Wooden boomerang and an open notebook on a picnic table while friends dance under string lights at golden hour

Throw a Blessing Instead!

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Wooden boomerang and an open notebook on a picnic table while friends dance under string lights at golden hour“It is never wise to seek or wish for another’s misfortune. If malice or envy were tangible and had a shape, it would be the shape of a boomerang.” ~Charley Reese

I love that picture. The late syndicated columnist knew exactly what he was saying. You don’t throw a boomerang away. You throw it, and it comes right back at your own head!

Envy works the same way. So does a grudge, a little private wish that someone falls flat, or the satisfaction we feel when the coworker who annoys us gets bad news. We think we’re aiming at them. We’re really aiming at ourselves.

Why it always comes back

Think about who actually pays for envy. The person I resent is probably eating dinner, laughing with friends, and sleeping fine tonight. I’m the one replaying the conversation at 2 a.m. I’m the one with the knot in my stomach.

Buddy Hackett, the comedian, is widely quoted as saying, “Don’t carry a grudge. While you’re carrying the grudge, the other guy’s out dancing.” Back in 2010, I built a short post around that line called Resentment has no power…, and it still makes me laugh because it’s so true. They’re dancing. We’re carrying.

Today I want to look at the boomerang a little differently, because envy is sneakier than an open grudge. A grudge says, “You hurt me.” Envy says, “You have something I want, and I wish you didn’t.” It usually shows up quietly. Somebody gets the promotion, the new truck, the happy family photos, or the clean time we’re still working toward. Then a small voice inside says, “Must be nice.”

That voice is the windup. And the throw always returns.

In Success-Full, Living Life with Purpose: Recovery Mode, I put it in two words: “Resentment kills!” For people in recovery, that’s not drama. Envy and resentment feed self-pity; self-pity feeds the old thinking; and the old thinking has a way of steering us back to the very things we left behind.

The answer is a different throw

So what do we do with the urge? We can’t just pretend it isn’t there. Simply trying to “let it go” rarely works, at least not for me. The better move is to throw something else.

Early in my recovery, I learned a simple prayer, and it’s in Success-Full too: “Lord, please give them everything I want and more!”

Read that slowly. Not “Lord, help me tolerate them.” Not “Lord, fix them.” Everything I want, and more. Health. Peace. Prosperity. Happiness. Good relationships. A good night’s sleep. Whatever I’d ask for myself, I ask for them first.

It feels upside down. That’s exactly why it works. You can’t pray for someone’s happiness and wish for their misfortune in the same breath. One cancels the other. I first wrote about this prayer years ago in Overcoming Resentment, and I still lean on it today.

Jesus put it even more directly:

“But I say to you who hear, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you.” (Luke 6:27-28, ESV)

Notice there’s no condition there. He doesn’t say pray for them once they apologize or once you feel like it. He says pray for them. Period. And here’s the grace in it: God isn’t asking us to manufacture warm feelings on command. He’s asking us to take one small step of love and let Him handle the heart change.

Try it for two weeks

The recovery literature has a famous version of this idea. In the book Alcoholics Anonymous, often called the Big Book, there’s a personal story titled “Freedom From Bondage.” The woman who wrote it had carried a resentment against her mother for twenty-five years. Then she came across a clergyman’s suggestion to pray for the person you resent and to ask that they be given everything you want for yourself: “Ask for their health, their prosperity, their happiness, and you will be free.”

The part I love most is the honesty. She was told to do it even when the prayers were “only words,” and she didn’t mean them. “Do it every day for two weeks, and you will find you have come to mean it and to want it for them.” Action first. Feelings follow. That’s recovery in a nutshell!

Five ways to throw a blessing today

  • Name the boomerang. Write down one person you envy or resent right now. Be honest. Nobody else has to see the list.
  • Say the prayer out loud. “Lord, please give them everything I want and more!” Say it each time they pop into your head, even through gritted teeth.
  • Get specific. Ask God for the exact things you’d want for yourself: the job, the health, the peace at home. Specific prayers are harder to fake and easier to mean.
  • Run the two-week experiment. Set a 14-day reminder on your phone. Pray for that person every morning, then notice what changes in you, not in them.
  • Turn envy into gratitude. When “must be nice” shows up, follow it with one thing you’re grateful for in your own life. Gratitude and envy can’t share the same seat for long.

Let them dance

Here’s what happens when we stop throwing malice and start throwing blessings. The other guy’s still out dancing. But now we get to dance too. We’re not stuck on the sidelines with our arms full of grudges. In Wipe it Clean… I said it comes down to one question: “Do I want to be right or happy?” Envy asks a cousin of that question: do I want them to lose, or do I want to be free?

In Recovery Thinking, 90-Days to Change Your Life! I wrote, “Winning in life is an inside job.” Freedom from envy is an inside job too. No one else can do it for us, and no one else can stop us from doing it.

So pick your person. Say the prayer. Mean it a little more each day. Life is GOOOOOOOD!!!

Here’s my question for you: Who is the one person you could start praying for today, and what would you ask God to give them?

Go, Go, Go… Dan 🙂

Books quoted in this post:

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A note on anonymity: Although I write about Alcoholics Anonymous and its literature here, nothing in this post should be taken to imply my membership in any specific mutual support group, in keeping with Tradition Eleven.

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Reflection note: Quotes belong to their original authors and sources (Charley Reese; Buddy Hackett, as widely attributed; “Freedom From Bondage,” Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th edition, p. 552, Alcoholics Anonymous World Services; Luke 6:27-28, English Standard Version; Success-Full, Living Life with Purpose: Recovery Mode; Recovery Thinking, 90-Days to Change Your Life!). I used AI to help organize this post and reviewed it before posting.

Image created with AI assistance.