FEELING JEALOUS: Thoughts And Feelings Series

Feeling Jealous

Thoughts And Feelings Series

Author: Sarah Levete
BUY – Feeling Jealous

What is feeling jealous all about? Powerful emotions come up for so many reasons, so how do kids deal with these?

By recognising and working through feeling jealous, children are empowered to develop healthy relationships and high self esteem.

This helpful book explores a range of jealous feelings that a group of primary aged children are experiencing. The photos and illustrations show common scenarios in a child’s emotional development.

Some situations are followed by short explanations which help identify what is happening, why the kids might be feeling the way they do and how the situation may be resolved. Some of the resolutions are pretty clear and others may need further discussion or investigation on the part of an adult.

We follow several children through the book as they begin to understand their actions and reactions. We find out how their feelings have changed over a period of time and what they have learnt.

Paddy’s Story:
Jack and Paddy were best friends. When Jack made a new friend Omar, Paddy refused to go to his birthday party. This made Jack really upset and confused. Why was Paddy being unfriendly?

A touching photo of the boys, with an arm around each other’s shoulder shows them talking it through.

Paddy explains that he wanted Jack to feel sorry for having a friend other than him. He realised that he was being unfair. Jack tells Paddy that even though Omar is great, Jack is still his good friend too.

Later in the book Paddy is asked if he is still feeling jealous. He truthfully says that he still does feel a bit jealous, but understands that he nearly lost Jack’s friendship by being unfair to him and to Omar. Now the three of them go round together and he is feeling better about playing by himself sometimes.

One of the strong points of this book is that kids themselves are tell their stories and we get to see their emotions through the colourful photos.

Jealous feelings can result in hurting the people you care about. Some things start small but can escalate into unpleasant patterns if they are not dealt with.

A wide range of subjects are touched on. Being a spoil sport, being mean and rude, being jealousy of others belongings, sibling rivalry, bullying and getting someone into trouble.

Feeling jealous can be the basis of so many unhappy moments. Children are encouraged to talk to a parent, teacher or trusted adult instead of acting out further.

Sometimes upsetting people is a way to show that you are feeling cross or in a bad mood. When others are jealous of them, children say they feel that they have done something wrong.

Reasons for this behaviour are discussed, like feeling jealous of how someone looks, their abilities or even of their happiness.

When parents have a new partner or new children come into a friend group, kids can feel left out, sad or that they are missing out. It can make them not want to share. Doing something to make others feel special like sharing a toy or game or saying something kind can really help.

Positive suggestions like using drawing and writing to express and release bad feelings are suggested and another great aspect of this resource is that it shows a wide spread of multicultural groups.

There are a few extremely grumpy little faces pictured which seem a bit over the top, but perhaps parents can point out to kids how unpleasant they look and how awful it must make them feel. It’s easier to be friendly and change how you feel if your face and body are more relaxed.

I’m an advocate for creative solutions that integrate letting the body help the mind to change. Parents can definitely use this book as a starting point to introduce their own suggestions.