I was chatting with a man yesterday who has, over the years, morphed from being a football terrace acquaintance to a greatly valued close friend. I like and admire pretty well everything about him, from his deep compassion and love right through to his still simmering anger with hypocrisy and what is wrong with society. For reasons I shall not reveal on here, his life is in an upward trajectory right now and it is possible that it will get even better. God, I really hope so. I love it when good people in general and friends in particular succeed in life.
It is important for people like me, who thanks to clinical depression, believe their lives are a complete failure, to separate their failure from the success of others and in so doing avoid the temptation to feel jealousy. There was a time when I was angry and bitter and people either climbed the slippery slope or succeeded through their hard work and talents. Why should they succeed when I couldn’t? It was a long, long time ago, but the petty jealousies were all too prevalent in my life. Sometimes I would avoid events and gatherings because I felt so utterly inferior and inadequate. I am not going to lie to you: those feelings of failure and inadequacy still remain but rather than adding to those negative feelings with jealousy and bitterness, I have learned to celebrate their success.
I have learned mainly through the actions of my partner, a smart, well-organised woman endowed with more than her fair share of of drive and determination, to keep our lives in order and, probably more importantly, to ensure our children had more opportunities to succeed than we did. Having children changed the dynamic because suddenly I had someone else to root for. No longer was I consumed with my own failures and shortcomings. Now I had other people to encourage and steer in the direction I was never able to move in. Gradually, I came to understand that the desire to see others succeed must include everyone I considered to be friends and, moreover, everyone else who had a chance in life and took it.
Now, when I see someone I know and care about succeed in love and/or in their chosen profession (in that order, always) I am moved to celebrate. I know better than anyone, I think, that finding someone to love who also loves you (I can never understand for the life of me what she sees in this old relic and it’s best not to ask) will always trump over the professional side of life, regardless of what you do and how much you earn. My failing was that I was never any good at anything and it’s hardly anyone else’s fault that they were!
Through my darkest days, I have been sustained by people who could have walked by, but they chose not to, so how on earth could I possibly wish anything other than love and continued success? How sad would it be if I was reduced to wishing the people I loved nothing but failure? My inner self was not going to allow that to happen.
God grief, I have learned to have positive thoughts about the lives of others. I’d hate myself even more if I didn’t, so that’s something. And if I can have positive thoughts about others, maybe one day, before I die, I might have them about myself too.
