Nexus between envy and acrimony

The filmmaker, Farha Khan, with all gusto, was recently gushing over great traits of her supposedly graceful mother, who was full of grit and gumption. It seems, Farah’s mother, lived a much meaningful and marvellous life, mainly as she had managed to keep two mind-enfeebling culprits, ‘envy and acrimony’ at bay.     

Surfing through these lines had set me into some serious pondering. It may sound paradoxical, but surely, there is a strange nexus between severe envy and spirit-sapping acrimony. Then, it made me think of techies, often talking about toxic ambience, entwined with a competitive attitude, at their workplaces. 

A paternal relative, placed in a multi-national company, has a potent intellect, along with a pleasing persona. He was once saying, “A senior colleague of mine has this singular envy towards me, which is starkly seen. The envy manifests in his malicious ways of making me feel miserable at all moments. He even tries to stymie my strides of progress and success. When his incessant efforts turn ineffective in inhibiting my career growth, he exhibits that intense animosity. I placate myself feeling, “A happy and highly-competent human, would never ever harm, harry, or unduly hector others. It is only the distraught, distressed, and disgruntled lot, like him, who try diffusing dollops of trauma around”.”

Indeed, spiteful envy can stem out of several factors – Someone else’s presumed better looks, intellect, education, profession, health, talents/skills, financial/social status, etc., can all propel envy pangs. The deadly envy is such that it can even drive a person into doing some deplorable, diabolical, and dastardly things. Finally, even after all these, when this person’s efforts, to prove himself pretty superior to someone, precipitates in a pathetic fiasco, what possibly follows is the poisonous acrimony.    

Evidently, envy gets engendered, only when a person feels an extreme lack of something. Envy, to an extent, is also emblematic of a mind, inflicted by an inferior attitude, incompetence, intellectual insecurity, or even immaturity.

On the contrary, if the mind is confident of its ‘capacities and capabilities,’ and tries capitalising and channelizing these positives, on the proper path, then all envy gets pulverised by itself!

Apparently, once the envy gets annihilated, automatically all acrimony, too, gets amazingly extinguished. An undisturbed mind/heart, devoid of devastating ‘envy and acrimony,’ would then truly be a ‘divine sanctuary’ for delightful thoughts to dwell in.