Dear Sugar,
I’m jealous. I’m jealous of people who succeed at what I do (write literary fiction). I’m jealous of them even if I love them or like them or respect them. Even when I pretend to be happy when my writer friends get good news, the truth is I feel like I swallowed a spoonful of battery acid. For days afterwards I go around feeling queasy and sad, silently thinking why not me?
So why not, Sugar? I’m thirty-one. I’ve written a novel that I’m currently revising while searching for an agent (which is turning out to be more difficult than I imagined). I received a first-rate education, holding a BA from a prestigious college and an MFA from another prestigious college. Several people in my social and literary orbit have gotten the sort of five and six-figure book deals that I dream of getting. A couple of these people are jerks, so I don’t feel guilty for resenting their good fortune, but a few of them are good people whom I like and respect and, worst of all, one is a woman I count among my very best friends.
It makes me sick that I don’t feel happy for them, especially when it comes to my close friend, but there it is. When I think of their successes, it only reminds me of what I don’t have. I want what they have, but it’s more than that: them having what I want pains me. When other writer friends are met with failure (rejections from agents or publishing houses, for example), I admit I feel a tiny lift inside. The feeling is more relief than glee—you know that old saying about misery enjoying company? I don’t truly wish others bad. But neither do I honestly wish them well.
I know this makes me a shallow, awful person. I know I should be grateful that I have a decent job that allows me time to write, good friends, wonderful parents who are supportive of me both emotionally and financially (they paid my tuition for the above mentioned colleges and have helped me in countless other ways), and a generally great life. But I find it impossible to focus on these things when I hear the news that another friend or acquaintance or former grad school peer has sold a book for X amount of dollars.
How do I deal with this, Sugar? Is jealousy simply part of a writer’s life? Are my feelings what everyone is feeling, even when they pretend otherwise? Is it possible to purge these negative feelings and feel other, positive things when I hear someone else’s fabulous news?
Talk to me about jealousy please. I don’t want it to rule my life, or at least if it’s going to rule my life I want to be reassured that it’s ruling everyone else’s life (secretly) too.
Signed,
Awful Jealous Person
Dear Awful Jealous Person,
We are all savages inside. We all want to be the chosen, the beloved, the esteemed. There isn’t a person reading this who hasn’t at one point or another had that why not me? voice pop into the interior mix when something good has happened to someone else. But that doesn’t mean you should allow it to rule your life, sweet pea. It means you have work to do.
Before we get into it, I want to talk about what we’re talking about. We are not talking about books. We’re talking about book deals. You know they are not the same thing, right? One is the art you create by writing like a motherfucker for a long time. The other is the thing the marketplace decides to do with your creation. A writer gets a book deal when he or she has written a book that: a) an editor loves and b) a publisher believes readers will purchase. The number of copies a publisher believes people will purchase varies widely. It could be ten million or seven hundred and twelve. This number has pretty much nothing to do with the quality of the book, but rather is dictated by literary style, subject matter, and genre. This number has everything to do with the amount of your book deal, which is also related to the resources available to the publishing house that wants to publish your book. The big presses can give authors six figure advances for books they believe will sell in significant numbers. The small ones cannot. Again, this has no relationship whatsoever to the quality of the books they publish.
I feel compelled to note these facts at the outset because my gut sense of your letter is that you’ve conflated the book with the book deal. They are two separate things. The one you are in charge of is the book. The one that happens based on forces that are mostly outside of your control is the book deal. You could write the world’s most devastatingly gorgeous book of poems and nobody would give you $200,000 to publish it. You could write the world’s most devastatingly gorgeous novel and maybe get that. Or not.
My point is, the first thing you need to do is get over yourself, Awful Jealous Person. If you are a writer, it’s the writing that matters and no amount of battery acid in your stomach over who got what for what book they wrote is going to help you in your cause. Your cause is to write a great book and then to write another great book and to keep writing them for as long as you can. That is your only cause. It is not to get a six figure book deal. I’m talking about the difference between art and money; creation and commerce. It’s a beautiful and important thing to be paid to make art. Publishers who deliver our books to readers are a vital part of what we do. But what we do—you and I—is write books. Which may garner six figure book deals for the reasons I outlined above. Or not.
You know what I do when I feel jealous? I tell myself to not feel jealous. I shut down the why not me? voice and replace it with one that says don’t be silly instead. It really is that easy. You actually do stop being an awful jealous person by stopping being an awful jealous person. When you feel like crap because someone has gotten something you want you force yourself to remember how very much you have been given. You remember that there is plenty for all of us. You remember that someone else’s success has absolutely no bearing on your own. You remember that a wonderful thing has happened to one of your literary peers and maybe, if you keep working and if you get lucky, something wonderful may also someday happen to you.
And if you can’t muster that, you just stop. You truly do. You do not let yourself think about it. There isn’t a thing to eat down there in the rabbit hole of your bitterness except your own desperate heart. If you let it, your jealousy will devour you. Your letter is evidence that it has already begun to do so. It has depleted your happiness, distracted you from your real work, and turned you into a crappy friend.
You know that woman you mentioned who recently got the book deal—the one you describe as among your best friends? She knows you’re not truly happy for her. She knows it even if she’s convinced herself that she doesn’t know it; even if she’s tried to explain away whatever weird vibe you emitted when you pretended to be happy for her about her good news. She knows because you can’t fake love and generosity of spirit. It’s either there or it isn’t. The fact that when someone you profess to care deeply about shared with you something excellent that happened to her you had to fake your joy sucks way more than the fact that you haven’t yet gotten the five or six figure book deal you’re so convinced you deserve. And if you want to have a real, true, deep, authentic, satisfying, kickass, righteous life, I advise you to get that shit straightened out first.
I know it’s not easy being an artist. I know the gulf between creation and commerce is so tremendously wide that it’s sometimes impossible not to feel annihilated by it. A lot of artists give up because it’s just too damn hard to go on making art in a culture that by and large does not support its artists. But the people who don’t give up are the people who find a way to believe in abundance rather than scarcity. They’ve taken into their hearts the idea that there is enough for all of us, that success will manifest itself in different ways for different sorts of artists, that keeping the faith is more important than cashing the check, that being genuinely happy for someone else who got something you hope to get makes you genuinely happier too.
Most of those people did not come to this perspective naturally. And so, Awful Jealous Person, there is hope for you. You, too, can be a person who didn’t give up. Most of the people who didn’t give up realized that in order to thrive they had to dismantle the ugly jealous god in their heads so they could instead serve something greater: their own work. For some of them, it meant simply shutting out the why not me voice and moving on. For others, it meant going deeper and exploring why exactly it pained them so much that someone else got good news.
I hate to tell you, but my guess is that you’re in the latter group. A large part of your jealousy probably rises out of your outsized sense of entitlement. Privilege has a way of fucking with our heads the same way a lack of it does. There are a lot of people who’d never dream they could be a writer, let alone land, at the age of thirty-one, a six figure book deal. You are not one of them. And you are not one of them because you’ve been given a tremendous amount of things that you did not earn or deserve, but rather that you received for the sole reason that you happen to be born into a family who had the money and wherewithal to fund your education at two colleges to which you feel compelled to attach the word “prestigious.”
What is a prestigious college? What did attending such a school allow you to believe about yourself? What assumptions do you have about the colleges that you would not describe as prestigious? What sorts of people go to prestigious colleges and not prestigious colleges? Do you believe that you had a right to a free “first-rate” education? What do you make of the people who received educations that you would not characterize as first-rate? These are not rhetorical questions. I really do want you to take out a piece of paper and write those questions down and then answer them. I believe your answers will deeply inform your current struggle with jealousy. I am not asking you these questions in order to condemn or judge you. I would ask a similar series of questions to anyone from any sort of background because I believe our early experiences and beliefs about our place in the world inform who we think we are and what we deserve and by what means it should be given to us.
It is a way of going back to the roots of the problem, as it were. And I imagine you know I’m a big fan of roots.
You might, for example, be interested to know that the word prestigious is derived from the Latin praestigiae, which means conjuror’s tricks. Isn’t that interesting? This word that we use to mean honorable and esteemed has its beginnings in a word that has everything to do with illusion and deception and trickery. Does that mean anything to you, Awful Jealous Person? Because when I found that out, every tuning fork inside of me went hum. Could it be possible that the reason you feel like you swallowed a spoonful of battery acid every time someone else gets what you want is because a long time ago—way back in your own very beginnings—you were sold a bill of goods about the relationship between money and success, fame and authenticity, legitimacy and adulation?
I think it’s worth investigating, sweet pea. Doing so will make you a happier person and also a better writer, I know without a doubt.
Good luck selling your novel. I hope you get six figures for it. When you do, write to me and share the wonderful news. I promise to be over the moon for you.
Yours,
Sugar
126 responses
Holy shit, Sugar. I’m going to need to have this spray painted on my bedroom wall.
God. You are good. This is just devastatingly on the mark.
this is fantastic. i did not go to a prestigious college, but i do find myself saying things about my family–a story i’ve told myself about the kind of family i have–that probably inform a great deal of my oft-recurring general malaise. thank you, sugar, i’ve got a list of my own questions to come up with tonight.
EVERY TIME, SUGAR! Every single time. How do you do it?
I mean, really. In “The Black Arc of It” you made me cry. I said as much. In this one, you did nothing short of making me question the fortitude of the morality I attempt to cling to on a daily basis. That’s outright fabulous. Because nothing is more important than questioning your own generosity of spirit, especially when, inside, you consider it one of your best qualities.
Being humble is learned, you’re right…because anyone from any background can find something to feel entitled about. You’ve really done an amazing job at showing that self-talk and self-questioning and working earnestly on oneself is straight up necessary to be a good writer, and a good person.
Damn, girl. You’re smart.
There isn’t a thing to eat down there in the rabbit hole of your bitterness except your own desperate heart – one of the best sentences I have ever read.
Thanks again Sugar. You are truly the best.
Jesus Lord, you really preached in this one. This is just sound advice for every single writer. I kind of shouted PREACH while I read this which was awkward in that someone just walked by my office, but that’s fine. Privilege really does have a way with fucking with our heads. This was just so perfect.
Fucking a, Sugar, you’ve done it again! I’m with Chelsea, I have some of my own questions to be asking myself.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for speaking the truth.
Sugar neutralizes battery acid. Check.
Um. Um. Hmmm. *Cough.* Wow.
I’ve always linked jealousy to insecurity. I’m not by nature a jealous person, but the times in my life when I have felt jealous have been times when I felt insecure about something. When I was jealous of another woman, it was because I was insecure about the man I was dating. The origin for the insecurity sometimes lies within me and sometimes within the relationship and the guy and sometimes within us both. Often it isn’t a fault thing, and everyone is just doing the best they can. When I’ve been jealous of other writers, it’s because I feel insecure about my own writing, that I suck.
The way I deal with it, at least with writing, is to get the critic/editor out of my head because truly it’s that vicious overlord that’s making me feel insecure. He/she is always there pointing out how badly I suck and in what ways that I suck and how I’ll never be as good as my friend X because I have absolutely no talent. I let my inner kid, my inner creative, out to play and I focus on the things I can control—as Sugar said.
I love that you talk about privilege and prestige, Sugar. I hadn’t thought about it in quite those terms, but it is so much about expectations. On one hand, you don’t want to be so beaten down that you don’t even try, but you also don’t want your expectations to be so high that they are inevitably and always disappointed. It’s a bumpy ride, this thing called life, that’s for sure.
I think you should have called this one ‘there is enough for all of us.’ What a nice true thing. I’ve thought a lot about all the sorts of feelings and actions that the false sense of scarcity underlies. What a pleasure to know some of your thoughts about it. A pleasure, as always.
YES!
I know this is probably not going to be one of your more popular posts, Sugar, but this hit my sweet spot. I see this entitlement everywhere and it’s disturbing for so many reasons – the most poignant being that it’s so stifling to the person who exhibits it!!
I was not born into a family that could give me all the aforementioned advantages, but I still struggle to resist buying this bill of goods:
“…you were sold a bill of goods about the relationship between money and success, fame and authenticity, legitimacy and adulation”
sugar: your grace and empathy are ceaseless fountains of inspiration. the ‘when’s my turn?’ whinge is a sadly common sensation for me. i will recall your words when my battery acid levels rise
I was married to a writer for years. I loved him doggedly until his “why not me?” self buried his greater, more generous self under a mountain of bitterness. He has since fought his way out from under that mountain and found his positive self again, but the neither the marriage nor his writing career survived the process. Our friendship remains strong, and I will pass your sage words along to him. Thank you from both of us.
Additionally, your words of abundance, happiness and gratitude remind me to heal my own “why not me?” acid burns. They aren’t related to writing, but they are useless wounds that I continue to reopen and that I will be a better person for laying to rest. You are an inspiration.
I think the reason I love you, Sugar, is that you are such a bad ass with a truly compassionate spirit. Now that I think about it, I guess you really can’t be a bad ass without a compassionate spirit. It is just so rarely displayed in such an eloquent manner. Thanks.
Whenever I get feeling like this I listen to Bob Marley.
Try this on for size: “Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake Up and Live!”
So right on, Sugar. Fucking right on.
This is exactly what I needed to hear and I’ve just been too stubborn, selfish, and scared to realize it until now. I think you might have just fixed my life. Thank you.
“Because when I found that out, every tuning fork inside of me went hum.” Yes, indeed.
Amen, Sugar, amen. One of the points I like best is the one about how other people’s success bears no relationship to your own. Working from a scarcity model–if someone else gets X then there is less to go around, therefore I am less likely to get X–will just lead to bitterness and unhappiness. And it isn’t how things work most of the time anyway.
Be happy for all writers who get good book deals because they also go through the struggle of being artists. And their success might provide a path that you can learn from. It also might be a sign that more people are buying and reading books and that would be a fabulous thing, too.
Besides, when individuals experience success (professionally or personally) I imagine they feel happier. And happiness, like success, isn’t a zero-sum game either. I know this is cheesy but the more happy people in the world, the happier the world is. And I imagine less violent etc. (though I honestly don’t know but I like to think that). And, if you let yourself be open to it happiness can be contagious.
You inspire me!
This, is of course, spot on.
One other side to the whole MFA circuit is the installation of not just a sense of privilege but also the idea of being in competition with other writers. I have luckily not experienced much of this myself, but have seen evidence of a crabs-in-the-bucket mentality. One must ‘win’ by getting the book deal, the quicker the better. If you don’t, you are ‘wasting your life’.
A former high school teacher once met me while I was at work in a cheese shop, long after I had graduated from university and was struggling to find my feet. I told her I was trying out the writing thing, that I’d always enjoyed it. She presumed to tell me about a boy from my class who had ‘already’ written a book and had it published. Accusing me, somehow, of not getting my shit together fast enough, implying if I hadn’t done it now, I never would.It rankled, but more because she, as a teacher, was in the position to apply that kind of warping pressure to young people. She had put that pressure on when I’d been doodling in her class. ‘you’re wasting your life’ she said, because I was dreamily staring out of the window. It was luck, in a way, to hear this kind of nonsense from her and not from someone who had something to say about the actual writing, like a trusted workshopper, or writing professor, for example.
Make art, and you are only in competition with yourself, with the impulse or the obstacles to producing the best, most moving, challenging, weird and beautiful work you can.
I still haven’t got a book deal. I know people who deserve to have their work shared with everyone in reach, and yes, I have the same particular writerly egotism that wants to do the same with my own stuff. But like you say, Sugar, you write like a motherfucker, and that’s the important thing. You win life by giving the most you can, art, love, research, box-carrying, whatever.
I read your entire archive the other day — I love everything you’ve said, every bit of advice, every piece of yourself you’ve shared, every bit of compassion you’ve shown, and all the way you’re no-nonsense, and yet so sweet, without condescension.
Thank you, for this, Sugar.
You don’t need my approval or my praise, I know, but you have my gratitude, for this post, in particular.
It reminds me of my late father-in-law’s philosophy, which can be boiled down to four simple words (that I so very often need to remember):
Bitch less; give more.
Thanks for posting this. I’m a newbie blogger with 27 followers. One of my best friends, who has a completely different kind of blog and started about 2 months before me, has about 56. EATS me up inside that she has more followers… #HowDumbAmI? Ugh!! I totally needed to read this post.
I can think of more than one person who needed this kick in the ass, and hell, sometimes it’s me. Thank you.
SUGAR. Seriously. I, too, am a writer…much younger and greener than Awful Jealous Person. Sometimes that’s a good thing, sometimes that’s a bad thing. But to cut to the chase, I am publishing my novel with a small independent press after trying to bash my way into a literary agency or a major publisher with sheer persistence and force of will. I discovered that even though I love my book, it doesn’t really matter whether the editors love it or hate it, it’s whether they think they can sell it. Which is exactly what you delineated so beautifully.
I’m taking a leap of faith by going with this small publisher. They can’t give me a six-figure advance, or commercials on TV, or even ads in magazines. But they have shown immense love and professionalism in handling my writing, which means so much more to me than money. Maybe it’s just because I’m still a puppy (I harbor no illusions about how very young I am in the context of writing) and puppies get excited about anything, but to me it’s worth the risk, to be able to just throw my voice out into the sea of people in the world, and if one person notices and reads my writing and it helps them in some small way, I’m happy with that.
Wait – you really mean I’m not going to get $200,000 to write the world’s most devastatingly gorgeous book of poems?
Thanks, as always Sugar. You are so awesome.
Sugar! Thanks for inspiring this savage.
Wish someone would pay for me to go to college. jk!
I understand that need for notoriety. I blame it on being a Leo but we all want to feel successful and capable.
What a great kick in the pants.
You are amazing at getting to the root of things and you really dug into this one. Sound, practical and honest advice. We can all learn something from this… brilliant, as always.
While I completely agree that the letter writer has conflated the value of writing with the value of the book deal in a way that must be very confusing to her as an artist, I also think that envy and jealousy come from deeply wounded places more often than they come from a place of entitlement. Even people with good lives and good educations and supportive parents can have wounded places. While I think it is always good, in a place of envy, to remind oneself of what one has … it’s equally important, I think, to listen to and honor whatever lost self or old hurt is asking for attention with that jealousy. Just deciding not to be that way isn’t usually effective, any more than forcibly quashing any negative or ugly emotion is. I think it’s quite possible to feel jealous and make a conscious decision not to *act* that way, but I don’t think it actually is as easy as saying to oneself, “Don’t be silly.” That’s pretty dismissive of whatever hurt part of the self is trying to get attention with the jealousy.
Somehow I doubt that getting a book deal, or being a writer, is really what this is “about” for the writer of this letter. I wonder how the response might have differed if, for example, she’d written saying she couldn’t conceive a child and she was jealous of her friends who are mothers. Or if she couldn’t find love, and she was jealous of her friends who are part of a happy couple.
The jealousy being centered on her friends’ writing success makes it easier, somehow, to brush off the issue of what is hurting in this woman to make her envious. I think she’s more likely to figure it out by embracing that envy compassionately and asking it what it has to tell her, rather than deciding it’s silly.
entitlement = bad writing
Yeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah Sugar!
This would have been an Oh, SNAP!, but like everything you write, it goes so much deeper than that. Ha! Everyone in the world should read this, but especially all frenemies, haters, and MFAs in creative writing.
Love and love and love again.
Snooki made more last week from A Shore Thing than almost any of us will make writing in a lifetime.
My two cents for whatever it’s worth:
Feeling jealous of your friends certainly does not make you an awful person. Jealousy is so primally, inherently human that the very first pair of siblings in the world — according to our creation story — suffered the first fratricide because of it. According to our bible, even God — in whose image we were supposedly made — identifies himself as a jealous God. (And what does HE have to be jealous about? He’s God, after all!)
Perhaps my interpretation is wrong, but I didn’t read the part about the prestigious school as a claim of entitlement. I read it as the writer saying she can’t and doesn’t blame anything external for her “failure” — that on the contrary, she acknowledges that she’s had every advantage.
I have a rule for myself which is: you don’t have to feel the right thing, you just have to do the right thing. If a close friend (whose work I loved and respected) landed a huge book deal, I’d probably send flowers with a note saying something I could say in all honesty, like: “Congratulations on placing your truly great book; no one deserves it more than you.” I’d come to her book party and toast her; I’d buy the book; etc. And I’d give myself permission to feel whatever it is that I feel. If I trusted my friend enough, I might even try to be honest with her about my feelings. “I hate myself for feeling this way, but I can’t help comparing my situation with yours and feeling envious.” I doubt such an admission would shock anyone.
I had a close friend who found her life partner a few years before I did. A huge part of our friendship was commiserating over relationship issues and dating (mis)adventures. When she suddenly crossed the bridge to a secure, ecstatic place, I felt stranded and alone on the other side. If you and your friends have shared, and commiserated over, the artistic struggle, and suddenly they “arrive” and you haven’t, I would think that of course that would bring up all kinds of fear, sorrow, loneliness, etc.
I wonder if it’s even possible to be truly happy when someone else gets what you desperately want and don’t have yourself. As Joan touches on above, would we expect a woman who hasn’t conceived a child to be truly happy about the pregnancies of her friends?
I agree with Sugar that the work is the point, not the external validation. I think the work itself can often be the best therapy for jealousy. And I agree with Joan that we’d do well to consider our jealousy with compassion.
I meant to mention, in the case of my friend above, that I shared my mixed feelings with her, and she welcomed that completely, and most of my difficulty with the whole issue vanished in those moments.
Also, of course I meant “a woman who wants, but hasn’t conceived a child.” Didn’t mean to imply that every woman wants one.
Wow. What a lot of food for thought. I think this sense of entitlement is particularly pronounced in American culture. We have the highest standard of living in the world, yet all these folks are driving around in their SUV’s screaming that they want their freedom back, as if it’s been taken away. I recently lost a sibling who was the most voracious consumer, and ended up losing everything, including her life. She was a bottomless pit of need. She would borrow money and never pay it back, convincing herself that she deserved it more than the person she borrowed from. Her main motivations in life were jealously and mistrust. I have to look at myself and ask what part of that I share. I live on very little money and am the queen of finding resources, yet that can be it’s own trap, too, when i start to feel as if these things are owed to me, and get resentful of all the time it takes to try to get by as an artist in this world. I find comfort in reminding myself that we all are doing the best we can…. Getting a break is such a random thing. I’ve never been financially successful as an artist, yet I’ve managed to find ways to be creative my entire life. That is a much richer reward than making a bunch of money. Thanks for making me reflect on this!
This is beautiful of course, as usual, but I do agree with Elissa that allowing our feelings, greeting them with compassion, instead of just trying to put a stop to them, is the healthiest thing and the best way to allow them to pass in the long run.
“You might, for example, be interested to know that the word prestigious is derived from the Latin praestigiae, which means conjuror’s tricks.”
Thank you, Sugar! This word has always bothered me — particularly because I know so many writers who quite blatantly make Facebook and blog announcements about how they were recently accepted into or given something “prestigious”. It bothers me because trumpet-blowing bothers me, but of course there is always a little rue mixed in there. Knowing the etymology will help, next time. 🙂
I’m with Joan and Elissa. Jealousy comes from hurt. Anger comes from hurt. Grief comes from hurt. It’s OK to have those hurt feelings. Be gentle with yourself. We worry about being kind to others but a lot of us forget to be kind to our own selves first.
Baaam. nailed it!
Sugar, I’m so grateful to you. So happy to have found your column. You mean the world to me. 🙂
There isn’t a thing to eat down there in the rabbit hole of your bitterness except your own desperate heart.
Simply put, you stopped me in my tracks. I wait every Thursday for your posts, and am always moved, often to tears by your incredible empathy, compassion and spirit. But this, this is simply perfect.
Thank you for humbling this savage…
To those who argue that jealousy is about being wounded or insecure rather than privileged, honestly, the two aren’t really mutually exclusive. And whatever AJP’s wounds, Sugar nailed it right on the head about her privilege likely being a large part of her sense of jealousy. Her wounds stem from having been given too much and never having learned the rewards of struggle. Because she feels entitled to the things she wants, rather than looking them as goals, she likely feels inconvenienced by struggle, or that it’s a hardship she doesn’t deserve, and that it’s grossly unfair that others are having the type of success she wants without (what appears to her to be) as much hardship.
What happens when you are not born into privilege is that you understand the nature of struggle better. Struggle becomes a fact of life, and you don’t expect any different – when your struggle is rewarded, it is either a joyous surprise or at least a relief and a reward, rather an expected matter of course. The struggle itself – the work you do, and the sacrifices you make to do it, become their own rewards, in a way, and maybe you even appreciate the fact that you have the luxury to be embattled by such a struggle, rather than doing something you hate with no hope of pursuing what you love.
Further, when you struggle with others, maybe – at least I think it’s true of me – you come to see the successes they have – whether earned or stumbled upon – as inspirational and a sign of hope, rather than a cause for indigestion. God knows I’ve not lived my whole life without jealousy, but I can honestly say that when good things happen to my friends, I am happy and excited for them, because it renews my faith that good things can and do happen, and that maybe they’ll happen to me, soon enough.
In the meantime, I am grateful for the opportunities I’ve been given, that I get to eat regularly, that I get to write regularly, and that I get to talk about it on the internet at my leisure.
I love you, Sugar. I’m turning this into a poster and putting in on the wall of my classroom.
Learn it. Live it.
“while searching for an agent (which is turning out to be more difficult than I imagined)”
If it weren’t more difficult than you’d imagined, you wouldn’t value it.
Realize, too, that even when you sign that dreamt-for book deal, the temptation of jealousy and envy will not go away. Someone will always have more.
That’s interesting, Linda. Especially when on your own blog you write: “I fancy myself a writer. I’ve paid a fine academic institution way too much money to give me a piece of paper saying that I actually am one.” As if the, uh… prestige of the institution has the power to confer the status of writer upon a person (rather than, say, writing). Yes?
It’s nice that you see the successes of others — whether earned or stumbled upon — as “inspirational and a sign of hope, rather than a cause for indigestion.” I guess that’s except when it’s Joe The Plumber or Miley Cyrus?
You seemed really upset when they got huge book deals. In fact, to you, it seemed to represent nothing less than the end times of literature in America.
I’ve known lots and lots of people who were handed nothing, given nothing. They were just as jealous as the next person. I don’t think entitlement has anything to do with jealousy. Maybe it has to do with how hard we expect life and/or work to be. Maybe the letter writer *is* unrealistic about how hard the artistic life can be, how long it can take, and the fact that the world owes her nothing. That’s fair enough. But I see that as an issue separate from jealousy, which is the issue she was seeking help with. I think jealousy is the most universal experience there is. A 2-year-old baby with loving parents who attend to its every need will still be jealous when a younger sibling is born. It’s the way we’re wired.
This girl never said she *deserved* anything. She said she’s jealous when her friends land huge book deals, when she herself has yet to find an agent: the most natural, understandable feeling in the world. I truly doubt anyone anywhere would feel differently. It’s not a noble emotion, but it’s hard to believe how everyone is piling on this woman and bashing her for admitting something she already hates about herself and wants to change.
Thank you, Sugar, and the many people who commented here. I’m not having the jealousy issues, but the entitlement ones? Let’s just say I have a lot of rethinking to do.
Elissa:
Thanks for the thoughtful response, and for taking the time to look over my blog. You seem to have a couple of questions, or at least, it seems like I need to clarify a little, so I will.
In regard to the line about paying a fine academic institution to give me a piece of paper calling me a writer, there’s a lot of irony in that statement. In fact, I didn’t decide to go for an MFA to “legitimize” myself as a writer, but rather to figure out how to write better. It’s not the only way to do it, but it’s one of the few ways I found to do it and have the government loan me money to do it so that I could focus pretty strictly on writing rather than working a full-time job that inhibited my ability to write due to time and energy constraints. Your mileage may vary.
As to Joe the Plumber and Miley Cyrus’ book deals, there are a couple of things to address here. I know I probably wasn’t clear, but when I referred to others, I was definitely referring to friends and colleagues – people I actually know – rather than celebrities. I mean, I did mention my friends specifically, but maybe you mistook Miley Cyrus and Joe the Plumber for my friends? They’re not.
My upset at Miley Cyrus and Joe the Plumber getting book deals wasn’t about jealousy, but rather kind of a genuine flabbergast at the way celebrity functions in America. I mean, that was two years ago, so my perspective on the state of literature in America has shifted somewhat, but that’s really neither here nor there. I think you were trying to imply that I was jealous of Miley Cyrus or Joe the Plumber, and neither is the case. I’m not saying it wouldn’t be nice to be really rich (famous, not so much – that seems like more trouble than it’s worth), but it’s not really one of my major concerns. I’m more concerned about the cultural implications of people like that. But again, I’ve developed more indifference to it over time.
Elissa, I’m not saying jealousy is an experience limited to the overprivileged at all. However, I do think that this case in particular points to the things that Sugar was saying, and your vehemence about this subject – particularly the time and trouble you took to go read back however many entries in my blog it took you to find that Miley post – indicates that maybe you’re taking this whole thing a little personally, and that maybe this column – and my mini-rant about it – hit a little too close to home for your comfort.
Just sayin’.
Further, just to clear up another point, this girl’s sense of entitlement aside, she didn’t say she necessarily wanted to change it – she just wants everyone to admit they feel the same way so that she feels better, and justified, about feeling the way she does. I have friends who have agents, who’ve won crazy awesome fellowships, who are well on their way to book deals. I have friends who are enormously successful, who’ve had broad strokes of good luck, who are doing awesome. I honestly, no bullshit, can say I’m not jealous of them. It’s not that I don’t think those things are great, it’s not that I don’t want some of those things for myself, but I can truthfully say I have never felt like I was swallowing battery acid when I found out about them. The happiness of the people I love makes me happy. There are ways in which I am a petty, shitty, grimy little creature, ways in which I could and should be a better person. But I can sincerely say that I feel good when the people I care about feel good. And I think a lot of other people are that way, too.
Linda, thanks for your equally thoughtful response. I appreciate a respectful argument and I often go on to become a friend and/or fan of someone who’s willing to spar with me with honor and grace. If I knew your last name, I would look for your writing.
I did not assume that you were jealous of Miley or Joe, but that you seem to be questioning their entitlement — that word again — to publish. (“But what the fuck?! Nevermind this girl’s complete irrelevance to anything of any meaning or value – but she’s sixteen fucking years old.”)
As Sugar pointed out, the marketplace has little correlation with literary merit. So why should it be the slightest surprise that publishers believe that people will want to read what celebrities have to say, especially as their fans already admire their work and/or vision? Such books will make money, which is what matters to the marketplace.
It’s wonderful if you truly feel nothing but happiness when your friends get something you desperately want and don’t have. The reason I went to your blog is that I was very impressed with that assertion and wanted to learn more about someone who could say that. Your blog isn’t very long — unless I’m mistaken, just half a dozen entries or so.
I don’t think it’s true that this girl didn’t say she wanted to change her jealousy. She says she knows it makes her a “shallow awful person” and it makes her sick to know it about herself. You describe, again on your blog, that despite all the wonderful circumstances in your life — having a sweet, sweet gig and being able to do whatever and go wherever you want — you still — “WAH WAH” — want things you don’t have, just because you don’t have them. You said you talked this over with a friend who really helped you to reach a better place. You don’t specify how she does this, but I imagine she didn’t tell you to stop being a “petty, shitty, grimy little creature.” I don’t believe our flaws — especially the ones that pain us deeply, the ones we’re seeking help to rein in — make us shitty grimy little creatures, and I don’t think jealousy makes anyone an awful person.
First, it was great to read the letter. I’m not a fiction writer but a doctoral student working with a bunch of other doctoral students. I have to say the letter definitely spoke to emotions I have felt when a colleague has gotten one step closer to graduation, while I feel stuck.
Second, it was even more wonderful to read Sugar’s response. Her oh-so-subtle shift from gentle support to strong critique was excellently done. And she had some powerful things to say as well.
Third, it was the most wonderful to read the comments. Comments written thoughtfully and without rancor (with the exception perhaps of Elissa’s last one). Commenters who care about ensuring they are understood and their posts are grammatically correct. All of them made me think further into the letter and the response and provided new perspectives.
Usually when I share an article, I tell people to avoid the comments. This time I’ll make a point of saying they are part of the story. Thanks everyone.
Which part of my final comment did you find rancorous, Lauren?
I was just going to write to clarify! I was referring to the first 2 paragraphs of the post timestamped 9:50am. But it seems you and Linda S. are sorting it out.
Thanks for clarifying. I hope and believe we are sorting it out. I absolutely mean no disrespect to Linda S. I just honestly feel sorry for the writer of the letter — though maybe she’s perfectly ecstatic with Sugar’s answer. I do certainly identify with feeling jealous of all kinds of people in all kinds of situations. I also believe in the marrow of my bones that jealousy is a basic aspect of human nature, even of animal nature (my cat, for instance, is ferociously jealous of the feral cats I feed). I think we need to hold ourselves to a certain standard of interacting with loved ones, but I don’t think we should hate ourselves for how we feel. If the writer of the letter needs to separately address a sense of entitlement, fine, but I wish she didn’t judge herself so harshly for feeling jealous, an emotion that seems to me to be hard-wired into us by biology.
Am I the only one who finds this response out of character for Sugar?
The nature of the advice itself — “simply stop feeling that way” — is bizarre, given the number of people who write in with feelings they also struggle to control. Why is jealousy so much more easily subject to will?
And the last five paragraphs in particular felt misplace to me. The tone — particularly, “I believe your answers will deeply inform …” — is borderline accusatory. Yes, the writer puffed herself by noting she went to “prestigious” schools. Hardly surprising, given the circumstances of her letter. Is it so easy to conclude that her jealousy stems from an overinflated sense of entitlement?
I also felt that the statement ” I would ask a similar series of questions to anyone from any sort of background” wasn’t entirely true — certainly not all, and frankly very few of the Sugar responses deal with the letter writer’s socioeconomic status (or even self-image of the same). I can’t help but feel that this response had more to say about Sugar than the letter writer.
And the last sentence — I know it can’t be meant this way, but could it be read as mocking? “I have the virtue with which you struggle, and I will demonstrate it to you?”
I’m a big Sugar fan, and I believe in her good intentions. But I felt this response was a little unfair to the writer.
When I get jealous – of a book deal, a beautiful woman, someone who’s been to sixty countries – I tell myself that I will get a book deal too! I am beautiful too! I will travel too! It reminds me that someone else’s success/happiness/luck/talent takes nothing away from me (and to get my ass back in front of the keyboard!)
Love the column, Sugar!
Preach it, Sugar! Thank you for tackling this head on instead of writing “you poor thing”. All each of us can do is look after our OWN hearts, our own capability for empathy and understanding and love. And it WILL make his or her writing way better.
And thank you Elissa and the L’s for worrying at the problems until you had said exactly what you meant. This is what good writing needs: stubbornness and self-examination (mixed together).
In the poem “The Book of My Enemy Has Been Remaindered” Clive James tackles this same territory (making fun of his own bitterness) and you young’uns might find it amusing, but this discussion is way more helpful than that poem. (Clive James has spent his life “overcoming” his Aussie origins. Talk about self esteem problems. Authentic Australians rock; hug one today!)
I attended one school with history and resources, one that was a trade school with a new name and a tall tower, and one that wasn’t even accredited. All I EVER learned was as a result of failing and picking myself up afterwards; one can do that ANYwhere…for free even…
(At the not yet accredited school I pitched in and helped them edit the course catalog – on a 512K Mac, using the font Boston II, which was optimized for the clunky pixels on the first Imagewriter – they needed a nice copy to submit to the lowest-possible-tier accreditation board. Stop me before I reminisce again…)
I agree we’re hardwired to assess where we are, and not, relative to our cohort. That’s how the brain works, whether it’s obsessing about tribal status (what we 21st C. humans call “careerâ€), or babies, or the animal it wants to eat for dinner, or the animal it wants to have its babies. There’s evolutionary good in that wiring. People both use and misuse it for power. Who hasn’t traded on their set of privileges, and had expectations of return? Who among us can throw the first stone? I feel empathy for “Jealous Person,†not just for what they wrote, but also for the judgment that honesty brought.
So, dear JP, don’t feel “awfulâ€: Everyone harbors these feelings about something. You were brave to be so honest—not just with us, but with yourself. Sometimes it’s hard for people to admit, even to themselves, that they share in the darkness. People will find many ways to disassociate themselves from it. That’s why Sugar says she can just tell herself “Don’t be silly,†and hones in on your “privilege†and its assumptions. In doing so she makes huge assumptions of her own about the roots of your emotional life, which may reveal more about her biases than yours. And doing so made it very easy for other readers to rush to similar judgment.
Many of us recognize, intellectually, the American Dream as myth. That doesn’t mean it’s not etched into our collective privileged American unconscious enough to cause major disappointment. It’s presumptuous to argue that Dream’s expectations—that good education and hard work bring good life—are the result of individual privilege. We all have privileges and expectations, to some degree. We all check out our cohort to see how we’re doing. We all buy into the myth on some level. Even those of us who grew up in the projects and attended our prestigious schools on scholarships while we worked full-time. Maybe especially us.
And does a person’s jealousy harm them most? I don’t know. More often, I’ve seen jealousy destroy good people who were its target. Either way, then, it’s good for all of us to admit our envies and examine their sources. And learn how not to make these feelings a disabling focus of our lives. Sugar’s right about those things. But in the end, her advice, and her questions, are only as good as her own biases and assumptions.
So, dear JP, here are some alternate questions: What do you want in life? What are you willing to sacrifice for it? What concrete steps can you take toward it? Are you going to be okay when your dearest dreams crash and burn, because some, or even all, will? How can you fill your life and heart with things no one can take from you, that will sustain you when that happens?
Also: Who in your life loves you as you are? Whom can you tell these things to, without fear they’ll judge? Those people are your true friends, and way better than any advice columnist and her devotees. Talk to them. Silence and repression can be far more self-erosive than jealousy. Those truly on your side are the best guides and give the best constructive feedback to help you grow.
And it’s never too late to become your own best friend and advice columnist: What’s the worst thing about yourself? Write a poem, or story, in which you love that worst thing about yourself, see it for all its glorious human complexity. Start it today.
Good luck. I hope you write back to us all someday full of love for yourself, for the friends who love you as you are and through that love guide you, and for whatever you’ve found that’s made you happiest. xxoo
I agree that we should be compassionate with ourselves about our feelings and that feeling jealousy does not make one an awful person. One of the ways to move past a negative emotion is to clearly acknowledge it to yourself and the impulse for it, often some variation on fear but not always, and not hate on yourself for feeling it.
But once that is done sometimes it helps to firmly tell yourself you aren’t going to give that feeling more space or more power over your emotional state than it already has. For some people that diminishes the jealous thoughts. The book “Get Out of Your Mind and into Your Life” has some interesting ideas on ways to do that.
I am also grateful that Sugar addressed the issue of privilege. It is rarely a bad thing to consider where our expectations come from and how they impact our perspectives.
“Don’t be silly”. Sometimes that phrase pulls me away from that little negative voice inside me that imagines that everyone is walking off into the sunset except me. Now I can imagine it in Sugar’s voice with a “sweet pea” on the end.
pres·ti·dig·i·ta·tion   
[pres-ti-dij-i-tey-shuhn]
–noun
sleight of hand; legerdemain.
I found this inspiring too. Sugar has a way of making you think she’s going to scold you (“These are not rhetorical questions. I really do want you to take out a piece of paper and write those questions down and then answer them.”) But then she feints, dodging to a place that’s authentic and caring.
Gracie, your response was spot on. Thank you for so articulately and compassionately “rewriting” a different bit of advice that may help those of us who share in JP’s struggle, yet felt Sugar’s reply was unduly harsh and perhaps motivated by his/her own personal issues.
All advice is autobiographical.
@bryan – i felt the same way. it almost felt written by someone else with a few “sweet peas” thrown in for good measure.
Of course jealousy is part of a writer’s life. It’s part of every life. I don’t think feeling it makes AJP a bad person or a crappy friend or an elitist whose never struggled. The stakes are enormously high in this creative game. It’s difficult not to equate contracts and money with the idea that you are good at your craft. I don’t think wanting to succeed in the field and to be highly regarded by peers and others in the industry is a critical flaw – would you say that about someone who studied medicine? Or law? Or played tennis? The answer is way more simple that Sugar makes it out to be and could be delivered without an attack (or reference to a T-shit catch phrase) AJP needs to surround herself with the best writers she can so she can learn from them and professionally network at the same time. She needs to learn about the business side of things to help her land an agent and then navigate the stormy waters of the publishing biz. She needs to decide whether there is value in writing whether her work ever sells or not. Then she needs to keep putting one foot in front of the other and doing the work. There are many sources of inspiration in writers who couldn’t make a sale to save their lives or who were dropped by their houses only to find success. AJP should take some comfort in those.
Nailed it! And you nailed it with a compassion and a beauty I really doubt I could have mustered.
AJP, I know exactly how you feel. I’ve been there, done that. Doing that actually – looking for an agent is dreadful. We’re about the same age. But honey, when I read “I’ve written a novel…” I wanted to slap you. Really? You have a whole novel? Because I’ve written 3. And I’ve got a hard drive full of short stories. And every other real author I know has a box under the bed or a set of notebooks or a flashdrive full of unpublished stuff. Because that’s how we learn the art and craft of writing. By writing again and again and again. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from listening to successful published writers it’s that there are no over night successes. None. Some have it easier and sooner than others, but no one gets the golden laurel over night. That one shining book that sets the literary world talking represents thousand of hours of struggle and thousands of pages discarded that will never make it to the shelf of a store.
I had the privilege of talking to an award winning southern author at a conference and I asked him about his “first” novel. “What did you do with it?” I asked. “I shot it,” he said. He literally took a double barrel shotgun and blew the stuffing out of his first novel’s only manuscript. And the second one. Because they were so bad and so unsellable and they had cost him so much effort and pain. But if he hadn’t gotten through those (and a lot of short story writing) he wouldn’t have become the writer who wrote a book that actually deserved an award. (Note that getting an award and deserving it aren’t always the same.)
So please, AJP, as one writer to another. Take Sugar’s advice. Write for the love of it first and always. That’s the only antidote I’ve found to the “Why not ME?” syndrome. And may we both get paid boatloads someday.
AJP – Your question to Sugar came at exactly the right time for me, because lately I have been struggling with feelings of jealousy as well. I’m in my 20s, single, in a bit of a career rut and trying to decide if I want to go to grad school. And as I watch my friends enter relationships and find fulfilling careers and score better on the GRE than I do, I definitely wonder, “Why not me?”
Last night I was walking down the street with a friend and she was talking to her mother on the phone and she said something to the effect of, “I can’t put my money into a Roth IRA, the income limit is $120,000.” And I thought to myself, “Oh my god, you make more than $120,000 a year? I make less than half that.” And I consider her one of my best friends as well, and on top of that it was her birthday, so you can imagine how guilty I felt about the green eyed monster rearing up inside me.
And I’ve been thinking about this, trying to figure out why it raised such a strong reaction in me, and I realized that I had been jealous of this particular person before. On the other hand, there were other people I had never been jealous of, like my parents and my siblings and my best friend from high school and my college roommate. No matter what great things happened in their lives, I was always genuinely happy for them. What was the difference between them and $120K girl?
The difference was that these other people had shared with me their pasts and their struggles and their hopes for the future, so that I felt a genuine sense of empathy for them. Consequently when something great happened to them, I felt as if light were entering my life too. But this girl, the one whom I was frequently jealous of, was a fairly recent friend. Although we spent a lot of time together we had never developed the closeness that comes when you share your most inner self – your most vulnerable parts – with the other person.
Does that make sense, AJP? It seems to me that in this Facebook-status and Twitter-update world we are inundated with the success stories of people we barely even know, without ever hearing about their failures. No wonder that it is jealousy that develops rather than empathy. So my question to you is this – have you been honest with your writer friends? Have they been honest with you – about their struggles, their doubts, all of the shit that goes on in life? Because if not, then the quickest way to get rid of your jealousy might be to have that conversation – to remember that between small bouts of success we are, all of us, struggling. Once you figure that out I think your jealousy will naturally subside.
Hmm, good as always Sugar, but I dunno, I think maybe a smidge more acknowledgment of how difficult a creative field really is, and how hard it is to watch others get accolades, jobs, publicity, rewards, for work similar to yours, might be in order. Because it’s really, really hard. Yes, focusing on your own successes, your own luck, your own good times, of course that all helps. But in a real sense, every time you’re passed over for a gig, it’s a sort of failure. And failure smarts. Sometimes convincing yourself it’s worth it to work through the pain and get back up on the horse for the thousandth, millionth time, it’s really freakin hard. No pain, no gain, blah blah blah, but there’s a certain isolation and existential horror to the pain of someone in a creative field, one that our culture doesn’t acknowledge. So it would be helpful, I think, to allow it to be real, rather than just castigating the legitimately struggling creative worker for being a “bad friend.” Yes, get over it, keep working, of course! All of those things! But my God, can we just say how much it sucks sometimes?
oyou and charles b sugar –
writing
often it is the only
thing
between you and
impossibility.
no drink,
no woman’s love,
no wealth
can
match it.
nothing can save
you
except
writing.
it keeps the walls
from
failing.
the hordes from
closing in.
it blasts the
darkness.
writing is the
ultimate
psychiatrist,
the kindliest
god of all the
gods.
writing stalks
death.
it knows no
quit.
and writing
laughs
at itself,
at pain.
it is the last
expectation,
the last
explanation.
that’s
what it
is.
JP, I don’t know if you’re still looking at this thread, but it occurs to me belatedly that you should read a fantastic essay called “Envy” by Kathryn Chetkovich. The opening — which, in my opinion, speaks to the universality of jealousy in writers — is: “This is a story of two writers. A story, in other words, of envy.” Chetkovich was so jealous of her own true love’s success as a writer that she was actually grateful that the events of 9/11 eclipsed the publication of his book. I’m pasting in the link below and hoping it works, but if it doesn’t, the essay is all over the internet.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2003/jun/22/extract
@Elissa I was just coming here to leave a link to “Envy.” It’s one of the most honest essays I’ve ever read. (I wonder if it got any easier with Franzen’s publishing of Freedom?)
I’m jealous of how hot Sugar’s honesty is. But I’m not prestigious. 😉 xo
I didn’t read all of the above comments, so you’ll have to excuse me if I repeat sentiments.
You rock Sugar. You rock because after I read this letter I wanted to say, “Really?” And yet, you dug deeper, which you always do. You asked AJP sincere questions so that the real roots of the problem can be found. I read this letter and thought, “My God…if this is your biggest problem, I’d love to be you for a day!” But that’s not fair of me and makes me sound just as shallow. IT’s a knee jerk reaction to the entitlement issues that I see around me every day…that so much of our society believe they deserve A, B, and C simply because they exist, forgetting that getting A, B, and C takes work-hard work, time, patience, and the understanding that you reap what you sow.
I’ve learned through the years that for people that have led “charmed” lives, it’s harder for them to find happiness with just being who they are and what they have. Those of us that have spent more time just trying to survive and cope with our battles, learn that happiness is created, not given. We find pleasure in the little things life has to offer because for years, life was only offering dirty water and cheap shots.
Happiness is created. No one is entitled to anything. Success is relative. Everything is perception.
I can emphasize with (Not So) Awful Jealous Person, for sure. At 29 years old, I’m still waiting for a book deal for my first, co-written novel. I did both my BA and MA at ‘prestigious universities’. Two people a couple of years above me at my first university are now successful podcasters/reviewers/talking heads and I sometimes look at them and wonder if I’ll have that prestige when I get to their age, in just a couple years time. I know I need to work harder to get there, so I don’t know why I don’t just shut up and do it.
In the meantime, I’ll definitely be taking out a piece of paper and writing down my answers to the ‘prestigious colleges’ questions.
Can I be on the one hand “YAY!” and on the other *sigh*?
I wholeheartedly agree with being happy and being grateful and generous towards our fellow hard-working friends and that the American culture of “I deserve” is at the heart of our current tug of war between personal dissatisfaction/envy and rampant consumerism. Sugar, you did an awesome job nailing this response with tough-love compassion, wit, and deft writerly skillz
but
I’ll admit to getting snagged on an “oh not this again” when I read your and others’ reaction to “prestigious college” line because there is another American cultural phenomenon (maybe even a human one) to tear down someone’s accomplishments, which is not the same thing as envying them or being jealous of them, especially if it’s along an economic divide. Nowhere did our Jealous person say that his/her parents sent them to these “prestigious” schools and that presumption gave tacit permission to heap a lot of other judgments and generalizations along for the ride. No one knows how s/he got there or how s/he paid for it, but one thing is for certain: whether or not that person has put a lot of misplaced faith in a piece of paper equaling the right to be published, I am reasonably confident that s/he EARNED those diplomas. He or she would not have been accepted into a college or MFA program without having the test scores, grades, background or talents to do so, separate from the money issue. Few of these institutions hand out free passes. It’s an interesting that we Westerners personally want to succeed financially, but not succeed TOO much because we all know that rich people are evil, corrupt, spoiled, or ethically unsound and undeserving of whatever they have. No one wants to be that person and folks often feel justified in disparaging them (a sort of reverse-envy?). At Harvard, this is called the “H-Bomb Effect.” It means that no matter what, you will be sneered at for having a Harvard degree because people will either react with a) Oh, la-di-dah, this person’s from Harvard and must think they’re all that, or b) They’re from Harvard and don’t know X/Y/Z? HAHAHAHA! What happened to standards? i.e. You’re screwed either way and most often those who graduate say they went to “a school in Boston” to avoid the issue entirely. And, yes, I know this because I went to Harvard. (And it was something impossible to contemplate, paying my own way using my life savings, a lot of loans, and struggling to get accepted anywhere by volunteering in my field of choice and working two FT jobs to prove that I was worth considering.) I never dreamed of Harvard, it wasn’t even in my vocabulary, but I earned it. All on my own.
So while I applaud the sentiments and agree with 99% this amazing post, I wanted to point out this one thing that irked me: everyone piling on the “prestigious” bit and making some dangerous presumptions about entitlement, jealousy, and who does or doesn’t get the right to suffer based on their socioeconomic status. The idea I’d like to take away is that there’s more than enough success and good sentiment for everyone. Publishing is hard and whether you wrote one book or fifty books or a hundred books, every The End is a milestone and we’re all on this journey together.
And this is a damned fine bit of writing, thanks for sharing it!
While I agree that this jealous person does not represent themselves in the best light, that’s not what this is about. Sugar makes some excellent points. This is about re-framing the concept of writing and perhaps teaching this person that getting a great book deal isn’t the point of writing, and is not at all a reflection on the quality of their character (where jealousy naturally comes into play).
All this talk of jealousy takes me back to the playground, where a kid would get called a poor sport for making up excuses for losing a game. By seeking to undermine the fairness of the situation the individual hopes to lessen the blow to their competitive ego.
Being a poor sport is jealousy incarnate. It is an individual’s *fight* to retain self esteem by making up excuses for their loss; a coping mechanism used explicitly when dealing with a competitive outcome that an individual doesn’t want to believe is real or fair. We have ourselves a poor sport, and, unfortunately, on top of that our athlete doesn’t know what game they’re playing.
My advice to Jealous Person is to stop thinking competitively about book deals as a reflection on your abilities as a writer, and (if you have to) start thinking about them as a reflection on your abilities as a self marketer. Finding a deal has nothing to do with the schools you went to, it has to do with your ability to make your book sound awesome to the right person. Jealousy in this instance is blocking personal growth. As a good sport would, look at what your successful friends are doing, accept their successes (maybe even be happy for them), and try to learn from them.
Hear, hear, Linda S (April 1st, 2011 at 11:54 am)!
Kurt called it…
Everyone who sits in envy whining about others’ success needs to figure why they’re not getting it themselves. Everyone suffers through some serious shit along the path to finding an agent, landing a deal, getting the book accepted, getting it reviewed, finding readers, promoting it…People who are jealous are wasting the time and energy better spent figuring out what simply isn’t good enough within their control to clear the bar that their published friends are clearing.
I watched two friends, non-fiction writers, recently on the “Today” show. Was I jealous? No, delighted. Because their ass in that chair does not remove the possibility of mine following it. How could it?
I agree that two free rides to fancy schools will set you up to believe you’re going to succeed and feel like crap when others do. But that’s her issue to get over.
My second NF book is out April 14 — with my sixth agent and after dozens of other publishers turned it down. You need a shitload of talent, endless persistence and a Teflon soul if you really hope to last long enough to succeed in this game.
Right on, Sugar. You are constantly the voice of reason, and heart. Thank you for that. So good.
Great article. Of course the most valuable advice is under the surface. By diggin inside herself, AJP will uncover the kind of material every writer needs. Any institution can give you a piece of paper, but no school can teach you how to transubstantiate inner rubble into external art.
Dear Sugar,
Let it not be unclear that you engage us in ways we are not always
comfortable with. You demonstrate time and time again your familiarity
with territories both light and dark, the names of all our angels, all
our demons.
If we shout, struggle, twitch; we are simply shaking dust off of old bones,
doing our best to stretch old ribs, breathe deep, trace ourselves along the
fingerprints you left, and fly.
I want to speak for us all, when I say I appreciate every single honey,
every hammered sweet pea, every perfect letter you allow yourself to share,
and I love you for everything you are.
Dear Sugar,
I am a 64 year old woman who has been thinking and seeking all my life and still am. Feel like I have come a long way and still have a long way to go in understanding.
I think you are really wise. I admire and respect your wisdom. Thank you for your being.
Hey Dawn, the letter writer specifically mentions that she attended two prestigious schools and that her parents paid her tuition at both of them. Just sayin’.
I’m so with Sugar on this.
It’s about the writing. Put on your BIG GIRL PANTIES and stop comparing yourself to others.
That one can delineate their ideas, characters, stories, in the written word is a great gift all in itself. And hey, if an agent or publisher doesn’t take the initiative to get your work out there, just do it yourself. Think smashwords.com and amazon.
Then get to work and write like a motherfucker, because if writing is in your soul, no amount of battery acid belongs in your mouth, and you owe it to yourself to find some mouthwash in whatever form you can.
I have no quibbles with Sugar’s response whatsoever. Echoing the “PREACH!” chorus.
I can’t believe I missed this stunner on Thursday. When I read this letter, my guts clenched as if I was hit in the solar plexus with a rake. Like AJP, I’m fairly certain my previous best friend bailed on me when she got her totally outrageous, totally lottery ticket book deal (and, in addition, everything else any woman dreams of). I think I hated myself for being red with jealousy, and I fought it with all my might but it bled out in yucky green slime all over her and our friendship. She was a coward about communicating. I was a jealous, horrible, self-hating phony.
I’m going to pull a “Stephen Elliott” here and say, “it’s complicated.” When friendships are close and sororal, when two people are ridiculously intimate and have the exact same dreams in life, it gets real dicy. For example, two actors who are best friends. Both go out for the killer role in a huge film and one gets it and the other doesn’t. Both are talented. Both are sometimes assholes. But, the fact remains: Both women are uncomfortable and tense.
I agree with Sugar’s response. I also believe that I have to work towards my totally unreasonable dream of writing books for a living REGARDLESS OF MY CIRCUMSTANCES.
In the end, it doesn’t matter if I’m giving handjobs in a massage parlor (I am) or if I starfuck my way into a comfy marriage to a man who wants to float me a future of writing, it’s about the quality of the work. I ask myself all the time: Do I have what it takes because this is fucking hard.
FUCK YEAH I DO. Thanks Elissa Bassist and Sugar.
Great article; thoroughly great blog, too. I haven’t got the book deal but I have done okay for myself in the writing world. We have to promote other writers in this life, recognition is hard to find when there is so much competition out there! Funnily enough, as trivial as it may sound, I lost a few followers and some bloggy-friends seemed to drop off when I announced I’d published my book. Strange how folk react to other people’s good news. Yet when they have some themselves, they expect the world to bend over backwards to help promote them. Success works both ways.
Kathryn (CJ)
Excellent!
Goosebumps!!!
Loved the article. Sugar-sweet grapes-sour?? Thats about it really… I also think your blog’s great too. Keep up the good work.
Bull’s eye. This column is a gift to us all.
I think both Sugar and Joan (March 31, 9:25p) are correct in their assessment of the wellspring of jealousy, esp w/ friends.
Yes, there is usually some form of entitlement, the sense “I deserve this, but they’re getting it.” But that well gets dug often by emotional experiences that are deeply painful, often shameful.
And the irony about being ‘entitled’ is that deep down, people often feel DIS-empowered, and have a guiding belief structure that the only way they can succeed or have Good Things in their life is to have them handed over by some external force.
For that reason, while I suspect the self-examination exercise Sugar suggested would prove rewarding to anyone willing to be honest with herself (whether or not Sugar would truly have made the suggestion to someone from a lower SES), I’d move more toward suggesting AJP to get more active in her life in very concrete ways, and to do something that demonstrates to herself that she *is* competent and capable. And if she’s *not* terribly competent and capable, despite said degrees, then she needs to develop some competencies.
And seriously, writing books with a goal of getting published is like a taking a scythe to one’s confidence, esp if deep down, one does not feel terrible competent. I’m thinking volleyball or a learning foreign language or race car driving or something safe like that.
Of course, writing to become a better storyteller is a quite different goal, and a different competency to develop. The whole ‘getting published’ thing is not a competency. It’s, to a large extent, lightning. You can put a rod on your head by honing your storytelling craft, but you can’t make it strike.
In my experience, “Get over it” is very gratifying to say, but not terribly effective in producing change.
Additionally, I think it’s important to be aware of the role of attributions (attribution theory) in looking not only at jealousy or envy, but at our *response* to it.
The fundamental attribution error states that, in general, people attribute their own shortcomings/mistakes to EXTERNAL forces, i.e. things outside their own control, but attribute other people’s shortcomings/mistakes to internal, characterologic traits.
In other words, when I’m late, it’s because traffic was awful. When *you’re* late, it’s because you didn’t care enough to be on time.
Reading this (amazing, as usual) column, I couldn’t help but think of my greatest frenemy in high school. This girl had all the same interests I did: writing, subversive literature, music, fashion. She had an older sibling so she knew about way more cool stuff than I did. She dressed better, she was more socially mature, she was probably more intellectually mature, and she knew it. We should have been great friends since we had so much in common, but we never quite gelled and instead, she ended up stealing my best friend and they decided I wasn’t cool enough to hang out with. She was so condescending and mean to me. I hated her. Needless to say, we lost touch after high school. Fast forward to a couple of years ago, probably the year I turned 30. I was working on a novel I still haven’t published (I’m still working on it and still haven’t really published anything) – but I had also been living a full life, singing in bands and getting an MA and living abroad and having relationships and coming into my own. Other friends had published and I’d dealt with feelings of jealousy in much the way Sugar recommends, by acknowledging that they came from our broader cultural scarcity mentality and consciously choosing to embrace the “there’s room for everyone” mentality. My old high school frenemy found me on Facebook and wrote me a note to say she was glad to see I was doing well and would like to reconnect. I accepted her gracious extended hand and thought, well, people can change and maybe she’s not a bitch any more. Looking at her FB profile, I discovered that she had just published her first book: a memoir about recovering from the stroke she had at age 22. I think that was the moment in which most of the remaining jealousy I had about other people’s success fell away. It’s not that I think she deserved to be published because something horrible happened to her, or that I would rather never publish a book if that were the price. It was more a realization that each of us has her own singular path – we struggle in different ways and we have dreams about being a writer and life constantly throws unexpected shit in our way – and it is ridiculous to compare ourselves to each other. My old nemesis from high school probably would have become a writer regardless of what happened to her – if she hadn’t written about recovering from a stroke she would have written about something else, and maybe she would have been published at age 30 and maybe she wouldn’t have. In any case, there was just no possible way not to feel inspired that she had continued writing in spite of what had happened to her – that she had turned adversity into art. Since then, other friends of mine have published books, and though I feel a twinge of insecurity that is more about my own feelings of inadequacy for not having gotten off my ass and published anything yet, I have largely felt happy for them, and greatly enjoyed their books. I’ll never forget that hugely healing moment when I ordered a copy of my high school frenemy’s book and wrote her a brief note congratulating her. It felt wonderful.
I hope you helped “Awful Jealous Person”, because you sure gave me some food for thought. I am a visual artist, and this may surprise you, but we can be a bit, “Awful Jealous Person” too! Thanks for a great head check. I gotta go “focus on the art” now, be reading ya. Cheers!
This column provoked a 2000-word response out of me.
On writing, envy, and food: http://isak.typepad.com/isak/2011/04/there-isnt-a-thing-to-eat-down-there-in-the-rabbit-hole-of-your-bitterness-except-your-own-desperate.html
This is amazing. As a mother, I’ve deduced that jealousy is a universal sentiment that defies all logic. I see it every day with my kids. Basically, everything always looks better when somebody else has it. That said, there are always plenty of valid reasons to be jealous, too, especially when things appear, or are, unfair. I guess as writers, the best thing we can do with that jealousy is to try to re-channel it so it feeds into our inspiration and helps us keep writing. 🙂 Think: “don’t get mad (or jealous), get even!”
I’m with Elissa and Bryan. Jealousy is not the exclusive province of the “haves” nor the “have nots.” It’s a human condition. It’s also part of writers’ lives and a part of our times, where even those who went to “prestigious” schools and who might in fact be good writers or good teachers, have to try harder than ever to get their work into the world.For me, the best part of Sugar’s response in this post is the bit about separating “book deal” and “book.” I hope the writer of this question can take that advice to heart and that she (I think it was a she) doesn’t feel lonely and eaten up for being jealous. We all have shameful impulses. It’s how you act on the knowledge that determines what you’re really made of. For what it’s worth I’m the kind of privileged person who has in many ways been deeply insecure FOR BEING so fortunate as to have parents paying for good schools and the like. It’s true that struggle can be a great motivator and confidence-builder. I’ve seen it in friends who write like motherfuckers and throw it down with incredible power and courage. I have also seen myself blocked by the kind of self-hating stuff that happens when you’ve been given a lot but have yet to achieve the kind of result that makes up for the chances given to you (whatever “achieve” means). It’s hard not to get sucked into definitions of success and failure. We all tell ourselves stories about ourselves. We all have moments of gutlessness and cowardice and spells of schadenfreude. And we all have moments of hubris and self-aggrandizement–when we think we’re “the shit.” And we all have moments of grace, or at least the ability to be gracious and that starts with being honest about yourself. In the end, I think owning up to feelings takes courage and then the next step is accepting you’ve had some sucky, rather ungenerous feelings about others’ success. And perhaps you do something to mitigate that feeling–something outside yourself; even if you can’t bring yourself to gush all over your friend, go write a great Amazon review or buy her book for Xmas presents. And while you are busy atoning or accepting or whatever you want to call it, get your butt back in the chair and go to work. Everyone deserves success and good fortune if their work is good. Whether you get it or not is often predicated on both hard work AND good luck (cf. Malcolm Gladwell). You can’t control the luck; you can control the hard work part. Good luck, Awful Jealous Person.
“I see writers, generally, in every country, as a unity, almost like an organism, which has been evolved by society as a means of examining itself. The organism is not conscious of itself as an organism, a whole, though I think it will soon be. . . . If you see writers . . . as a stratum, a layer, a strand, in every country, all so varied, but as together making up a whole — it tends to do away with the frantic competitiveness that is fostered by prizes and so forth” (Doris Lessing, from the essay “When in the Future They Look Back on Us,” included in her 1987 collection “Prisons We Choose to Live Inside”).
http://amzn.to/gQKrcw
Sugar!
First off I gotta get one of those mugs; second where have you been all my writing life? At last a writer who’s not afraid to swear and swear well!
Just my little bit of info:
I heard a speaker at a con who advised those with “professional jealousy” to try and think of other authors’ place or level of success as “different” than yours rather than a two-fisted competition. Sometimes it works for me and sometimes it doesn’t but if it gets you back to writing with confidence and intensity, what the hell?
Personally, my best technique is to forget it and concentrate on my own writing rather than giving too much time to someone else’s career. It stalls your own creative and success engine.
Sugar, I think I really like you. You’re a sassy, cool creature, and you have my respect.
Here’s another take.
Us spiritual direction types don’t really see jealousy, if properly understood, as a bad thing. Yes, those feelings grow and can be stunting and even debilitating, but the most important question to engage is…”What does it point t?”
You might say, “an immature person” or “a loser”…but these common first responses don’t get down far enough.
Jealousy points off the map to passion…which is neither good nor bad, in itself. It is passion that gets us off our butts and helps us do great things (or horrid things, if we go down that path). Jealousy signals the passion in us, and tells us what it is connected to, and what we really hope for.
Rather than feel guilty, or malicious, or even normal, for feeling jealous, dig deeper and use jealous feelings as a helpful gauge, that doesn’t have anything ti do with that other person, and everything to do with what you hope for.
Then taking a baby step in that direction, and be thankful that jealousy helped make you aware. Don’t let it take you to ‘the dark side.’
cheers.
-Lisa
PS
I use a thesaurus, so I really can’t take a step backwards creatively and get a mug. …sigh…
This place is like ‘The Oatmeal’ of writing stuff. I want to love you, but yet, it stings.
Sugar, It appears I have a problem typing the word “to”… would you mind patching that nonsense up for me?
-Lisa
This is great advice. I love your point about the book and book sales being different. It’s difficult to focus on the creation when one needs to pay bills, impress the publisher, keep writing, etc., but once we get sucked in our writing suffers terribly. Love the column.
It’s absolutely normal to feel jealous of those who have what we want. I am pretty sure the majority of us have felt that way at some time or another, and I know that those of us who pursue creative endeavors especially feel that. As much as published writers credit their work ethic and persistence for their careers, there is an element of it that feels so damn arbitrary, like you had to luck into getting the right editor at the right time of the right day, or else your labor of love will never see another pair of eyes.
So of course it’s okay to feel jealousy and envy. But you can’t dwell on it. You can’t obsess over it. Otherwise it seeps into your heart and corrodes you from the inside out. Your work suffers. Your relationships suffer. And then what do you have? A bitter heart sitting alone in an empty room.
I like Sugar’s advice because, as harsh as it sounds, it is also exceedingly practical. There is no reason AJP (who, to me, doesn’t seem all that awful, but anyway) should continue to marinade in her jealousy. She’s felt it enough that it’s possibly harmed her close relationships, she’s acknowledged it enough that she’s written a letter to Sugar. Now it’s time for her to do something about it. Mindfulness isn’t easy and most of us don’t master it; that’s why its called a “practice.” But I think it will certainly go along way toward helping AJP to find a way to deal with the way she feels.
Some people do stumble upon something great without trying. But more often folks who look like they’ve lucked into something have also made good luck more likely to happen by being persistent and continuing the work even when things don’t look promising. Acknowledge the obstacles and the frustrations, then regroup and move forward.
All I can say is, thank you for this.
Has anyone seen the movie “Interiors”? One of my favorites, and gloriously apropos to the topic at hand.
I loved reading this. For someone who’s going into medicine, these lessons are extraordinarily relevant (given that the path to “doctor hood” is paved with many an ultra-competitive-cutthroat stepping stone), in terms of understanding the priorities that we assign to particular things in our lives. And how, oftentimes, those priorities counter-intuit or destruct our overarching goal and ambition.
What a fortunate day it is today that I stumbled over to this site and your fabulous advice. Clarity is a beautiful thing.
Can I get an Amen to THAT?
Thank you. A thousand times, thank you.
Your column makes me happy to be alive.
Ok, I know it’s awfully late to join this circus, but The Sun magazine ran some Sugar stuff in their June ish which I read yesterday, after which I got online and read through the Sugar archive. Wow, some good writing here. I do have one thing to add for AJP (and everybody else): I lived in L.A. awhile, long time ago, and was good friends with my neighbor the aspiring actress, who told me that one of her acting teachers taught that whatever happens to you in life, use it in your art. So, your lover left you? Use it! Your mom died? Use that! Your friend got a great book deal and you hate her bloody guts? Pull all the passion and venom out of that and slap it on the page! Have you gotten a story out of that yet? If not, you’re wasting some great material, and there’s a bonus: as you work your writerly alchemy on it, your perceptions of it will change, whereas trying to force yourself to change your feelings can just make you nuts.
I found you today when one of your Twitter followers posted the link to your blog. I clicked, I read, and I spent the rest of my afternoon reading your older posts. I am (truly) humbled at your sincerity, your compassionate honesty, and your no bullshit approach to pointing your readers in the right direction. You are so incredibly gifted with words and empathetic insight.
You have a new devoted follower who will be order a “Write” mug. I NEED one.
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I’m your newest fan!
Oh man. This is the best advice I’ve heard about dealing with artist jealousy next to Art and Fear. Thanks for writing this sugar, this is something the world (or at least all us artists) need to hear over and over again.
Jealousy is a perfectly normal emotion. Maybe this writer needs to work it out with a therapist. I don’t think it’s a good idea to tell someone to just “stop feeling” whatever it is they feel. That’s next to impossible most of the time. I believe we have to fully acknowledge our emotions before we can begin to let them go. “The best way out is always through.” -Robert Frost
The Stain that came straight down from Cain; but it all started with Adam and his madam.
Heckuva counsel, Sugar.
Oh, just to clarify, I didn’t write that letter. 🙂
This is how I bring myself back down to earth, and truly be happy for friends’ successes:
I remind myself that success comes not only from luck, and talent, and hard work, but also from who you know.
Maybe that successful good friend can help send your manuscript on to their editor one day. I write that also admitting that I know nothing about publishing, and perhaps writing and publishing doesn’t work that way. But nonetheless, successful people want to help their friends – especially the ones who do have talent, and deserve a shot.
Perhaps this adds a selfish twist to things, but it works for me. I really do enjoy my friends’ achievements, and everybody’s happier for it.
Just wandered in. Agree re: this sentence: There isn’t a thing to eat down there in the rabbit hole of your bitterness except your own desperate heart. I’m printing that out and keeping it at my desk. And you’re absolutely right about privilege and self-questioning — it’s hard to be honest with oneself, but it’s the best way out of jealousy.
It’s interesting that the jealous people in this thread focus on other people’s external success.
A decade and change ago, I wanted to write a book. I made it through the prologue with a lot of anxiety and effort, telling myself I could edit it later. But it was so, so bad. I had no idea how to fix it. And for a while, reading good fiction sent me into small fits of jealousy. I didn’t wish I had a book deal; I wished I could write that well.
I never did quite figure out novels. I had much better luck with songwriting. Though I’m jealous of the musicians who actually make money playing music, at least I know that I’ve created something good. In that sense, I did what I set out to do.
I just stumbled on your column today through a friend’s tumblr, and keep crying reading these posts, so happy to hear advice this frank and at the same time this caring and empathetic. I’m 23, and never really had a relationship with my mom where I could trust and put my confidence in her enough to talk to her about my problems. These columns for me are like getting the kind of loving but firm advice I have always wanted so badly. These really mean a lot to me.
Good lord. This made me acknowledge my selfishly “entitled”, petulant, childish behavior as of late. This made my face go red with shame. And then it picked me up off the ground and gave me clarity.
For the trillionth time… thank you. Thank you, Sugar. It isn’t an exaggeration to say that you have changed my perspective, my LIFE, since the night that I stumbled upon your kind, direct insight when I needed it most back in August 2011. I am bursting with love and gratitude for your existence.
Thich Nhat Hanh calls it sympathetic joy.
And I am feeling it for you today.
Thank you for re-imagining true freedom.
Keep writing.
I’m so fucking happy for you.
Keep writing.
It happens. I’ve struggled a great deal with jealousy. There have been times in my life when it really impeded my ability to enjoy what had. It was rooted in a deep sense of worthlessness that I’d acquired from a few childhood experience. Keep moving forward exploring and things will get better. Jealousy and envy can help us clarify our desires. It can also motivate us to get the hell out of bad situations. I think it reminds us of what we truly care about. Maybe you just need to respect the feelings and recognize what they really represent. The feelings are feelings, they aren’t you, and they don’t define your worth.
I really don’t like this response: it seems to demonize a very human and healthy emotional situation in a way that the letter writer is already worrying about. Isn’t it possible that, as a person who struggles with jealousy and feelings of inferiority when confronted with others’ success, this person has a very UNSELFISH fear of hurting other people the same way? After all, if my success is going to hurt my friends, aren’t I a better person if I simply wallow and procrastinate in my own imperfections–personal and professional? This is a big problem for many talented people, and I’d assume for most of us it doesn’t have a straightforward “Don’t Think That Way” solution. Sugar, you really don’t get to go all medieval on people’s asses because they want to succeed and envy their friends’ success. Envy isn’t an enemy to be conquered: it’s a message to be understood. And it’s not an impediment to success–personal OR professional.
You really can be both successful and a good friend. It just takes practice. And at the same time, there’s no shame in leaving a situation that continually makes you feel like neither.
Hi Sugar! This is an old post but deserves to be revived. I was a bit worried to begin with that you would placate and hold the hand of the whiner but I’m glad you kick her butt instead and really told her the truth. As a writer, shoot as anyone doing anything in the world, we all face the same demons. But if we let them win and allow them to tell us that we deserve, more, better, bigger, nicer, etc. then we become as you say whiney little bastards who believe far more in scarcity than in abundance. I do my best to ALWAYS celebrate success and creativity in anyone anywhere anytime. There is more than enough to go around and I am incredibly blessed with all I have been given. Thanks for the reminders! ~Kathy
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