Elisabeth McKay

You're going to make very toxic assumptions about what people are doing and why.

And ultimately, you end up becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I have seen many a girlfriend ultimately destroy their relationship while in their mind they're trying to protect it.

And certainly this can go the other way with men doing this to women.

I'm not saying that it can't.

It absolutely can.

In a way, your emotional addiction cycle ends up manufacturing evidence through confirmation bias to justify or support why you should keep pushing, why you should keep being suspicious.

And jealousy, by the way, is also one of the primary roots of gossip.

division and quiet destruction of all types of friend groups, employee groups.

Most people don't want to admit it because jealousy is very rarely presented honestly.

Most people aren't like, hi it's me, I'm jealous, I'm going to destroy your life now because I'm jealous.

It often will disguise itself as criticism.

I've even seen this be disguised as spiritual discernment.

fake concern, passive aggressive behavior, superiority, false humility, especially if we're talking about covert narcissism, moral outrage, or I'm just being honest, in air quotes.

But underneath, it's often that their existence triggers something unresolved in me.

That would be the honest, if they were really, truly being honest, that's what the answer is.

And when people refuse to acknowledge jealousy in themselves, it is dangerous, especially to the people who they've placed targets on their backs.

I have had a target on my back for this behavior literally since the moment I was born.

But truly, in my adult career, this happens frequently.

far too often and it is exhausting it's so easy to see and it's so easily corrected if somebody could just be honest because you can actually learn how to rewire these patterns but you can't if you compartmentalize and pretend that it's not happening