The Phenomenological Analysis of Envy, by Michael Kelly, Routledge, £35, 160 pp, ISBN: ‎978-1032423760.

Have you ever felt pained by the success of a neighbour, friend or colleague? Did you feel a tinge of irritation, maybe even shock (a feeling you had to work hard to hide), after you heard of a colleague’s promotion or bonus, one that you failed to get? What of social success you don’t have? Or financial success you lack? What of parental success that eludes you? Or success of any kind that you do not have but covet? Does the other’s success perturb or disturb you? And does it make you anxious, unduly competitive, insecure and generally miserable? And finally, do you feel inferior because you lack it?

Usually, we describe this internal or existential pain as envy. It is not quite jealousy nor is it joy you feel in a colleague’s failure (schadenfreude), though they are conceptual cousins. But what is envy, really? And how can we become aware of its presence in ourselves? Are there preventative measures to protect against its ensnaring control? Can we inhibit it before it infects our soul?

Aristotle observed 2,500 years ago that envy manifests as ‘a disturbing pain and directed against good fortune, but not that of one who does not deserve it, but of one who is our equal and like’. Augustine asked, about 1,500 years ago: ‘What could be more miserable than envy?’ Thomas Aquinas proclaimed about 800 years ago that envy ‘is feeling sorrow at the other’s achievement of good’. Descartes noted 400 years ago that envy’s emotional make-up is a ‘vice consisting in a perversity of nature whereby some are vexed by the good they see befalling others … and in so far as it is a passion, is a species of sadness mingled with hatred’. What more is there to be said? Envy is morally perverse or simply ‘bad’ all around, is it not?

Envy is a form of sadness mixed with shock, what the author of a recent excellent book on the theme calls a distressing feeling that can only be described as ‘galling’. Michael Kelly’s The Phenomenological Analysis of Envy argues in smooth prose that envy operates like a negative feedback loop, or a trap, whereby galling distress about another person’s success prompts further feelings of distress at one’s own lack of success. It need not involve hatred, but it does involve begrudging of some kind. And this can take up so much emotional energy that it shuts down one’s own pursuit of success. One can get stuck, so to speak, in envy’s glutinous whirlpool.

What I appreciate about Kelly’s research is not that envy can harm the envier or the one being envied. Or that it always involves desire for what one lacks (I can’t be envious if I already possess the success of the other). He makes that clear. What I find compelling is Kelly’s capacity to tell a story about what envy is ‘not’. Even though envy must entail comparison with another individual, it is not same thing as emulation. Envy is also not resentment. Nor is envy a species of extreme jealously. Discussing each of these will further illuminate the structure of envy’s pathology of comparison.

Kelly wisely perceives a ‘thin line’ between envy and emulation. Both undergo the pain of experiencing a neighbour’s superior in standing, status or excellence. Say I see my neighbour receive a promotion and purchase that beautiful new home down the street. I say wow, what an excellent property to be in possession of and well done on receiving a promotion. I feel like I want to duplicate such excellence and the material goods that ensue. But my motivation originates in a feeling of inferiority (since I lack that possession and the money it takes to purchase that new house). In other words, emulation and envy both involve a moment of self-assessment that ultimately counts as a moment of inferiority, however fleeting. Both envy and emulation, therefore, involve us in a comparison between me and the superior other.

Wherein lies the difference between my envying and my emulating my neighbour’s status? The difference resides in the stance I take on how I see myself. Emulation stimulates me or spurs me on to imitate the other without diminishing my sense of self, whereas envy ‘demeans the self and (at least) begrudges the other’. Emulation enacts a comparison with the other that does not rob me of my worth nor does it undermine my relationship with the other. Not even ‘emulative envy’ remains a possible exercise, according to Kelly, since envy always involves self-reproach. The philosophical connoisseur will be alert to the resonances between Kelly’s proposal of healthy imitation versus toxic imitation and Rene Girard’s work on mimetic theory.

Resentment is often formulated in the Nietzschean terminology of ressentiment, which need not detain us at length: it simply invokes the idea of being bitter toward that systematic injustice against which we feel powerless. Resentment would suffer from impotence to do something about the perceived problem or grievance. But impotence as a phenomenon also belongs to feelings like grief, resignation, humiliation and embarrassment, to some degree. What is resentment? And how does it differ from envy? Both suffer from desire and nonfulfillment, and both suffer from comparison inferiority. But what marks their individuation from one another?

Let us return to the example of the big, beautiful home my neighbour just moved into. Envy expresses the feeling of desiring a good that I lack, which is the lovely new home. It also teaches me to continue to desire excellence in acquiring material goods, a desire that is the root cause of my envy. In contrast, resentment tells me that I should never like large, beautiful homes and that anyone who does like them is risibly foolish. And yet, it seems society at large proclaims their value by assigning to these large homes a sizeable price tag. If no one wanted a large home, then the price would be very low. But since they are sky high, resentment sets in. A fuming hatred follows and grows, expressed about the housing crisis and socioeconomic system that permits expensive homes – and resentment typically isolates that whole system as blameworthy for my misery and that of others. How ridiculous the housing system and what a social ill it is, says the one full of resentment! But a further qualification of resentment is necessary here: that I (who is inclined to feel resentment) feel utterly impotent in my capacity to do anything about the problem. This impotence, in turn, dwells as a latent negative energy in me, and causes me to hate the whole idea of housing, capitalism and so on.

Kelly is careful to point out that envy never engages in the hatred of housing and big, beautiful homes. Nor does envy fall prey to impotence. Some who envy may resort to work, barter, crime, violence or cheating to improve one’s situation. Or more typical of envy is that it may cause self-pity, admitting the superiority of the other and adopting a negative self-image that projects itself in an attack of the other’s superiority. My neighbour might be good at making money and thus putting himself in a position to purchase a beautiful home, but he’s terrible at making friends, or he’s no good at sports, or he’s had three divorces. So, naturally, he’s not that good overall! Envy leaks out in these kinds of back-handed compliments (attached to passive-aggressive insults) dished out by the envier. Resentment may exclaim that the whole idea of the housing system simply functions to distract us from real life and, further, does nothing more than drain society of valuable financial resources. Envy, in contrast, forever clings to the desire for that home with a swimming pool, an outdoor kitchen and a four-car garage.

The final chapter is worth the price of the book. Here, in a climax of sorts, Kelly writes of a pernicious kind of jealousy that he names Zelotupia, a Greek word for the English vocabulary of ‘jealousy’. It bears within it a further existential vice, a deeper form of ‘sadness mingled with hatred’ that goes beyond envy. Zelotupia involves the pain and sadness over another coming to have what one already has oneself. Kelly concludes that Zelotupia is more ‘vicious’ than envy. I agree. Imagine the following scenario, and perhaps we have all been there: a mean-spirited and selfish individual feels obligated to deprive another of a chance to enjoy something they already have and could easily share. I once knew a person who hosted everyone for dinner. This individual would ensure everyone had enough to eat and made more than enough food. But when a guest of whom she was jealous stepped out to take care of the needs of her baby, the host would hasten all the food away, either by serving it to others or throwing it away. This passive-aggressive behaviour escalates into the domain of cruelty, where the host wishes not only to protect and guard ‘her goods’ but also to inflict pain on an innocent other by deprivation.

Kelly’s book is not only a moral warning to these kinds of cancerous attitudes, but a manifesto urging us to be conscious of them. Do I guard my goods and protect my status, friends, children, my own reputation at the expense of everyone else? Do I hurt people so I can feel superior? Do I hurt people because I cannot help but feel inferior? When I am selfish, why is it that I am acting that way? What moral psychology feeds my inner pain when I see my neighbour’s success? Why not celebrate it with them? Philosophically rigorous and stylistically pleasing in its prose, the book’s underlying message evokes a basic theme often seen in self-help manuals – and I say this as a compliment. Too often philosophical research descends into abstract argument, but not with Kelly. A favourite line is in the acknowledgements, in which the author dedicates his book to his teenage son, Austin. Telling him that ‘envy just isn’t worth it, buddy’, Kelly offers an antidote: detached gratitude for all the goods and gifts that we have, even though it is easy to think we are missing other experiences, things, gifts and skills that others possess. To be envious, then, is to get stuck in an endless cycle of desire and nonfulfillment. It is just not worth it.

Envy originates in the psychological, philosophical and spiritual problem of one’s own sense of self (or lack thereof). While Kelly implies this, he could have said more about the role of negative preoccupation of self. Another way to describe the cause of envy is the absence of self-love. Narcissists, for example, are known to be great enviers. Why? Because they have no real secure self. They do not really know who they are and thus do not enjoy a sense of self to love. Because they are vacuous, they feel compelled to project their insecurities on to others. This leaks out in not-so-subtle critiques of others, verbal takedowns (my colleague is so lazy), passive-aggressive compliments or in the form of control (I won’t include my neighbour in important conversations that I know would improve both of our situations). Narcissists express their pathology in a notoriously competitive attitude, a defensive posture that often seems to come out of nowhere. Envy, however, is a symptom of something deeper, a preoccupation with one’s lack of self. This reveals an even deeper cause: a lack of self-love. If I love myself, and if I see myself as lovable, then no such feeling of inferiority needs to arise. One of the best ways to practice self-love is to celebrate another’s self-love. In this act I cease fixating on what I lack, and envy may lose its existential bite.

Kelly mentions the timeless novel Abel Sanchez written by Spanish existentialist Miguel Unamuno in 1917, which features a rich account of the inner torture of envy. Joaquin, the main character, cannot stop fixating and ruminating on what he lacks – always in comparison to Abel, his childhood best friend. Perhaps if Joaquin realised he is worthy of love, he would relinquish himself from the trappings of envy. While he seems acutely aware of his envy of Abel, he cannot bring it under control. It spirals. It deepens into dread and melancholy concerning the very meaning of existence. Joaquin describes his inner world in lurid detail: he’s full of cold hate. He feels the ‘gangrene of hatred’ that makes it impossible for him to love himself or anyone else. Loveless and cold, he feels like a ‘spiritual invalid’. When he attends confession in the church, he tells a priest he is held hostage to envy. It produces alienation from his own life and family, and he is mired in a ‘seed-bed of horrors’. The story culminates in a direct comparison to the biblical story of Cain and Abel. For no reason other than envy does Cain kill his brother. How am I, Joaquin asks himself, any different? And should I not hate myself? Filled with nausea at his own behaviour, Joaquin wonders if he has any free will left. In a word: he has no self to love.

Envy is a symptom of an invisible cause, what I call a lack of ‘self’ or, more precisely, a lack of a secure self. Because there is no secure self, the envier cannot help but fall prey to the trap of comparison. And the feeling of inferiority grows, sprouting up from a ‘seed-bed of horrors’ and attacking the self. According to Abel Sanchez, envy tends to metastasise like a cancer, so much so that takes over the whole soul. It feels terminal, as if the envier’s agency and free will have been drained. Playing with envy is like playing with fire. It just isn’t worth it and should come with a mental health warning.