2021 — A Year of Growth and Reality — January 29th, 2021 — Jealousy
Today was a pretty hard day. I ended up going home after work and breaking down in my dimly lit hallway, because I couldn’t even make it all the way to my room… You know those movies where it shows the person expecting to get a promotion because they’ve been with the company forever and have given their best the whole time they’ve been there but then when the big board meeting happens, their name is not the one being announced and celebrated? I had always been able to feel bad for them and think “Wow, that’s horrible, I can’t believe they didn’t get it.” But today, I finally felt just a pinch of how frustrating it really is.
When I came into work today I was informed that someone had gotten a promotion to the position I had been working towards the past 5 months that I had been employed at my job. Now of course if it was someone that had worked their for a while too, even if they had started after me, I would understand, but the person that got promoted had been working there for a week. I knew the person from school and I even helped them get the job, I’m not sure if I would consider us friends rather than acquaintances but either way I feel like I should have been happy for them to start working with me and for them succeeding in this job.
Immediately when they told me they had gotten promoted, my mood completely flipped. Today was one of, if not the, shortest shifts I’ve ever worked but it felt like the longest and most miserable one yet. Usually when we’re busy it makes things feel like time is just passing by, but today we had reached the largest amount of net sales I’ve ever been there for and it still didn’t change a thing. Three of my coworkers ended up asking if I was okay or why I looked so distant and each time I just gave them a happy smile and said “Oh no, I’m fine.” But anytime I would think about how much work I had put into this job and how unfair that it felt that they just started and already got promoted, it became so hard to hold back the tears.
When I ended up talking to my mom and boyfriend about it, they helped me remember that everything happens for a reason and this job is only temporary and I could leave whenever I want. My mom really helped a lot by reminding me that it really could be a blessing in disguise and with the fact that I’m not able to drive yet and my main focus at the moment is school, having more added on responsibilities may not be the best thing for me right now anyways.
I still keep getting the intrusive thoughts that I deserved the promotion more than her and the feelings of frustration and hurt but I’m hoping that time will help heal me and give me a better understanding of why things turned out like this. I do believe that everything happens for a reason and it takes time for me to remember this sometimes so I just know I need to be patient and let life play out. I hate the feeling of jealousy and really do think it is the stem of so many bad outcomes as well as bitterness within a person so I will try to learn to separate my own hurt away from other’s success, even if what I lost was their gain.
