I get jealous.

I hate that I do, but I can’t help it. My heart drops in envy when others succeed, but my nerves relax in relief when they fail. Call me a terrible person, but I am sure that we have all felt this way before.

As humans, we are naturally competitive.

We are constantly competing against each other for made-up titles that supposedly define the amount of power we hold as individuals.

Although I do believe that competition is necessary for growth, our competitive nature has reached an extreme, to the point where we are ruining relationships for personal gain.

Obviously, we want to succeed. I mean, who doesn’t?

But, when we don’t get that job promotion or the admittance letter to the most prestigious college, we find it difficult to feel joyful for those who were recognized because we want to be the ones acknowledged. We want what others have.

On the other hand, when we are recognized for our accomplishments, we have an automatic response to be proud, and we should feel proud. However, our pride often veers off into unintentional boasting.

We are so focused on our own successes that we fail to take into consideration the situation of those who weren’t awarded.

Now, we don’t mean to bring down those who weren’t recognized, but secretly, we do it because it makes us feel better about ourselves.

We want our peers to acknowledge our accomplishments, yet we find it difficult to acknowledge the achievements of our peers.

Our struggle to celebrate the success of others is one of the most difficult challenges as human beings.

We view the success of others as the failure of ourselves. However, it should not have to be this way.

The success of others does not define how successful we are in our own lives. After all, success is relative to an individual.

Success is measured based upon where we start and where we end up — not where we lie in comparison to others.

In life, you win some and you lose some, but so does everyone else. So, stop throwing your friend under the bus, and start lifting each other up.