The 50th Law (with 50 Cent)

Transmute envy into emulation.
We cannot stop the comparing
mechanism in our brains, so it is best to redirect it into something
productive and creative. Instead of wanting to hurt or steal from the
person who has achieved more, we should desire to raise ourselves up
to his or her level. In this way, envy becomes a spur to excellence. We

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may even try to be around people who will stimulate such competitive
desires, people who are slightly above us in skill level.
To make this work requires a few psychological shifts. First, we
must come to believe that we have the capacity to raise ourselves up.
Confidence in our overall abilities to learn and improve will serve as a
tremendous antidote to envy. Instead of wishing to have what another
has and resorting to sabotage out of helplessness, we feel the urge to
get the same for ourselves and believe we have the ability to do so.
Second, we must develop a solid work ethic to back this up. If we are
rigorous and persistent, we will be able to overcome almost any
obstacle and elevate our position. People who are lazy and
undisciplined are much more prone to feeling envy.
Related to this, having a sense of purpose, a feel for your calling in
life, is a great way to immunize yourself against envy. You are focused
on your own life and plans, which are clear and invigorating. What
gives you satisfaction is realizing your potential, not earning attention
from the public, which is fleeting. You have much less need to
compare. Your sense of self-worth comes from within, not from
without.
Admire human greatness.
Admiration is the polar opposite of envy—we
are acknowledging people’s achievements, celebrating them, without
having to feel insecure. We are admitting their superiority in the arts
or sciences or in business without feeling pain from this. But this goes
further. In recognizing the greatness of someone, we are celebrating
the highest potential of our species. We are experiencing Mitfreude
with the best in human nature. We share the pride that comes from
any great human achievement. Such admiration elevates us above the
pettiness of our day-to-day life and will have calming effect.
Although it is easier to admire without any taint of envy those who
are dead, we must try to include at least one living person in our
pantheon. If we are young enough, such objects of admiration can also
serve as models to emulate, at least to some degree.
Finally, it is worth cultivating moments in life in which we feel
immense satisfaction and happiness divorced from our own success or
achievements. This happens commonly when we find ourselves in a
beautiful landscape—the mountains, the sea, a forest. We do not feel
the prying, comparing eyes of others, the need to have more attention
or to assert ourselves. We are simply in awe of what we see, and it is

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intensely therapeutic. This can also occur when we contemplate the
immensity of the universe, the uncanny set of circumstances that had
to come together for us to be born, the vast reaches of time before us
and after us. These are sublime moments, and as far removed from the
pettiness and poisons of envy as possible.
For not many men . . . can love a friend who fortune prospers
without envying; and about the envious brain
cold poison clings and doubles all the pain
life brings him. His own woundings he must nurse,
and feel another’s gladness like a curse.
—Aeschylus

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