Overcoming Jealousy

Jealousy… sucks. It burns a toxic hole through everything good it touches.

It can arise within from personal insecurities, the shady actions of others, or even past triggering experiences.

Regardless of its origins, jealousy poses a toxic threat to the quality of our relationships and life.

Here are three ways to get rid of this feeling:

Watch the video above for the full lesson so that you can continue living #TheChargedLife!

How do you deal with jealousy?

One of my students asked me the following question: “I’ve been in a long term relationship. I found the guy of my dreams, but I’m poisoning it because I’m so jealous of him and that jealousy keeps coming in. How do I stop feeling that way so that I can have a good, positive relationship?”

For a lot of people, that old feeling of jealousy arises from when they were younger. So, let’s talk about three ways to get rid of this feeling.

#1 Awareness

Awareness is always key.

When you’re in a state of awareness, you realize that jealousy is just fear dressed up. That’s it.

If you have jealousy about the other person, it’s just your fear coming in.

Your fear is arising because of one of two reasons. For one, your past behavior may be inducing fear and triggering the thought, “Well, they’re going to cheat on me”.

The second reason fear may arise is your insecurities. Perhaps this person has done something that makes you worry.  So, if that’s the reason why you have jealousy, that calls for an honest, open conversation wherein you say to the person, “I’m having a lot of trust issues. It’s because of something that you did, and I have to be honest about it and talk to you about it.”

You have to be an adult, rather than an accuser, finger-pointer, or hater. You just have to say, “I am feeling this way because this happened, and I need to process that with you. I need to ask you to change your behavior, or I just need your help in understanding what happened because I don’t want to feel jealous. I know jealousy will kill our relationship.”

If jealousy is coming from your insecurities, you need to realize that your insecurities are just coming from nonsensical trauma that happened in the past, or real trauma that happened in the past, which continues coming up for you and continues making you feel ‘less than’. Because of these insecurities, you may feel like they’re going to leave you, which is a fear of loss. You may feel like you’re not good enough, or pretty enough. Or maybe you’ve done things in the past that people didn’t approve of.

Recognize that fear is coming from a ‘what if’ statement followed by a negative statement.

You might be saying, “What if he leaves me and I’m alone for the rest of my life? What if he all of a sudden stops talking to me, or stops loving me?”

Whatever the mental process looks like, that’s where the jealousy appears from. It’s a fear of insecurity and that insecurity results in the thought, “What if because of who I am or what I’ve done, they leave me?”

So, be aware. You just need to know where your fears and insecurities are coming from. Is the cause their behavior or your internal stuff? Be honest about that and get into it. Think about it. Don’t avoid it. Don’t be scared.

Check in with what’s arising, and assess if it’s taking away from your joy, vibrancy, and your connection with this person.

They probably don’t like that you’re jealous, so you have to beware. It’s painful. Until you deal with one of those two issues – their behavior or your insecurity – it’s difficult to resolve the issue.

#2 Remember your strength

If you’re experiencing fear of inadequacy, specifically thinking that someone’s going to leave you, it often comes from not giving yourself enough credit. You do good things but you don’t feel and integrate those things into your identity so that you become a stronger, happier, healthier adult.

A lot of people are actually extraordinary people, but they don’t feel extraordinary because they never take the time to integrate the extraordinary things that happen in their lives.

For example, when someone gives them a compliment, they dismiss it without really hearing it or taking it in. It doesn’t penetrate their identity. They live life without saying things like, “I’m alright. I am good. I can be confident now. I’ve achieved enough. I’ve come forward enough. I’ve survived enough.”

It’s important to give yourself credit and remember your strengths.

You’ve overcome such difficult things in your life, and because of that, you are stronger than you know.

So, why is that so important? If they do leave you, you will be fine. That is the hardest thing to believe when you are experiencing jealousy.

You might be worrying that if they leave you, you’ll be wrecked. You won’t be wrecked. You’ve survived a lot in the past. Someone’s probably already left you in your life. It’s just true, right? Maybe lots of people have walked out on you. Lots of people have left me. I’ve had lots of break-ups in my life. That happens, and I’m still here. I’m still surviving. I’m still a pretty annoyingly happy dude.

You can be happy with or without anybody or anything.

You don’t need more wealth. You don’t need more people. You don’t need a higher career. You don’t need anything. You can choose in this moment to feel grateful and blessed. You can choose to focus your attention on things that you appreciate, to take in the good again.

If you start taking in those good wins, and start acknowledging the small daily actions that you’ve accomplished, that’s when you stop worrying about other people and you start recognizing that you’re fine with or without other people. This ability and practice makes you more attractive.

#3 Love on that person more

If you don’t want somebody to leave you, then treat them awesomely. Maybe in the past, you’ve been awesome to someone, fully giving of your heart, being vulnerable, loving, caring, and compassionate. And despite all your efforts, they cheated on you. That happened to me, and it broke me at the time.

At some point, with time and perspective, you realize that if they ran off and cheated on you, then they weren’t right for you. They just weren’t.

But if you are loving and giving to that person, the odds of them doing that go down. It’s when you neglect or stonewall someone, are cold toward someone, exhibit jealousy, point fingers, or blame somebody, that’s when they’re more likely to walk away.

But when someone is fulfilled in their relationship because you give without holding back, you allow them to give, you meet them where they are, you pay attention to their love language, the odds of them staying are higher.

So, don’t be afraid to give more in the relationship as well as live your life full on. It’s easy to walk around not giving our love when we’ve gotten hurt in the past. When that happens, sometimes we build up the walls to keep out the bad guys, but when we do that, we prevent the good guys from coming in.

Never forget that it’s in our own self-protection that we block out the very things that we want—connection, love, vitality.

So, if you haven’t been vulnerable lately, be vulnerable again. If you haven’t been loving to that person, love them. Start engaging them. Give them gifts. Kiss them on the face. Love them so much that they feel vibrant,love,d and adored by you. They will stay around a whole lot longer, and you will start to feel love in your heart again. And the more the love comes in, the less jealousy can be present.

So, watch this video again if you are struggling. Take time to reflect on what the problem and struggle is, and where it’s coming from. Start bringing more strength into your life so that you can stand on your own. Be confident, sexy and attractive in your own person, no matter what, so that you can overcome those fears. When you do that, you will start to experience what we call, The Charged Life.