A Jealous and a Possessive Mind
There were twenty theatre enthusiasts of a college who participated in the audition for staging the annual college day play. In all six roles were up for grabs, which included one female and five male characters.
As a safety valve, the well-feted and cerebral director handpicked one additional female lead and two male characters. The first choice was a female lead that was attractive, vivacious and bubbling with talent. She felt wretched sharing stage-space with another plucky woman.
Her covetous and jealous mind, instead of concentrating on the character and performance, kept plotting strategies to run down her perceived opponent, much to the consternation of the director.
At his wits end, the director opted for the alternative and assigned her the lead role. The tempestuous woman burning with envy was clearly irresponsible.
The world has become exceedingly ruthless and is not populated by monks and sages. Renunciation today is seen as an act contemptibly performed by someone lacking in courage. Competition fuels the aspiration to lunge territories and enlarge the area of dominance.
8 | Make the mind Mt. Kailasa
Companies, countries and communities have all become wary of the material success of their ‘competitors’ and in the process compromise with their goals and objectives. Consequently, they resort to shortcuts in order to emerge triumphant and victorious. These vicious methods do not generate positive externalities, but endanger their own existence. In the long haul however, only public good can sustain and run organisations. Maybe to interdict or preclude something evil, they indulge in charity or philanthropy. This perhaps results in providing largesse to the community at large, but originates from a guilt complex. Maybe that is why the Mahatma advocated the philosophy of trusteeship.
“You can be the moon and still be jealous of the stars,” writes Garry Allen.
The attribute of jealousy arises in an individual when the mind is possessive of certain belongings. Essentially, they fail to appreciate it is primarily inadequacy and deficiency in the personality that triggers this kind of capricious and mercurial behaviour.
Interestingly, envy in many also arises out of shortages. There can be lack of aptitude, talent, resources, connections, opportunities, or because of unfavourable outcomes. This engenders negative feelings towards perceived competitors, which culminates in jealousy and other negative feelings.
Individuals subsumed by jealousy build walls of possessiveness and false security walls around their personalities. Such minds feel cheery about their possessions. They attach importance to this property, literally clinging on to it. This could be a physical property, position, power and pelf, pleasure or sex.
As per the Mahabharata, Karna was extremely jealous of Arjuna, which eventually proved to be to his nemesis. Similarly,
Feelings, Emotions and the Mind | 9
Dev Dutt remained extremely envious of his enlightened cousin, Buddha, which led to his downfall.
The jealous and possessive mind is acquisitive by nature, taking both animate and inanimate objects for granted and gets attached to things like an addiction to alcohol or marijuana. Additionally, such a mind is perpetually petrified at the prospect of losing acquisitions. Fear in such minds harbours negative tendencies such as hatred, greed and ruthlessness.
For instance, in the case of the college theatre mentioned earlier, the more talented actress became fearful and was gripped with hatred and greed. Her ruthless mind kept conjuring tricks, trying to outsmart the second lead and in the bargain lost the plot. Jealous and envious minds have become laboratories of antagonism which spew hatred.
“The jealous are troublesome to others, but a torment to themselves,” writes William Penn.
How do we overcome attributes such as jealousy, envy and possessiveness?
At one end of the spectrum are organisations and authorities which need to take up this responsibility. This includes proper parenting, where children are brought up on ideals of inherent goodness, an effective educational system which imparts values as part of their pedagogy, governments which take up the responsibility of providing equal opportunities to the citizens and makes an attempt to carve out an egalitarian system, and a society that addresses the core issues of humaneness amongst its citizenry. Vasudaiva Kutumbakam (or one world family) is the net result.
This may appear altruistic, but is an effort to restore some semblance of sanity in society, which otherwise is plagued by avarice and jealousy.
The spiritual touch is an important colour in the rainbow
10 | Make the mind Mt. Kailasa
of goodness. One can practice any faith, but we need to be tolerant of other peoples’ point of view. Spirituality succeeds where religions draw the fault lines and wave red flags.
Globalisation has made the world flat, but has resulted in an exponential increase in crass commercialisation and human minds have fallen prey to the traits of jealousy, envy and possessiveness.
The vicious tendencies of jealousy and possessiveness can be tackled by following the two-fold approach highlighted, so that the chasm between individuals diminishes.
Manifest plainness Embrace simplicity Reduce selfishness Have few desires
— Lao Tzu
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