Tell Envy From Admiration Before It Ruins Your Evening

Someone's good news has just landed and your face has done something you didn't plan. This tells envy and admiration apart quickly enough to use before the dinner, the group chat or the rest of your evening gets swallowed by a feeling you haven't actually named yet.

You've just heard someone's good news (a promotion, a new relationship, a book deal, a house) and something in you has gone tight. Name the specific feeling honestly: is it envy (I want that too, and its absence is painful) or admiration with a sting (I'm impressed and slightly uncomfortable being reminded of my own pace)? Write one sentence for each possibility as it applies to {SITUATION}, then decide which one is actually true tonight. Do not perform generosity you don't feel, and do not punish yourself for the envy if that's the honest answer.