Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[ClarissaMach]

I'm not sure if I'm using the expression "be jealous" correctly here, but I hope you will all understand.

Have you ever felt jealous of your partner or of your own stuff?

For example: do you refuse to lend your personal belongings to your siblings?

Do you get bored when your boy/girlfriend seems to give more attention to someone else than you?

Have you ever felt jealous of your siblings because of your parents' attention?


PS.: If is there another expression to refer to this feeling, please tell me!
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Stormy Weather.

[CP]

People often say "jealous" when what they mean is "envious." It's better to save "jealous" for the real thing.

We are jealous when our loved one shows too much interest in someone else. When her boyfriend kept dancing with the new girl, Sally became jealous and had a fit.

We envy someone who has something that we would like to have. I envy you your nice car / I am envious of your new car. If I really want it from you, I covet it. Too often, though, people say "I'm jealous of your car" rather than "I envy you your car."

One of the 10 commandments is against coveting our neighbor's wife or belongings, so someone who breaks that rule might end up making the neighbor jealous.

We are protective of our belongings, wanting to keep others who envy us (or who covet our things) from having them. We might even hoard them.
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You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb

[ClarissaMach]

Let me see if I understood it, CP: it's not incorrect using "jealous" the way I used in the sentences I've wrote in the first topic; but people (i.e. native English speakers) usually commit this little mistake, they use "jealous" when they should use "envious". Is it correct?
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Stormy Weather.

[CP]

Yes, people do use "jealous" when they mean "envious," and it is good to know that to understand others, and not to make the same mistake. Your post in quotation marks:

"For example: do you refuse to lend your personal belongings to your siblings?" This refers to protecting your belongings from your envious or covetous siblings.

"Do you get bored when your boy/girlfriend seems to give more attention to someone else than you?" Boredom would not be jealousy. The jealous person may become anxious or worried when he / she sees the sweetheart being nice to someone else, but if he / she becomes bored, I think he / she doesn't care enough to get jealous!

"Have you ever felt jealous of your siblings because of your parents' attention?" This would be a form of jealousy. The parents are giving attention to someone else, not you.
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You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb

[ltp-008]

In what situation do I feel jealous?I don't know,once in a while I indeed envy somebody who has achieved great success.But most time I always do my own business.Jealous is not a very good thing,if you were a person who like jealous,your life would be very tough,you would always be jealous when you don't overrun other people ,but duirng our lives,we can't overrun other people in everything,so it is better for us to learn being humble,when our friends have a better lives than ours,we bless them,don't be jealous.

[RedRose]

[garfield_jesse]

Envy is apart of our lives, people almost dont desire with what they have...we feel jealous (envious or covetous)...i think that is the good way to make ourself better.
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I'm smart, that's why i'm single...haha(^_^)

[ClarissaMach]

To be honest with you, I feel envious sometimes, but it's not something that makes me feel uncomfortable. I envy Russian native speakears because they can read the best books ever written in its original language. . . I envy those people that, even living in really poor conditions, keep smilling ("why can't I learn to be so happy even in disgrace?"). I envy a lot of things, but that doesn't make me feel bad at all! On the contrary: it makes me wish. Wish to learn other languages; wish to learn how to live and to be happy; wish to change.

I never think about what I can't change. That's the secret!
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Stormy Weather.

[ltp-008]

To RedRose:

I don't know what is your standard of mature?When you told other people that they are not mature or they are naive,you must think yourself very mature and full of rich experience,could you please tell us how mature you are?Could you give a few in-death analysis about all my other posts which you presume pre-mature?Because you said that only one which I posted was mature,that means more than 100 other articles which I have posted are not mature,in fact I reallly appreciate you for what you have read all my posts,if you hadn't read all my posts,you wouldn't have concluded this conclusion .I am sorry not to read all your posts,but I will pay attention to your posts in the future,I will do my best to find how mature you are .I really envy you for having such good feelings,very jealous.

[RedRose]

[Delia Gao]

I don't have any siblings,or a boyfriend.I'm a person that easy to be satisfied.I don't think that I should envy someone who is better than me.It isn't important to me.Sometime I don't like some people because I hate their characters,for example,there are some people,they are not smart, they spend a lot of money on entertainment,they don't have any really friends,and they even don't have any personal standpoints,but they are snooty!I couldn't understand them.I don't know what makes them so proud,money?Maybe...

[ltp-008]

To RedRose: :

How do you know I am upset or angry?Are you a psychologist?Even though you are a psychologist,it is unlikely for you to know what I exactly feel about you.Through what you said in your post,obviously you are the one who is upset and angry ,I really don't know why you are so angry about me,but I really sorry about that,no matter of what reasons you are angry about me, I appologize for what I have offended you.

Perhaps we had some big differents on some issues in which we had discusssed,but for mature people as you prefer to yourself to be ,they don't get upset or angry easily through discussions,they just made their opinions clearly so that other people can understand them,they don't insult other people during arguments ,if they don't agree with each other,they just put facts and evidence in their posts,as mature people they can control their tempers and alway be polite to their conterparts.

It is a good chance for us to meet here ,not only do we improve our writing but also discuss some issues which we are obth concerned,so it is important for us to discuss some issues politely.We can have different opinions about some certain issues,but we must be polite through arguments.I think that you as a mature person would also agree with this common sense.Good luck.

[RedRose]

[ClarissaMach]

I am not understanding what is going on here.

RedRose, why did you say that this was the first time Itp had made a mature comment? I believe he has a right to feel offended, for one might infere that he has never made a mature comment before.

Could you explain what you've said?
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Stormy Weather.

[RedRose]