Society has an uncanny way of training us to think and act certain ways.
This can be a good thing and a bad thing.
We learn from advertising, books, and movies as much as from the people around us.
What is love?
How do we show that we love someone?
How many times have you seen a movie or read a book and seen one of the following:
- One partner feeling good because the other feels jealousy
- One partner deliberately provoking jealousy as proof that the other partner loves them
- Lack of jealousy being evidence that one person does not love the other
- Some form of conflict or fight between one partner and a third party over interactions with “their” partner
Basically, if we love someone, we feel possessive of them in an exclusionary way and feel jealous if someone else tries to intrude on our territory.
If we want to know if someone loves us, then we should attempt to provoke a jealous reaction.
But is that really what loves is? I licked it and so it’s mine?
These kinds of tropes are used so often, that we equate this kind of behavior to a part of the romantic process. Not only should we want to be in monogamous relationships, but we should want our partner to focus solely on us. Our partner becomes a kind of turf that we’re expected to defend as proof of our affection.
Jealousy is not about love. Jealousy is insecurity.
Jealousy is lack of trust in ourselves.
When we’re insecure about our relationships and our appeal to our partner, their attraction to us, then we feel jealousy. Because that casual interaction with another person might be the start of them ultimately leaving us. Because that other person might be better than us, have more to offer.
Jealousy is lack of trust in our partners, in the bond we have with them.
If you’re worried that your partner might run off with anyone they meet and find interesting, what you’re really worried about is that you’re not interesting enough for them to stick around.
No matter what they say, you see a risk because you see a lack within yourself.
We’re trained to want this jealous behavior while at the same time not wanting too much of it. There’s a fine line between romantic jealousy and toxic jealousy we’re told.
But what if I was to tell you that all jealousy is toxic.
Because it is.
Jealousy is projecting your insecurities on the object of your affection.
You don’t trust them because you don’t trust yourself. You make your partner responsible for your insecurity.
This is not healthy. Ever.
The only person who can make you confident in yourself is you.
The only person who can make you confident in your relationship is you.
Insecurity is an insidious toxin within our minds, but the only one who can do the work is you.
There is nothing your partner can do to assuage your jealousy. It will never be enough, no matter how far they go to alleviate it. Because it’s not about them. It’s about you.
So if jealousy isn’t love, what is?
Trust.
Trust has nothing to do with the number of partners in your relationship.
The flipside of the jealousy as love narrative is the expectation that we’re in a relationship with only one person. This isn’t the case for everyone.
If you don’t feel jealousy, then you open the door to not just healthier monogamous relationships but also healthier polyamorous relationships. Whether you have one partner or several, trust is the cornerstone of love.
We’re told so often that we should pick a partner and defend them against all comers that many individuals who would be interested or happier in a poly arrangement never try it, believing that they could never do it. They believe that they have this jealous nature because they’ve been told it’s the way relationships work.
I believed that about myself for years. It always felt surface, like repeating a lesson out loud, but I didn’t question it. After all, that’s how I’m supposed to feel about a partner, right?
We’ve romanticized jealousy, but the reality is that it’s a toxic element that is impossible to keep in control.
Imagine that, instead of feeling jealous because your partner is talking to someone else, you don’t care because you know they wouldn’t do anything nefarious. What if you had the communication to know that your partner likes to dance but you don’t, so if you go out and they’re dancing with someone else, you know they’re having a good time.
Jealousy focuses on the existence of another person and how close they are to your partner, but cheating isn’t about the number of partners. As long as everyone is communicating and being honest, there is no reason for jealousy. Simply having multiple partners is not cheating.
Cheating is about lies and hiding things. If that’s happening, then there is a deeper problem. Being jealous over someone who is or has cheated isn’t going to solve the real problem.
The classic cat fight over a cheating partner is a fantasy that is fed to individuals as training for them to be jealous over a partner and believe that the third party is the problem. There is no trust and jealousy steps in to fill that void. But it can’t.
If you don’t have trust, if trust is broken, then the love is broken as well.
Jealousy is not love. Love is trust.
