How to deal with people jealous of your professional success?

When you reach a high professional level, manage important responsibilities, and your position exposes you to the public, you inevitably attract jealousy. Woody Allen, one of the most famous and prolific American filmmakers of his generation, said: "People never hate you for your weaknesses, they hate you for your strengths." Whatever you do in your life, there will always be people jealous of who you are and what you do, especially in your professional life when it is synonymous with success and notoriety.
However, attracting the jealousy of others is rather a good thing! In psychology, it is said that "jealousy arises when you see someone who possesses what you desire most or who is what you would like to be." But even if this manifestation of others' jealousy is ultimately rather rewarding, suffering from this often gratuitous and unfounded jealousy can have unpleasant consequences for your activity and your professional reputation. So how do you protect yourself from people jealous of your success?

1- By ignoring the attacks
It is not you who is consumed by jealousy, so the best thing to do is to ignore the attacks, especially when they come from people you don't know and who don't know you.
Continue on your path, ignoring their criticism; this is one of the best ways to manage jealous people. Responding to the attacks of a jealous person would give them importance they don't deserve and prevent you from appreciating the successes that come your way and that you deserve thanks to your professionalism and commitment. If someone finds your professional success too great, it's a problem of conscience for them, not for you!


2- By remaining humble
You should absolutely not react brutally to the wrongdoing of a jealous person. This will only fuel the fire of their jealousy and will only lead to conflicts and resentment.
On the contrary, stay true to yourself and continue to enjoy the fruits of your labor while remaining humble. People jealous of your success imagine that you are pretentious and full of yourself, so on the contrary, show them that you don't feel superior. Act with humility; this will only make them feel even more inferior to you than they already are by their hateful and misplaced behavior.

3- By being tolerant
Be tolerant of those who do not accept your success well. On the contrary, rather sympathize with their inner discomfort. In psychology, jealousy is defined as a disturbing emotion focused on what others have accomplished materially or professionally and on the inability to bear their successes. In this case, the subject experiences a deep feeling of injustice, which translates into aggressiveness and frustration towards others, leading them to acts of malice (denunciation, false denunciation, harsh criticism, etc.).
By sympathizing with this state of affairs, you maintain a positive attitude that neutralizes the jealousy of others and thus turn back on them the negative waves and thoughts they may have had towards you.

4- Don't limit your ambitions
Know that being envied is a good sign! It means that you have arrived... somewhere, where the people who envy you will never arrive. It means that your skills are recognized and that your success is deserved. So there is no need to limit your ambitions and aspirations because you are attacked and criticized. On the contrary, redouble your motivation and efforts to continue to make people talk about you; it is not your status that creates jealousy, but the way others look at you.

In the end, the most important thing is not to know how to control jealous people, but to learn to control your own emotions and feelings towards them so that their actions and wrongdoing do not affect us. Be above all this pettiness and keep smiling; it is precisely because you are good and recognized in your profession that you bother and attract jealousy, and this should only motivate you to go even higher... again and again...

Philippe Montant CEO ExeKutive.biz