by Anonymous
Having grown up with 3 sisters, I know all about comparison and jealousy and competing for attention… And I know all about covering things up with niceties, manners and politeness when presenting to the rest of the world, yet knowing full well the feelings that are underlying between us.
When I reflect now, it’s sad to feel the way that we were with each other and in some ways, still are. How is it that 5 beautiful women (including my mum) were all living in the same house and, for a lot of the time, there were unspoken resentments, jealousies and judgments towards one another. It’s been hard to admit, but if I am really honest, that is the truth. And I played a full part in that. It is painful to feel that I measured myself constantly with my sisters and also with my parent’s expectations. Instead of expressing and getting it all out there in the open, we tended to hold things in and keep it all under lock and key, letting it all build up – with the inevitable emotional explosions from time to time. And all the while, so often our words and actions were laced with the insidiousness of anger, frustration or disappointment under the guise of ‘politeness’ or ‘niceness’.
Growing up, it was instilled in us that we were to be polite, use our manners, be good girls, be kind and always put someone else before yourself. I had a bit of an issue with all of this from an early age. Although I would conform, most of the time (until the rebellion) I felt very deep inside me that something here wasn’t quite right for me. There was a lot that didn’t feel true, that was tainted by a glossy layer. This would keep us from really getting to the crux of it all – to what was really going on.
With four girls, body image was huge in our house. Even though it may not have been stated aloud, we were all measuring our looks, our shapes and our weight against each other. There was a time when I would look at myself in the mirror and really hate what I saw: I was too fat, not pretty-enough and too short. I played around a little with not eating and trying to throw up my food (although this didn’t ever last for very long)… all for the purpose of being thin, because I thought that being thin was beautiful.
So the question still remains; how is it that four beautiful girls can grow up in the same house and be this way with each other? I guess, given the way society is and the media onslaught that is there right from the word go, the question could also be; how can 4 girls grow up together in a house and be any other way? I think there would be very few women in the world who could say that they have grown up without experiencing comparison and jealousy – whether it be with sisters, family or friends. This has been my experience, not just within family but with women out in the world, too. Although it is a super diligent practice of mine to stop it and deal with it whenever it arises, I can still find myself comparing or sometimes even criticising other women… and I can also feel women doing it to me. Maybe my sisters would say that it wasn’t the case, but I would say that I can still feel it happening between us today, and we are all grown women! It’s fascinating really: why can we not just see each other for the amazing beauty that we are, and leave it at that? What is it about us that thinks that we need to be better than another, or thinks that another is better than us – or that we are lesser? And why do we pretend that it is not happening when clearly it is? I heard someone say once that comparison and jealousy is like poison in your body, and that is exactly what it feels like.
Through Natalie Benhayon’s Esoteric Women’s Presentations, I have been able to work through this and get to see what kind of ‘pictures’ I have conjured up about how and what a woman ‘should’ be. I began to understand how I had taken on a multitude of ideals about what I needed to do and how I needed to be in the world. Growing up, I learned (along with many others) that it was about what I ‘did’ that got me the recognition that I was searching for – and that simply ‘being’ me was not quite enough. So of course I am looking ‘out there’ to measure how well I am doing, or how much better I need to be.
And of course, what I took on from my parents and those around me were things that they took on from their parents and those around them and so it goes on… I could see the pattern and I could feel the effect that it would have on my body if I continued to live it all out.
So why was it then, when I did get the recognition that I so desperately craved, that there was still something missing, that it never quite hit the spot? Through my experience with Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s Health, I now understand what it was that I was really searching for. The recognition I received never really truly did it for me because what I was looking for was not ‘out there’. I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am. It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside… and that kept me thinking that I need to compete with other women to get it. Now I know this to be an absolute lie. There is no competition, only the love that is unwaveringly there within each and every one of us. And now, as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it is such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman… such a joy!
So what is this loveliness? For me it is something deep within, a feeling that is so very familiar and so very beautiful, very much like a coming home. It is a tenderness with myself that allows me to just let go and not need anything from anyone, yet it stays open with everyone.
Before, I would disregard this loveliness and put others before me; now I honour myself and the love that I am so I can share more of myself with them. Before, I would push through and just keep going; now I listen to my body and feel what is truly needed. Before, I would feel that I wasn’t enough and that I needed to do and be more; now I am finding it easier and easier to just be with myself in all that I do, knowing that it is all of me doing it and this feels so lovely. Before, I would more often make another better than me or strive within myself to be as good as, or better than, another. Now, I see how ridiculous this is and can now appreciate the very special gift that is in our unique and very individual expressions… all of which are not comparable!
My relationships with my sisters, my mother and all women are continually unfolding into ones that are so much more open, honest and truly loving. As I am able to be more of me and claim the tender and loving woman that I am, I know I can be more of that with them also. My sisters and my mother are all very beautiful and truly amazing women whom I love dearly. Given our history and the backlog of ‘un-saids’ and half-truths, I don’t think I could have stated this with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty within myself first.
Women in Livingness Blog 
To truly transform any relationship one is in, it begins with transforming one’s relationship with oneself first and allowing the love that we hold for ourselves to unfold and deepen, which in turn then allows the relationships around us to deepen too.
It is the love that we live and give ourselves that fills the emptiness, no external source can do it for us: “So why was it then, when I did get the recognition that I so desperately craved, that there was still something missing, that it never quite hit the spot?”
This is an age old trick that has fooled so many of us, and now that we know we can turn it around and let go of this external domination: “Growing up, I learned (along with many others) that it was about what I ‘did’ that got me the recognition that I was searching for – and that simply ‘being’ me was not quite enough. So of course I am looking ‘out there’ to measure how well I am doing, or how much better I need to be.”
“as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it is such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman…” Feeling the beauty in another is a reflection of an equal beauty in yourself.
Comparison is such a killer, what is shocking is that most of the world are so unaware that comparison and jealousy are 1. that harmful and 2. how rife this debilitating emotion is.
The quickest and easiest way to get out of jealousy is to move differently, straighten your posture and align again to the stars.
Connecting to our own beauty and appreciating it then expands our appreciation of all other women and once we let go of the protection built up because we fear we are not enough we become more open with others and allow for the blossoming of beautiful relationships.
To hold another woman in awe, to our own detriment, harms both self and another. When we look at another, glorify their attributes, yet cannot see our own, it signals a lack of self worth. To truly heal, first bring attention tenderly back to self, deeply love and honour who we are, and dismantle all previously held beliefs about ourselves. In Oneness, we’re all equally grand, beautiful and precious, with no need to compete or feel less than another.
Finding and cherishing that love in us first is the key to seeing it in all others. It’s within each of us, and the more we live it, the more we give others the space to do the same.
We have amazing opportunities to be inspired by one another and use the reflections from one another to help us evolve and grow – instead of cutting each other down, and getting ahead at the expense of each other. When we start to appreciate and understand what it is that we bring that offers evolution and growth to another, so we open up to the learning offered back through their reflections.
Using the reflection of another as a point of inspiration, means we all grow together. Anything less keeps us in the same place, often holding bitter resentments.
‘And why do we pretend that it is not happening when clearly it is?’ The belief that it is wrong or shameful to feel jealous of another we can hold in our body can be so embedded in our consciousness. The jealousy is there but we can swear blind that it is not. It can take many, many lifetimes to let go of what we think is true to be in the absolute honesty with where we at.
This pattern, of not being enough and having to do more and more, is so big in many women, and one that I used to have, great to call it out and choose to let it go, ‘Before, I would push through and just keep going; now I listen to my body and feel what is truly needed. Before, I would feel that I wasn’t enough and that I needed to do and be more; now I am finding it easier and easier to just be with myself in all that I do, knowing that it is all of me doing it and this feels so lovely’.
Having been ill for several weeks recently I have become aware of this on another level and have been listening to my body in a way that I never have before and it feels so lovely and spacious and I keep remembering that I am enough before I do anything which relieves the tension of trying.
Lovely to read how you now enjoy your own loveliness, and have let go of this old pattern, ‘The recognition I received never really truly did it for me because what I was looking for was not ‘out there’. I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am. It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside…’.
We all are divine so, why do we push so hard? what makes us feel not good enough the most part of the time? for sure anything that makes us feel less or more in comparison of others is not love. This blog feels very supportive to read, it inspires me to keep on developing a more loving relationship with myself, to holding me in love which melts any hardness or contraction in my body from my past choices.
I agree Inma – this blog is a great reminder to come back to our relationship with ourselves and deepen this and not be so hard on ourselves and seeking approval or recognition from others.
At work sometimes I can see the competition that plays out between my colleagues. It is felt in little details like certain tones of voice, sarcasm or in some gazes. All occurs in an instant – behind a politeness that never would be questioned – but creates a configuration in the office that is far away from brotherhood. I’m learning that my job is to remain steady in my body to read what’s going on with no reaction. This simple choice is supporting me to build a deeper sense of who I really am and to bring the true me not just there but everywhere.
Exactly Elizabeth it all comes back to truly loving ourselves.
So worthwhile reading, I often feel jeslous and in comparison and it is without a doubt poison to my mind and my body. The developing of my relationship with myself is key to shifting from the empty looking outward to looking within.
How important it is to have role models from young that encourage us to connect to the beauty within us and not be looking outside for our sense of value or worth. Everyone has their own expression and flavour to bring to the world and it is something I now appreciate greatly in my family of women. We inspire each other and support one another to embrace this.
Appreciation of ourselves is very important, it is when we lack the self appreciation and self love, that we compare and judge others, simply due to our own emptiness.
Which brings it back to the importance of loving ourselves first, ‘It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside… and that kept me thinking that I need to compete with other women to get it.’
One of the most inspiring presentations I ever saw was when Natalie presented alongside another women and they shared on this topic and how there was the potential for it in their relationship but they never went there, they always reflected on what the other offered them and then used this to inspire themselves. It was awesome to feel how we all reflect something to each other and it is for us to learn from one another not feel less for something we may have not yet developed.
I love this, this is the way we inspire and support each other.
Searching outside of ourselves for our own beauty will never satisfy – it is only when we choose to appreciate the beauty and tenderness of our essence that we can let go of expectations and build true relationships with other women free of jealousy and comparison.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” I have found that to take that time to be with me can be very quick to feel how lovely I am, so quick it’s instant and goes against the belief/want to work hard or struggle to receive my loveliness. But this loveliness isn’t something I can work hard for, it’s already within me.
Beautiful Leigh. It feels so simple what you shared here. It is not about working hard but simply coming back to just being.
I agree it is important to appreciate ourselves and others, our uniqueness, how we all bring something different to the world, ‘and can now appreciate the very special gift that is in our unique and very individual expressions… all of which are not comparable!’
I am getting the very clear sense that I need to allow myself to fall in love with me. But truly too.
Yes and then the offering of that quality is innately then opened up to others.
A love affair or romance with oneself….and deeply so.
This is something that I am observing within myself at the moment, it is really uncomfortable to feel the level of interference these thoughts have with how I feel about myself and then how I relate with all others. I was not aware of the degree to which it is there and how I constantly set myself up to play less than others and then the fury that I go into when I am treated in this way- it is a self fulfilling prophecy and one that does not work.
If we could just bring ourselves in our love and nothing else in connection with other women, there would be no need for comparison or jealousy because we would each equally feel amazing and just want to share that amazing just in how we move and express, just as naturally as breathing.
Very cool to be starting this conversation about all the unsaids and untruths. Jealousy and comparison is so sinister, in that it is easy to avoid being aware of it, given society feeds off it really. I’ve spoken to many people who don’t believe it’s part of their life when I can see very very clearly that it’s destroying them. But it’s because we don’t talk about it, we don’t realise we’ve made it normal. There is a freedom waiting for us, but we have to acknowledge what’s going on and then re-learn to truly appreciate who we are before we can really let any of that go.
Love for others only really begins when we learn to love, accept, and appreciate our own love of self first. This then naturally flows out to all others for the love they too are.
Reconnecting with our loveliness and allowing ourselves to keep coming back to it and appreciating how beautiful we feel, and in truth are, makes for a relationship with ourselves that is ever deepening in it’s love and true care.
“…all for the purpose of being thin, because I thought that being thin was beautiful” – and also the accepted norm by others too… when we are not feeling right inside or not feeling worth it, no amount of thinness or body shape will ever do or satiate our lack really of self-appreciation. Recently i’ve been learning that feeling great inside and appreciating the body determines true shape/weight/size in a way that’s naturally beautiful, always.
That’s what’s changed my relationships with other women, a deeper relationship with myself and I find if I’m at odds with myself then I find it more difficult to relate to others and compare and find fault. So it’s our relationship with us and how we feel in it.
I dealt out comparison and felt it throughout my childhood, in impacted on all of my relationships with women, even closet friends etc, I feel this from, it is habit that we as women can choose to kick, but we just need to be honest about what is fuelling it. Self disregard and a lack of self -love, when you love yourself you will not harm another and you certainly wouldn’t compete.
Comparison is a killer for women. It can be super challenging to shine when surrounded by women who want to cut you down when you do shine. So how do we get through it when it is so rife? We read it. We read past the comparison and look at why there is comparison. And a great antidote to comparison is appreciation. That is a great way to stop ourselves going into comparison as when we are full of our own love and appreciation for ourselves, there is no need for us to compare – and when it comes our way, it can bounce straight off.
It would be cool to see 4 Women transparently be themselves and with each other in honesty in a real life situation. As although no one as perfect, we tend to keep so much of what we feel and how we are hidden to keep a so called nice image but there is so much poison brewing underneath that if we simply express, jealousy and all, we can at least start to deal with it. I find that inspiring.
This is a great example of how women are with each other – even women who love each other.
To drop comparison is to recognise your own glory. The more you know and are confirmed in who you are the less the need to be recognised outside of yourself by another.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.”
If we are not with ourselves in our fullness and have any sort of opening or weakness, thoughts can come in that take us into comparison with another. If we can catch it early and be honest with ourselves, we can turn it around and stop anything further from playing out, and be really clear where that loveless energy came from.
This is a great topic for us to explore further as women and to open up more of a dialogue around as I think we are more affected by comparison than we often realise.
It is really ironic how we look outside for what we already are – for everything we ever wanted and far, far more than we can even imagine is already within.
We learn that jealousy is normal, that its is a human trait. This is not only not true (we are not born jealous) but also prevents us from understanding how deep of an impact this emotion has on our lives.
The times that I have felt jealousy or comparison come up for myself is definitely when I am not fully with myself and so don’t have my own loving support and confirmation as my foundation, so then am open to those thoughts being fed to me.
I have always felt truth and covered it up with all kinds of emotions from being nice and good to lashing out my anger and frustration onto another. I did not know what to do or how to be with the truth I felt inside my body with what was being presented and lived around me from a very young age. I can still play out being good and can still react at times but I am becoming much more aware of these behaviours I can go into that are so not who I am. The more I choose the connection to me expressing the quality of stillness knowing that truth means everything to me the more I am getting to know who I truly am and that is very different to the emotional and pretence reflection of the woman I used and thought I should be.
Your final sentence really is the key- you need to find this beauty first within yourself before you can then truly appreciate another and embrace in full the reflection they offer.
It is beautifully inspiring to read of the self transformation you have experienced since connecting to and learning to express the loveliness within and from that develop the truly beautiful relationship that you not only have with yourself but your family. A gorgeous example of healing the past through healing our ill beliefs and behaviours based on these.
Appreciation of ourselves is a key in building truly loving relationships with others.
I remember being very competitive and hungry for recognition constantly when I was younger. And you are right that no amount of recognition or attention would ever be enough and so it is an endless chasing of something outside of us to bring us something we can only bring for ourselves – a deep honouring and appreciation of our qualities and what we bring to the world.
It is very interesting when we start to really look at and be honest about how we are in certain relationships with others, it can be very confronting initially, but as you allow yourself to see more and more, you also feel the truth in your body that how you were within that relationship had no truth or love and it hurts you to keep up the facade.
Jealousy is a very potent poison. When we choose to reconnect to the beauty of who we are inside we realise that there is an equal beauty in us all so there is no place for jealousy or comparison.
I can really feel the depth you have gone to in understanding how these comparisons and jealousies come up for us as women both in families and with other women in our lives. It is insiduous and very harming to ourselves and others if we do not acknowledge it and attempt to deal with it. The only way I have found, is to embrace myself for all that I am – the good the bad and the sometimes pretty ugly behaviour I indulge in. No beating myself up, but without honesty I cannot choose differently next time the situation comes round again.
I grew up with 3 sisters and 1 brother, I was the youngest with 13 years difference between me and my eldest sister. I watched the family fight and squabble with each other and would continuously try to get everyone to like each other it never worked and I would then get frustrated because no one would listen to me.
Learning how to love myself is a work in progress but I have noticed how my relationship with my sisters has improved and I am always asked to be more and to take the relationships deeper with them.
When we leave our body, we open the door for comparison to enter.
It is so true that if we do not feel and know the real beauty we are then how can we see it in another? First step to stop the comparing is look at why we are comparing which we always come back to a lack of self worth and a lack of appreciation.
It is sad really that we can grow up with sisters and never really resolve those feelings of jealousy and comparison, the conversation between us may change but the underlying un-dealt with feelings will still be running the show, lacing all of our meetings and get togethers.
I loved the realisation that when we are empty and seek love outside ourselves, it sets up competition with other women. I have never thought of it this way before but it makes sense. It’s almost like a market place where we have to vie for limited goods. If we believe we need to have a certain relationship, kids, house etc to be complete, then we will have to make ourselves stand out from other women and potentially cut down those who get in our way.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am”. It sounds too simple to be true but the love we are really looking for is within us. We know deep down that the place where we can feel complete and pure love is within ourselves and can never be found out there. It’s quite ironic with all the love songs, stories and movies that we are actually the one we are looking for.
It’s that vicious cycle of needing to be perfect and not get anything wrong that can also bring out the green eyed monster and to then feel comparison or jealousy towards another. If we were cherished and appreciated for who we are when really young, and then that was fostered during our teenage years, perhaps we would feel solid enough within to not feel we are lacking in any way.
Being willing to recognise and appreciate our own loveliness is the perfect antidote to jealousy and comparison issues. The less I feel the need to look outside of myself for recognition the less pressure I feel to compete with other women to get recognition. I have tried to fool myself for way too long that I was not competitive but actually I am now acknowledging where my behaviour can still be fuelled by the desire for recognition and how this causes me to view others as a threat to my desired outcome. For me becoming more settled in myself is dissipating the need for outside recognition and allows for the blossoming of many lovely relationships with other women.
There is no doubt about it Anonymous, looking outside of ourselves for love and acceptance is always going to cause comparison and jealousy. Find the love within and accept that we are this love then there is no longer any need for comparing. Great blog!
Thank you for sharing what I feel is a big issue that we seldom speak about. I know in a split second I can go into comparison with another woman. It happens a lot. Getting to the root cause of this is well worth discussing.
“It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside”.
Valuable words, enlightening words and words that free anyone who is willing to hear them.
This is a very beautiful article, you can feel that in society we are missing true sisterhood, it has been jaded and sadly we are naturally so connected as women. I can feel that through learning more about yourself, you are now free to enjoy the beautiful woman in your family more freely.
It does feel like poison, I remember the first time I ever realised I was jealous. It felt so painful, so ugly, I just wanted to get it out of me!
Our eyes can tell us all sorts of things about how it sees us when we look in the mirror, like too fat, too thin, big bottom, large thighs and so on, and we will base who we are on those judgements and comparisons running around in our head, that we have retained from other people, the media and so on. When we stop, close our eyes and just feel who we are, the images just don’t have a chance, and our soul does not need a certain body shape or look to shine through us, only a willing open and loving heart and body, to move in a way that reflects heaven on earth from every cell.
This is a trap that keeps us searching on the outside, ‘why was it then, when I did get the recognition that I so desperately craved, that there was still something missing, that it never quite hit the spot?’ Great that you are now honouring yourself and the love you are, ‘I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.’
It’s interesting how on the surface everything looks okay, be it in family homes, friendships, workplaces, relationships, a veneer – but scratch it, take one time layer off and actually it’s a mess. This is something I have not been willing to see, until now that is. I have wanted everything to be okay, I have wanted to see people as doing better then they are, I’ve not wanted to see the mess and rot we all live in. Why? Maybe because I have wanted life to be okay. The truth is the world is riddled with abuse, jealousy, corruption, comparison to name but a few ill emotions that completely destroy us and harmony.
I find that the relationship I have with the women closest to me e.g. my sister and mum, really sets the standards for my relationships with other women… So if there’s comparison or frustration between me and my sister, then when I’m with other women this plays out too. It’s so important to have supportive and loving relationship foundations rather than disharmonious ones.
If we focus on and re-act to the energy of comparison or jealousy we fall into the trap that is being set – separation between people, friends and family who naturally care and love each other deeply. This doesn’t mean we don’t feel it, because we will, but when we don’t take it personally it can’t fuel and further create the separation and distance between people.
Yes it is only when we can truly accept and appreciate the loveliness in ourselves that we can connect to the loveliness we feel in other women unclouded by comparison and jealousy.
I too have been very inspired by Natalie and all that she lives. There is not one ounce of comparison in here, only a love and dedication to truth that I have seen and experienced.
Yes, we waste so much time and energy on comparison and more so when it spirals into its bitter cousin, jealousy. And worse still is the impact of all that dysfunction on and in the world. This is most harming – the fact that we are still struggling to claim ourselves and live the sacredness and beauty we all are just because we are women, not because of the way we look or what we do.
“How is it that 5 beautiful women (including my mum) were all living in the same house and, for a lot of the time, there were unspoken resentments, jealousies and judgments towards one another.” It seems normal, because we see it everywhere in families, hear about it everywhere but reading your words this time I could feel how horrible it actually is to have this comparison between women because women have the potential to live so very beautifully together.
I have felt how I used to compare and judge others, because I judged myself all the time, now I accept love and care for myself I no longer judge myself the way I did before, and as a result I no longer judge others, and when others judge or compare me I remember that once I did the same, so my reactions to judgment is becoming lesser.
Understanding that our reactions and judgements of others is directly related to our relationship with ourselves is very freeing. There is a natural appreciation and love for each other when that love is felt and connected to within us.
“Growing up, it was instilled in us that we were to be polite, use our manners, be good girls, be kind and always put someone else before yourself”. This early pressure to be good is something that is not a part of our true nature – we are so much more than nice or good! This causes the suppressing of who we are and then occasional explosions that have to come from this constriction.
I went to a school where ‘good’ girls go and it was well known that this ‘picture’ caused many to rebel and be what was considered ‘bad’. If we were encouraged to be truthful it would have played out very differently I’m sure.
The first paragraph about using niceties to cover up resentments and jealousies between women was an important one. We learn this in our families and with our female friends early on. I used to notice this a lot with my friends who had sisters, as they always seemed to be fighting. This carries over into our adult way of relating to one another and spills over into our workplaces, social and community groups. This comparison poisons the potential for real collaboration and support to occur.
‘And why do we pretend that it is not happening when clearly it is? I heard someone say once that comparison and jealousy is like poison in your body, and that is exactly what it feels like’. Our body feels everything, and the more connected we are to it the more we are aware of what is around us, or inside of us that we are expressing to another.
Comparison and judgement is love’s true killjoy. I can see where comparison and judgement has played out in my life over the years. Its like we have this age old pattern so entrenched within us that it can feel very hard to shake, but it also feels to me that comparison and judgement are trying to plague us from feeling the absolute powerhouses we are when we are in connection to ourselves. When women come together in connection to who they are and drop the guise that is comparison and judgement and recognise that the true beauty lies within, it unlocks this amazing intimacy between them and that is hugely healing.
One of the points you make is about being the ‘good girl’ and always putting others before yourself- this is such a strong belief that is often given to girls from when they are young. I know I had this growing up. Boys are given different messages- both are the opposite of what our divine nature actually is.
To speak about that there is jealousy and comparison particularly among siblings is already a great start so we can become aware of it and thus work ‘with’ it instead of pretending it is not happening.
To realize that what we are looking for is living inside ourselves and all we need to do is connect to it is very confirming but also very sobering as we are then confronted with everything we have invested in on the outside to cover up for the lack on the inside.
Listening to those outer voices and going into comparison or judgement about ourselves or others, really does not feel good in the body, and until we do truly feel in our own bodies that we are gorgeous, and we are enough just as we are and squash those thoughts with that loving self appreciation, the way we move will continue to keep us stuck in those destructive unloving thoughts.
I think you make a great point- when you did get the attention you craved- why wasn’t this enough. I think many women can relate to this- if we have any lack of self worth we will often then too have doubts about the comment or not be able to accept it in full.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” I often find when things get a bit messy in my relationships with others, I haven’t been actively building and cherishing the relationship with myself. It’s a bit of an ouch each time I realise yet it is also an really lovely moment.
‘Instead of expressing and getting it all out there in the open, we tended to hold things in and keep it all under lock and key, letting it all build up – with the inevitable emotional explosions from time to time. And all the while, so often our words and actions were laced with the insidiousness of anger, frustration or disappointment under the guise of ‘politeness’ or ‘niceness’.’ I do know this so well, the seemingly harmony in family life but underneath this all is a tension of unspoken words. Even getting angry was done in a way that there was only silence and no words. Expressing what I feel is still a work in progress but with opening up and not holding back I feel so much more joy in my life, I feel alive.
It’s amazing how when we rebuild a loving relationship with ourselves we can start to rebuild loving relationships with others.
I think your closing line hits the nail on the head- that you wouldn’t have been able to express your love and sincerity so openly if you hadn’t first developed the love for yourself- this is key and the only way to truly have love in relationships.
Recently I have had a couple of experiences with a group of women that left me with no doubt, that comparison and jealousy is ABSOLUTELY not who we are. During this experience of seeing these women in their absolute truth, confirmed we are most definitely, all absolutely gorgeous through and through and each one of us holds our own equal but unique specific essence that is boundless and complete. And what we have to bring is totally for humanity, and we know it to the core.
This aspect played out in my family, and I have lived with it practically all my life: ‘And all the while, so often our words and actions were laced with the insidiousness of anger, frustration or disappointment under the guise of ‘politeness’ or ‘niceness’.’ Its a silent killer and when you get underneath it is a terrible, terrible way to be with another human being – so safe, and yet so loaded.
When did we as women start to compare and measure ourselves against each other, and take ourselves away from our naturally loving bond in sisterhood together? Imagine if we all knew and felt to the core that it is our essence that dictates true beauty and grace and that every woman is equally beautiful within, how this could change the world as we know it.
Recently I have been taking the time to genuinely stop and connect with myself deeply. In this time I’ve come to truly love who I am and totally appreciate all that I bring and offer in ever part of my day. There is no more room
For self criticism or judgement. Naturally I am also enjoying and appreciating all women in my life and seeing their beauty and everything that they bring. The compassion between women that is so strong in society is only a reflection of the fact that most women struggle to accept and love and appreciate themselves in full.
When you go into comparison or jealousy, your body hardens and your heart closes as a truly loving heart cannot express what is communicated when you are in that energy, then we have to completely override the discomfort that we have naturally felt when we choose this and hold back love from another. So in that moment you could say, we are saying, I am in judgement in this moment and I simply do not choose to be/feel the love that is all around me/us.
It is beautiful how in coming to appreciate your own beauty you are able to accept the beauty of others and drop that constant need to compare that dogs the majority of us through life with all the unspoken undercurrents that are so debilitating. Learning to appreciate myself and sharing that with others has been so powerful in changing the way I interact as I have less need to compare and find myself wanting because I am focussing on the positives rather than the things that have gone wrong that I used to beat myself up about. A much more loving and gentle way to be in the world.
I love the detail the author goes into. There is subtle dialogue that happens between people all the time and sometimes to the detriment to the relationship between people. Being in a politically correct society isn’t entirely what it is cracked up to be. In honestly it allows us to remain dishonest with each other for a longer period of time. At least with the communists everything was spoken fairly black in white. The last comment came from a recent chat with a work colleague who grew up in the old Soviet Union.
Hi Luke I too appreciate the author’s detailed sharing and can really relate to the often unspoken dialogue that is going on beneath the surface between people. I am curious to understand what impact you feel political correctness and communism have had on this age old way of relating that feels to me like it happens in all cultures and classes until we start claiming our own amazingness and let go of comparison and jealousy?
Agree Helen, I will explain my point more clearly. As per my conversation with a friend who grew up in the Soviet Union she stated that people spoke very direct and that at first when moving to Aus she found it difficult to communicate because she found people getting offended of the directness that she spoke with.
There was no side way approaches to ask a question, simply just asking a question no matter how it sounded. For example
Do you want me to show you a tip to clean up the mess next time? compared to You didn’t clean that mess up well. This is a very basic example. But it highlights how we can tip toe around subjects with no benefit to anyway because no one knows what you really mean. This lets everyone run free until something drastic occurs.
I love how you have had a complete circle in your awareness and honesty in how comparison and jealousy can actually be let go off. Firstly coming to ourselves and looking honestly at where we have judgement on ourselves and seeing it for what it is and actually going deeper and connecting to our true essence as a woman that we are has a great starting point. To feel that we are Everything already and there is nothing needed is so freeing for all.
It says a lot about our society today when four very beautiful women growing up together which is in truth an absolute blessing, are constantly living with comparison, jealously and emotional reaction towards one another. This is an illness rarely seen as such
This is beautiful. Falling in love with ourself lets us equally and quite naturally fall in love with everybody else.
What I am finding more and more these days is that when I am appreciating and supporting myself, the more I can see and feel all women equally and the true beauty and power just exudes from all. The immense surrender in the support held by all women is also very beautiful and it is something I am feeling more and more from attending my sacred movement groups. Women appreciating and supporting each other now that is true power.
When a family of 4 women becomes a family of 400 women, then 4,000, then 40,000 etc and chooses to feel an equal love for themselves and for all then harmony in the wider family of humanity will be restored.
The sizing up of each other as women is a complete travesty against the power and sacredness we each hold and the mountains we can shift when we work together. I’ve found when there is no jealousy or comparison between two women or a group of women it’s incredible the depth of wisdom that is there along with a lightness and playfulness. I love working with women (and also men), and keep uncovering the subtleties of comparison that are there.
“What is it about us that thinks that we need to be better than another, or thinks that another is better than us – or that we are lesser?” It’s a great question and it’s only by asking of this of ourselves can we start to feel how crazy it is and bring a stop to it. Of course it has to be replaced by something else and this something else is appreciation and love for ourselves.
I loved rereading this blog today, “And now, as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it is such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman… such a joy!” When we build a relationship with ourselves, there is no longer a reason for us to make what comes from the outside more important than what we truly know from within.
Anonymous, I find your writing totally inspiring – it is in my body your words resonate so deeply. Numbing ourselves from feeling what is going on in our body and thus holding back expressing it, is so detrimental to our true health and wellbeing and poisoning to all.
“Instead of expressing and getting it all out there in the open, we tended to hold things in and keep it all under lock and key, letting it all build up – with the inevitable emotional explosions from time to time”.
A great blog on comparison, jealousy and love. “why can we not just see each other for the amazing beauty that we are, and leave it at that?” I found that to be a great question, and why do we have a view on someone else’s life, we not living their life, yet often we think we know better than them. It’s time we allowed each other to make and be responsible for their own choices without the judgment we so often have.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” Such a powerful line and something we traditionally don’t allow ourselves to do as women.
I agree nicolesjardin, and thank you for highlighting this line. What’s coming up for me now is not to count the ways in which I don’t do this, but to appreciate and recognise the ways in which I do. Confirm what is me and not what is not.
Gorgeous Lucy, what an awesome way to start building a solid and loving foundation, recognising and appreciating what we already do is a great way of seeing how amazing we already are, no need to jump through hoops, get plastic surgery, good master chef meals, get promotions, fake tans, fake nails fake hair extensions out of a feeling of not being enough, but to simply celebrate all that is already there.
Yes great point Nicolesjardin. It starts with us building a loving and intimate relationship with ourselves first, which flows into all of our relationships thereafter. A very powerful line indeed.
If there is any discomfort in me whatsoever when I see or meet someone or am talking with someone or hear someone speak in a group, i have to ask myself what that is. By catching it, in the bud, as you say, it is possible to see it for what it is, be it comparison, jealousy or whatever and nominate it and let it go. Gradually these poisonous emotions fade from or lives and allow us more space for love and appreciation.
Anonymous from reading your blog the need for more self-appreciation bells are ringing. I’ll definitely be making more of a focus on seeing, feeling and appreciating how naturally lovely and amazing I am now and nipping any negative self-talk in the bud more instantly.
It is remarkable how ideals and beliefs about how we ought to be and look come into our relations making them truly complicate. It is a bt like we do not talk to each other anymore in a direct way but through our set of ideals and beliefs having first checked the extent to which we talk properly to them (is my look the ‘right’ one? Am I pretty enough? etc.). It is the result of this silent dialogue what pollutes the horizons of possibilities of the other potential dialogues. No wonder why there is so much going on in silence.
Great awareness and comment Eduardo. The silent communication we have based on ideals and beliefs and our relationship to them is what is at the root of the rot going on in society.
My teenage son shared today that what he sees is that girls are so nasty to each other and will do anything to bring each other down, and that boys can actually be more gentle then girls. He couldn’t believe the lengths some of them go to hurt each other. What are we showing the world especially boys and men of how women should be treated if we are abusing each other? It’s taking a step back and looking at all the ideals and beliefs we a running on and exposing them for the waste of space and garbage they are.
It’s really sad that women (in general) think we have to put other women down in order to feel better about ourselves when in actual fact if we accept the inspiration from another woman, our self-worth will build and be through the roof before too long.
Spot on Lucy, being inspired truly pulls each other up instead of the fake short lived feeling ‘better’ at the expense of another. There is so much to celebrate when women open up and connect with one another.
There have definitely been times when I have felt the hurt of both being compared to and of doing the comparing myself. And I can genuinely say that the broken relationships this has left in my path is not a pretty sight. I feel at times that I would do anything to change those choices I made that hurt another person so much. However, knowing that I cannot go back, but that I can change this moment right now is deeply empowering and makes every new friendship an opportunity to explore a more loving way to be with people, free of the past.
When we’re disconnected from ourselves and not honouring and appreciating the beauty that comes from within, what lies beneath the polite and nice facades is not so pretty. However these comparisons and judgments we use to bash or inflate our self worth only exist in the disconnection and when living up to the ideals and expectations of what society says being a woman is. In the connection, the true beauty of ourselves is seen and incomparable and the rest just falls away.
This is such a real and honest blog about what goes on in families and friends everywhere as common place .It is beautiful to share the love you have found in yourself and how this changes everything and how you feel about everyone and is a joy to read. Wow what a difference we can all live and be by truly expressing and appreciating our selves and everyone. An amazing blog to be shared for everyone.
There is always a bond one can have with sisters, which can go many ways over a lifetime, you can be incredibly supportive with and for each other, then flick to all the things you have nominated in your blog, the comparison, the not being supportive, the playing the game so not to have to create waves and call each other out on things. These are all ways we protect, ‘keep the peace’ and usually ensure the status quo is kept. But are we really evolving when we allow the status quo to be kept, no not at all. So there is a lot to be said for speaking out truth and not getting caught up in keeping the peace.
Thank you for writing this brilliant master piece anonymous. It is truly beautiful to read and I am going to have to read it a few times I think.
It’s beautiful to read what you have shared as I can feel how much our lack of self-love has led to us choosing to relate or not relate to the women in our lives. I feel choosing this love for self absolutely opens the door to honesty, truth and true connection in our relationships as women and for myself this is a quality that I am just beginning to explore and develop. It is amazing to feel the difference in both yourself and how you relate with others. Just a beautiful and healing blog to read.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” Such a beautiful moment for every woman to get to.
Thank you for highlighting this part Shelley. It is a beautiful moment to get to and You can really feel it in the writing. This would be one thing I truly want as well.
What struck me when reading this blog was how many families there are like yours who have girls growing up with all of these un-spoken or half truths, so much left un-said and then grow up to raise daughters in the same way. I can relate as there were four women in my family growing up and we never once had a conversation about being jealous or comparing ourselves against each other – I know I had those thoughts. This is definitely a subject which needs to be aired.
Great point. Jealousy is rife everywhere yet no conversation is had about it. That’s cause everyone is jealous and no one wants to really admit it. It’s should be something spoken about- because as women we know that comparing ourselves to another doesn’t help any body, it would be great to squash this when young rather then have it fester more and more as you get older.
We are also led to believe it is ‘wrong’ to be jealous so we hide the fact that we feel jealousy. In fact it is the opposite – if we nominated when we felt it we could start to address our lack of self-worth issues that allow us to feel jealousy and seal the door on this hideous energy entering us once and for all.
Thats a really good point Jeannette. If we were just honest about how we felt we can start to nominate and address things.
I agree Ladies. Hiding how we feel is what keeps the whole cycle of comparison and jealousy alive and kicking. Being honest about it brings it into the light where it has no power.
This happens with boys and men to. They are affected by jealousy just as much as women are but it manifests differently. For women it is more in regards to how we look and for men more about what they do and what they have. But its founded on the same poisonous separative lie that keeps us from knowing we are all the equal Sons of God.
The power of women working together is immense. Every woman brings so much and together we can shift mountains. It comes as no surprise that there is so much competition, comparison and jealousy that plays out among women because of the power we hold when we do surrender to the harmony, love and incredible wisdom that exists between us.
We all do it, and it’s serious, but also funny, how we look outside and look outside…. and it was inside all along!
Mmm. Spot on Dianne. Well said…..
Its an inside joke haha … and the twist is that once we feel and know the love we innately and equally are made of it cannot help but come out to be shared. It really is too much to contain.
Such a gorgeous blog to have the honour to read and learn from, thank you.
I really loved the line and the subsequent explanations of behaviours coming from it, “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.”
It’s a great feeling to see these words ‘in print’; they seem to confirm the experiences we all have and feel, and they show that there can be a different way.
It is lovely to read how the loveliness in you is now that starting point for which you view life. Knowing and accepting that is the foundation that allows others to be who they are also in their beauty and uniqueness.
It is always lovely to read – the moment we change ourself and grow, everything around us gets affected, and our relationship to other people become so much more lovingly. Wonderful.
Great point Amelia about how we need to untrain ourselves to not be judgemental of ourselves and then others and that we start to raise our children to love themselves and their bodies. This is so important especially in today’s times when there are many, many messages that confirm the opposite and promote messages that you are not okay as you are, that you need to be perfect, that you need to look at certain way, that we are always on a path of improving ourselves- it all feeds these ideas that you are never enough as you are- this is one false belief that we need to blow out of the water for you were gorgeous the day you were born- there was no ‘improvement’ needed.
Hugely important Kristy. The whole ‘improvement’ concept, and industry that has now been built around it, needs to be dismantled. What we need instead is Love, and industry based on Love with the focus on supporting all to connect to and return to the most natural state of being, as the love that we are.
In full agreement with you here Kristy and Amelia – ‘improving and bettering’ our lives is a consciousness that needs to be dismantled completely as it just keeps us going round and round in ever-decreasing-circles, searching and seeking outside of ourselves for ways to be more perfect and have more material possessions to feel good about ourselves.
It never works, only compounds the belief that we are ‘not enough’ simply being ourselves.
“this is one false belief that we need to blow out of the water for you were gorgeous the day you were born- there was no ‘improvement’ needed” (Kristy)
“What we need instead is Love, and industry based on Love with the focus on supporting all to connect to and return to the most natural state of being, as the love that we are”. (Amelia)
.
This blog is really beautiful, and had me reflecting on my own relationships with my family. This extends now to the housemate ‘family’ I live with too. It is so utterly ridiculous to look at and criticise another person’s body, just as it is to do that to ourselves. We have been somehow trained that this is the norm however, and now need to be ‘untrained’ in it. This can be a long and wieldy process for some, if not all! Starting to raise our children without this tainting is so important. We can have a world that is pure harmony, we just need to reconnect to it.
“… we tended to hold things in and keep it all under lock and key, letting it all build up – with the inevitable emotional explosions from time to time. And all the while, so often our words and actions were laced with the insidiousness of anger, frustration or disappointment under the guise of ‘politeness’ or ‘niceness’.” Gosh, don’t I know this Anonymous. Learning to voice my feelings has been a challenge because I tightly locked them away as a child. For many years I feared opening my mouth as I was scared of what I might actually say, and then, of course, I would have to deal with the fallout. This isn’t the case anymore, as I am expressing myself more than ever before and it is libertating … and very loving.
Loved this Maree. Glad you’ve highlighted this part- this way of bottling things up under lock and key is the complete norm. Which in itself is frustrating haha to not feel like you are able to just be and express is hard. Yet we are doing it to ourselves.
Here here Maree. I too feared opening my mouth to say what I really felt and boy has it been freeing to let it out.
As I read this blog I could feel the love you have for your mum and sisters. Often as women we really hold back the love we have for each other, if we expressed this more, in the beauty and tenderness that we feel it, it would be much easier for us to also express the appreciation for them and also feel it for ourselves.
Yea. Appreciation and inspiration rather then jealousy and comparison- sounds like the way to go.
I agree Kristy. We so easily go into harsh criticism of our self and others – the lack of love we have for each other is the same lack of love we have for ourselves. As this author has written, connecting more to her own Love has allowed her to experience it more in others.
Expressing love in the beauty and tenderness that we feel.. protection can stifle the flow and ease of such exquisite expression.
Yes Kristy expressing our appreciation for others is a missing link in today’s society. When we appreciate ourselves and others it has a flow on effect to all facets of our life and the changes felt are immensely healing.
Yes Kristy the love is felt and the appreciation allows us to deepen the potential relationships we have with all women not only those within our families.
“I can still find myself comparing or sometimes even criticising other women… and I can also feel women doing it to me”. Although difficult to admit, I know I have done this too. Sometimes it came from frustration, sometimes from envy, sometimes from jealousy … but whatever the source from where it came, it just never feels right, it never feels like a true way to live as women together. I can feel how cruel we can be to each other as women and yet the opportunity to be loving and tender is always there for us to choose at any time. The chance to be inspired and be supportive is also a choice. In fact, seeing and valuing the gorgeousness in another, is really quite easy.
Anonymous there is much here that I can relate to … so where do I start!
Growing up … I was also instilled to be polite, use my manners, be a good girl, be kind and always put others before myself. I did this all very diligently, because I wanted to be liked. If I disagreed with another I worried that I would lose their affection so I put their needs first and put up with whatever came my way as a result. This is how I lived until I reached the age of about 15 where I became the opposite, rebelling against ‘good’ and ‘proper’. I began to play up in school, not wanting to be good, and I took this to the extreme. On the outside it probably looked like I was fighting the world, but really I was just fighting myself.
Of course my teachers and my parents wore the brunt of this, probably because they were figures of authority in my life. But there were those teachers and parents of my friend’s that treated me like I mattered, that I was equal, they were tender and gentle, and I was different with these adults … I mellowed into the tender side of myself too.
As I look back I can see that ‘good’ just didn’t work for me, and neither did ‘bad’, but I have found since attending Universal Medicine that being ‘me’ works just fine, something I wish I had chosen a long time ago.
I feel that politeness and being cordial is so insidious because it masks everything that is bubbling away underneath. There is a lack of honesty with how we are living, it is done just to please another but all the while everything can be felt for what it is. I have found politeness to be false and will never bring out the true person.
Thank you the part that really got my attention was where you wrote “What is it about us that thinks that we need to be better than another, or thinks that another is better than us – or that we are lesser? ” it’s really interesting that it is all about the choices we each make. Maybe we need to appreciate another’s choices more, rather than going into comparison, and jealousy.
I very much appreciate reading your article, Anonymous. Your line: “Now I know this to be an absolute lie. There is no competition, only the love that is unwaveringly there within each and every one of us. And now, as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it is such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman… such a joy!” touched me deep and lets me feel the beauty of the different expressions, we as women are and what a gift it is to receive and share “the love, that is unwaveringly there within each and everyone of us”. So much beauty, love and playfulness is waiting for us beyond comparison. I very much appreciate every woman who is working diligent on letting go of these learned behaviors, to return to the true unfolding beauty and freed connection of women. Working on it too, I love this very precious, although often challenging process in my life.
To me it is very sad that the vast majority of women are striving to be ‘something else’. The ‘something else’ is vague and unachievable but yet there is a constant pull for it. When we are able to stop and recognise that we are everything we need to be already, the impact is palpable as there is so much space and freedom opened up.
Accepting the beauty within is the starting point for loving you and others. When that is found the beauty of others is also appreciated more deeply. The offering that another woman can bring to us is truly beautiful. If in jealousy we miss the blessing our sisters are offering us.
What a journey of return Anonymous and one that we can all relate to in some aspects. I didn’t have sisters but was in boarding school with 30ish girls, I can still feel the comparison, especially after term breaks we would go through each other’s new clothes, I would really feel less and jealous as it wasn’t often I got new clothes. It’s a subject we don’t often discuss as we pretend it doesn’t exist so great blog exposing jealousy and comparison and recognising your beauty.
For a while I thought I did not have the issue of comparison or jealousy but I discovered that it is difficult to track sometimes. Because it is such an ingrained and subtle process you hardly notice until you really start paying attention. I grew up with brothers, lost my mother at a young age and my stepmother only ever had boys. I was just lost in the way | was supposed to look and behave as a woman. I felt like a boy actually. I think there was a very subtle thing going on inside me when I saw a beautiful, strong and feminine women I would immediately feel less and overpowered being out of touch with my femininity as I was. I love how it is all changing now because of the loving connection I am starting to develop with myself thanks to Universal Medicine. ‘Now, I see how ridiculous this is and can now appreciate the very special gift that is in our unique and very individual expressions… all of which are not comparable!’
Learning to let go of the world that is outside of us and connecting to the world within has been a challenge for me as I have spent so long investing in what is outside of me. I love your realisation that recognition will never bring you to the yumminess within and that it is connecting with you that matters.
So true Anonymous. There is no greater pain than that of jealousy. In feeling how early it starts in life for us as kids growing up, feeling it before even knowing that is what it is, its not hard to see how the many tricks we employ to get around that awful feeling, have come to be. Not until we can honestly stop and begin to connect to who we are in essence, and truly appreciate that, that the ‘poison’ will no longer take us out.
This is gold Anonymous. Super in explaining what that missing ingredient is… “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am. It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside… and that kept me thinking that I need to compete with other women to get it.” To be with this feeling is having the connection to the fullness of being woman, in all her grace, and there is no room for comparison or competition whatsoever… only seeing your own exquisiteness in another woman because you know they too have this quality within them. When in connection, it is Impossible to be in comparison with another women – only inspired.
What you present here anonymous is beautiful and very inspiring to read. Growing up in a family with 4 other women I know too well the feeling of competition and jealousy that can hold back true relationships with other women. Attending Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s presentations have really supported me and hundreds of other women to address this issue and begin to live in a way that is truly honouring of our own unique qualities and loveliness. There is no room for comparison or jealousy when we appreciate and accept how amazing we really are, and allow ourselves to be inspired by another woman’s choices.
Yes, I agree, jealousy and comparison is like poison in the body – I have felt jealousy and what helped me disengage from this, was the fact that I connected to how it felt in my body. It felt like sewerage in my veins- thats how toxic it is. Well it was very easy to get out of the sewer when i realised what i was doing to myself.
I have never forgotten that experience, and every time feelings stir that could lead to jealousy I remind myself of how much more amazing inspiration feels in my body- effectively I used this as my way out, i realise that i can have everything I see within others, I simply have to choose it.
I was the only girl in my family, but this did not allow me to escape feelings of comparison, judgement and jealously. Having 2 brothers there was much of all of the above in the way that I saw myself in my relationship with my brothers. Sometimes being the only girl felt very lonely and left out. Trying to fit in my family I found myself becoming more boyish as I aged. Doing all the things that my brothers did hoping my Dad would think I was just as good as them. Somewhere along the line I had completely disconnected from my true essence in behaving this way. I am coming to deeply understand that when fully in my essence I love myself deeply and it matters little if others do or not. But how can they not?
Having 2 sisters myself, i can understand the comparison that can go on in a family with many women. When growing up, you can’t help but compare, it isn’t healthy to do so, as it breeds a lot of self doubt and lack of self worth, which I certainly fed into. There are still days when the old thought patterns come in (if i let them), comparing myself to other women, even now in my early 40s, but nothing to the degree I used to. Now i thrown those thoughts out as i have learned to do that in the first instance, but also to deeply love and cherish all of who i am, what my body looks and feels like. It is daily check in and a constant commitment to myself, to deepen the self honouring and self love, which I am lovingly developing each and every day.
Thank you anonymous for sharing your journey with your Sisters. I know there was not always a closeness between siblings in my family at times, but nothing too serious. We were all very different in personality and shape and size but we didn’t seem to envy each other or compete, mainly because we seemed to almost be different generations. I know I haven’t been completely innocent of envy and definitely not free of comparison. I have learnt a lot from Universal Medicine teachings and the presentations of Natalie Benhayon .
Honesty in expression with others that we live with or are close with, is quite an art. In my experience, there seems to be layers that are revealed once a person has expressed what is there for them. And so it unfolds and the honesty brings understanding.
The more that I claim myself as the power and grace of the Woman that I know that I am, I can hear others in their expression with less reaction. This is an amazing thing really because in my family growing up, expression was mainly nice or pleasing the other, controlling or being more than another or really angry and out of control!
I have to agree that since attending the Esoteric Women’s Presentations I have come to re-evaluate my relationships with other women and seem how glorious they can be. I have wonderful women in my life but I feel now that I have developed a better understanding of how I am with me I can be so much more with them. So much less demanding or judgemental. I am sure I am much nicer to be around!!
Dear Lucy,
Me too! I love your sharing, especially your last sentence. “So much less demanding or judgemental. I am sure I am much nicer to be around!!” I too feel this way and am coming to relax and enjoy being more fun, light and playful.
I like the questions you pose here Anonymous:
‘So the question still remains; how is it that four beautiful girls can grow up in the same house and be this way with each other? I guess, given the way society is and the media onslaught that is there right from the word go, the question could also be; how can 4 girls grow up together in a house and be any other way?’
I have also grown up with jealousy as ‘normal’. However the Benhayon family have shown me that it IS possible to live entirely without jealousy, even with women living together in one home. This is our normal way to be with each other- appreciating, confirming and growing without an ounce of comparison. How far we have strayed from our true normal. But, how quickly we can reclaim it back if we choose to.
Thank you for this blog anonymous. Comparison and Jealousy are cheap and damaging imitations of accepting and appreciating ourselves and others to the point where they are the complete opposite. Why is it that we have accepted these two emotions as something that is acceptable to have in our lives? because without addressing we we allow it. It’s like we are taught and tricked into believing that we won’t be special if we don’t stand out from others and at the same time we are lesser if we don’t conform to what is acceptable. Lesser for not being like a certain image and lesser for not standing out – it’s a loose loose situation! That essence of the true you that you write of I have also felt and in it when I feel it in another person it feels the same. What if we stopped pretending that we want to be special and united and accept and feel that we are already special and united deep down, what would that feel like?
Spending time with my sister recently we recalled ‘happy’ memories
I felt to express to “clear some of the backlog of half-truths and unsaids” from our early years. No jealousy, no comparison, with this deeper level of connection, I felt an unfolding of love and trust growing between us. Thank you Anonymous, truly inspiring.
It is so true that jealousy and comparison is going on just beneath the surface all the time and we can all feel it yet we pretend that it is not there and cover it up (pretty thinly) with niceness and politeness. This is such a trap and a game with no winners because we all feel miserable or less. I can really feel at the end of your blog that you genuinely love and appreciate the beauty of your sisters and mother more because you love and appreciate yourself more too.
It is the commonly accepted niceness and politeness behaviour that tries to cover up the under the surface running jealousy and comparison. I can feel that we actually all know that this behaviour of niceness and politeness is actually keeping us from not exposing the truth of what is actually going on because we are from this truth and only try to not be aware of it. I agree with you andrewmooney26 that loving and appreciation of yourself runs nought the need to compare and to become jealous and frees the way to see the beauty in one another and this is clearly felt in the end of the blog where the true love and appreciation is being expressed.
At a Women’s Presentation not that long ago it stood out to me when Natalie Benhayon talked about how we clock everything about another woman when we meet, what she is wearing her makeup,her hair ,whether she is contracted or feeling great about herself etc. I have been observing this with myself and other women and it is true, we size each other up in a split second. I am endeavouring to not do this and simply be with the other and feel her essence.
What a lovely way to be, to feel another woman’s essence and not get distracted by her external appearance which is read in an instant. To feel another’s essence we have to be connected to our own.
True, when we walk on the street, there is this way of quickly going up and down with the eyes and putting someone in a category. Am I less or more than this person? It is a habit that needs constant awareness and with the growing appreciation of ourselves, this habit becomes less until it totally dissolves.
I agree with everything that you guys have said but what is also important to remember is there are no rules. I am not saying that you are trying to imply that there is but what came to me after reading this run of comments is this. We also need to appreciate that as woman we are very observant and along side our love of true connection usually lives our great love of fashion and shoes. You can connect to someones essence and also notice how great they look in purple or how much you love them in those shoes. We need to imprint this in a new way but I think its important we don’t just react to an old way of meeting and thus dishonor how we are naturally are with others.
Absolutely! Good point. I love to look at women and see how creatively they are dressed and often give them compliments.
I can so relate to your blog Anonymous, I grew up with a great deal of comparison and jealousy around me, and certainly did my fair share of it too. It was only through the teachings of Universal Medicine and in particular the presentations by Natalie Benhayon that I really began to break down what this was about, and become aware again of the depth of beauty inside. Now, as you so beautifully expressed to… it is very easy to appreciate other women and their unique beauty, so long as I remain connected to mine.
Today the stand-out phrase is ‘It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside…’. When not connected to my own precious beauty within, that is when comparison and jealousy can slip in … and it is then I need to come back to me and love myself more deeply.
To put aside the comparing eyes, and see with true love and appreciation for all of us is to look for the beauty within ourselves, as we all come in many shapes and sizes, differing talents and traits. If we continually look to the outer we will never appreciate the exquisite essence we truly are within, and that makes us the same – beautiful without compare.
Love what you say here Jenny, pearls of wisdom beautifully written.
Learning to build appreciation of self I am rapidly learning is the only way to appreciation others for the equal beauty and love they are. If we don’t see that in ourselves of course we are going to be jealous, judgemental and competitive with another.
Well said Joshua, it is so true… how crazy is it that we have to work so hard to truly appreciate ourselves, when from our beginnings and our essence we are already that beauty and love we struggle so much to re-claim for ourselves.
Very very very crazy, especially when we consider that we are struggling expressing in full what was once so easy to natural to us.
To read this blog written over two years ago yet written with so much awareness, acceptance and honesty, it is a wonderful testament to the wisdom coming through Universal Medicine as a constant in so many peoples lives. That wisdom is like taking in a key that unlocks patterns of thinking and behaviours that keep us measuring ourselves against others (as stated in this blog) and freeing ourselves to the truth. I very much agree with the writer, that we can not come to see the beauty and loving natures of others, until we have embraced them in ourselves. Such wisdom. Such truth.
Very well said Simon – this is a revolutionary blog, and what the writer presents is pure gold, even though it was written over two years ago! It is wonderful to appreciate the wisdom of this, and that it can only have expanded and grown since these revelatory findings surrounding comparison and self worth.
jealousy and comparison is so damaging to relationships and a persons inner self-confidence. It is an energy that gets in and tries to make us so small, and crushes us down, so all we have to defend ourselves with is anger and reaction against a world that doesn’t come with any love. But by trusting that inner confidence, we can see that comparison is silly, because it doesn’t allow us to know who we are by what is inside us.
Absolutely agree harryjwhite. The power is there within us all
Harryjwhite, what you have written about jealousy and comparison is so true, it is so harmful and jet we are doing it almost without realising it. We first need to be honest and aware of it before we are able to change it.
I grew up with brothers and was often mistaken for one of the boys with my short hair, lean tall body, I seemed to fit in with the boys and enjoyed their company. I didn’t have an understanding of women nor did I trust them. Strangely enough I chose working environments that were soley female, being modelling and the airlines. I found the way to fit in was to enjoin the behaviours I originally found repugnant. Now having found Universal Medicine I have been able to develope the trust within myself and the self appreciation I bring as a women and have developed true relationships with many beautiful women.
As a man it feels amazing when I see women together who have a level of self-love and care and not competing or being nice together. There is such a gentle and solid strength and nurturing, that we as men, dearly need to feel
As you experienced with your sisters Anonymous, the awful thing about comparison and jealousy is the fact that these damaging emotions are covered up with pretense and niceties. Because of the disguise it is a hidden danger that has an unknown and damaging effect on who ever it’s aimed at. It’s not until we become aware of energy and feel what’s playing out, can we chose to not let it affect us. The subject of jealousy and its effects was widely presented at this year’s Universal Medicine Retreats in Australia and UK. It’s an awesome subject to discuss more widely.
I agree Rosanna – jealousy is a very sinister type of emotion, and from attending the Universal Medicine Retreat here in the UK I can definitely second how interesting and beneficial it was talking about the issue in a large group… A lot of jealousy takes place within the ‘realms of our mind’, you could say, but actually what I’ve realised is that everything I think has an affect on my mood, the way I walk/talk/look at people, so they then get affected too! Having jealous thoughts can be much more harmful than we think.
Yes! To consider our thoughts as harmful to others – they are energy that doesn’t just evaporate once the thought has gone from our minds, but stays as an energetic statement – requires a personal responsibility to not then inflict harm on another.
‘A lot of jealousy takes place within the ‘realms of our mind’, you could say, but actually what I’ve realised is that everything I think has an affect on my mood, the way I walk/talk/look at people, so they then get affected too! Having jealous thoughts can be much more harmful than we think.’ Wow thank you Susie this is so true and recognising this has led me to taking greater responsibility for the quality of my thoughts and the impact they have on others. For me actively acknowledging the things I appreciate about myself (to someone else) on a daily basis is transforming the way I think about myself and others.
I too have noticed a huge difference between having an appreciative relationship with myself compared to having a critical one. I recently had a conversation with someone about what our first moments of the day are like, and what we think when we initially get out of bed, and it occurred to me that I can sometimes beat myself up the moment I get out of bed if I feel even the slightest bit full from the night before, as I criticise the fact that I must have overeaten. It’s incredible how this transforms my morning – everything becomes a chore; exercise, work, getting ready, and I don’t enjoy it because of the critical thoughts in my head. I am very interested to see how my morning would change if I were to wake up and appreciate something about myself rather than find something ‘bad’ to self loathe about.
The whole idea with all kinds of ideals to find recognition out there is truly an obstacle for loving relations with others. Actually, first and foremost with ourselves. I was also confusing doing with being. Recently I realized out after a session with an Esoteric Practitioner that I am still having this I am not enough idea in me, I can do better. I decided to focus on confirming me instead of criticising me. And most of all celebrate me for who I am now. It gives a completely different feeling of me and how I relate to others. It’s an opportunity to celebrate not only me, but allI meet during the day.
Wow thank you and yes we definitely need to speak about this more with each other and in terms of recognising and understanding how our behaviours have changed over the years to not feel jealousy towards ourselves or when aimed at others. There are some great insights throughout and I stoped and really considered what is expressed here.. “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am. It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside..”
When I do not feel enough it is like an emptiness from which I can strive for recognition or approval. As you say JS unless I take the time to connect and appreciate my inherent loveliness I am open to comparison or jealously either towards others or projected towards me.
This is so true Jenny, I also agree with JS too. When I do not stop to connect to the loveliness that is me first, before anything. This is of course if I have lost that connection to myself initially, which does happen all the time throughout the day. I can see and feel how recognition comes in, or comparison creeps in. It is really overt and very easy to see these days. It doesn’t stop it happening, which has been a great lesson in itself. To understand this and be ok, that being disciplined in awareness is key.
I have been experiencing more the fact of jealousy in my life lately, both from others and from within myself, projected out towards others. I have never considered myself to be a jealous person, but it is there in very subtle forms and what I would of thought of as subtle, now seems much more clearly gross and disturbing. I have to say the growing awareness of the deeply harming effects of jealousy has occurred for me because of presentations by Serge Benhayon, who ceaselessly calls out what is going on in the world, without any personal gain and indeed much personal hardship bestowed upon himself from how people react. How Serge presents can be challenging because it is so honest and direct. Yet what is offered is never imposing and judgemental so you have to work hard to make it personal and take offence, because it is offered with an immense amount of love. However for myself, there is a responsibility to explore if what is being presented is true for me and there has not been one case, where what has been called out, has not led to a deep and lasting change for how I see life and the quality of life I choose. In the case of jealousy, as with the author, there is an unfolding awareness of how insidious and destructive it is and how what I thought of as a little thing in people’s lives, is actually huge. I appreciate how this has been elaborated on in this blog. For myself, perhaps relating to it as a man, jealousy may have a different taste and form, being about measuring how well another is doing in life and the intellectual prowess being expressed. Thanks to Serge Benhayon, much is and will be exposed about these competitive ways men think and live and this is and will continue to hugely benefit all mankind
Living up to those images about how a woman should be, yeah, I get that. But what happens when we don’t chase those images? What are we left with and what is there instead? There are so many layers of the ideal piled upon each other it can be hard to distinguish who is the true woman.
It is so a reality what you describe Anonymous, because we all tend to lock up our natural expressions and instead we go into comparison and jealousy. It looks like this is the normal way of living together and the unavoidable emotional explosions that are a natural result of this behaviour are taken for granted. We have forgotten what it is to live together in full expression and be the love that we are inside. When we start to live that there is no place for comparison and jealousy anymore and we will express from the love within and not hold back but share with the world what it is to live as a Son of God on earth.
What you share here Nvan is so important… we are so adept at sweeping jealousy and comparison under the carpet and making life appear ‘normal’ that what we effectively do is say it’s ok to let it be there, undermining all relationships involved. This means we are preferring this to a truly loving relationships. That was a big wake up for me to see and feel what I choose by not acknowledging it when I feel it coming my way, nor being honest about it and addressing it when it is within me that it originates.
When we choose to live the ‘true us’ the love that we are and carry within us all equally, truly loving relationships wil naturally originate from that.
“because we all tend to lock up our natural expressions and instead we go into comparison and jealousy.” This is a great point and I feel we do this because we’re coming from such a deep lack of self worth and lack of love for ourselves. Knowing that the way to deal with this issue is to develop a truly loving relationship with ourselves….honouring ourselves in every moment as best we can…something I’m learning to do.
Wow, this is a beautiful and powerful blog about a topic we need to speak about much more and start to be honest about. I only have 1 sister and with 3 women in the house we also experienced comparison and jealousy. And just because we don’t want to feel jealousy from others we dull our lights and give up on truly shining. I love how you wrote:
‘There is no competition, only the love that is unwaveringly there within each and every one of us.’
If we all allow ourself to feel that and give ourselves permission to be all of us we will feel and live that love.
This is gorgeous, thank you for sharing. I can seriously relate to having the ideal that to be beautiful you have to be thin and tall. I have a sister too, and we compare a lot with each other, which (as you say) is just a way of measuring how I’m doing and hopefully get a one up on her. When we talk about comparison and jealousy it really exposes the ridiculousness of it, hence why it’s so important to start the conversation, like you have done with your blog.
So true Susie, it is ridiculous really, yet it is such an unspoken force that we all get affected by. And yes, starting the conversation, getting it out in the open is so important.
Jealousy and comparison starts from a very young age, like you share in your blog, with family members and then soon with friends and other people around us. I recently realized how much we change ourselves during our lives in order to deal with this. The more we have a connection with ourselves and start building a relationship with ourselves, we can see jealousy for what it is and it won’t have an impact on us any longer.
Agree Mariette, I feel acceptance and appreciation are key to this relationship with ourselves. Accepting my self as I am and taking the time to keep appreciating my qualities allows me to appreciate others and thus no room for comparison or jealousy because why would I want to be anyone other than me?
I love that Josephine. Why would we want to be anyone other than who we are. We are the only ones that can express in our unique way so it makes sense we give ourselves permission to explore the fullness of our expression.
Beautifully said Josephine, why would we want to be anyone else?
Wow as one of six sisters jealousy was rife in my upbringing. I can now feel how it affected me and how awful it was for all of us. Now I have reconnected to my own self-love and appreciation how I feel about my sisters and other women has changed to greater appreciation of us all. There are still times where jealousy and compassion raise its ugly head but now it can see clearly it’s not true so it has no power over me.
Wow Sharon, one of six sisters that must of been some full on experience. You and Anonymous, as one of four sisters, could get together and write a book. But then as I ponder on this further I realise it is naught to do with how many sisters one has and everything to do with how much we care for, love and appreciate ourselves as without this relationship with our self in tact one person is enough to throw us completely off track.
It was a wonderful moment when I understood that the only thing we needed to look at was where we are at, each on our own journey, and whether we are moving forward and unfolding more deeply – taking stock and taking the next step. There is no need then for any competition, comparison or jealousy to enter in. Only appreciation for the inspiration others bring to us on their own journeys.
All we need is to develop and nurture a relationship with ourselves. ‘The recognition I received never really truly did it for me because what I was looking for was not ‘out there’. I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.’
A gorgeous testament to how our relationship with ourselves heals all our other relationships. Jealousy and comparison is bigger than we truly want to acknowledge as women – I too have felt and dealt thoughts along the lines of keeping up, being better than or less than another woman and the crushing effect that follows is so far from the loveliness within me and the others around me – it is time to take the pressure off ourselves and just be ourselves.
I agree Gemma. Jealousy and comparison is bigger than we truly want to acknowledge as women. Anonymous asks us a great question ”And why do we pretend that it is not happening when clearly it is?” I too can relate to being better or less than another woman and it is horrible… it feels so destructive and abusive to my body. It Is time to go deeper and look at our issues with jealousy and comparison so that we can feel more of the loveliness that we know we truly are.
Such wise words Gemmarubin . . .”our relationship with ourselves heals all our other relationships.” . . . and also so true. Building a truly caring and loving relationship with myself has most definitely changed my relationships with my own two sisters and with everyone else for that matter.
I have found the same Kathleen, it is through deepening that foundation of love with oneself that I could let go of comparison and jealousy, seeing them for the deeply harming forces they are to both myself and everyone else, (and they let in all kinds of other reactions as well). Choosing to love and confirm oneself in that allows me to observe and let others in without judgement – it does indeed transform relationships. Imagine if every woman chose to honour herself in this way – where would the world be 🙂
The world would be amazing! So it is great that we have made a start.
Yes I agree Gemma, as women we are often very hard on ourselves and this becomes part of the jealousy, comparison complexity. As you say it is time to take the pressure and I would add self-judgment off ourselves and instead learn to appreciate just being ourselves. We are all deeply gorgeous.
I didn’t have any sisters but i was aware of the feelings of jealousy towards me from when I was very young although I could not name it as such ’til later in my life. Having a 2 year old brother also brought up more overt forms of comparison and jealousy. Recently in a workshop I experienced the feeling of jealousy in my body- it was like an enormous force that wanted to pin me down and crush me and leave me powerless. Feeling this energy leaving my body was amazing and I have been able to feel so much more since then. I have also been able to recover more easily when I feel the emotional reactions of others being expressed in a damageing way around me. Thank you Serge Benhayon Universal Medicine and The Sound Foundation for this huge opportunity to heal.
Like you I grew up in a house with 3 sisters and we had all the same things you described like comparison and jealously with one another. Learning to appreciate ourselves and each other has been the key to changing this.
Wow, what a beautiful sharing Anonymous. ‘I don’t think I could have stated this [love of my sisters] with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty within myself first.’ So true. All that self-judgement and self-loathing stops us being open and loving and appreciative of others.
This is such a beautiful sharing Anne. I was really touched by this writer’s transformation. By re-connecting to her loveliness again she was free of all the old comparison and was able to joyfully celebrate other women. I want to live this way too – amongst all women – celebrating them, not comparing with them.
Very true – if we judge ourselves, how can we but judge others. If we don’t love ourselves, how can we possibly love someone else. Everything starts within us before it can be in our relationships with others. I know I still struggle with this understanding, believing it easier to love other people rather than myself, as that is what we are always taught.
Our True Beauty, is Not comparable! Hear hear!
When we connect to our true beauty I feel there is no room for comparison or jealousy unless we choose to disconnect and let it in. Appreciation of self can also support the letting go of jealousy and comparison. Wouldn’t it be amazing if we could start to live more with connection and appreciation rather than comparison and jealousy. Wow this would revolutionise the world.
So true Toni – a revolution of love and appreciation.
Yes this would be the most amazing thing – if we simply focused on appreciation and connection with ourselves, it closes the door to full blown jealousy and comparison, I have been around women who have worked solidly on this, and it feels amazing, when the unspoken tension is simply not there.
I agree Felicity and from my experience when I am solidly connected to my sacredness there is no room for any jealousy and comparison as I am so in-love with myself and how I feel there is no-one I would rather be or be like. I am simply inspired by women that have made choices I have not yet made for myself.
Hear Hear! Thank you Anonymous, for raining gold nuggets. “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” I have been realising this today, putting a stop to self-loathing and self-blaming behaviours with the clarity of keeping everything simple, and just being me. Wow, and so long looking outside of home, when all I needed was to close the windows which let the cold air through, to receive the reflection of me in the glass, and to receive the confirmation that the fire is always inside, and it is just a matter of allowing it to shine.
Very beautiful Arianne, keeping everything simple and just being me! Closing the window to receive the reflection of me in the glass, love it!
Yes the fire within that never goes out- when we all know this, what a difference it makes to how we feel about ourselves and the world.
This line also stood out to me as well. All these horrible games of comparison and jealousy are all for nothing because when we do make that choice to come back home, to the love within us, everything we have tried to fill that void within us – the recognition, acceptance, attention etc is seen and felt for what it is – simply not true, not what we want and this love brings the fact that we do know this. Everything outside of choosing to be the love that I am allows a lesser false ‘me’ to run my life. And running away from this fact is also not me. Thank you Anon for this reminder that we can choose to come home at any time and it is what we truly desire more than any attention, compliment or standing amongst all others.
what an inspiring and powerful analogy for self reflection you bring here ariannekasi, – yes, let the truth be allowed to shine!
“Wow, and so long looking outside of home, when all I needed was to close the windows which let the cold air through, to receive the reflection of me in the glass, and to receive the confirmation that the fire is always inside, and it is just a matter of allowing it to shine”.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am” – this is a beautiful realisation. I remember how we were all pitted against one another at school and at home –how well we do what we can do, how we look… anything and everything. It was almost as if comparison was encouraged and seen as good motivation so that we could improve and better ourselves. So there seems to be a fundamental belief that we were never good enough as we were.
‘Growing up, it was instilled in us that we were to be polite, use our manners, be good girls, be kind and always put someone else before yourself.’ I also experienced this and now I realise that it was at the expense of honoring ourselves, and the value of how precious we truly are. However this is so insane as without our connection to ourselves and honoring what is true for ourselves first how are we ever able to truly share and appreciate or know what is needed for ourselves let alone anyone else. This cultivates a belief that we are not enough and that the world outside of ourselves is far more important than our truth, love and the tenderness we are within. Yet this is who we are and this is what we need to begin to celebrate within ourselves and with each other. As we all hold equally a unique and beautiful and essence within.
“Before, I would disregard this loveliness and put others before me; now I honour myself and the love that I am so I can share more of myself with them.” – I’ve found this too, that the more I build a foundation of accepting and loving myself for who I am the more open I am with others and the less comparison gets a look in.
“And all the while, so often our words and actions were laced with the insidiousness of anger, frustration or disappointment under the guise of ‘politeness’ or ‘niceness’.” – I can relate to this, and it feels so awful when you realise what’s been going on under the surface.
It does feel awful, but once felt we have the power to cease it. The words of Michael Benhayon’s song are playing in my mind “We settle just for kindness and people don’t see better”…
Comparison means that if we believe one is better then another must be lesser. Even so-called ‘healthy’ competition is a form of comparison, which has a detrimental effect on the body, for if someone wins, someone else must lose. I used to even compare myself with my past performance so I’d try to get better marks, jump higher than my last record, swim faster than the last lap etc. When I appreciate the loveliness in me I don’t need to strive to find that in a false sense of elation. It is such a poor substitute for the love within.
I really love this blog, thankyou for sharing so honestly and fully. I can really relate to the game of politeness and how it stifles our true expression and how we really feel, often leading to pent up outbursts later on. Politeness is a real game of pretending and has very little to do with honesty. I’m still affected by this and can feel how draining it is physically to not be fully me in every moment. Politeness requires such a mask. Some great reminders here on being real, thanks.
Comparison gets in the way of us truly seeing how amazing we are, and how others are equally as awesome.
Beautiful Anonymous, thank you. I loved reading your experience of reconnecting to your own inner beauty and how this has supported you to put a stop to the better than/less than merry-go-round that most women are on. I have found taking deeply loving and nurturing care of myself to be the key to reconnecting to our innate beauty and this confirmation is such a powerful quality to live with as you truly meet and support yourself and all others. This makes me wonder why we are taught as young girls to put the needs of others before ourselves? My experience, and I am sure others can relate, is that this disconnects us from our inner connection, our true essence of beauty and results in us wanting recognition and acceptance from the outer. It feels like a big trick that leaves us lost and floundering as women stuck in comparison and jealousy with each other instead of connected and truly powerful and confirming that we are all equally beautiful and inspiring each other to be the amazingness that we all are.
Very true Mary. Serge Benhayon was the first person in my life that showed me that the only way to change was to change within myself first.
Thank you Anonymous for your willingness to share how it was for you growing up with your sisters and mother. I felt the same with my sisters: the constant comparison and petty jealousies. Even now, we do not have particularly close relationships with each other but I do respect their choices, how they are and how they live their lives and they are all beautiful and amazing women.
To have the clarity and astuteness to call out the comparison and jealousy between women does require, as you quite rightly state, an honesty that can only come from the acknowledgment of our own worth and beauty, however unfamiliar and tentative these steps might be in the beginning. But small steps turn into bigger and more assured steps eventually, and that will bring about the needed change in our societies everywhere.
What a great article. Comparison and jealousy literally wreak havoc in our lives and it’s not until we stand up and ‘out’ them that they lose their power over us. Thanks Anonymous for bringing this subject to the fore.
I grew up with 2 sisters and mother, so can really relate to a lot of what you have shared. But also extrapolating that out to comparing myself to girls at school, then in adulthood at work and even down the street. This all made me feel terrible about myself most of my life, until i too began to look within, attending Universal Medicine presentations, seeing people like Natalie Benhayon reflect true beauty and self worth, did i begin to view myself in a more loving way.
While reading I thought wow I’ve never had a sister to experience this, but realised yeah you have all of school, some workplaces and sport teams we were all crazy jealous and in comparison definitely not knowing the truth of how we get to these places sure makes it difficult for any true change
So great and necessary to expose what really goes on even between flesh and blood that is so rarley discussed. If we as women are constantly comparing ourselves to other women, then we would naturally be doing it with our family members as well, we just call it sibling rivalry as if that normalised it to avoid dealing with what is actually going on.
“I heard someone say once that comparison and jealousy is like poison in your body, and that is exactly what it feels like”
I can relate to this feeling also as I grew up with 2 sisters and on reflection we were always in comparison about something.
I also love the way you have expressed your love and healing with your family;
“Given with our history and the backlog of ‘un-saids’ and half-truths, I don’t think I could have stated this with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty within myself first”
Rereading your blog anonymous was so confirming for me.
Reflecting on growing up with 4 women in my home was very similar, very little was truly expressed, in fact not much at all. This was incredibly difficult for me to deal with as I am naturally expressive and am very willing to be open. I calibrated with them and shut down. More than ever I now understand the vital importance of providing a space which everybody is free to express, respectfully, with each other. Thank you Universal Medicine for showing me a true way of being, that I always knew deep down.
I have two older sisters and thinking back now I know I compared myself to them but didn’t think anything of it. It was never talked about. Unless we do something that is ‘mean’ when we are younger how we interact and relate to others isn’t much talked about. So we base things off what we see in others. Great blog, something to think about indeed.
It’s sad but true that we have been unaware that there was another way to be. It is so lovely to have your voice speaking this truth about comparison between women. It feels so lovely that now I can get ready for my day with no thought of comparison with anyone else, but with the thoughts of inspiration and sisterhood. It is a very worthy thing to keep very aware of.
That is a touching story. I know that there has been comparison and jealously between my sister, mum and I and it’s very sad that, that can go on between women that are so beautiful. You are so right when you say, it’s not comparable! we all have different expressions, different lives so different things to deal with etc, everything that makes up our entire being will be different to another and it’s perfectly designed that way to be different for everyone so why compare? I’ve really enjoyed being with other women and girls and not comparing but enjoying their beauty and sharing it with them. It’s such a contrast to what it use to be like for me and it’s far more joyful.
I had tapped into the same game! I was doing what was wanted from me, had my sister and my mom — mainly my sister — have the priority. Today I more and more find my voice to speak up for what is my truth when I am with them. And that is constantly leading to a more na more equal relationship between the three of us***
Imagine how it’s going to be when we eventually get to the point that rather than cut other women down we actively seek to lift them up ! Boy oh boy the world better watch out we’re going to be a thunderous river of love, an unstoppable raging torrent of pure divine female expression. Yet at the heart of all that apparent motion will be the most profound bottomless stillness ! Time to get cracking !
Thank you anon, I would agree that comparison and jealousy happens a lot between women. I too found it really helpful to be more aware of the pictures that we can hold about how we think we ‘should’ look or behave in life, to be more aware for myself of what I had taken on that was suppressing the real me.
What a touching and honest post. Your words……”Given our history and the backlog of ‘un-saids’ and half-truths, I don’t think I could have stated this with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty within myself first” clearly affirms that the confirming of another and in their beauty too, is only possible when we’ve first confirmed ourselves. That with honesty and through self-confirmation there can be acceptance – where we can let go, and let everything be. Beautiful.
This statement really struck me too. I am feeling at the moment how hard my default position has been on myself – and uncovering a whole new layer of tenderness and appreciation to have with myself. It feels strange because it’s like I’m not used to loving myself this much. Thank you for this blog Anonymous, it really helped to deepen my awareness of how this hardness can also affect my relationships with my family, and of course other women everywhere.
Coming back and giving ourselves what we truly need sets such a freedom free. True freedom within us- because we don´t need to seek, compare or judge anything in the outside.
As I read your blog, I kept asking myself, what would it be like to have grown up in a house where the women of all ages supported and nurtured each other to remain true to themselves? what if self care was seen as a basic foundation and not an add on for a special girls night in or weekend away? I see glimpses of it in my house now, but I can see so much potential to support each other more. Thank you for your insights and inspiring me.
Awesome blog and comments. I too have found that the more that I accept myself for who I am the more I can allow myself to feel the beauty of others; when I feel miserable with myself (less and less often these days) then I am in total comparison and don’t want to the beauty others are showing me, just to avoid feeling less! How crazy and sad is that!
Awesome, awesome blog. Comparison definitely is a poison, it is very damaging and harmful. I grew up with constant comparisons between my sister and I by my family. I felt the resentment and jealousy from my sister and it was very destructive and harmful. I used to cringe knowing how much it hurt but didn’t speak up. Now when I can feel myself in comparison with others or feel that from a friend, I have learnt to speak up and talk about it. By being honest and willing to recognize comparison when it is present allows me to work on it, to release it and that feels great.
absolutely Rachel and this is a great revelation, that there are entire industries built on the the lack of self love many women suffer from, be it clothing, make-up, weightless, fitness, estethic surgery. This is perptuatated by the comparison that is so deeply instilled in most women. What if those industries put their energy to celebrating and appreciating every just as she was? In her own natural, beauty and expression….as true beauty is not what we have been sold, true beauty is feeling lovely within yourself.
Comparison among women is rampant. The world drives the comparison with an endless list of competitive events, think about the Oscars and the so called “best dressed” list, beauty pageants, advertising that wants one beauty produce to make you look better than another…. the list is truly endless. For us there is only one way forward, choose within ourselves not to compare to others, and do that by dedicating to ourselves, and accepting the beauty of the individual essence each of us is.
So true Heather, there are so many ‘setups’ for comparison rather than an appreciation of everyone’s unique expression.
Heather so well said this is exactly what is at play and the counter for it all is purposeful choice to stop the comparison and to dedicate acceptance, love and self worth for ourselves.
I do remember that feeling of “poison in my body” when my sister and I did ‘comparison’ in the past.
How wonderful it has been to share with her, my insights and deep truths about myself I have realised, from attending the illuminating presentations by Natalie Benhayon on women and for women.
Great question – “why can we not just see each other for the amazing beauty that we are, and leave it at that?”. Thank you for writing so openly about a topic that haunts a lot of women. Likewise, it is only through Esoteric Women’s Health and Universal Medicine that I am beginning to understand the answer to your question as also you have shared in your blog and others have also shared in their comments.
The more I love myself in full, the less I compare myself to others. I also see that when comparisons comes, it is simply a reflection of something that needs my attention. And I have discovered to answer that question in a super honest & loving way. And for that I am very very grateful for.
Thanks Anon for bringing up the conversation with this blog and to everyone for your valuable insights into this subject. Comparison, jealousy and the sense of feeling ‘not enough’ is hideous and has led me down many self destructive paths which are slowly being repaired since I have come into contact with Natalie and Serge Benhayon and other Universal Medicine practitioners.
I agree, having grown up with 2 sisters, i understand so much of what has been presented here, comparison, jealousy, very much the feeling of not being enough was definitely palpable. Since meeting and having sessions with Natalie and Universal Medicine practitioners, I have turned around how i lived, full of insecurities and self doubt, to truly loving myself and what i bring to humanity.
Exactly the emptiness we feel is lack of SELF love and appreciation, how can we expect to fill this from the outside. Even if we strive to be all that we can be in the outside world, if we don’t love and appreciate ourselves, we will never feel enough. The more we start to appreciate ourselves, the more we are then able to appreciate others without jealousy or comparison.
An important topic here, comparison. Even as the girl in a brother, sister situation, and with a mother who did not really compare herself to others in an overt way, I certainly suffered the disillusionment of comparison. I was always to fat and never enough. I really feel that this was coming from my own lack of connection to who I was, pretty much everything about me, I judged from outside references. It was debilitating, and is taking time, awareness and self love to heal the damage it causes. Thank you for writing on this.
The topic of comparison and jealousy among women is a big one indeed. Many a time in my younger days and up until several years ago, I was constantly comparing myself and feeling less, reading the picture of what I thought another had and feeling like I was missing something. Through my experience with Universal Medicine and Esoteric Women’s Health, I have come to realize how important self love and self care are and how when you have more self love and can feel that deep inner beauty and allow it out, there is no need to compare or judge as what you feel from within you, is most definitely enough and truly lovely to feel. And when you allow yourself to appreciate and feel the real you, that appreciation is reflected in every woman that you meet and there is a feeling of total equality, grace and confirmation.
Reading your blog Anonymous, the release of tension you have experienced is palpable, and deeply inspiring. No matter how we’ve been – as women, with other women in regards to comparison and its destructive nature – this can be turned around if we are but willing to look to ourselves, to the women we are, and build a relationship with ourselves first and foremost. Do we truly see our strengths, the blessings we bring? Where do we care for ourselves deeply, and if not, what might be going on there?
It has most definitely been my experience that Esoteric Women’s Health and the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine have supported this process enormously. To the point that for me, I know that even if I find myself caught in some comparison, I do now know my ‘own way back’. There is no need to remain crippled, or feel diminished by any comparison whatsoever, and I acknowledge that its mere presence alerts me to go deeper ‘with me’ – why WOULD I put myself down, hold myself less, or even see myself as more? It’s all absurd if we truly look at it, and begin to appreciate the beauty of every woman.
I must say, that I am particularly inspired by women who do know who they are, and have no need to hide it. Even if a few buttons are pushed in others, it all offers the potential for greater self-knowledge and true growth, if we are willing to go there.
I’m the same Victoria, it was definitely Esoteric Women’s Health and presentations from Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine that brought this insidious issue to my attention… breaking through what was a (subconsciously held) long-held consciousness. The more of us who begin to see what we have created – and continue to create when we hold another woman in comparison or jealousy – the better.
Hear, hear Victoria ‘L’! This is no small stuff, and it keeps us from the most amazing richness that is possible to experience with each other as women. Not long ago, I had two female friends come to stay with my husband and I. I can honestly say that it was the most heart-opening and profoundly beautiful experience – for we all knew each other very well via a lot of contact via the internet prior to this. With being physically together in person, our appreciation and being ‘blown out’ by each others’ physical presence in all its infinite detail, went off the richter.
The love, acceptance, joy, laughter and continual amazement was profound – instant family, with no walls… The experience showed me how we can be at any moment with each other, particularly as women. There is so much to see and appreciate in our own and each others’ beauty, and just so much to share…
I know all about the comparison and jealousy you write about. As with you, the more I love myself, the more this drops away.
A friend of mine told me a questions she would ask herself when comparing herself to other women. The question is, ‘Would I really want to be in anyone else body? and the answer is always NO, because I love my body and being connected to it.’ This is such a simple way of letting go of comparison.
So beautiful Madeline. Even though I find myself still comparing to other women, in truth, I actually wouldn’t want to be anyone else but myself! So it’s a little bit crazy to think that I would even entertain comparison… It is simply a marker for me to come back to feeling myself and the love that I am in full. As Rachel, so beautifully said ‘love me in full…all else will flow’
this is so true to consider Madeline. When I consider it like that there is no doubt in the world that I want to be in my body and not really be like someone else.
There were 4 women in my household too when I was growing up, so I can fully remember the comparison issue. I can distinctly remember feeling down when I compared with my 2 sisters and would then react with an unkind comment to offset it. What a crazy pattern to be in! When we get together now, I appreciate how we are all different and as I truly compliment them, I can feel how that supports me to be me.
Isn’t it amazing what we will do out of our desperation for recognition?
Comparing and competing to be recognised, to gain approval or to be the best is so toxic, and can never really bring us the love we are craving. Thank you for bringing this out into the open and saying what is so often ‘unsaid’ but very clearly felt amongst women.
It is such a shame to look at other women through eyes of measuring and registering (so you know what you are up against) – we waste so many years and opportunities doing this when we could actually be appreciating and enjoying the richness that every other woman brings to our life; and we bring to theirs.
Absolutely Kylie, we waste so much time and energy comparing and looking for recognition when we could be spending that time enjoying and appreciating each other. When we do this life opens up and feels so much lighter.
‘So you know what you are up against’… That describes the dilemma perfectly Kylie and so sad that as women we buy into this way of doing life without even knowing it. When we do (finally) become aware of it, it’s great awareness to have, giving us the opportunity to love and appreciate each other rather than compare.
You’ve really made me realise how much I play into that same game myself…but I so often do not pay it any attention. Jealousy has not been a huge part of my life…but as I get older I’m starting to notice it crop up here and there, which is interesting, because perhaps it was there all along, and it’s only now that I am able to recognise it. It’s an awful feeling, jealousy. It has always felt like such an untruth to me..and that’s why now when I do feel it from time to time, I feel yuk about it and really question what it is that is having me feel that way.
This is such a beautiful blog, it depicts so clearly the author’s moment of understanding when she realised that what she felt she lacked had always been inside her, and that she need not compete with other women to have all the love she had ever wanted. Very beautifully said, thank you anonymous.
“Why can we not just see each other for the amazing beauty that we are, and leave it at that?”
It was great to read how you were asking the questions of what is truly going on and questioning everything that didn’t feel true to you! And it is amazing the learnings, understandings and new way of life as inspired by what Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon have given you- wow!
Great questions posed about why as women do we hold comparison and jealousy towards each other? I can feel it with women I know and it seems to rear its ugly head before I am even consciously aware of it. I am learning to deeply appreciate myself and the women in my life as we all have a loveliness to share with each other.
What I understood reading this blog, is that any issue we feel with another woman is an absolute pointer that we have not resolved something in ourselves, have not sought our own love with absoluteness of purpose.
And the world we live in offers solutions to “fix” the dilemma – to look prettier, be smarter, get the “edge” over another. As women, we drift further away from each other and devastatingly further away from ourselves in pursuit of the “fix”.
All we needed to do…way back at the start…was to see we did not love each other in full…
…and know that the reason was we did not love ourselves.
And therein lies the only true path and true solution.
Love me in full…all else will follow.
Following a perceptive blog that gently unpacks comparison and leaves me with a stronger sense of the antidote for comparison Rachel’s comment about looking for solutions and a fix has also struck me. Particularly the devastating emptiness that ensues from the pursuit of a ‘fix’. Both men and women are bombarded by idealizations that deviously set us up to compare ourselves against it and therefore others. Year after year this amounts to more and more limited constructs of who and how we should be and consequently the mouse wheel of comparison, solutions and ‘fixes’. The tendency to look for solutions and fixes is such that loving me in full might also be my solution, my ‘fix’ – but so far it has removed many of the complications of other ‘fixes’ and saved a lot of otherwise wasted time and money. I feel less devastated because this ‘fix’ actually works and the changes have not been temporary and slowly but surely my relationships with people are more real and intimate and I am more actively engaged with life and my community.
So true Rachel and so simple, it is extraordinary to feel how much effort we put into the outer when all along it is a matter of loving ourselves deeply.
Very beautiful Rachel. It is an important responsibility to love and appreciate ourselves first, as constantly judging and comparing with other women is extremely destructive. Imagine if all women genuinely supported and appreciated each other instead of the incessant jealousy?
So simple, thank you Rachel…love ourselves in full and then watch what happens around us. Love it.
Spot on Rachel. Self responsibility is the key back from jealousy and comparison and self love is the way forward.
I too have finally come to realise that; “any issue we feel with another woman is an absolute pointer that we have not resolved something in ourselves”. I have learned that to build a loving relationship with me first provides the necessary support to be able to understand the feelings of comparison when they arise and the willingness to ask myself what is still there for me to look at. Not always an easy process, but one that is so valuable for my quality of living and my relationships with other women.
Natalie and Miranda Benhayon recently shared how they are very tender towards themselves if one of them reflects to the other something, like a skill or quality, they are yet to develop. Rather than perceiving it as another nail in the self worth coffin they celebrate the reflection the other has offered with appreciation and a light-hearted understanding that there is something the other has shown them that they too can develop. Celebrating the moment without comparison ties in very closely Ingrid with building a loving relationship with ourselves as you mention to support this unfoldment.
This blog is beautiful to read, I love the way you have”tracked” your transformation and can now appreciate and really honour yourself and others.
Reading your words, I am left with the awareness that beauty begins within. Once this is connected to and felt, it is then confirmed by the beauty we see reflected back through others – there is simply no room for comparison. Comparison invites a ‘poison’ in that doesn’t kill but masks the beauty that is naturally on offer always.
Its so tru that when we ourselves fully appreciate and accept our beautiful selves that we can see that reflected in others. Truly amazing.
Agree Kelly
i love how you share that when you found the loveliness within yourself this opened you up to see, feel and deeply appreciate this in the other women also.
I can relate to this too – it has only been since I have begun to appreciate and truly take care of and nurture myself as a woman that I have begun to appreciate other woman in this same quality. The presentations of Natalie Benhayon and Esoteric Women’s Health have been hugely supportive and inspiring in this process.
I too really relate Angela to the experience of the more I accept the natural beauty and loveliness that is my natural essence as a woman, that I appreciate that in other women. Also the anxiety associated with comparison that I may have with other women drops.
I wouldn’t use the word loveliness but I have a very similar experience and it has exactly the same effect. I am able to see the beauty of others of either gender. Thanks, Serge.
Reading this blog is timely, as jealousy and comparison between my closest girlfriends is something I am currently working on. It feels awful in the body and doesn’t allow for relationships to go deeper as that energy is always creating a gap between us. I have working on closing that gap, by looking and seeing where I am lacking in my own connection that I I feel something in them that I don’t have. I am finding the more that I connect with me, enjoy being with me, then the jealousy and comparison fades. When it rears its head, I know I need to go deeper in my own inner connection and self love.
“I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” I so enjoyed reading what you have expressed here, Anonymous. I love it when I take the time to be with me, the world seems to almost come to a standstill and the love I feel there timeless. It’s a beauty-full ongoing work of art that stretches me and inspires me returning me to the blank canvas I came into this world as.
I came to realise that when we leave ourselves all that is left, is to look outside of ourselves to know who we are. So we continuously compare and measure ourselves. With the very unreal beauty ideals we will never be able to be right and it will keep us forever searching, changing or bettering ourselves. I have come to understand that whenever i compare or measure myself i need to focus on my connection and relationship with myself.
I didn’t realise how much I compared myself to other women until a few years ago, and when I began to see this and feel how I bought this to my relationships with my female friends I was overcome by shame and sadness. I now appreciate that I am honest enough to admit to myself when I feel jealousy or comparison towards other and even explore why this is the case. Once I understand it no longer has a hold on me.
Thank you so much for this very clearly written blog. I felt quite sad as I read this, not only because I can feel that comparison is still an issue for me but that it stems from me not allowing me out (so to speak) – seeing and feeling the inherent and magnificent beauty that I (and all women and men) am within – and comparison does feel awful – all the way round. It is such a blessing to have the opportunity through Universal Medicine to actually heal these old patterns, that are not who we are, so that we can have truly loving relationships with women (and everyone)
something you wrote made me laugh inside – you refer to ” the rebellion” – I think I was part of that rebellion.
It feels so liberating to put it on the table that as women this is what we do. For me, until recently, this was a normal way to behave – I knew it from a young age and it was so “normal” I had no awareness of it. Yet now I can feel in my body how yuck it felt and that it is not normal.
What you write about here is something I am pondering on myself a lot. Why do I as a women always compare and compete? What is it that I am so easily jealous or in envy of other women instead of being inspired? I agree with you that it all starts with letting ourselves be our self. Seeing myself as enough and just absolutely beautiful the way I am allows me to see also the same beauty in all other women, it feels then we are complementing each other instead of the competing for being the One Ideal.
Beautiful Leike what you have shared. It is a blessing when one women truly accepts and honours herself, because she gives permisson for other women to do the same, she offers a different reflection which is not one of comparsion or competing, but rather which holds and complements, which feels a whole lot nicer.
Reading this blog something started to deeply let go in me. To understand the truth of what is really going on behind the screen of comparison and competition allows me to accept more.
This is a great article and it allowed me to realize that I had spent most of my life comparing myself to the mental picture I carried of what I felt I should be in order to be a beautiful woman. Of course, I never matched up to my picture. The suggestion at Women’s Groups to feel the loveliness and beauty of me within me was challenging; “What? Me, lovely?” I had never considered that to be possible but gradually I have found that it is true and when I choose to feel the real me within there is a blossoming beauty and loveliness.
This article allows this relationship between comparison and lack of self relationship to be really obvious and raw. Any time I am being judgemental or critical of another women, or comparing myself to another women I can deep down feel that I have not been meeting myself, being with myself and appreciating my own loveliness. So it’s the missing of my own loveliness that drives me to look to the outside for ‘ways’ to feel better, i.e. being better than another. Super healing for all women to feel, thank you!
A profound blog explaining beautifully how to climb out of comparison and jealousy to be able to see ourselves and each other for the amazing beauty that we each individually and uniquely are. Such wisdom from lived experience. A great sharing, not just for sisters or families, but for women in general.
“..as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it is such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman… such a joy!”
This is so very true, when we feel the depth of our own love and appreciate the qualities we bring we can then see that in another. Likewise if we don’t feel good enough we will look and compare ourselves against others stirring up jealously and comparison. These are really harmful qualities that can act like poison in the body.
Once we drop the need to be better than another it allows us to be naturally supportive and compassionate towards each other, this is our true way of being.
It’s beautiful to feel the joy in your comment Sam, this is so ingrained in us that it takes layers and layers to release it. Just when I think I’ve done with jealousy and comparison to another woman, something happens and I find it sneaks back in. Developing our own depth of love for ourselves is the key.
I too grew up with two older sisters and what you have described and shared is so spot on and true. I love your question – ‘how can 4 girls grow up together in a house and be any other way?’. I too have experienced amazing presentations by Natalie Benhayon and Sara Williams that debase the way in which the world ticks in regards to living as a Woman. There are many ideals and beliefs that run hard and fast as to what it is to be a Woman. What you share about jealousy and comparison is a massive killer to both Men and Woman. Your last sentence sums it up beautifully – ‘Given our history and the backlog of ‘un-saids’ and half-truths, I don’t think I could have stated this with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty within myself first.’ Thank you
I grew up with 3 sisters too. I loved them so much (still do) and as a child they were at the epicentre of my world. Like you I was aware of any tensions between us and like you I held myself as being less in the mix as I lacked the self love to hold myself as an equal. Had I done it would have been easy for me to have supported them with their feelings of inadequacy as I could feel when they were jealous or in doubt or in self loathing. As it was, this wasn’t on the radar and I fell into the role I allowed for myself and took on their issues and allowed myself to feel small under the weight of comparision, mine and theirs. Finding the beauty in me has allowed me to appreciate more fully their amazingness without any need for them to see me in any way at all, which in turn supports them in feeling that amazingness too.
A beautiful article wonderful expression
So true what you say here about comparison and jealousy is like poison in your body. I never saw it that way before – until I really started to notice how much of that I was responsible for – and how others did the same to me. I game indeed for women to devalue other women – as if we don’t get it everywhere else already!
And like you say – it is absolutely an opportunity for us to love ourselves first – and to consider that we can either support our bodies or poison them
Comparison between women is so destructive and something that I have been part of in the past. Particularly with my sister and mother. I have a daughter now myself and I feel sure that I am now in a position to offer an alternative reflection to the one I received myself, (without perfection, but at least we can have a conversation about what is happening when it comes up). My comparison with other women or feeling it from someone else, created a feeling of sadness, not being good enough and lack of connection. Choosing to participate in ‘comparison’ can result in a lack of personal development and not building true loving relationships. I am still exposing it in myself, and it feels great! Thank your for raising this topic.
How beautiful to be able to express so confidently the love of yourself and other women. And so this is the key to jealousy and comparison – love yourself and in that we can love others equally and see each of our unique beautiful qualities, then we won’t feel that we need anything from anyone else but have everything to share with each other. Thank you for this reminder.
Very inspiring and it’s so beautiful the way you are now able to see and feel the beauty in your mother, sisters and other women because you have connected to the beauty inside you. I too have been on a similar journey of learning to accept I am as beautiful as all those beautiful women I see in the world, deeply assisted by Universal Medicine, Esoteric Breast Massage treatments and the Esoteric Women’s presentations. How amazing to be building true love and appreciation between you all after such a competitive beginning!
This is the second time I have read your article Anonymous, this time it brings awareness to me of the ‘unsaid’ and ‘half truths’ between myself and my family, it is as if it is better to not say what is really going on and what we are feeling because if we do it causes reactions, so the ‘unsaid’ things supposedly make life easier for us all, but I can feel that this isn’t the case, I can feel that the unresolved issues cause frustration, anger, resentment to name but a few. It is inspiring to read that ‘your relationships with your mother and sisters are unfolding into ones that are so much more open, honest and truly loving’.
We are so influenced as children not to recognise our own loveliness, or feel that lovely feeling inside of being just us, that it becomes very difficult to reconnect with it. Like you, Anon, I have known unspoken jealousies and judgments in some relationships, and like you, can still feel them coming up occasionally, including my own! Does it get in the way of a loving relationship? You bet! The jealousy comes out in all sorts of sneaky ways, not least self pity, bitterness and criticism. But this is a challenge I am engaging with. When I find myself reacting to someone in that way, I always ask myself first, ‘and what is my part in this?’ Then I remind myself to observe and recognise any emotion that comes up in me and not react from its impulse. Sometimes I really lose it, but gradually, with the intention of Love, these relationships are changing.
This is an important article and one that exposes the evil of comparison and jealousy but also the simplicity of truly dealing with this and over coming it. Self-Worth is what we are missing in both Men and Women and true ‘self-worth’ comes from a true connection with oneself.
I found this blog quite difficult to read, as I know I have and still do at times compare myself to others and jealousy comes up in me and it hurts.
Thank you for sharing a really important subject, comparison and jealousy. It can drive families apart and friendships can break up if we don’t address it. It is interesting that we don’t like to talk about it, but mask it with niceties and politeness and pretend it does not exist. I did not have sisters, but I have 2 brothers and when we were young, while we did not physically compare each other, there was still rivalry and jealousy between my older brother and me on what we did, and what we were allowed. I could relate to the paragraph about pushing through to get things done and about not feeling enough and so looking outside myself for confirmation, and recognition and how this can lead to jealousy and comparison. I thought I had addressed jealousy and comparison, but the more I open up Pandora’s box, the more there is to see.
An amazing article, your story really resonated with me. I think so many women have come across comparison and jealousy in everyday life, I know I have. I have found sometimes I can be comparing myself when I am the only one around! The other day I was looking in the mirror with no make-up on and I didn’t feel pretty, but to feel that, I have to be comparing to an idea I have about what being pretty means. For me discovering that comparing doesn’t just happen when I am faced with other women, but can also happen when I am on my own, was huge. But when you said “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am.” I had to smile, because for me that sentence is very true, and something that I am working on. Breaking down ideas about what life should be, and what we should ‘do’ in it as a women takes time and dedication, so thank you for sharing your story, it was very inspiring.
Thank you for this beautiful blog. I can so relate as I grew up with 3 sisters and a beautiful Mum. I can relate to the harsh words in how we spoke to each other and the competition that we all took on. There was a constant relay or comments and criticisms about how one of us looked that was so normal and accepted that until recently I hadn’t allowed myself to feel its impact. I now call it out, it is a work in progress as it is so ingrained in us.
As I allow and connect to the deep beauty in me I can feel the reflection this is offering all of those around me. Thank you for this amazing blog and to Natalie Benhayon a true inspiration and reflection of true beauty.
“Now, I see how ridiculous this is and can now appreciate the very special gift that is in our unique and very individual expressions… all of which are not comparable!” This line particularly resonated with me, because when you stop and pause, it just doesn’t make any sense!
I can relate to everything you have written about, having been raised with two other sisters and watching the different dramas playing out with each of them and my mother. This is a very important subject to raise and to bring awareness to the ill relationships that can exist between female family members.
Your blog has reminded me that feeling jealous myself, or becoming aware of jealousy of me in a close female family members of friends is pretty much the most painful thing that I ever felt – it felt physical, and induced feelings of nausea, despair and panic. It was like the earth that I walked on had been made uneven and wobbly. For me it hurt most because it was so counter to the love and trust that I knew to be the basis of those relationships – it just made no sense at all. It had such an effect that I now find it difficult to tell if I am feeling jealous myself; it’s like I have just blanked the feeling of jealousy, so cannot now recognise it. And so I am starting to work backwards, and to ask myself whenever I find unkind thoughts about other women coming into my head, particularly when they are about the women that I am most close to, “is it possible that you could be jealous?”.
Thank you for opening this discussion.
Your description of jealousy is very insightful Catherine. I agree, and would add jealousy is insidious, sitting well below the surface…..
Thank you Anonymous for bringing a much ignored behaviour to light
Beautifully expressed Catherine. Thank you.
I recognise these words: “It was my own emptiness of that love for myself that kept me wanting or needing it to come from somewhere outside”. Thanks to the inspiration of Universal Medicine and all the Esoteric Practitioners, and my fellow students who are living that love, I am learning to appreciate what is within me and to develop a way of being that includes making self-loving choices in every moment.
Jane that sounds just beautiful. And that appreciation of self can only be truly reflected by someone who is already living it in their own lives. That is why Natalie Benhayon has inspired so many women, because she has for a long time been living this way. And now more and more women are choosing this and so we can inspire one another. It will be awesome when such love and wisdom is taken into schools.
Thank you for expressing this, it’s just as my upbringing was with 4 women in the house.
I love your comment, “I appreciate and enjoy the loveliness in me, it is such a joy to appreciate the unique loveliness and expression of another woman”.
As I learn to appreciate my loveliness now, my relationship with my 2 sisters is constantly evolving and the tensions of comparison and jealousy are melting away too. It’s never too late.
What a beautiful blog! I can feel the openness that you have allowed yourself through the blog which has inspired me to be more open with people myself in this tender loving non-competitive way.
Beautiful article, thank you for you’re honesty and for speaking truth.
I enjoyed your article. I also have 3 sisters who are amazing and beautiful and I could so relate to what you wrote. I love them all dearly, but wow the tensions of comparison and jealousy we went through when growing up was well… intense. Your are right, finding the beauty in yourself first then enables you to see it in others.
Really inspiring – the questions you pose about growing up and the influence to be a certain way from the outside when it’s naturally the opposite are something well worth considering and hit home for me. Reading Jane’s comment above how amazing would it be to educate chlidren in schools so they build that connection with themselves. Thank you for sharing this.
Beautiful article – thank you. I have a sister 3 years older than me and can totally relate to the comparison that I have felt previously towards her… I notice that at school as well, it’s just expected for you to compare to other girls, and about 50% of the conversation between girls is purely about something that they want (a body feature, shape, skin colour etc) that someone else has; it’s incredible how much jealousy occurs between women in every environment.
Comparison between ourselves, especially those nearest and dearest to us runs high within our world. Seldom do we take the time to appreciate where we are at or how amazing we are, without looking out to the “image” or ” picture” that others project and portray of themselves. You’ve hit the nail on the head by admitting that indeed you were missing your own recognition of yourself. Put like that, how simple if all the world were to stop and do the same…
What an awesome exposure of something that I am sure many of us carry so deeply. I loved your line “The recognition I received never really truly did it for me because what I was looking for was not ‘out there.’ I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am”. What an awesome revelation. Thank you.
Thank you for beautifully exposing the truth of comparison and jealousy. I too can relate to this with having only one older sister. I love what you said – “And now as I appreciate and enjoy this loveliness in me, it such a joy to truly appreciate the unique expression and loveliness in another woman”.
Thank you for sharing so honestly. We need to have these conversations because in many of us as women, have or still do know comparison only too well, and it’s important to recognise how destructive it is to ourselves and our relationships with other women whether personal or not. As you shared, connecting to your inner loveliness and knowing that we are enough as we are, opens us to loving relationships with ourselves and others.
Thank you Karoline. Just by being ourselves and dropping any competitiveness and comparison, there is a pressure that is taken off us and our relationships.
Absolutely agree Karoline. It’s great to start having these conversations about jealousy and comparison and feel the effect this has not only on ourselves but on our relationships and to begin to really look at what drives or feeds these patterns of behaviour. I am deeply grateful for the presentations of Esoteric Women’s Health and Natalie Benhayon who have initiated these conversations and who have lit the spark for all women to be open to these loving relationships – firstly with ourselves, and then with others.
Your blog is a blessing for all of us. Thank you. 🙂
What a beautiful blog. I can feel it resonating in my body, I can easily feel my own loveliness. I especially liked what you said here: “I was craving my own recognition of myself – to actually take the time to be with me, to see me, to feel me and feel how lovely I am”. I can also relate to this very much. I always thought that I was self loving but recently I discovered that I was always alert because there could be, maybe, someone who needed me to be there for them. I was so much doing that, that I did not have real time for me. Like you said just, taking time to be with me, to feel how lovely I am without doing anything. After realising and feeling that I have become more focused on me and it feels lovely. And now, also like you said, when I am with other people, I feel that I am more with them than I was before.
Thank you Lieke that is such an amazing reflection. Something I can very much relate to myself, this constant alert I am in, not only that someone could need me, but that someone might want something from me as well as the constant alert of comparing myself – to assess where I might be at.
I love your last line “Given our history and backlog of ‘un-saids’ and half- truths, I don’t think I could have stated this with such sincerity and love before I had found the same beauty with-in me first”. Until we find that place where we truly know who we are, we can always be swayed by the un-saids and half truths that undermine our confidence and create confusion and comparison. Thank you for sharing the reflections that living in a family of beautiful women can bring if we don’t stop to honour who we are first.
I too grew up with three beautiful sisters and a beautiful mother, and while we have never shared these unspoken rivalries that you have written about, I now appreciate them for who they are, each one to be honoured and treasured. I feel blessed to have them in my life.
I also grew up with many sisters and yes, I must agree we had a similar experience. I remember going to live with my mother for a short time and I was craving acceptance so much that I decided not to eat for a few days, so I could be skinny. This led me to blacking out on my first day at school.
Now I have the opportunity with my teenage daughter to share with her my inner beauty and I feel this support offers her the opportunity to build her own self acceptance. We hold much power as women and this is something we should embody with wisdom, and as a friend of mine said, “when I feel this inner beauty others can not help but feel it” – thanks Sarah.
Thank you lovely woman. What a rare opportunity you had growing up with 3 sisters and exposing all of this, and what a blessing you bring to them in honouring yourself and I can feel you honour them also and other women, as a result.