What happens when envy, jealousy, comparison, or feelings of inadequacy begin shaping your relationships, your work, or your sense of self? What becomes possible when you can recognize these dynamics with more awareness, honesty, and compassion rather than shame or defensiveness?
Envy and jealousy are powerful yet often unspoken emotional experiences that shape how we relate to others, particularly in groups, workplaces, and intimate relationships. While jealousy is often linked to fear of loss, envy can evoke discomfort around comparison, worth, and visibility. Pre-emptive envy adds another layer, where individuals anticipate envy in others and may limit themselves in response.
This workshop will also explore these dynamics from a social perspective, particularly how individuals from marginalised locations may negotiate visibility, success, and belonging in contexts where envy is not only experienced but anticipated. Pre-emptive adaptations, such as self-limitation, managing visibility, or holding back, can emerge as ways of navigating relational and structural risk.
This experiential workshop will explore how these dynamics arise in relational and group contexts, how they are defended against, and how they influence patterns such as withdrawal, competition, self-limitation, or overcompensation.
Drawing from Transactional Analysis and a group analysis lens, the session will invite participants to reflect on their own experiences, notice how these emotions operate in the here-and-now, and develop a more thoughtful and less reactive relationship with them.
This workshop is suitable for therapists, trainees, and anyone interested in understanding relational and social dynamics more deeply.
What we cannot acknowledge, we often act out!
Date: 08-June-2026
Time: 11 am to 1 pm ET (My time zone)
About the Facilitator
Prathitha Gangadharan
Prathitha Gangadharan brings together psychotherapy and group process with warmth, rigor, and curiosity. After her engineering career, she trained in Transactional Analysis with a specialization in psychotherapy, completed a Master’s in Psychology, and expanded into training, supervision, and therapeutic work with individuals and groups.
Her later journey into Group Analysis shifted her attention toward the social, political, and cultural dimensions of human experience. What began as an interest in understanding group dynamics evolved into a deeper inquiry into identity, achievement, belonging, and the feeling of inadequacy that can persist despite outward success.
Drawing on Kreeger’s 1992 paper on envy pre-emption, Prathitha has already sparked lively engagement at both the 2025 SAATA Conference and the 2026 Group Analysis Conference, generating curiosity and ongoing exploration around these themes.