The Creative Jealousy That Drives Us

My Green Monster of Jealousy

It’s not that I don’t want other people to do well. It’s not that I am a naturally jealous person (wait, is it?). It’s not that I don’t have my own “thang” going for me. But when you are a Creative, and trying to make a living as one, jealousy seems to rear its ugly-ass head in the dumbest, most debilitating ways.

Just the other day I received an incredibly nice, and somewhat undeserved, message from a fellow writer who said she was jealous of my blog. I had to re-read the message five times before my brain was willing to comprehend what she was saying. This writer, a woman I have always admired and felt jealous of since the day I met her, actually said: “I was depressed all weekend because your blog is so much better than mine.” What?! Come again?

I will hold her message to heart for as long as my insecurities plague me (so pretty much forever), not because it validates my mad skillz, but because it validates the green monster of jealousy that I always thought of as my own private weakness. To realize that the people I envy for their talents and creations are also capable of being jealous of me is like finding out that Starburst sells packages full of only the Pink and Red flavors (oh yeah, I’m totally serious, hit up a QuickTrip near you).

Now I realize that jealousy is not just a disease of the unemployed. Although, since I’ve been unemployed, I have had ample time to peruse the online portfolios of the unemployed ad talent out there right now, and it’s enough to make anyone want to throw their portfolio in the trash and cry in a corner. It makes me wish that we could send all of this unemployed talent to an abandoned island and call it “The Lost Land of Advertising Fame;” there they could probably start a war, or at least convince people to join a war, and maybe win a shiny award for a really great Super Bowl ad. But since this is unrealistic, I am forced to compete with these people who ooze creativity from every pore while I sit around, oozing nothing but sweat, fear and envy. Given these circumstances, putting my rinky-dink portfolio out there feels like wearing a bathing suit made of bacon and then going for a swim in shark-infested waters. At this point, I’d have better luck trying to tap-dance my way into a job.

On a positive note, I have found that this type of jealousy and creative combat can be an excellent source of motivation, and thus I have started another blog, which will serve as my resume/portfolio/bio/pseudo-professional site. You’ll find the link in the side bar, and also right here. It’s not much because I haven’t done much (I mean, geeze people, I’m only 24 years old, which is practically 12…if you divide it by two), but if you have feedback, advice, suggestions, or other projects that will help me beef it up, and create seething jealousy among other ad talent, feel free to drop me a line.

In the meantime, I’m going to put on my big girl pants, which means a slightly nicer pair of sweatpants than those I slept in, and keep on truckin’, because I’m a ninja unicorn, damnit!