16 Nov, 2015

How to keep jealousy from ruining your life

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In my life I tried to be friends with all sorts of people, from all nationalities, colour, type, different characters, professions, way of thinking. After meeting so many people, I realised that there is a particular kind I really can not be friends with- the jealous type.

Having a 6 years older sister who is one of the highest achievers I ever met taught me a lot in life. More than anything it thought me that you should never compare yourself or be jealous of other people’s success, specially when you love that person so deeply much- you realise their success should be dear to you. As a child I would often compare my grades to my sister’s and it drove me to be better to get better grades that I normally would and to try do more. It also gave me a horrible, bitter feeling when I wouldn’t make it. I will never forget the day it all changed, it was in my 6th grade when I visited my sister in UK who was already at university.

I always looked up to her so much and thought how much better she is than me- in every possible way. Best student of the generation, best in extra curricular activities, best in anything you can think of. And me, I was just good, always an excellent student but nothing extra ordinary. On that occasion that I visited her in UK, she was making a poster- presentation of her paper that she was writing for months. She designed it several times, and when it finally came out in print, the size wasn’t perfect. It was slightly longer than she wanted it to be, but she was confused how to perfectly cut it, without losing the good composition, without making it crooked or without making a mistake. She stood over it for some time, and then I realised I could help. Without making the story so long – I made a little system, measured sides carefully, used a pad and a sharp scalpel and cut it for my sister. I was 12 and this was the first time that I was actually useful to her, and not the other way around.

Why am I telling you this? Thats when I realised that actually two of us aren’t competition. We are good for different things. None of us are competition, because we are so different. I am creative, I think out of the box and she – she has the best logic I could ever come across but isn’t always creative. We can not compete, because my essays in Serbian or art pieces were better than hers, and her maths or biology knowledge was just something I could never have. Even now being colleagues, I feel that there are parts of pharmacy that I am better at (even thought they are- trust me- very minimal).

Having an older sister helped me learn so much and become a secure, not envious person. I never felt bitter when other people got a better grade than me, I never felt jealous when someone else got a promotion instead of me, not because I am so good or anything like that, but because I couldn’t really handle the feeling of jealousy. I didnt like this bitter horrible feeling inside, so I decided to swap it for happiness. I knew that if I am happy for someone else’s success I will feel better and eventually even get success myself. Post graduating from Pharmacy degree at University of Brighton I had a lot of people try to diminish my success, saying things like “Its easy to get a degree in England”, or “That degree doesn’t even count”, to the extent where people would comment how I made it all up and that I actually only have a high school diploma. Why? Why would someone think of something so ridiculous? One word-jealousy. It made them feel better to tell these stories to themselves. Green eyed monster that is eating them inside, but leaving me in the same position as before. So who wins?

Nowadays I am surrounded by best friends who are exceptional! My friend Noor won several blogging awards this year, my friend Sandra, I mean have you seen how gorgeous and stylish she is? There is also my friend Victoria, one who is taking the blogger world by the storm and climbing to the very top of it so swiftly. If I was a jealous person it would be very difficult to be friends with these people. If they were too, I wouldn’t be able to tell them all the amazing things that happened to me this year. Its sad that I felt the ineed to write about this topic, but I feel that every single one of us had that one person in your life who just COULDNT be happy for the achievements we have. For the new amazing bag we got, or that A+ you worked so hard for. Its very toxic and difficult surrounding yourself with people who only enjoy hearing about bad stuff, but can’t praise you for being better than before.

The reason why I wrote this post isn’t because I feel like I want to preach, but because I had a hard time learning that having jealous friends is really horrible, and I realised that long ago, back in high school. I now almost every day hear stories of girls who find their friends are putting them down or try to minimise their success by saying something bad about it. To truly be happy you need to be happy for other people, to never try to diminish their success and thats when you will have success in your life too. Simple as that. World is an incredible place, but only when you get rid of the green monster living inside of you.

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Za ovih 26 godina pokusala sam da budem prijatelj raznim ljudima, razlicitim rasama, nacionalnostima, religijama, profesijama, ljudima sa razlicitim nacinom razmisljanja. Nakon sto sam upoznala mnogo ljudi shvatila sam da postoji jedna vrsta sa kojom ne mogu da budem prijatej- to su ljubomorni ljudi.

Kada imate sestru koja je 6 godina starija i koja iza sebe ima ogromna postignuca naucite mnogo toga u zivotu. Vise od icega ja sam naucila da se ne uporedjujem sa njom, da ne budem ljubomorna na uspesnije od sebe. Kada nekog volite toliko mnogo onda shvatite vaznost radovanja tudjem uspehu. Kao dete stalno sam poredile ocene sa ocenama moje sestre. Ovo me je teralo da budem jos bolja, da ucim vise i da se trudim da budem kao ona. Takodje sam se cesto jako lose osecala ako ovo ne bih postigla. Osecala sam neku gorcinu i nezadovoljstvo sama sobom. Ovaj osecaj mucio me danima i nisam mogla savladati. Nikada necu zaboraviti, sve se promenilo kada sam posetila sestru na Uskrsnjem raspustu u 6. osnovne.

Uvek sam se ugledala na nju i posmatrala koliko je bolja od mene – u svemu. Najbolji ucenik generacije, najbolja u svim drugim, van skolskim aktivnostima, odgovorna i pametna. A ja, ja sam bila ok, uvek odlican djak, ali nista nadprosecno. Tom prilikom u 6.osnovne posetila sam je u Engleskoj, bila je na fakultetu i tada se spremala da odrzi prezentaciju jednog istrazivanja. Imala je poster koji je morala predati, a njega je dizajnirala danima, nekoliko razlicitih verzija i konacno ona prava kojom je bila zadovoljna. Nazalost poster nije stigao kuci onako kako je trebao doci, bio je pogresno odstampan, tako da tekst nije bio u sredini. Moja sestra je stajala nad posterom i gledala ga razmisljajuci kako da ga isece bez da poremeti ostale aspekte dizajna. Bojala se da ga isece, jer nije htela da bude krivo iseceno, ili pogresno izmereno. Bez duzenja ove price, priskocila sam joj u pomoc, napravila mali sistem, podmetac, postavila paralelne lenjire, uzela ostar skalpel i isekla ga bas onako kako je moja sestra htela. Sa 12 godina ovo je bio prvi put da sam se osecala kao da sam ja pomogla njoj,a ne uvek obratno.

Zasto vam ovo govorim? Tada sam shvatila da nas dve nismo konkurencija. Mi smo jednostavno dobre u razlicitim stvarima. Niko od nas ne moze da se poredi, pa ni rodjene sestre, jer smo svi dobri u necemu, ali na drugaciji nacin. Ja sam kreativna, razmisljam drugacije, a ona je neko sa jako razvijenim logickim razmisljanjem. Ne mozemo da se takmicimo jer su moji sastavi iz Srpskog ili crtezi iz likovnog bili mnogo bolji od njenih, a njeno znanje iz biologije i matematike je nesto sto ja nikada necu imati. Iako smo danas kolege po struci, imam osecaj da postoje neki delovi u farmaciji u kojima sam ja bolja (iako su – verujte mi – veoma veoma mali delovi haha).

Starija sestra mi je pomogla da upoznam samu sebe, da postanem sigurnija u sebe i nezavidna osoba. Nikada nisam osecala zavist kada su drugi ljudi dobili bolju ocenu od mene, nikada nisam osecala ljubomoru ako bi neko dobio unapredjenje umesto mene, ne zato sto smatram da sam dobra ili bolja, vec zato sto jednostavno ne volim osecaj ljubomore, nezadovoljstva, gorcine. Volim da budem srecna, zato biram da se radujem tudjem uspehu. Radujem se tudjim rezultatima i sama sebi kazem, doci ce i moje vreme. Na ovaj nacin osecam zadovoljstvo i srecu svakodnevno. Nakon sto sam zaradila diplomu magistra farmacije na Brajtonskom Univerzitetu, cula sam razne price i teorije o sebi koje nisam mogla ni zamisliti. Neki su rekli “Lako je zavrsiti fakultet u Engleskoj”, drugi su rekli “Ta diploma ni ne vazi” dok su treci imali razne teorije kako sam izmislila fakultet te da imam samo diplomu srednje skole. Zasto? Zasto bi neko osmislio tako nesto? Jednostavno, kako bi se oni osecali bolje, jer ih ljubomora izjeda. Ali dok njih to grize unutra, ja sam i dalje u istoj poziciji, pa ko mislite da pobedjuje?

U danasnje vreme okruzena sam prijateljima koji su neverovatni! Moja drugarica Noor osvojila je nekoliko prestiznih nagrada za blogovanje ove godine, moja drugarica Sandra, da li ste videli koliko je ona lepa, zgodna i uvek dobro obucena? Tu je i Victoria, devojka koja se neverovatnom brzinom penje u sam vrh blogerske industrije i nize uspehe kao niko do sada. Kada bih bila ljubomorna osoba nikada ne bih mogla da se druzim sa ovakvim ljudima. Kada bi one bile ljubomorne ja ne bih mogla da im pricam o divnim stvarima koje su mi se desile ove godine. Tuzno je to sto sam osetila potrebu da napisem ovaj post, ali uradila sam to jer mislim da je svako od nas imao nekad u zivotu tu neku osobu koja nije podnosila nas uspeh. Nove cipele, ili 5 iz matematike. Ovakvi odnosi su jako toksicni i teski, zato se nemojte okruzivati ljudima koji zele da cuju samo sta vam se lose desilo ove nedelje.

Nisam napisala ovaj post kako bih vam popovala, vec zato sto sam u srednjoj skoli prosla kroz iskustva koja su me naucila mnogo cemu. Sada skoro svakodnevno cujem price o “drugaricama” koje medjusobno ponizavaju uspehe svojih takozvanih drugarica i koje uvek imaju nesto ruzno da kazu o tome. Da biste bili srecni u zivotu, morate biti srecni zbog tudjih postignuci, tek onda ce doci i vasa. Veoma je jednostavno. Svet je neverovatno mesto ali tek onda kada se oslobodite zelenog cudovista koje zivi u vama.

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