Stop Being Envious: How To Manage Envy as a Single Catholic

The restless single.

I recently turned 30. You may be younger or older than I am, but one thing is certain: we’re still single. As the single years pass with not-quite-right relationships, you may start second-guessing yourself.

And, no matter how much you question your ultimate desires in life, no matter how hard you try, you still may not be able to shake the feelings of envy that come with watching your close friends and even high school classmates get married and have families. 

Remind yourself that marriage is a sacrament.

The world tends to view marriage as a social institution where a couple gets to officially proclaim their love for each other to the world, or simply a piece of paper stating that two people who love each other can now achieve the legal benefits that come along with being married. We’ve lost the deeper meaning of marriage in our culture, which is why so many get divorced when they find themselves no longer “happy.”

In the life of the Church, marriage is not simply a legal contract, but a life-long vocational calling, much like entering the priesthood. Marriage takes work. It’s a commitment made with one’s spouse and God to help each other grow towards becoming exactly who each of you are meant to be in Christ.

Since marriage is a specific calling, you might not be called to it until later in life. You may need to personally put yourself in a position where you are able to offer your spouse that which is necessary for their salvation, and you simply have not achieved this yet. Remember, not everyone’s spiritual journey is the same as yours, and those that you envy may actually be envious of you in some aspects of life. 

The sacramental calling of marriage does not work on your timeline, so my advice? Be patient and work towards contentment with wherever God may lead you.

I know, easier said than done, right?

How do we strive towards being content with whatever God may lead us to in life, knowing that He knows precisely what is necessary for our salvation?

Ask for the intercession of your patron saint.

Our patron saints are there to help us. They are there to pray to God for us. They are literally right there with God. We should constantly seek God’s guidance through their prayers. My patron saint, St. Catherine of Alexandria, had much experience with men seeking her hand in marriage, and she ultimately refused all of them and committed herself solely to Christ instead.

I’m not saying we should all become monks and nuns, but what I am saying is that your patron saints know what they’re doing. There is no doubt in my mind that St. Catherine's intercession is able to help me find proper discernment when it comes to making decisions about committing myself fully to one person for my entire life.

Read about the lives of your own patron saints, and seek to trust their intercessions with all of your heart. While we should always pray to God, I’ve found it helpful to be able to relate to those human beings who have faced worldly struggles and achieved sainthood. 

Pray for others.

Whenever you feel that raging envy from being asked to be a bridesmaid in your friend’s wedding, to being invited to baby showers and seeing your friend’s pictures of babies on social media, pray for them. Turn that envy into helping yourself to become like Christ, since Christ-likeness is part of the goal of seeking marriage in the first place.

Pray that these persons are able to maintain good communication and love in order to work through any marital conflicts with grace and clarity. Pray that they are able to guide their children with patience, and that their children grow up to be followers and seekers of Christ’s truth. Whenever you feel that tinge of envy, pray for them. You may just find that your envy will lessen as you strive to seek the greater good for others.

Don’t Settle.

Not settling, of course, goes along with trusting God to bring you the right spouse. But, think about all of the times in your own life that you’ve convinced yourself that a partner was right for you when they clearly weren’t, simply because you wanted to get married so badly.

Do you know anyone who got married simply out of a desire to be married, or because they were envious of their friend/sibling, and ended up getting divorced shortly thereafter? We need to examine our true motivations for pursuing relationships like this, as in, are we making this marital decision as a life-long vocation to help each other achieve salvation, or are we doing it because we selfishly want what other people have?

In some relationships I was the one that was “too religious,” and in others I was called “spiritually lazy.” In relationships, just as God does throughout our daily lives, find a spouse who doesn’t belittle you or project any feelings of spiritual self-inadequacy onto you. Rather, find a spouse who understands and even appreciates your faults; one who is willing to take you where you are without demanding instant perfection, while you both maintain the goal of spiritual improvement.

Submit yourself to the unknown and focus on your goals.

Don’t make getting married your only goal in life, as that would be a guaranteed way to set yourself up for disappointment. Rather, think about why you so strongly desire to get married, and find ways to achieve some of these desires while submitting yourself to the unknown.

For example, nurture and share intimate friendships. Work on being a better, unselfishly devoted friend. Volunteer with children. You may stumble upon aspects of yourself that you may not have discovered otherwise. Throughout my work with children, I’ve noticed, despite my overwhelming love for children, that I don’t have nearly as much patience as I thought. Achieving more patience with children is something I work on consistently, and something that I surely need to work on if I have any aspiration to model unselfish Christ-like love to children of my own.

Do you have goals to see the world? Goals to write a book? Whatever your goals are in life, shift your focus towards them, make goal checklists and cross them off. Make lists of gratitude about what you have achieved in life, what you are able to achieve, and all that you have in life.

Whatever you do, don’t let envy of others get in the way of remembering that there is not a single person in the world that doesn’t struggle with achieving their ultimate perfection in Christ, married or not.