Hey there, and welcome to Nothing but Words. I’m Your Book Coach, Candice L Davis.

I hope your week and your writing are both going well.

Before we dive in, I want to invite you to my Open Q&A Call all about writing and publishing books, this Friday, Oct. 19th, at 7 pm.

There’s no charge for the live Zoom call, and I’ll be answering as many of your questions as I can.

You can ask general writing and publishing questions.

You can ask questions about my coaching programs.

Or you can ask specific questions about your specific book project.

You do need to register in advance, and you can find the registration page at candiceldavis.com/qanda.

Now, in today’s episode, I want to talk to you about book envy and how you can actually make it work for you.

We often use envy and jealousy interchangeably, but they can have slightly different meanings.

Depending on your chosen dictionary, jealousy and envy both describe a desire for what someone else has, but jealousy also has a malicious connotation.

Jealousy, in this case, has an element of resentment or hostility towards the person who has the thing you desire.

Maybe you not only wish you had the thing, but you also resent the fact that they have it.

Maybe you get annoyed or irritated every time you think about their success.

With envy, as we’re using it here, your desire has much less to do with the person and much more to do with the object of your desire.

It’s not so much that you want to take the object or the achievement away from the other person, but seeing them with it intensifies your desire and makes you feel bad about not having realized it yet.

I’m not here in favor of anger, or envy, or jealousy. Left unchecked, they can become self-damaging or hurt the people around us or both.

But the fact is, as humans, we experience the full spectrum of emotions, even if we try to repress or ignore them.

Usually, it’s not that you resent your friend or your colleague or your mentor for writing a book when you haven’t written your yet.

Instead, their book is a nagging reminder that you’re letting yourself down.

You might be familiar with the term schaudenfreude, finding pleasure in someone else’s misfortune.

You might be less familiar with freudenfreude, because it gets much less press. Freudenfreude is finding pleasure in someone else’s good fortune.

When I attended a conference recently, one of the things I enjoyed most was how much everyone in the room celebrated each other’s successes.

Freudenfreude, for sure. 

But I have to believe there were people in that room who had inklings of “What about me?” not because they necessarily begrudged the other woman her achievements, but because that success reminded them of what they hadn’t yet accomplished.

In fact, I saw a woman there who started her coaching business around the same time I started mine, and her success stirred up some questions in me about my own journey. “Why not me? Why don’t I have a business that size, or with that much reach, yet?”

I was genuinely thrilled for her, but my sense of “What about me?” brought me to a fork in the road.

I could either give in and spend the day beating myself up for not achieving all my goals first or I could use the moment to my advantage.

If you’re not paying attention, envy or jealousy can lead you to feel guilt and shame.

Those emotions might be short-term motivators, but they’re certainly no fun.

Rather than beat yourself up for feeling envy, I want to suggest you use that emotion when you feel it.

Here’s what I did with that sense of “Why not me?” that I felt when I saw my colleague’s success and how you can apply it to help you write your book.

When you see your old classmate or your colleague or even one or your mentors write their book, and even though you might be thrilled for their success, you feel a bit of envy, start first by acknowledging that feeling.

It doesn't make you a bad person. It just makes you human.

So when you feel even a little envy around someone else’s book, ask yourself a few questions.

What do they really have that I want?

         Is it the quality of the writing, the writing style, or the engaging storytelling?

         Is it the phenomenal research she’s done or the frameworks she created for her book?

         Is it her book deal and the advance she received?

         Is it bestseller status?

         Is it the speaking engagements her book helped her land?

         Is it her book sales and that extra income stream she’s created?

The odds are you don’t really want the exact results this other author has. 

Maybe their memoir has gotten them speaking engagements all over the country or the world and you really don’t want to travel that much.

Maybe their novel has won a prestigious award, which would be cool, but you don’t really care all that much about awards. 

Really identify what they have that you want from your book, including finishing it and publishing it. Don’t overlook those important results.

Then, as much as you’re able, assess what they’ve done to create those results.

If you know the person well enough, you can just ask them.

Many authors talk about the behind-the-scenes aspects of writing and publishing in interviews and on social media. Pay attention to what they say.

Then ask yourself if you’re willing to put in that same effort.

If the author you envy says she wrote every day at 5 am, that doesn't mean you have to do the same.

But are you willing to put in an equivalent effort in a way that works for you?

At the conference, I had to admit to myself that the colleague who stirred up a sense of envy in me had taken much bigger risks in her business than I had.

Then it was up to me whether I wanted to decide to put in similar effort and take similar risks.

When you feel a little book envy, you can try to ignore it.

Or you can follow that feeling and see where it leads you.

Let it guide you to figure out what you really want from your book and how to get it.

Whether you already have a clear picture of what you want from your book or not, I’d love to have you join me for my Open Q&A Call.

I’ll answer as many questions as I can for whoever shows up for the call. And if you can’t make it live, you can always register and email me your questions. I’ll answer them for the recording so you can get your answers in the replay.

Register for the Open Q&A Call at CandiceLDavis.com/qanda.

That’s all for this week’s episode, friends. Thanks for listening to “Nothing but the Words.” I’m Your Book Coach, Candice L Davis, and I’ll see you next time.