Effects of comparing Yourself to Others

Comparison is the thief of joy!
Theodore Roosevelt

In this social media era, it is very possible to find ourselves in the comparison wagon. I mean, some people we went to school with are buying real estate, having kids, being named in lists of most influential and successful and you most likely don’t have much to show for yourself.

It’s not easy not to compare, after all, it gives us something to aim for, but should you really stress about the success of others?

We forget that our graphs in lives are drawn differently, and that we all can’t move at the same pace. Also, we get blessed in very different areas.

Effects of comparing yourself to others

You measure your life on their yardstick

Our lucks are different. It’s not always fair, but it is true. There are those who are luckier than others. Psychologist Daniel Kahnemann says, “Success in life is as a result of talent plus luck”.

Luck plays a major role in the success of different people. Comparing yourself with another person means you are assuming your cards were drawn the same but they really were not.

When you use the life of others to measure how successful you are, you are being unfair to yourself. We are all on different paths. Don’t be so hard on yourself.

You stop trusting that everything happens for a reason

I am not being complacent at all when I say this, but I believe everything happens for a reason. There is a reason that your life events have taken place in the sequence they have so far, even if the reason is not that obvious.

These things may all make sense at some point and therefore comparing yourself to another person means you are being myopic about destiny. I am not saying something bad will happen to the other person if they are doing well, but you don’t know what’s in the cards for you, at least not yet.

Don’t be hard on yourself and trust the process. Remember, people on social media just post the highlights of their life, and hardly the low moments.

You forget that we are all talented differently

Understanding self-awareness means that you appreciate that we are all different, from our personality types to our strengths and weaknesses. As a result, you should not take another person’s talent, and place it against yours and compare.

If a person was talented in business, and they went out there, hustled and made some decent business people out of themselves, good for them. I recently asked a good friend, who has a great job in employment that she is happy with, whether she has ever considered starting a business.

She told me no, I know I am not a good business person and I would suck at it. That right there is self-awareness. That is knowing where her talents lie, and she therefore went to school, earned many papers, and got herself a job that pays her for her education.

You start being hard on yourself

There is an activity recommend that you take, what drivers me? People have different drivers in life. There are those driven by power and fame, others status and money, others good relationships and freedom.

When you compare yourself to another person, you ignore the fact that you may not be driven by the same thing. When a friend becomes a TV star and all the newspapers are writing about her, and she is living her dream, this could be a nightmare to another person.

The second person is not driven by fame, she is probably earning higher than person A, but she is quietly enjoying the freedom her financial status brings her, and creating rewarding relationships with those around her.

Therefore, don’t see a person in the limelight and think they are more content, or they have made it than the person you hardly ever hear about, it may all be a façade.

You forget you are exactly where you should be

I read this statement somewhere, …..Someone graduated at 22, and didn’t get a job till they were 30.. another person became a CEO at 30, died before 50. Another became a CEO at 55, died at 90…….

This is not verbatim, but the point is, like I said earlier, our graphs are drawn differently. Don’t compare yourself with another person, you are exactly where you should be. Now, live your life, and be happy, you are doing the best that you can!