I caught Nip/Tuck the other night and one of the lines that this psycho/manic depressive has-been plastic surgeon said to Christian (the drop-dead gorgeous, rich hunk of a supremely successful plastic surgeon) stuck to my mind.

"Jealousy is seeing someone with something that you want, and you working harder to get it. Envy is knowing that someone has something that you want, and that you'll never be able to obtain it. No matter how hard you try."

Something like that.

I didn't say it quite so well as the character in the show did.

But boy, was it good.

How apt, duncha think?

Going by that definition, I guess I have tasted envy before.

It's like a slow but deadly poison, working its way deftly within you, and before you actually realise it, you're trapped by its cruel, horrid grasp, ensnaring you, and you can find no way out.

And the irony of it all is, it's torturing you from within.

You're torturing yourself from within.

Your mind convinces you that you're in such a pathetic state, that the universe conspires against you to prevent you from reaching for your stars, that your family owes you a gawddamn living, that God Himself majorly let you down when He failed to demonstrate one of His crazy miracles to deliver you from all that's pulling you apart.

Hell no.

Snap out of it already.

Yes, you.