As you can see in this picture, my wife and I have a puppy – his name is Teddy and he’s almost 6 months old.
For the past couple of days, we have been babysitting Christina’s parent’s two dogs and it’s been fascinating to see the interaction between the three of them.
The most significant thing that my wife and I keep on noticing is the interplay between love and jealousy.
- When we come home, the dogs love us. But when we begin to pet one of them, the other two become jealous.
- If we are going to give them all treats, they love us. But when we give the first one out, the other two are jealous.
- If we hold one of the dogs, that dog loves us. But the other two walk towards us and either whine or look at us with eyes of jealousy.
How often, as human beings, are we also like that?
- When we receive a gift from a loved one, we love that person. But when our loved one gives a gift to someone else and forgets us, we become jealous.
- When we complete a project or a task and people positively acknowledge our work, we love them. But when the only work being acknowledged is someone else’s, we become jealous.
What exactly is the relationship between love and jealousy?
I believe it’s a battle between our human/sinful nature and a life that is fully devoted to God.
“The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: …jealousy…But the fruit of the Spirit is love…Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.” (Galatians 5:19-25)
Which side is winning in your life?
Man that is so true. I Love REAL people!
AMEN!
I dig your thought process…i wouldn’t have paralleled that.
But i can definitely say i struggle with asking myself when someone doesn’t acknowledge something i’ve done a really good job on (to me) at all, but they say something to someone else. Am i jealous, or am i more hurt by that person?
Is that truly the same thing, is pain and jealousy the same thing, because in my opinion its what you do with that pain, of whether or not you become jealous or you become humble.
any thoughts?
I really like this blog you did a really good job.
Hey Gev,
Thanks 🙂
I believe pain and jealousy are closely linked together, but that they are different.
To me, pain seems to be a received (passive) emotion; whereas, jealousy seems to be an invoked (active) emotion.
However, at the root of both emotions there lies a human soul that is desiring love, rather than hate.
Good point,
so do you think that animals operate in the same way? Do you think that animals have emotional battles with jealousy vs. pain like we do, or do you think they just have one or another?
personally i think that they can have both, we just can’t truly tell. We only see what we want to see in any situation, whether it be with a dog or a person. because people have a complete ability to feel more then one feeling we sometimes only see one of them, and not the deeper more important one. do you agree?
any thoughts?
I don’t think that animals have emotional battles because I don’t think they’re capable of that kind of mental thought process. I don’t even think they’re capable of reasoning. I believe their brain works on a cause and effect sort of system.
They can experience pain, and I believe they can experience jealousy, but not both at the same time, but what do I know? I’m not an animal psychologist. haha.
Good point that we want to see what we want in any situation, but I think that’s due to our ability to reason.
haha yes, you aren’t an animal psychologist, valid point there. my thought is this, do you think maybe god instilled us with more then just durable thumbs and the ability to feel to make us different from animals?
Because if animals can feel, but only due to cause and effect, then what makes them any different? We can because we assume as people we think we know exactly what is going on, when really we have no idea. There fore we are running off of a cause and effect type of mentality. But we feel more then just one feeling, we feel several, so is it really, or is is something more?
thoughts?
what’s the breed of your dog?
Hi Vanessa!
It’s a bichon maltese