Day 8 - Revised content about the sins
Sins Beyond Jealousy
[Now I know where to use this tidbit from day 6]
Alice and Bart are sitting around, being exhausting to themselves, to their friends, to their families.
Alice: I feel exhausting.
Bart: Yeah me too.
They think about what movie they want to watch, and they both draw a blank
Alice: Didn’t you have that film friend who recommended something?
Bart: Yeah. There was some horror movie about what happens when the Swedes and the Norwegians have a dinner party. Some kind of horror of manners. You know a comedy of manners? It’s like that but horror.
Alice: Sounds horrifying.
Bart: Yeah, I’ll go heat up the pizza.
Alice: Hey Bart, I was thinking about something.
Bart: What’s up?
Alice: I was thinking that we could go to that waterfall I used to swim under every summer when I was a teenager. We can go and be romantic or whatever.
Bart: Yeah being romantic or whatever sounds fun.
Alice: It had all these rivers and all these rocks. You can climb the rocks. Sometimes it is dry, and you can walk on the river, and there are these trickles of water. There is forest everywhere. Sometimes there are people around, but sometimes there isn’t a person in sight at all.
Bart: That sounds fun.
Alice: Yeah. And…well…we haven’t done it….outside in a long time. This could be the time. There’s nobody around…
Bart: But where would we throw away the condoms? We have to really be mindful about not upsetting nature. We could really get in trouble.
Alice: We don’t have to use condoms. We can go when I am in my we-don’t-need-protection zone.
Bart: But Alice. Didn’t you bang Crazy Rick the other day without any condoms? How do I know you don’t have any STDs?
Alice: Bart that was your dream that you had about me with Rick from Rick and Morty. That never actually happened in real life.
Bart: Hmm okay. It’s a plan then.
Alice: Yay!
Bart: But you have to do something for me.
Alice: Uh oh what is it.
Bart: I want you to let me fly my drone. I want to take pictures of you with my drone. You know. Before or after we do it.
Alice: whaaaaa—-
Bart: Yes. There won’t be people around. Nobody will be startled. If I crash it, it will be okay. I want to take photos of you with my drone.
Alice: well alright.
Crazy Sam: Oh hey guys what are you talking about
Alice: We are talking about going to the river sometime soon.
Crazy Sam: Oh that sounds great. Can I come?
Alice: Yeah!
Bart: Wait…uh…it might be….cold.
Crazy Sam: That’s okay that is not a problem I have sweaters.
Alice: Hurray!
Bart: But wait we uhhhhhhh might have plans
Crazy Sam: What’re you guys going to get up to?
Bart: We might take extremely boring drone shots
Crazy Sam: Oh I know how long that takes to set up, yeah, I’ll do something else. Meanwhile I’m gonna go shopping, later.
Bart: Alice what was that
Alice: Hmm?
Bart: Why were you inviting him to our special thing that you yourself wanted as your special thing!
Alice: Oh. I just thought I was answering his question.
Bart: You didn’t think he would actually want to come?
Alice: Oh yeah I thought if we didn’t want him to come we could just tell him later
Bart: But then he would already be excited about coming. It would be a whole emotional roller coaster
Alice: Are you, Bart are you’re being jealous?
Bart: What!? No. He can come. Whatever. I was just excited because I thought you were wanting to do something special, just the two of us, and I was excited because I thought you were excited.
Alice: Uh huh. That’s a great rationalization of you just being jealous.
Bart: What? No! I’m not jealous. I am feeling the feeling I am saying I am feeling.
Have you ever told someone they are being jealous, but actually they say they are feeling something else?
There is a good chance that they are actually feeling what they are really feeling. Probably some amount of jealousy, but often primarily, they are indeed feeling the other feelings.
There are many emotions beyond jealousy that can really harm relationships. Even in the case of cheating, often when cheating ends a relationship, versus being something that is survived, a number of other emotions are involved and never resolved. The cheating often shows that there are no plans, desires, or intentions to resolve the emotions, or that the plans have not been working and are given up on in some way. Sometimes, the cheating itself is intended a solution when other things are not working. In a case like that, sometimes the situation can be resolved when the (non-cheating) partner still really likes their partner, and registers the situation as a wake-up call rather than as a reason to try less in the relationship.
Remember the previous exercise about the variety of sinful emotions.
There are many feelings involved in relationships! And many vices! The classic pride, avarice, wrath, envy, lust, gluttony, and sloth, are just some.
Now, with these vices in mind, think about how these might come up instead of, or in congruence with feelings of jealousy.
For example,
Pride
Bart: He is proud to have been chosen for this special adventure, and would refuse to admit he feels insecure by Alice’s seemingly divided attention
Alice: She doesn’t want to admit that being wanted by both Bart and Sam boosts her ego.
Avarice (Greed)
Bart: He wants to “capture” Alice with his drone photos and “own” her in this new way. An idea of sharing her now after going deep into this feelings of ownership feels horrifying now.
Alice: She wants to maintain control of the situation. It was her idea, so she gets to shoot all the shots, and if Bart wants something to happen for him, she’s still going to be guarded around her own fantasy.
Wrath
Bart: He is actually Angry that Alice humiliated him in public by inviting Sam.
Alice: She is mad that Bart is stepping on her agency by attempting to police what she says to other people.
Envy
Bart: He has to work hard to get something “special” from Alice while Sam just walks by and effortlessly gets invited, carefree, and he gets to be the fun spontaneous one.
Alice: She is jealous that Bart or Sam can just decide whether to go on adventures or not, and have fun alone, while she would feel resentful if she is going alone that she’s not going with a partner she loves.
Lust
Bart: He suggests the drone photo as an erotic setup under a respectable excuse of “artistic shots” but actually he wants to go into a free-for-all mode in himself to use his imagination vividly and carelessly.
Alice: Her initiation of the waterfall plan has a strong sensual undercurrent—“outside” and “nobody around”—she’s craving intensity as a way to reconnect.
Gluttony
Bart: He got excited about the plan, but now is picking fights with Alice to feed even more on the intensity.
Alice: She feeds endlessly on bubbly conversation, nostalgia, and attention. She likes any kind of emotional indulgence.
Sloth
Bart: He knows that he should be putting more effort into making the kinds of plans he wants to have with Alice, but chiding her efforts is easier than doing her own
Alice: She doesn’t want to directly express exactly what she wants from Bart, and instead takes what she can get. She doesn’t put in the work to create the exact fantasies she envisions.
Each sin reframes what might superficially seem like “jealousy” into a spectrum of motives and vulnerabilities. That’s what makes this a powerful exercise—it lets you see how the same conversation could hold multiple emotional truths.