4 Types of Jealousy and 8 Strategies to Use it Wisely

Have you ever experienced envy or jealousy, those emotions that arise when we compare ourselves to others? What is the difference between these two emotions, and how can we navigate them in our lives? Welcome to the On Purpose podcast, and today we will look deep into the intricacies of envy and jealousy, and discover the three transformative steps to make any change in our lives. Let’s talk about why do we feel jealous or envious when we find ourselves going through struggles while others seem to have an easier path, why do we desire what others possess, how these feelings make us feel satisfaction from others' unhappiness or feel left out. Through reflection and introspection, we uncover the path towards personal growth and develop a mindset of compassion, gratitude, and inclusivity. In this episode, you'll learn: The different types of jealousy and envy How can we identify the signs How do we shift our mindset How to turn jealousy and envy into admiration Prepare to embark on a journey of self-discovery, understanding, and transformation as we learn to embrace our own path and celebrate the journeys of others. With Love and Gratitude, Jay Shetty What We Discuss: 00:00 Intro 03:17 Who doesn’t feel envy or jealousy in some way to someone? 10:43 There is a difference between jealousy and envy. What differentiates them? 12:27 Here are the three steps to make any change in your life 14:09 Type #1: You are going through something but others aren’t. You get jealous because their life is easy 17:36 How do you zoom out to bring your focus away from what’s stressing you out? 19:04 Type #2: We want what other people have 25:56 Find out more about people you know less about and turn it into admiration 26:07 Type #3: Becoming happy that others are down or unhappy 31:59 Type #4: Feeling upset of being left out See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by Vinted. Value can be found anywhere, even in the clothes sitting untouched in our closets. That's where Vinted comes in. Vinted is a secondhand marketplace app where you can sell clothes you no longer want and get more value out of them. Whether you're running out of space, moving, or simply updating your wardrobe. Listing items is a quick and simple process, and once something sells, Vinted creates a prepaid shipping label for you. And the best part, there are no seller fees, so you keep what you earn. It's a simple way to clear out your closet, be less wasteful, and maybe make some extra money along the way. And if you've been thinking about a wardrobe refresh, this can make it feel a little more worthwhile. You're not just letting go of clothes, you're getting more value from what you already have.

• 0:43Jay Shetty?

  Give your clothes a second life with Vinted. Download the Vinted app for free to start selling with no seller fees, so you keep every dollar you earn. This episode is brought to you by AG1. Are you feeling September reset too? Shorter days, longer to-do lists, earlier alarms, all those routines you promised yourself you'd pick back up. It can feel like your whole life is recalibrating. And when everything around you is changing, it helps to have a few things you can rely on. AG1 Next Gen is one of those easy habits to keep. It's the clinically-backed, comprehensive daily health drink that supports your gut health, energy production, and foundational nutrition all in one scoop.

• 1:26Jay Shetty?

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• 2:01Jay Shetty?

  This episode is brought to you by AG1. Are you feeling September reset too? Shorter days, longer to-do lists, earlier alarms, all those routines you promised to yourself you'd pick back up. It can feel like your whole life is recalibrating. And when everything around you is changing, it helps to have a few things you can rely on. AG1 Next Gen is one of those easy habits to keep. It's the clinically-backed, comprehensive daily health drink that supports your gut health, energy production, and foundational nutrition all in one scoop. AG1's ingredients are sourced from quality partners for absorption, potency, and nutrient density to deliver the foundational nutrition your body needs. And alongside a proper diet,

• 2:45Jay Shetty?

  AG1 Next Gen meets 94% of nutrient requirements and it's clinically shown to enrich the gut microbiome. For a limited time, save 20% on your first subscription order of AG1 Next Gen or AG1 Pro at drinkag1.com/onpurpose. That's drinkag1.com/onpurpose. Hey everyone, I'm so excited because we're going to be adding a really special offering onto the back of my solo episodes on Fridays. The Daily J is a daily series on Calm and it's meant to inspire you while outlining tools and techniques to live a more mindful, stress-free life. We dive into a range of topics

• 3:27Jay Shetty?

  and the best part is each episode is only seven minutes long, so you can incorporate it into your schedule, no matter how busy you are. As a dedicated part of the On Purpose community, I wanted to do something special for you this year. So I'll be playing a handpicked Daily J during each of my Friday podcasts. This week, I'm sharing an inspiring story that motivates me and hopefully can motivate you too. Of course, if you want to listen to The Daily J every day, you can go subscribe to Calm. So go to calm.com/j for 40% off your membership today.

• 4:09Jay Shetty?

  Hey everyone, welcome back to On Purpose, the number one health and wellness podcast in the world, thanks to each and every one of you that choose to come back every week to become happier, healthier, and more healed. Now, it's been an incredible year so far on On Purpose. The love from this community has been unbelievable. There are tens of thousands of reviews across Spotify and Apple and so many more, wherever you listen to podcasts, whether it's on iHeart or anywhere else. And I just want to take a moment to say thank you for those. They make such a difference to the way I feel and the team feels, creating this content every single week. And they make such a difference to new members. If

• 4:51Jay Shetty?

  you're a new listener, thank you so much for being here. If you've been here 100 times, 200 times, 461 times, I am grateful if you listen to us every day. Thank you. Whether you're on your first listen or your 100th listen, I appreciate you. And I want to dive into a really interesting topic this week. And this topic was actually brought to me by my team. One of my team members said to me, "Hey Jay, like, I'm really struggling with this. Could you help me? Could you do a pod on it?" Actually, that was the request. And I love it when something comes so organically. On these episodes, I'm always trying to start an organic conversation or share a conversation that I've been having with a client, a friend,

• 5:36Jay Shetty?

  a team member, whoever it may be. And it was really interesting because this started as one team member's request and turned into a team therapy session where we were all openly sharing with each other how we struggle with this. And so what you're about to hear is actually crowdsourced stories, experiences, challenges with this subject. And I hope that as you're listening, not only do you feel less alone,

• 6:07Jay Shetty?

  I hope that listening to this helps you judge yourself less and stops you from making yourself feel guilty. And of course, as always, I'm dedicated to giving you the steps, the solutions, the strategies, the methods, so that you can actually break through and move forward. Today, we're talking about the formidable blocks in our life of envy and jealousy. Now, I don't think there's anyone in the world who doesn't feel envy or jealousy in some way or some capacity. And I know it's hard to think that, it's hard to believe that there are people out there who don't feel that way. You look at someone and you go, "Well, they must have it all made."

• 6:52Jay Shetty?

  You look at someone else and we go, "Well, she has everything," or "They have everything." "They're good-looking, they're rich, they're famous, they're successful, everything must be perfect." And what I've learned by being closer and closer to that world, by people I meet and people that I've come across, is that no one feels that way. Everyone is either jealous, envious, insecure, or in some way unstable about whatever position or platform that they have. One of my friends told me this incredible story. And I'm sharing it with you because it really puts things into perspective at that sort of a level. So, he just bought the house of his dreams

• 7:36Jay Shetty?

  and it was incredible and it was everything he could have ever wanted. He was then invited to someone else's birthday party and he went to their home. And when he went to this person's home, they were showing him around the home and they showed him one piece of art in their home. And his house cost the same as the art on this other person's wall. And he said that that made him reflect just on how, at every stage, we can always feel envy and jealousy. So, sometimes we think, "Oh, when I get that, I won't be jealous anymore." "When I achieve that, I won't be envious of anyone."

• 8:19Jay Shetty?

  But actually, overcoming envy and jealousy has to be its own pursuit.

• 8:25Jay Shetty?

  As we pursue our desires, and this was something I learned during my time as a monk, where overcoming jealousy, overcoming ego, overcoming envy, these were pursuits in themselves. There was no external achievement that was going to take away that internal feeling. There was no amount of money, no amount of awards, no amount of comfort, no amount of first-class flights, no amount of even just having the happy family and the perfect setup. Even if you didn't have these grand ambitions, there was no external point of life

• 9:06Jay Shetty?

  that would remove envy and jealousy unless they were removed strategically and specifically. And so I want to dive into just how normal this is because I think one of the things that keeps us blocked is the guilt we feel for feeling it. One of the things that keeps us stuck is the amount we judge ourselves, right? We all feel icky, like we feel upset at ourselves for even feeling that way, especially when if it's about a family member or a friend or someone in our life. I know that we don't like carrying that feeling and I know you know what that feels like. So I want us to move past that block by recognizing that all of us struggle with this.

• 9:46Jay Shetty?

  So studies show that 79% of women and 74% of men reported envying someone within the previous year. Now, the research goes on to show that we envy less as we age, and that makes sense because as we age, certain things in our life become more clear and certain things in our life become more set up to a certain degree, where we get a more realistic view. So younger people were more likely to be envious about academic success, social status, romantic relationships, and of course, appearance. And one of the studies showed that 40% of the people who were researched

• 10:30Jay Shetty?

  reported envying the romantic success of someone else they New compared to less than fifteen percent of people that were over fifty. And that makes sense because the people over fifty were already in relationships. But it's interesting how we do envy less as we age, either by getting somewhere or getting something. Or either by maturing, and I want to talk about that active maturing rather than just naturally envying less. I think the natural process of aging and envy and jealousy decreasing is is great. It's something we can all look forward to. But I think while we're in this space of managing it and figuring it out, it's so important that we

• 11:14Jay Shetty?

  learn to purify and neutralize these feelings because what envy and jealousy do is that they end up blocking our growth. And they end up blocking us from celebrating other people's growth. Right? They're not useful emotions in that when they are negative in our lives. It actually stops us from focusing on our growth and our success and the path we want to take. And it stops us from celebrating, appreciating and admiring others. One of the studies I looked at from American psychologist Danielle J. Del Pryory and Sarah Hill and David M. Bass, and this was from a great article by Reiner Zittelman.

• 11:56Jay Shetty?

  And in that article, it breaks down the common things that women and men envy. And that's what the psychologist wanted to focus on. So women admitted that they found these things they envied more. So they envied physical attractiveness. They envied popularity. They envied social ease. They envied family relationships. And they envied better clothing. Those were generally the things that women envied. And the study was focused on looking at the difference in what genders envied. And men more frequently admitted that they envied other people's romantic success,

• 12:37Jay Shetty?

  greater access to financial resources, ownership of status item, a particular thing, greater academic success and superior athletic talent. So it's really interesting to see how even as men and women, we envy and are jealous of different things. And that's why sometimes if you're talking to your friend, your partner about it, you may find that you find different things triggering, but the point is we all find something triggering. I think that's what I always like to recognize is that we may all have different challenges, but we all have the challenge in and of itself. You're not alone. You don't need to feel bad or guilty or beat yourself up about having this trait.

• 13:21Jay Shetty?

  It is a human trait, a human experience to have this trait. And the majority of us are experiencing it somewhere or the other. And the fact that you're here today because you want to break through it and you want to overcome it, I think, is what we need to take confidence in. And I'm always trying to shift your mindset away from self judgment to breakthrough, because guilt blocks growth. Judgment stops you from taking action. Now, it's really interesting because a lot of researchers have looked at the difference between jealousy and envy. And there's lots of different versions of this.

• 14:03Jay Shetty?

  And I'll only share what I learned during my monk time, which I found to be very useful. And it was this idea that there is a difference between jealousy and envy. And in the monk teachings, it was shared with us that jealousy is passive and envy is active. And what I mean by that is jealousy is where you're like, I wish I had that. Envy is like, they don't deserve that. Right? There's that slight difference. And it's important for us to know which one we're struggling with, because one is a more extreme version of the other. Envy is a more extreme version of jealousy.

• 14:44Jay Shetty?

  The idea that not only do you want it for yourself, you don't think the other person deserves it. That can be a really harmful thought and harmful experience to yourself and others, because it can push you away from the people you deeply love. It can push you away from the people that you deeply value, the people that mean so much to you, the people that you believe in, right? It's so frustrating having this feeling when you're like, I love this person, I want them to win, but I just feel a little bit jealous about them, right? So what I thought I'd do in order to direct and guide and give structure to our conversation today is I wanted to talk about the different types of how jealousy shows up in our lives.

• 15:27Jay Shetty?

  Because I think it's really important to understand The different symptoms of how it shows up so we can truly be vigilant. There are three steps to making any change in your life. First is awareness, the second is addressing it, and the third is amending it. We first become aware, then we address, and then we amend. And so first, we have to become aware of where are all the ways and all the places in how my jealousy shows up. Now, the fact that you're here shows to me that you're already self-aware. It's already something that you know is blocking you from achieving your greatest potential. And that's what I've found about jealousy and envy is that they suck out the energy

• 16:10Jay Shetty?

  from your life and your focus so much because your energy is all pointing outward instead of pointing inward and forward. Right? That's a choice we get to make in our life. Is our energy pointing outward because we're looking outward at what everyone else is doing? Or are we focused on inward and moving forward ourselves? So let's start with awareness. There are different types of jealousy. And all I want you to do is make a mental note of whether there's a tick next to this or a cross next to it. Some of you may have a lot of ticks, some of you may have a lot of crosses. But I want you to refine your awareness, your radar, of how well you are at being aware of this.

• 16:52Jay Shetty?

  And again, we're going to do this in a safe space, a non-judgmental environment, because remember, we're all struggling with this. We all have a difficulty with this. We all have a challenge with this. And as I tell you these stories and examples, some of which my team shared with me in confidence, and they knew that I was going to share it on the podcast without naming names and giving away people. I think it's really, really important that you get a sense of which ones you struggle. This episode is brought to you by Indeed. I know how important every hire is for a business. If you need to make the right hire, this is a job for sponsored jobs. Indeed sponsored jobs helps find quality candidates when you need them most. You can reach who you need based on whatever criteria you're looking for,

• 17:35Jay Shetty?

  like skills, certifications, or location. In fact, people are finding quality hires on Indeed. Right now, in the minute I've been talking to you, companies like yours made twenty seven hires on Indeed, according to Indeed data worldwide. Spend less time searching and more time actually interviewing candidates who check all your boxes. Listeners of this show will get a seventy five dollar sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast. That's indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? This is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs. This episode is brought to you by Whole Foods Market. If you're talking about quality food, you can't forget Whole Foods Market,

• 18:17Jay Shetty?

  who've been holding themselves to the highest standards since they opened in nineteen eighty. That means you'll see thousands of organic products across their stores from the produce department to the aisles. It also means you'll never see certain ingredients. They've banned artificial sweeteners and colors, high fructose corn syrup and more, so you can shop with peace of mind. Shop Whole Foods Market in store or online. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. We talk a lot about intentional decision making, and that extends to the practical stuff too, like making sure your coverage actually works for your life. State Farm is there to meet you where you are, and they know how sweet it is to feel good about your decisions.

• 19:00Jay Shetty?

  Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can choose to bundle and save with a personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings and eligibility vary by state. So, one of the first types of jealousy is when you're going through a challenge and other people are not going through that challenge. So you're going through something, but no one in your life is going through that, and you're jealous because their life is easier. You're jealous because their life is more seamless or appears more seamless. You're jealous because you feel like, I wish my life was that easy.

• 19:45Jay Shetty?

  I wish my life was free of this stress that I'm having to go through. How many of you have ever felt that? Put your hand up right now. Take a screenshot of this moment as I walk through this list. This is a great conversation starter between your friends as well. I know I've definitely felt this before. I'm going through something. I wish I didn't have to go through it. And I can see other people are not going through it. And I feel jealous of them. So if you're experiencing this type of jealousy, where you're going through a challenge that others are not, and you're wishing you had their life, there's a really key technique to improve this mindset. And this technique is zoom out. The technique is called zoom out.

• 20:28Jay Shetty?

  You want to zoom out to look at the bigger picture, not the specific thing. For example, if you're looking at someone else's life and you're going, "I'm going through this stress, that person is not, I wish it was like that for me", you want to zoom out. Let me paint a picture for you. Let's say you and your friend are both moving home or you're moving country. So let's say in that scenario that your stuff gets lost and their stuff doesn't. So their stuff arrives on time, your stuff gets lost. You're now stressed out because you're dealing with talking to the moving company, you're talking to the airline, you're talking to insurance,

• 21:13Jay Shetty?

  and you're looking at their life and going, "Well, they've moved in, they're comfortable, they're like watching Netflix with their partner and like they're thinking about furniture and all this kind of stuff, and your stuff's all lost." And you're jealous of them because you're like, "I wish that happened to me. Why didn't it happen to me?" In those situations, we have to zoom out and look at the bigger picture. There are so many moments in our life where our life will be easier than others. And there are so many moments in other people's lives where their lives will be easier than others. And when you judge your life in one moment as being better or worse than someone else's, you could lose all the time if you focus just on that specific thing.

• 21:56Jay Shetty?

  Because just on that specific thing, your stuff is lost. Now, I'm not saying you're not allowed to feel stressed. I'm not saying you're not allowed to feel upset. I'm just saying that when it comes to that other person who has nothing to do with it, absolutely nothing to do with your situation, it's important to recognize that maybe this part went seamless for them, but hey, maybe them getting that apartment was really tough. Maybe they waited months and months and months to find that apartment. Or maybe right now, they just lost their job. Or maybe right now, they're going through a personal thing. Someone in their family's going through something. I think it's so interesting and easy when we focus on one area. We're like, I'm behind, my life's messed up, they're ahead, they're doing great.

• 22:39Jay Shetty?

  But when you zoom out, it changes the complete perspective of what's going on. And this is, one of the analogies I like to draw is between a movie. If you walk in halfway to a movie, you may think a character is having the most incredible time. Imagine you walked in halfway to Wolf of Wall Street, and you see him driving the fast car. You see Leonardo DiCaprio. Jonah Hill comes up to him and goes, "How much money did you make this year?" He's like, "I made forty-nine million, just shy of a million a week." They have that interaction. Jonah Hill's like, "I'll quit everything, I'll work for you." You see him on his yacht.

• 23:23Jay Shetty?

  When you walk in at that moment, everything seems great. And you think, "Wow, I'm jealous of him." But then if you really look at what happened before, and then you look at what happened afterwards, when you zoom out, you get a full perspective of someone's actual story and journey. And so I want you to zoom out. When you're jealous or envious of something specific about someone, know that... When you zoom out, we all share in our trials and challenges. We all have different things going wrong in our life. And Robin Roberts once said that if we were all to throw our problems into a pile, we'd grab ours right back. Because when we look at the perspective of the challenges others are going through,

• 24:08Jay Shetty?

  even if ours is really tough, there's a side where we're like, okay, I can deal with this. So I want you to zoom out. Now, the next type of jealousy is when we want something that others have. I want that kind of a guy. I want that kind of a job. I want that kind of a house. I want that kind of an apartment. I want that kind of vacation, right? It's constant. We want what other people have. We see what other people have and we go, that's exactly what I wanted. Why don't I have it? And maybe if it tips into envy, we go, they don't deserve it either. They're a bad person, right? Sometimes we feel that way. And it's really interesting because, again, that's normal. It's normal, it's human nature to look at what someone has and think, I want it,

• 24:53Jay Shetty?

  especially if it looks attractive. And especially if we've been conditioned for certain things to look attractive. And that's the first thing I want you to look at. Is it something that you genuinely find attractive because you care? Or do you find it attractive because someone else cares? Have your parents always told you, people who buy a house are set up for life? So now, whenever you see someone who's bought a house, you think, oh my God, people who buy a house are set up for life and that voice is in your head. But you don't actually believe that. You're really happy in your rented apartment, right? Where is that conditioning coming from? Have you had the conditioning from your friends that you grew up with that says, oh, if you're with this type of a guy or this type of a girl,

• 25:37Jay Shetty?

  then that's the person who's got it all together? Now you're carrying that voice in your head. So when you see that you want something that someone else has, I want you to ask yourself, is it truly something you want? It's that self-awareness piece. Is this something that I really want to pursue and chase? Or is it something that I'm just attracted to? Because someone's told me to be attracted to it somewhere. It's not really that important to me, but it's become important to me because of how I've been habituated and conditioned to believe. So in that moment, ask yourself, is this something I want? Is this something I want to pursue? If the answer is yes, this is something that's important to you.

• 26:22Jay Shetty?

  It's not important to you because it was important to your mom or dad. It's not important to you because it was important to your friend at school. It's not important to you because someone took a dig at you or you saw something. If it's truly important to you, ask yourself how your jealousy can become admiration and attraction. And you go, let me study that person. How can I do what they did to get there? How can I study and learn from them? We turn our judgment and our criticism into curiosity. And then we ask ourselves, do I want to do that after we study it? So the first question is, is that what I want? Or is that what society has made me want? If it's what I want, let me study what they've done

• 27:07Jay Shetty?

  and learn about what they've done, understand what they've done, and then ask myself if I'm ready to do that. This is how you transform through those three questions. You transform your jealousy into admiration, appreciation, and attraction. Right? It's easy for someone to see Cristiano Ronaldo, world famous soccer player, and think, I want that body, I want to look like that. And then you study how hard he works to look like that. And then you go, no, I'm good, I don't want to look like that, right? You can appreciate and admire and respect it without having to then think, I want it because I don't want to do the work. When you've done the added work of studying, of learning, of being curious,

• 27:49Jay Shetty?

  it's so important to transform our jealousy into admiration and attraction. Another technique for when you want something that others have is you've got to see jealousy as a sign. Right, you've got to see jealousy as a sign. If you study that person, if you figure out it's something that you really want, you can focus on building that. If you're fixated on what everyone else is doing, you'll never have time to invest on yourself. When you sit down right now and write down a list of items, if you've clarified that, yes, this isn't something influenced by my parents, yes, it's something I want, yes, I've studied their lives. Okay, what are my action items? How am I going to do that? What do I need to do in order to get there? Who do I need to call? Who do I need to know?

• 28:34Jay Shetty?

  What do I need to learn? And those action items stop you from having your emotional jealousy of that person and shift you into giving your focus to actually building that for yourself. You can either sit here and watch how everyone else is decorating their homes online, or you can start decorating yours right now. Right? You can either sit on social media and look at how everyone else is planning their holiday party, or you can plan your holiday party. Right? Whatever it may be for you, we can either sit here and fixate on everyone else, or we can invest in ourselves. And when we shift that energy to invest in ourselves, incredible things can happen. So I want you to sit down right now and write down those action items that you've been putting off.

• 29:19Jay Shetty?

  Studies show that 59% of people felt sad after seeing photos from a party they didn't attend posted on social media. And 45% were unhappy after seeing photos from a friend's happy holiday outing. Plan your own party. Plan your own game night this week. Create what you feel left out of. Create what you haven't built. Another strategy that really helps with this particular type of jealousy is something that one of my team members said beautifully. Her name's Helena, she's our podcast lead here at On Purpose. And she said to me, she heard something where someone said, "We're only jealous of people we know less about, and we're not jealous of people we know more about."

• 30:04Jay Shetty?

  And that's really interesting, isn't it? We want what others have because we don't really know too much about how they got there, how they got that, what work it took, what sacrifices, what cost it came at. And that's one of the bigger challenges with social media. We know very little about people on social media and therefore it's an easy way to feel jealous. Josh Noble, who wrote an article quoting Kupersky Labs, he found that 57% of people said that after going on social media, they've felt that someone they follow has a better life than they do. That is a big statement to believe that someone has a better life than you do. But when you know very little about someone, it's very easy to think that.

• 30:48Jay Shetty?

  Right? If you're only seeing 5% of someone's life, it's easy to think that that 5% is their entire 100% of life. But when you know 90% of someone's life, when you're closer to someone, you actually have a healthier sense of the balance of the different emotions they experience. So the key technique for this type of jealousy is to find out more about people you know less about and to transform jealousy into admiration and attraction. Now, another type of jealousy, or another way that it shows up, is being happy that others are down. Right? When someone shares some bad news with you, you kind of get a sense of satisfaction from it

• 31:31Jay Shetty?

  or you get a sense of appreciation like, oh, thank God it's not just me. And it's like this awkward feeling of, yes, I don't feel alone, but I'm kind of happy that they're sad too. Or you make someone else's positives a negative. So someone tells you, hey, I just got this new job. And you're like, yeah, but you don't really love the new boss, right? Or they're like, oh, I got promoted at my work. And they're like, yeah, but you don't really like the people you work with, right? So we play down other people's success or we turn their positives into negatives. Or at the very least, we're happy when that person's struggling or we get a sense of, just a sense of positive boost when someone else is struggling. And that's a really, really...

• 32:14Jay Shetty?

  Tough feeling to experience, even as ourselves. One thing that I want you to learn to do in this is learn to empathize with other people's pain and learn to celebrate other people's success. If you learn to celebrate others' people's success, here's what happens. People will celebrate your success when it happens. Even if they don't, when you celebrate someone's success, you are partaking in that success. It becomes part of your success story. You get to engage with that energy and the energy you need to get out the state you're in right now is the celebration energy. When you feel positive for other people's wins,

• 32:57Jay Shetty?

  you are now creating a positive energy in your life for your win. You feeling positive for their win doesn't take away any energy from yours, it actually fuels you more. But you feeling negative towards someone, whether they win or lose, creates more negativity within yourself towards your pursuit. See, you are harnessing an energy. Wayne Dyer would say, "If I squash an orange, the only thing that will come out is orange juice." Well, if you're squeezed and all you have is negativity, that's what's gonna come out. So if you're trying to create something beautiful, but you're holding on to this negative energy, we have to understand, we have to talk ourselves out of it

• 33:41Jay Shetty?

  because that negative energy perpetuates. And ultimately, what all of this is, is a transformation of thoughts. You're not a jealous person, you're not an envious person, you're a person with a jealous thought. This episode is brought to you by Wayfair. Home should be a place that feels like a sanctuary, a space that truly reflects who you are. But it can be challenging to balance style, budget, and endless options. I was looking to create a dedicated, calm space for my morning meditation and reading, but I was struggling to find pieces that felt grounding but could also stand up to daily use. I went on Wayfair and found a beautiful, solid wood accent chair and a bookshelf. Now that corner is my favorite place to anchor my day.

• 34:24Jay Shetty?

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• 35:01Jay Shetty?

  You have been trained to have a jealous thought. Human nature exists in jealous thoughts and whenever we have that jealous thought, we want to say to ourselves, "This thought is not me. This thought is not useful. This thought is not helpful. Let me celebrate other people's wins. Let me partake in their success and let it be mine. Let me create positivity for my pursuit by being positive for other people's pursuits." I want you to save this moment of the podcast and I want you to listen to that again and again and again. I want you to write it out in your own words and repeat it again and again and again.

• 35:44Jay Shetty?

  And I promise you, what will happen is every time you have a jealous thought, it will be replaced by the thought that we just created together. And this is something I did during my monk time. I wrote scripts and scripts and scripts of the dialogue I wanted to have instead of letting jealousy run rampant in my mind. See, we have scripts in our mind that have been developed over our whole childhood and adulthood and we've never edited those scripts. We've never rewritten them. We've never looked at them and reviewed them and thrown them in the trash because they're not useful, they're not helpful, they didn't get us anywhere. This is that moment where we burn those scripts, where we rewrite them, where we review them,

• 36:24Jay Shetty?

  we edit them, we completely, you know, start from a blank slate and build again because those scripts, so your script becomes, "Celebrating others makes me more positive."

• 36:38Jay Shetty?

  To pursue my goals. Appreciating and admiring others helps me study their success and replicate it for myself. Appreciating someone else's win doesn't take away my energy. It gives me energy. And putting down or feeling jealous towards someone's success actually takes energy away from mine. In my first book, Think Like a Monk, I came up with this idea of the theater of happiness. And how there are an unlimited number of seats in the theater of happiness. And we think

• 37:20Jay Shetty?

  that if someone else is in the theater of happiness, that we lose our seat. We think that there's a finite number of seats in the theater of happiness. But actually, it's an infinite theater. The theater of happiness is an infinite theater, the type of theater that we don't know about. Because we think if we don't have VIP tickets, then we haven't got our seats. Everything in the world is finite. There is a finite number of VIP tickets. There's a finite number of coach tickets. There's a finite number of economy tickets. There's a finite number of tickets sold. But the theater of happiness is the infinite theater. And the infinite theater is a seat where every single person's name in the world is on a seat. There's not two people's names on it.

• 38:05Jay Shetty?

  There's not two numbers where you're stuck at the theater where you're both like, wait a minute, that's my seat. Where's your seat? Oh, you tried to steal my seat. It doesn't, it doesn't work like that. The next type of jealousy is jealous of being left out. Jealous of being left out. And I talked about that earlier where we're sad when people don't invite us to their party. Fifty-four percent of people felt upset when no one liked or commented on a photo they posted. We feel rejected and left out. And forty-two percent were jealous when they saw a friend had more likes or comments than they did on a status update. Imagine you just announced you got engaged and your engagement

• 38:46Jay Shetty?

  post has less than someone else's, right? It's and the jealousy is you feel left out, you feel like your friends don't love you as much. You feel like your friends don't care about you as much. One of my team members gave this amazing example. She said she went through in her teens. In her teens, two of her friends were jealous of each other and they would tell her. And she was jealous that they weren't jealous of her, right? Like, it's incredible, the tricks our mind plays on us. Like, your two friends are saying, "I'm jealous of that friend." And then she's like, "I'm jealous of that friend." And you're there going, "I'm jealous that neither of you are jealous of me," right? This feeling of being left out, this feeling of being rejected, the feeling of being the last to

• 39:28Jay Shetty?

  be picked for sports, whatever it may have been, that feeling, that we're jealous, that we're not the cool one, we're not the one who's first picked, we're not the one who's most loved. And it shows up in so many ways. And really, this jealousy shows us an inner fear we have, a fear of being replaced, a fear of being rejected, a fear of being left behind, a fear of being judged. The question we have to ask ourselves is, we have to look inward and say, where is that fear coming from? Let me address that fear. Am I fearful because I was left out when I was younger? Okay, well, am I also trying to be part of

• 40:10Jay Shetty?

  groups that I don't want to be a part of? Like, I love that movie Mean Girls, right? And it shows the perfect example of Lindsay Lohan's character, who's trying to be a part of a group that she doesn't even agree with. How many of us are trying to be welcomed or fit into a crew of people that we don't really want to be a part of? We just want to be seen as cool. We want to be seen as respected. How many of our inner fears are actually making us focus on the wrong thing to be jealous about? What if we did find a group and a community that is actually aligned with our values? Maybe it would naturally work. Maybe we wouldn't feel replaced and rejected because we're not trying to be part of a group

• 40:54Jay Shetty?

  where we don't actually belong. Are we trying to force ourselves into a group or community or squad? That isn't our home. And it's so important that we also build a unique relationship with people. So often, we try to be like someone who's close to someone we like. We try to be like their closest friend. We try to be like all their friends. We change who we are into who we think they want us to be. What does that make us? It makes us a replaceable friend because we're now like every one of their friends. But if you have a unique relationship with someone, if you add something unique to someone's

• 41:33Jay Shetty?

  life, I find that in my world, I see myself as everyone's spiritual friend. I want to be their friend to help them connect with their deepest voice, their deepest essence. That's who I am to you. I want to be a friend that reminds you of your greatest self, your deepest potential, and that's who I am in my life to my friends. I don't need to be the friend who's the fun drunk. I don't need to be the friend who's the coolest kid. I don't need to be the friend who always is doing the best stuff or has the best social life. If I tried to do all those things, I'd fail at being me. And I could be replaced because other people can do that. What is it that only you can do? I promise you, there's something.

• 42:17Jay Shetty?

  What is it that makes your relationship with someone special? What if there was no hierarchy, but just diversity? What if there was no league table, but just love? Why is it always about number one, number two, and like my best friend, my BFF, my sec-, you know, my worst, whatever? Why is it always like that? Why can't it just be that we're being who we are for someone? I really hope that this episode today guides you in your journey with jealousy. What I want you to take away is that it's a normal feeling. It's a hard one to overcome, but it is possible. And if you apply some of these techniques that I mentioned today,

• 43:01Jay Shetty?

  I promise you that you'll start to see a benefit in your life. I want to thank you so much for listening. And I want to leave you with the wise words from one of my team members called Annie. She said, "We're jealous of the people we want to be and not people who we don't want to be." As we zoom out, widen our perspective, get to know more about the people we know less about, it becomes an incredible method to overcome and break through jealousy and start using it as a sign and using it to be curious and study and rewire the thoughts in our minds. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you share this episode with someone who needs it.

• 43:43Jay Shetty?

  Listen to it with your friends and maybe even jump into a conversation about it. I appreciate you so much. Leave a review. Tag me on Instagram with your biggest takeaways. If you haven't heard the Tom Holland episode yet, go and listen to it. It is absolutely epic. I'm so grateful for all the love that we received for that one. And thank you so much for being a listener of On Purpose. I appreciate you deeply. Lots of love.

• 44:16Jay Shetty?

  Albert Einstein once said, "There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." You might be able to guess where I stand. The next seven minutes are about leaning into a state of wonder. I'm Jay Shetty. Welcome to the Daily Jay. Let's start off as usual with a few centering breaths. Inhaling and exhaling.

• 44:54Jay Shetty?

  Expanding the chest.

• 44:58Jay Shetty?

  And relaxing.

• 45:02Jay Shetty?

  Focusing on this moment.

• 45:07Jay Shetty?

  And arriving in the present.

• 45:13Jay Shetty?

  So in the mindfulness world, there's this well-known Buddhist instructor named Wes Nisker, or Scoop, as he's sometimes called. Now Scoop isn't your stereotypical meditation teacher. He's also a comedian, performer, author, and radio commentator, and he's constantly exploring these massive existential questions. Like, who are we? Why are we here? And if we're all made out of atoms, which are 99.999% empty space, then what's holding your clothes on? He specifically has this one exercise that I love, and really, it's a whole approach to life. It's called "Be Here, Wow."

• 45:57Jay Shetty?

  All you have to do is reflect on the simple, yet incredible, facts of life, and allow yourself to be amazed. For example, without you consciously doing anything, your heart flexes billions of times over the course of your life, pumping blood through your body, keeping you alive. And if you laid out all your arteries and veins and such, connecting them end to end, they would stretch all the way around the Earth. Isn't that absolutely crazy to think about? Scoop calls "Be Here, Wow" a workout for your aural muscle. Basically, you make your own jaw drop. In his words,

• 46:40Jay Shetty?

  "One of our finest capacities as human beings is to wander at ourselves and the world, no matter what is going on." He's so right. Aural is one of our great powers. When we mindfully direct our attention and curiosity, we can positively influence our mood, cultivate gratitude, and maybe push pause on some of our striving and searching. Aural allows us to recognize that we are part of something bigger, something frankly unbelievable. And when we do so, we become more generous toward ourselves and others. As part of his "Be Here, Wow" practice, Scoop also likes to telescope out, literally,

• 47:25Jay Shetty?

  and marvel at the vastness of the cosmos. I mean, consider all the insanely improbable, mind-boggling events that had to happen for you to exist. The Earth forming billions of years ago. Evolution, opposable thumbs, technology. Think about the astronomical circumstances that occurred in order to get us here. With that perspective, I'm extra happy to be here with you today. And the truth is, there's so much delight and awe to be found in our day-to-day existence. If we just stop and look around. You might see a hummingbird and watch as it flies backward.

• 48:09Jay Shetty?

  Or notice the tree outside your window. How old is it? What has it witnessed? I like to watch videos about space exploration. I'm blown away by all the things that had to happen for people to land on the moon. Like astronomer Carl Sagan said, "The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars." We are made of star stuff. It's astonishing. And like Be Here Wow teaches, if we consciously embrace that astonishment,

• 48:50Jay Shetty?

  we can transform each day, each minute, each nanosecond of our wondrous lives. With that in mind, let's work on building our awe muscles as we turn to our meditation. First, get comfortable wherever you are. Settling your body and settling your mind.

• 49:16Jay Shetty?

  Letting go of any urge to analyze or judge,

• 49:22Jay Shetty?

  to worry or plan, and instead, opening yourself up to the beauty of the world.

• 49:35Jay Shetty?

  Now call to mind any simple, yet spectacular fact of life. And seriously, it can be anything you choose.

• 49:48Jay Shetty?

  Maybe that a snail can sleep for up to three years, don't be jealous. Or that on average, kids ask forty thousand questions between the ages of two and five.

• 50:04Jay Shetty?

  Or that you're the only you that ever was and ever will be.

• 50:13Jay Shetty?

  It could even be the mere fact that right now, your breath is sustaining and nourishing you, without you even thinking about it.

• 50:27Jay Shetty?

  Whatever you choose to reflect on, see if you can lean into a feeling of wonderment

• 50:36Jay Shetty?

  and truly be inspired by awe.

• 50:47Jay Shetty?

  And now let's open this up. As you go about your day-to-day life, how often do you experience a sense of wonder?

• 51:01Jay Shetty?

  How often do you look for it?

• 51:07Jay Shetty?

  What could you do to incorporate the practice of "be here wow" into your daily routine?

• 51:18Jay Shetty?

  If this message inspired you, remember that you can always bookmark this session so you can return here when you need a boost. And make sure to share it with someone else who might need it. I can't wait to see you again tomorrow. Have a wondrous day.

• 51:38Speaker 01

  Now, more than ever, we need someone on our side. But Rob Whitman? Whitman's votes drove up costs, cut Medicaid, and risked 350,000 Virginians' health care to pay for tax breaks for himself and his donors. He's not on our side. Shannon Taylor will fight corruption, cut taxes, and bring down costs. This November, vote for Shannon Taylor. She's for us. Paid for by HMP, the HouseMajorityPac.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.