Almost every morning I wake up early and go on a walk with neighborhood friends. And of course we talk the entire hour on everything from gospel topics to what’s happening in our kids’ lives. We all look forward to fun conversation, laughter, and, of course, exercise.
The other day on our walk the conversation turned to a frequent activity some of my friends were doing together that didn’t involve me. Almost immediately a feeling of jealousy started to well up inside of me. It was one of those emotions where you feel like an outsider-like you should be doing something to avoid being left out. It really wasn’t a big deal. I just wanted to be as close to them as they are to each other with this one activity.
I am not typically a jealous person at all, but every once in a while that unwelcome feeling will creep up and look for a home inside me. Jealousy in any dose brings unhappiness, and I hate the way it makes me feel.
With all the busyness of getting the kids off to school and taking care of the little ones at home I gradually forgot about the conversation. But later in the day when the kids were down for their naps and I had some quiet time with my mounds of laundry, I began to replay the morning’s scene in my mind. Just as those negative feelings started coming back, words from Elder Holland’s April 2012 conference talk popped into my mind:
“We are not in a race against each other to see who is the wealthiest or the most talented or the most beautiful or even the most blessed. The race we are really in is the race against sin, and surely envy is one of the most universal of those.”