Love Is Not Jealous or Envious Either (Love Is . . . Series)

Have you ever been in a relationship with someone who’s jealous? Jealousy is like a cancer to a relationship. Thankfully, there is a cure to jealousy. Before we talk about the cure to jealousy, we first have to talk about what are the root causes. Jealousy comes from 3 things; Insecurity, lack of trust, and fear. If we are going to be people in secure relationships, we need to have the ability to be aware of how these things may be causing jealousy in our relationships and marriages. 

Feeling some jealousy from time to time is a normal feeling in a relationship or marriage. I believe in most healthy relationships, a bit of jealousy should be present. Imagine if you saw your spouse flirt with another person, yet you felt no jealousy concerning their actions. Think about why you don’t feel any jealousy or envy. In that scenario, your devotion to your partner would be questionable. When we feel threatened or when we feel our love being threatened, the feelings of jealousy are evoked. We can have a healthy relationship with jealousy but if there are consistent or habitual feelings of jealousy, you have a problem. Jealousy, when not misused or abused,  is a sign that you care deeply about your relationship and you are willing to do anything to protect it. 

I believe the number one thing that causes jealousy is insecurity. Typically you don’t feel secure in yourself or your relationship. When this insecurity pops up, you try to hold on too tightly to the relationship. This is a vicious cycle because most healthy people don’t want to be constrained and controlled. When jealousy pops up in a relationship, the other partner typically feels like they are walking on egg shells and has to watch out for every little thing they do. The jealous partner will often become triggered by every little thing, causing them to hold on tighter and try to keep things in their control. This all stems from insecurity.

Lack of confidence and security can often cause this type of jealousy in a relationship. The triggered jealousy may not even come from something that happened in the relationship, but something that caused the insecurity prior to the relationship forming. You can’t ever make an insecure person secure. They need to do the work on themselves to heal this.

If there has been trust issues or past cheating in the relationship, you will typically see jealously flair up in a relationship. It’s important that each partner is able to heal if there was lack of trust in the past. If the healing did not happen, the problems will consist in the relationship. You can’t just simply forget infidelity happened; you have to be relentless and intentional to destroy the toot and its effects if that’s the case.

Fear is similar to insecurity and can show up in many ways in relationships. Oftentimes, people are afraid of losing the relationship and being alone. Fearful thoughts then become jealous thoughts. Some spouses fear not being fully loved by their partner. The fear of not having full commitment can cause partners to spiral and be overcome with jealousy. This fear can cause people to unintentionally sabotage the relationship. Fear has been called False Evidence Appearing Real. This is exactly what happens in jealous relationships. 

There is a cure to jealous relationships. We need to start getting real with our insecurities. This starts with going inward and understanding things that you are struggling with in yourself. Oftentimes, we project our insecurities onto other people. Don’t do this. Self-awareness is key when it comes to overcoming insecurities. You can start by recognizing an insecure thought and redirect that thought to love and empathy. Change your thoughts and begin to think about the good qualities you have. 

Next, look and probe your relationship for breaches of trust. There are times when you are simply discerning something that you need to pay attention to. It’s one thing to be aware of how your discernment may be watching over to protect your relationship, but it’s another if this discernment becomes obsessive and controlling. 

Last, be willing to deal with the fears that are controlling and sabotaging your relationship. We often have fears that pop up in our marriage that makes us jealous. We need to get real with these fears that pop up that cause us to think our partners will leave the relationship. Returning to love will help with overcoming fears.

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