Transcript + vocabulary list + exercise:
Transcript:
[00:00:00.610] - Oliver
Welcome back to English and Beyond, a new intermediate English podcast for learners of English as a foreign language. For this podcast, I'm publishing a free transcript, which you can find online at www.morethanalanguage.com. I promise to you, listener, interesting and unusual topics, and I hope to deliver. I am a jealous person. I confess it. As far back as I can remember, I've always been jealous. Jealousy is defined in the Oxford Language Online Dictionary as feeling or showing an envious resentment of someone or their achievements, possessions, or perceived advantages. This is, unfortunately, a definition I can relate to, although it causes me pain to admit it. Why does it cause me pain? Well, I think that jealousy is almost universally recognised as a negative emotion, and to admit openly you feel it, seems to me to be an almost admission of fault, an admission of some deficiency of character. I think that perhaps the most common kind of jealousy is in relationships. Oddly, this is one area of my life in which I've never really been that jealous. This kind of jealousy often occurs to a person when a third party talks to their partner, maybe flirts with them.
[00:01:23.580] - Oliver
I've seen, in films and real life with friends, people react extremely strongly when their partner receives a text from an attractive singleton, or this flirtatious third party lightly and laughingly touches the arm of their girlfriend in a club, for example. For me, this jealousy has always seemed quite a negative trait too, but I'm always surprised by how many people defend feelings of this type. Often people talk about needing to feel respected in this context, that their partner is not respecting them by engaging in this flirtation. But this is not a jealousy that I feel very strongly. Listener, you therefore might ask what provokes, that is, causes, feelings of envy in me. Well, I've always been very jealous of other people for their achievements, the things that they've accomplished in life. We talk in English about someone turning green with envy, and the idea that grass is always greener on the other side. I don't know why the colour green is so associated with envy. I felt jealous when I see people speaking foreign languages better than me. I go to the gym a lot, and I feel envious when someone else has a better body.
[00:02:36.480] - Oliver
Listener, you may feel surprised or even staggered to hear these sources of envy, because they may be areas of life that don't matter at all to you. If you were here, you might tell me just to get over these feelings, to forget about them. This perhaps isn't surprising. Every individual person has areas of life that matter more to them, and naturally cause more jealous feelings like money, career progression, popularity, none of which actually make me that jealous. Now, I'm not saying that I spend hours at the gym burning with resentment and envy whenever I see someone with a better bench press than me. Instead, I try to recognise that it's unhelpful and unhealthy to focus on other people's achievements. They say, and I'm inclined to agree, that comparison is the thief of joy. It's certainly true for me, and it's something that I've been trying to work on for the last few years. So, introducing my podcast partner again, César, tell me, in a word, are you a jealous person?
[00:03:46.080] - César
I think I'm not, but you probably can answer that question better than me because you also know me very well and you might see things differently. Do you think I'm jealous? Am I a jealous person?
[00:03:58.390] - Oliver
No, in reality, I don't at all.
[00:04:00.850] - César
I feel jealousy, for sure. When do I feel jealous? I think I feel jealous - I don't feel jealous at the gym. I was thinking, do I feel jealous when I see someone very attractive? No, I just think, oh, he's very attractive. I don't think I would feel jealous because I want to have their attractiveness. I feel jealous with the language thing. It happens, especially in the past. I felt like, wow, this person has the most incredible English accent, and he or she's Spanish, and I would feel jealous about that. I would feel jealous about how some people have the ability to communicate really well. Also, I think one of the things that I feel most jealous about is when I meet someone who is very serene. I always think, wow, it must be incredible to live a life so serene and in balance and peaceful.
[00:05:12.720] - Oliver
Well, I mean, you've actually already answered my second question, which was what provokes jealousy in you? I think that's probably quite an unusual answer you've given, serenity.
[00:05:24.080] - César
Yeah, I had in the past as well, and as well now, had some flares, no? Like, temporary episodes of jealousy about professional achievements. Or I don't know, I felt jealous in the past if I fancied someone and that person didn't fancy me back, but they fancied someone else. Of course, I think it's natural.
[00:05:51.310] - Oliver
I think that one is very common, in fact, that you fancy someone and then they get with your friend and you're heartbroken. I think that's happened to everyone.
[00:06:00.080] - César
It hasn't happened to me. They went with someone else, but not with my friend. That's horrible.
[00:06:07.910] - Oliver
Well, I mean I think it's, I, you know, I think it's, um, I think it's fine because I think it depends on the context, no? But I've been in clubs where a friend of mine has seen someone that they fancy and has really wanted to kind of get with them, and then this person has actually gotten with someone else in our friendship group. I always feel quite strongly that you can't reserve people. You can't say, "Well, I wanted to get with him or her, because it's just, it's, you know, people, people don't belong to anyone."
[00:06:41.630] - César
This is clearly a cultural difference.
[00:06:45.130] - Oliver
Because in Spain, you're like, no.
[00:06:47.440] - César
We get labels!
[00:06:50.300] - Oliver
Yeah, so, but I think, as I said, generally speaking, I don't feel romantic jealousy very much. Whereas for other people, that often is, kind of, the big type of jealousy. I think some people hearing the topic at the beginning of the episode will have definitely assumed that I would be talking about romantic jealousy.
[00:07:13.020] - César
Do you think you can feel jealous and happy about someone?
[00:07:18.500] - Oliver
Yeah. Do you mean happy for them?
[00:07:20.250] - César
Happy for them, yeah.
[00:07:21.340] - Oliver
Yeah, I think definitely because I think it depends on the relationship you have. But for example, I've definitely been jealous of my siblings, but absolutely happy for them. I'm been jealous of you, but absolutely happy for you. I think it depends on what it is exactly you feel jealous of. Something else that I found quite interesting about jealousy is that, and this sounds so modern - and I say that pejoratively -
[00:07:53.480] - César
You said that how?
[00:07:55.070] - Oliver
Pejoratively - like, you know, as criticising it - but naming your feelings, I think, sometimes can help, so I'm thinking in particular, actually, about my ex's current boyfriend. He speaks Spanish so incredibly well. He has the most incredible accent for an English native speaker. He's got all the mannerisms and the oral mannerisms, the sounds of thinking that differ in each language. In English it's "um", in Spanish it's a bit more like "eh", that kind of thing, so he just sounds amazing, and I remember calling up my ex or talking to my ex about him and actually saying, "Wow, I'm so jealous of this guy's Spanish, oh, I'm jealous of these different aspects." I think that's a strange thing to say to your ex, but it took away the feelings of jealousy that I felt.
[00:08:48.860] - César
Yeah, it's very strange, but you said to me in the past, sometimes like, I'm jealous of this, about me. Yeah. And it is true that if you say and if you are honest, brutally honest with someone and say, I'm jealous of you because of this, that might prevent being resentful with that person. Because sometimes jealousy becomes resentment, right?
[00:09:14.230] - Oliver
I think a lot of the time. And I think by talking about it, it actually, ironically, turns what can be quite a negative, all-consuming feeling into something actually quite nice and positive, because essentially you're complimenting someone, aren't you?
[00:09:29.850] - César
Exactly.
[00:09:30.310] - Oliver
But obviously, there are lots of circumstances in which you can't do that. If I didn't have a good relationship with my ex, I couldn't say to them, I'm so jealous of your new boyfriend, or something like that. I think it depends on the circumstances that you have. But let's say, my final question, really, let's say that you don't like being a jealous person or you don't like feeling resentful and envious about a particular person or thing. Do you think it's possible to change?
[00:10:03.530] - César
Well, I think if it's pathologic jealousy, as we say in Spanish, I don't know if that exists, that term in English.
[00:10:11.930] - Oliver
Pathological.
[00:10:12.780] - César
Yeah, pathological. If you're a pathological jealous person, that might be a problem. But I think it's like anger or sadness, they're emotions that you have to confront, you have to deal with.
[00:10:25.120] - Oliver
Can I just clarify? So by pathologically jealous, do you mean someone who's standard emotion, almost, is to resent other people's success. Exactly.
[00:10:35.330] - César
Yeah.
[00:10:35.820] - Oliver
So maybe in that case, it's necessary to go to a therapist. Exactly.
[00:10:39.760] - César
Yeah. And that might happen. But otherwise, I think you can transform, or not transform, but just use that emotion and say, okay, I'm jealous because this person is really good at doing this. It's some form of admiration as well. You look up to someone when you are jealous, actually.
[00:10:58.440] - Oliver
Yeah. It's funny that you should say this because I actually... So I had a session with my personal trainer today. That is someone who helps me in the gym, gives me exercises to do and pushes me harder than I would be able to push myself. And -
[00:11:14.920] - César
That's what personal trainers are for!
[00:11:17.110] - Oliver
Exactly. So during the final set of one of my chest exercises, he's kind of like clapping me to pump me up, and he said, "Use that self-loathing." Because he knows me very well now after two years, and we joke about the fact that I would say virtually every success that I have had in my life stems from some negativity that I direct towards myself. And I suppose that, jealousy could work quite similarly, that it could drive you on to work hard. And I think lots of people do. Although, I suppose there's always the danger that the good things from that are lost in the context of the negative. Because someone in my life once said to me, "Resentment is like chewing poison or swallowing poison and hoping that the other person dies." I think that's quite a good metaphor because jealousy might drive you on to achieve good things, but you're still feeling that negativity.
[00:12:28.060] - César
Actually, sometimes, jealousy It's not about what someone has achieved, but the resources they've got to achieve that thing. You know what I mean?
[00:12:38.930] - Oliver
So you mean that you maybe wouldn't be able to... If you're jealous that someone has had the money to allow them to do all sorts of travelling.
[00:12:48.710] - César
The connections, the money, the intelligence, the - anything - the strength.
[00:12:55.300] - Oliver
Yeah. I suppose all of these things come down to self-acceptance as the(se) things so often do. Okay. Well, thank you very much for your opinion on jealousy and whether you are a jealous person, César. That's it.
[00:13:12.540] - César
Thank you, Oliver.
[00:13:13.260] - Oliver
That's it for another episode. So as always, listener, if you have any questions or feedback, feel free to email me at oliver@morethanalanguage.com. And as always, please don't forget to rate this podcast on your listening platform.
[00:13:31.850] - César
And recommend it to other students.
[00:13:34.120] - Oliver
Tell everyone. Tell your mum, tell your sister, whoever. Tell people in the street.
[00:13:40.220] - César
Spread the voice.
[00:13:41.250] - Oliver
Spread the word, I think people say normally. Maybe spread the voice is an alternative, an alternate idiom. So, have a lovely week and hopefully see you next time.
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