Jealousy update

Thank you to all of you who prayed (are praying) for me. I'm happy to announce that this jealousy has really subsided. It's not completely gone, but it's not right THERE like it was when I wrote my original post. Your comments were very helpful and a friend of mine who I go on walks with (I love these walks for 2 reasons ... 1 - we get into some great, deep issues on our walks and it's SO great to talk these things out and get someone else's perspective and 2 - we get some exercise while doing it!) said the same thing that most of you said to me ... it's what you do with this jealousy that counts. She also said that it was obvious that what I was jealous about was something I was also passionate about, so maybe God was bringing it to the forefront of my mind to spur me on to take further steps to becoming more of that kind of person. I don't know if that makes sense, but I've actually noticed changes in my life already ... and that's exciting to me! I guess it scared me at first because I'm not generally a jealous person. I'm pretty content with my life, so when these issues came up, I didn't like not feeling content on this level, but I really do believe it was because God is doing a work in me and I'm slowly going through the motions with Him to help me figure out these changes He wants me to make and work through. It's been exciting!

The day after I wrote my original post, I found this next paragraph somewhere, saved it as a new post because it was so in line with what you'd all said and what God was teaching me, but now, for the life of me, I can't remember where I saw it! Is it the memory or the eyesight that's supposed to be the first to go? Whichever one it is, I'm losing both of them lately. Sheesh! Anyway, here's the paragraph I found that I saved but can't give credit to anyone because it's completely slipped my mind where I found it ... or if someone sent it to me. Sorry!

This kind of jealousy begs for a change in direction. God is jealous for us to turn away from the distractions of this world and turn toward Him. He’s jealous for us to let go of the false identities we hold onto so tightly, and to align ourselves with Him. He’s jealous for us to relinquish the things we allow to define our worth, and grab tightly to our value in Him.

Change of direction. - When I was in my early 20s, I remember saying to someone that change scared the crap out of me. Now, I love it. Life would be boring without change. I want to constantly be changing into more of the person that God wants me to be.

Value in Him - Over the last few years, finding my value in God has completely changed my perspective on life. That's how I feel I've been able to become content. Finding my value in God rather than worldly things (I'm definitely not saying I'm perfect in this area by ANY means - always a long way to go!) has given me so much freedom to not worry as much about what people think of me. Freedom rocks!

From jealousy to freedom. Thanks, God, for never giving up on me and for continually teaching me lessons. Help my eyes to be open and not to miss what You're trying to show me. And thanks for giving me great friends to help me along the way.