Grass is always greener till you get to the other side.

Grass is always greener till you get to the other side.

I always wondered if billionaires and multi-millionaires envied others. Do social media influencers who post about their luxury lifestyles get FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out)? Does everybody feel like they are supposed to be somewhere else? Is grass really greener on the other side or I don’t love myself enough to water my lawn?

There is a line between wanting something and wanting something that someone else has. When we want something, we focus on that and work towards achieving it. But when we have an eye on someone else’s possession, we get stuck in a loophole of comparison and envy. This envy blurs the reality, and you find yourself standing on your lawn. And across the fence you see your neighbor’s lawn, which is flourishing with green grass and colorful flowers.

When I was little, I always wanted to grow up as fast as possible because adults could go wherever they wanted, buy whatever they wanted, and most importantly, didn’t have exams. It was the dumbest thing I have ever wished for in my entire life. Now I am 23 and every day is an assessment to test my ability to survive a situation without crying. And no. I cannot buy whatever I want.

The same applies to job, hobbies, place where we live and relationships. You might find your hobby less attractive than someone else’s. I thought that my relatives who are living in the US are very lucky, while the only thing that is different is the geographic location. Turns out they all have their own share of problems in life. Everybody shows up looking their best and happiest. Everybody posts only 1/1000000 moments of their life on social media. And we only know what they choose to show.

We all waste our entire life waiting for an opportunity that, according to us, is the final destination and a door to happiness. We always say how we can’t wait to buy a house or start that dream business, so that we can be finally happy. But when we finally buy a house and start the business, we see the reality. It was just appearing greener from our old lawn. But now that we are finally here, it came with its own set of problems and it didn’t guarantee 100 percent happiness for the rest of our lives.

No matter how much we have, we are always on a quest for more. Human greed is a bottomless pit. Irrespective of how wonderful we are, we always think that everybody is ahead of us. We wish to be beautiful like others, have a bigger house like others, become an influencer like others. But I am sure that as long as we keep comparing ourselves to others, we will always go looking for greener grass while standing on the grass we wished for once upon a time.

As Sridevi rightly said in the movie ‘English Vinglish’, “When we don’t love ourselves, we dislike everything that is attached to us. But, when we learn to love ourselves, the same old things look anew and beautiful.”

You may also like: When Envy Gets Out Of Hand…