I was jealous of her success
Finding satisfaction in my life.
Have you ever looked at someone’s life in images and wished it were yours?
I've numerous times. I once loved a Christian YouTuber who had a channel dedicated to discussing her life in marriage, ministry, content creation, and other areas.
Every time I watched her life, it made me crave hers. I was so desirous of her number of followers, and her lifestyle that jealousy began to fill me up. I despised myself for having these emotions.
I consumed her content and followed her on all of her social media. Then I realized I was exerting a lot of effort to imitate her actions. I started to feel unhappy with my life. I became discontent with it.
I wanted to do and be more. This pushed me to go above and beyond. While it inspired me to take actions I had been rather slack about, it also made me miserable and dissatisfied with life.
I was working on the right things at the wrong time. It took some time for the Holy Spirit to teach me to be content with my process. I discovered how to embrace my life and bravely share my passions.
My monthly social media detox, which involves taking a 1-2 week sabbatical from social media, was inspired by this experience. Until I was mature enough to handle another person’s success without feeling envious, I unfollowed them on all social media platforms.
I also took the time to identify and bravely publicly voice my passions. I can now state with assurance that I understand how to control the influences around me, deal with other people’s success, and be content with my own.
I’m writing this because I’m aware of the pressures that come with social media. Many people are entangled in the web of striving desperately to step into the roles of influencers and other people they look up to, and become, or accomplish, someone or something people can celebrate.
Often, what you admire most about someone is what you yourself are capable of. However, you are either unwilling to do it, too lazy, or unprepared, and until you address these deficiencies, you will continue to gorge yourself on others’.
My best piece of advice to the reader for whom this strikes a particularly strong and personal chord is to;
Give yourself a break from watching people’s lives on social media. Unfollow them if necessary. I didn’t follow that Christian Youtuber back until I began to see her life as an inspiration rather than the gold standard for mine.
Identify your purpose and passion. Anyone who doesn’t know how to get anywhere will perceive every path as a route. Know what you want to do with your life so that no one else can dictate it to you. Be conscious of what drives you and what you’re driven to.
Let time meet you prepared. Consider building your own success rather than drooling over someone else’s. There truly isn’t time to be envious of another person when you put so much effort into what you do. I speak from personal experience when I say that as I began to take my work seriously, I discovered there wasn’t much time left over to act as a monitoring spirit.
Can I say this? Since we missed out on many possibilities, many of us are envious of other people’s lives. As a result, the lives of others serve as a reminder of our shortcomings.
However, I believe in second chances. I believe certain influences serve as reminders for us to step into our purpose and calling. We can achieve our goals if we are focused and put in the necessary effort.
I hope this helps you.
But each one must carefully scrutinize his own work [examining his actions, attitudes, and behavior], and then he can have the personal satisfaction and inner joy of doing something commendable without comparing himself to another.
Galatians 6:4 (AMP)
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