Most of us deal with jealousy in some form, and when it comes up, it s never prett y.

It might be jealousy when your girlfriend seems interested in someone else, or w hen one of your best friends becomes close with someone else, or when your paren ts give a lot of attention to your sibling, or when other people are having more fun than you. Why do we get jealous? What harm does it do us? How do we overcome it? I ll admit that I get jealous, and the me that gets jealous is not my favorite sel f. I don t like myself when I get jealous. So what do I do? I watch myself. I see it happening. I acknowledge it. And then I give myself a hug. Let s look at little deeper at jealousy first, and then go over what we can do abo ut it. What is Jealousy? Jealousy is simply an emotional reaction to a past wound. It gets triggered when something in the present reminds us of what hurt us befor e. We fear abandonment. Our parents get divorced (mine did), our spouse cheats on u s, our best friend leaves us. And so, because this hurt us so much, we remember it in our hearts, and it becomes incredibly difficult to forget it. It becomes a part of us, this wound, this fear. It surfaces at times when it s not helpful. It starts to control us. And so this wound becomes a controlling factor in our lives, and we become the w orst selves that we can be. We don t want that. Let s learn to be our better selves. How to Heal the Wounds and Overcome Jealousy Jealousy works because it happens without us realizing it s happening, or without looking deeper into what s happening. It has an unseen power over us, because it s u nseen. So first we have to see it. Recognize when you re jealous. Don t look away. We don t l ike to acknowledge the bad parts of us, because then we re admitting we re not alway s great. But it s important, because if we don t, it has more power over us. So recognize it, acknowledge it. Then realize that it s an old wound from the past. This is your old self that s gott en hurt, and because of this, your old self is scared, angry, anxious. Afraid of abandonment. Angry at others for threatening to abandon you. This is perfectly OK. It s completely understandable to be hurt when someone viola tes your trust. Your old self is justified. But that s in the past. You need to gi ve your old self a hug, and say that it s OK to grieve, but also acknowledge that you need to let go and move on and grow. It also helps to realize that the past wound only happened because you had a sel f-centered view of the universe. You took your parents divorce, or your spouse ch eating on you, as a judgment of you as a person, as an abandonment of you after

they judged you and found you lacking. That s not true, though. They left for reas ons of their own they were afraid, they were dealing with their own issues of ab andonment and jealousy, they weren t mature enough to commit, and so on. The reaso ns they left had nothing to do with you, and if you realize that, it might hurt less. Heal the wounds with compassion. Then grow.