing. My hairs do not stand on end, I do not crack a smile, my heart rate does not increase. There is nothing. I am numb to it. Mountains have been crossed only to arrive back at ground zero.

What I despise about the happiness of others is that they can comfortably feel it. I fail to know whether I can actually feel genuine bliss at all. Things come incredibly easy for me: jobs, crushes, friends, educational opportunities. It is feeling good about these gifts that I struggle with, and as a result, my self-destructive tendencies ruin each and every one like sand castles caught under a wave. Meanwhile, others with healthier brains than my own would kill for the opportunities I have squandered. Combined with my fear of failure, abandonment issues, and the looming risk of retribution from the universe for my enjoyment, my displeasure with life has been amplified over the years to a point that I no longer yearn for partaking in new experiences.

This is why I hold such disdain for the delight expressed by those in my life. I want to feel that same pleasure in having such commonplace experiences without the constant dread. To combat these feelings, I have taken to cutting happy people out of my life entirely. If someone so much as smiles in my presence, they have to go. I cannot have anyone more content than myself in my line of sight, and if they so choose to be, then it is one less envious thought I have that day. Happy couples, successful entrepreneurs, or a schmuck who is just overjoyed to have found a ten-dollar bill; they are all in line to be erased from the annals of my being.

I have cut myself off from everyone in recent years, not out of some fear of socialization. I am as extroverted as they come. If I am not around others, then I have no motivation to so much as take care of myself as a human being. What I need are the distraught, the downtrodden, and the depressed to shepherd and to guide in order to make myself feel better about myself. The snarling vacuum in my head feeds off of their sadness, converting it into a fuel source for my own twisted ego which needs to be admired and loved for being so powerful and benevolent as to look out for others, but if someone is already powerful and not in need of guidance, then it feels as though they do not need me, and my interest in them starts to flee.

My own voice echos in my mind, screaming in a hoarse, almost demonic tone, to cut the people out of my life, to make them feel bad for losing me, and to have them come crawling and groveling back to me to be let back into my life. That same voice claws at the edges of my brain, chastising me, and blaming me for following those same whims and causing myself to lose those close to me, "That is why you lost the only friend you had growing up. That is why the former love of your life will never take you back. That is why the only person to truly know you is gone forever. Who are you going to destroy next, asshole? What incomprehensible sin will you commit against them and cause them to flee from your life forever?"

Silencing that voice and numbing the pain it has raught has become a full-time job to the point that I cannot even function properly. Alcohol is too expensive and so is adrenaline (if you plan on going to an amusement park), so I have settled for abusing my body through exercise. It is astounding how easy it is to silence a single voice in your mind if the rest of your body is screeching out for merciful death. Despite this indirect pursuit of a healthier, fitter body, it is still not enough. If I see someone with a body better toned than my own, my ego sinks once more, yelling at me for not doing enough to look like them. No matter what, it is never enough to please that darkness crawling underneath my skin.

Do not mistake this for some displeasure with my current state. I already am more beautiful, talented, intelligent, and entertaining than most people on this planet, but there is always a yearning deep down for a harsher regiment to raise the standards of perfection. If there is one tiny aspect to a person that makes them stand out over myself, then that person must be outdone ten times over just to make up for the attention that I lost for a brief two seconds of existence. I begin internally screaming when someone else becomes the object of everyone's adoration, and a grudge is born, an undying vendetta against the world for taking its gaze off of me for even a moment.

At the same time, I demand to feel needed, to be the target of everyone's envy, rather than the archer. Stemming from my own youth, I have always felt the incessant need to have the world adore me like a god. Rather than feel sorry for myself and give up after years of neglect, I inverted those feelings, and began to tell myself, you are worth more. Without anyone or anything to keep that mindset in check, it began to warp into a feeling that I was worth everything, that I deserved everything, and that if I could not have something, then I would change everything about myself in order to achieve it.

When you spend your childhood having half of your family put you on a pedestal telling you that you are special and the other half criticizing you and making you feel less than you are, it is not hard to tell which voices you will gravitate to. Those thoughts shape you, planting seeds in your head about who you will become. Then, as you age and you are not receiving that same admiration from other adults, reality can seem far less appealing. I bore witness to these experiences first hand and so, to reclaim those seldom happy moments from adolescence, I began to craft who I was based on what others would deem pleasing enough to want to be me.

In my own mind, if others wanted to be like me, then maybe it was a sign I was not all broken. This failed to be as simple as it sounds, though. I would change my speech patterns, likes and dislikes, fashion, and mannerisms; all for progress to becoming someone that others would deem superior and something to aspire to. Still, since the attention of humans can waver from one subject to the next, I would lash out and spite anyone who stole my spotlight while, at the same time, trying to shed my previous skin so I might morph into theirs.

People would sense it was not my genuine self coming out and try to convince me to be myself, but this was a foreign concept to me. Not once in my life was I concerned with being genuine, when I could be worshiped instead. To no one's surprise except for my own, I was actually pushing people away with my over the top antics and attempts to constantly outshine every star in the heavens. Naturally, my next course of action would be to only further change who I was on the outside in the hopes of finally meeting that glorious finish line of deity-like status with open arms.

It is not a far stretch to say that this sea of green washing over me has made me feel like a monster, perhaps rightfully so. I take, and I take, and I take, and have rarely felt concerned how my actions have hurt those in my life until it was too late. Even still, as more and more people have fled from my life, I have not made much progress in changing, try though I might. While some changes have stuck, I have found myself still falling back into the same patterns of my early life. The path to recovery is not an easy one, and while things may seem impossible, I like to believe they are not.

The key to changing the emerald demons polluting your soul is all in forcing yourself to partake in the uncomfortable situations. It does not have to be a constant bombardment, but to dip your feet in the waters of socialization with those you find yourself clamoring to mirror is the first step. Catching yourself before you enter a situation and scripting what to say and do to avoid misspeaking or making a general ass of yourself is also a powerful tool. You have to be on constant alert to the point that every other thought is about mindfulness and not about how to one-up the rest of humanity.

Envy is not merely some fleeting emotion that makes you feel uncomfortable. To some of us with personality disorders, it can be a siren luring us in only to rip out our hearts once we get too close. The trick is all in recognizing its bag of tricks and being ready to counter each vial of poison it pulls forth. You must remain vigilant and as you practice these mindful techniques, they start to become second nature and slowly but surely, it does become easier to not have to try and constantly be better than everyone. This is not to say the monster will give up or that the void will become sated, but from that day forth, you will be armed for every fight ahead.