How To Stop Comparing Yourself To Others

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How To Stop Comparing Yourself To Others

How To Stop Comparing Yourself To Others : You just learned from Facebook that your class mate from 6th grade just got a promotion at his job. Another ‘friend’ got married, while a third one just bought a new Mercedes. The right thing to do is to congratulate them, hit the ‘like’ button, comment with thumbs up and clap emoji. But, in most cases, you don’t. Because you are feeling terrible seeing your friends’ highlight reel in Facebook, and can’t stop comparing yourself to them.

Comparing yourself with others is “a sure-fire recipe for a drop in self-confidence and for unhappiness. It’s also not that useful”, writes famous blogger and life coach Leo Babauta in his blog Zen Habits . It often makes us unhappy even if we have enough and should be happy with what we have. In fact, numerous studies point out how comparing yourself to others can lead to depression. As Teddy Roosevelt said, “Comparison is the theft of joy”.

Let’s look at what is wrong with comparing yourself with others:

The highlight reel vs real life

First of all, when you are comparing yourself to someone by looking at their posts and updates on Facebook or other social media, you are actually making the wrong comparison, to begin with. In fact, you are actually seeing the highlight reels, the best bit of their lives, and comparing it to your whole life.

Honestly, that is an unfair comparison. Your friend who just bought the new Mercedes won’t share the huge debt he may be under or the health and family problems he might have. In the end, you are literally giving up your joy and peace of mind over someone’s social media posts. How To Stop Comparing Yourself To Others

You have different values than others

Your values decide the direction of your life. And most of us have different values and priorities. There are people who are willing to do anything, even murder, to make money or to be in a powerful position. The question is, are you willing to give up your values just for the sake of money or power? May be if the other person followed your values and principles, then they won’t even reach where you are right now.

Your colleague who got a promotion might be working 15 hours, 6 days a week. But, by doing so, he is sacrificing value time with his family. So, the question here is, are you willing to make that sacrifice? To gain something you will have to lose something else.

Understand your limitations and embrace your uniqueness

It is absolutely idiotic to judge a fish by its skill to climb a tree. Everyone has different sets of strengths and weakness. Your strengths and hard work will help you progress your journey.

However, you have to understand your own limitations. You may not have the skills and grit to work at an investment firm 12 hours a day to earn a huge bonus. But what you may have is teaching skills, that can lighten up lives of hundreds of children who will all be grateful throughout their lives.

Compare yourself to where you were 1-2 years ago

If you are looking for a benchmark to measure your progress, then rather comparing with someone else, compare yourself to where you were 1-2 years ago. Evaluate yourself and recognize the progress you made and what all changes you can make to yourself. Note the progress you made in life, as a person as well as in accomplishing your goals and resolve to make progress every single day.

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