ENVY
There’s a lot of hype around sisterhood, goddess power and the sacred feminine. There’s a big movement called Women Supporting Women and there are a lot of strong women out there yearning to co-create, support each other and collaborate. I am one of those women and I would go as far as to say that it’s even in my blood, my lineage and my karma. My grandmother was amongst the first women in Finland to get a driver’s license and a dedicated yogini (before it was cool & trendy) and my mom, whom I’m very proud of by the way, has always been an avid feminist and worked to support women. She served as the president of the Finnish Women Entrepreneurs for several years until she finally retired this year. Cheers to you mama ❤️ I recognize your hard work.
I believe that there’s power in numbers and union and supporting each other is absolutely beautiful and we should definitely co-create, collaborate and work together. Unfortunately, however, there is something we fail to talk about openly, the big underbelly of sisterhood called envy. It’s understandable, I mean who would want to bring up the nasty, big ole’ envy with its ugliness, and it surely isn’t something to use when marketing. But envy is real and as much as women would love to have the support of each other, unfortunately they (we) are the first ones judge, criticize, belittle and smack talk each other.
I’m going to use myself as an example. When I first started my blog a few years ago I decided I needed to write at least twice a week and post on specific days. Consistency was key and every marketing savvy person would advise new bloggers to do this as it was considered to be the best method for SEO optimizing and gaining more readers. This was in 2016. The blog scene was already pretty established and I was kinda late to even be jumping on the bandwagon. I decided to give it a go anyways as I thought it’d be cool side project and something that would help me build my biz in Mex. Well, It didn’t really go as planned and life happened, I lost interest, dropped the project and stopped writing altogether. I felt a lot of insecurity in my writing and felt as if what I had to say wasn’t valuable, interesting or good enough. I was reading other blogs and felt that my posts where silly, unimportant or just shitty compared to the other stuff out there.
Fast forward three years, a lot of craziness and rapid growth and I suddenly find myself typing again. Unexpected, unplanned and unintentional. But this time it’s not forced, this time it flows, it feels good and I feel like I can stand behind everything I am writing without feeling insecure, without worrying about what other people think. Because I know better. Because I know myself. Because I’ve grown. But perhaps most importantly because I’m not comparing my writing to anyone else’s. It feels like I am finally using my own voice. It feels good to write and it feels good to share my opinions, thoughts and learnings. And if I can touch someone with my writing, or make someone think, even better.
We are all unique and have something different to offer.
My aim is to be real, genuine and write about the hard stuff too. Like envy. Not just the picture perfect life that social media can portray (and I am very aware of that my own insta feed displays this, hence the blog with more depth), but more about lessons, growth, life, whatever comes to my mind really. There’s no guidelines or restrictions. It also feels very therapeutic and more free as I have no set rules on how often to post, I simply do it whenever I get a splurge of inspiration, like right now at this very moment. And right now I feel like talking about envy. Everyone’s felt it, everyone knows what it is, but nobody really talks about it. So let’s.
So what is envy? Well, it’s thinking that what someone else has or is, is somehow better than what you are or have or are doing. The root to envy is comparison. It’s counting someone else’s blessings instead of yours. It’s feeling less than someone else. It’s the feeling of lacking. It’s not being happy with who you are or with what you have to offer. Heavy stuff huh.
So there are two very likely outcomes of feeling envy, either you’ll start feeling resentment towards the person or then other nasty side effect: you’ll start talking shit. But does either method make it go away? Hardly. So how do you make it go away? Perhaps the most important thing is: to stop comparing yourself to others. The saying “comparison is the thief of joy” truly is the truth. Comparison will not take you anywhere and you are only comparing yourself to an perceived image, not the actual truth. “Don’t criticize, emphasize” is a good one, because you have no idea of knowing what the person you’re envious of is dealing with, what they’ve been through or about their struggles or issues. So recognize their mundane humanness and simply stop.
Okay, so if there’s no way that you can stop comparing yourself with someone else or emphasize with them, there’s one more way: start working towards your dreams. Use the feeling of envy as fuel towards your own goals and start making shit happen. And this, ladies and gentlemen is empowering AF.
Lastly I would like to say that if you notice that you’re feeling envy towards a friend instead of a random Joe, try be open and honest about it and talk it out as difficult and even embarrassing it might feel. It takes a lot of courage, but the truth is energy doesn’t lie, and most likely your friend already felt it. Communication is key, to absolutely everything, even in dealing with envy amongst friends. Because if not, you’ll start wishing them to not be so successful or good or whatever it is you think they are, and eventually your friend will have to turn to people that wish them the best.
Life is hard, support each other and recognize your uniqueness. We all have something to offer and we are all just trying to figure it out.
Thank you for taking the time to read my typing, it’s nice to know someone out there is reading this.
Con amor,
Evita