Envy

My writing career has been very much up and down since the pandemic. It frustrates me no end. Seeing Sybil's fabulous photos of Malice made me envious. I had nothing to promote this year, so didn't want to spend the money to travel from Arizona to the east coast. 

Dennis Palumbo

One of my fellow Poisoned Pen Press authors, Dennis Palumbo, not only writes smashing thrillers, he's also a psychologist working in Hollywood. Many of his clients are in the entertainment industry, naturally, which is job security if I ever heard of it. On top of working as a full time therapist and knocking out novels in his spare time, Dennis writes a blog called "Hollywood on the Couch" for the online edition of Psychology Today magazine. A few years ago he wrote an entry called "Envy", which I recently reread - because I needed the reminder. I had just written these words to a friend of mine: "I read what other authors are doing with their careers and am overcome with bitter envy."

Not necessarily because so many other writers are more successful than I – that doesn't bother me as much as you'd think. Many years ago I had a friend who couldn't stand  the success of others. Not schadenfreude, exactly. She didn't wish them ill, but she didn't want them to be richer/happier/more talented than she. Even in my youth I never thought that happiness or success is a finite commodity in the universe. I like to think that good fortune begets more good fortune in the world.

What I envy is other people's ability to work in spite of obstacles in their lives. I envy time to promote and travel, their discipline and work ethic. My perception is that other people are better able to cope with the difficulties of their lives than I. They seem to be able to concentrate after a traumatic day, the carve out time to work in spite of all the picayune things they have to deal with during a day. Why can't I do that?

In his article. Dennis says, "only by investigating what envy means to us can we risk acknowledging it. The plain fact is, it's just a feeling, like other feelings – which means it's simply information, data about what's going on inside of us."

I've known for years that emotions good and bad come and go like the tide, the best way to get through is to feel them and then let the go if you can. They will go, eventually, without effort on your part. Judging yourself for feeling bad, or nursing your hurts and fears, only makes the pain last longer.

One of my favorite quotes by Sholem Asch is: "To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are."

Dennis' excellent essay on envy is at https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/hollywood-on-the-couch/201112/envy-in-hollywood

However, if you're an author, you won't go amiss to read all his entries at Psychology Today. It'll make you feel better, I guarantee.