Comparisons: A Slippery Slope Towards Poor Self-confidence

Earlier today I wrote this on Twitter:

If you feel bad or miserable for where you are, professionally and personally, here's my advice:

STOP comparing yourself to others.

STOP comparing yourself to where you thought you would be by now.

I know it's more complex than that but my bet is that covers a majority of it.

I actually think comparing yourself to others, or to where you wanted to be, *could* be good. It could be a motivator. It could give you hope and remind you of dreams you once had.

But in my own experience, and from what I've learned by talking to others, comparisons like these are unhealthy.

They can lead to self-doubt and disappointment. They can lead to discouragement. They can lead to jealousy (Shakespeare wrote a thing or two about jealous and the effects of jealousy).

If you are the type, like I have been over the years, to let this type of comparison eat at you, I encourage you to stop. Just stop.

One of the best ways I can think of to stop, and fill that space with something good, is to figure out what good you have. This could be a list of things you are thankful for, it could be journal posts digging deep into the goodness you have, it could be practicing your expressions of gratitude by telling people what you are grateful for.

This, by the way, is not a one-and-done exercise. Recognizing the goodness in your life, and expressing or recording it, should be done regularly. Healing can happen when you shift your thinking to "I don't ever get anything good" to "look at all of the great things I have in my life!"

If you are reading this on your own phone or computer, you have some good in your life! If you are sitting there without an oxygen tank, you have something to be grateful for. If you can go to the bathroom without help, or get your own glass of water, you have something to be grateful for. If you have to dig deep then dig deep but I bet you can list a hundred things that are awesome in your life.

Years ago I was speaking at a job club in Southern California. This was an accomplished audience that was used to making serious money. There were really nice cars in the parking lot. Many of the audience had advanced degrees.

In one part of my presentation I talked about how people around you (as a job seeker), people who ask, "How's your job search going," actually care about you. They might not know how to express it but if they're asking then they might want to, and be able to, help you.

A mother and her adult daughter were sitting in the front row and said, "NOPE, no one cares about us." I thought they were joking so I played into their joke, but they emphatically repeated that NO ONE CARED ABOUT THEM.

How sad. I don't know if they were toxic people, and people distanced themselves from that, or what. I still believe that if they let people in, there would be people who indeed would help them. People would care about them.

Unfortunately, we didn't have time during or after that presentation to go deeper. I kind of left the area sad for them.

If this is how you feel about yourself then start listing things you are grateful for. Do this every day. Do it every hour if you need to. Start to shift how you think about the cards you've been dealt.

I'm pretty sure you can list a bunch of hardships and bad things, but there are likely plenty of people who have things harder than you do. It's not a contest but you aren't alone in your hardships.

Once you figure out the great things you have, and start to think more about that than the hardships, you put yourself on a path to grow and learn and become.

Instead of comparing others for what they have or who they are you can think about yourself and how you can get what you think you want!

Back to the idea of healthy comparisons: I do this regularly. I've had to check myself (remember my post on professional jealousy?). But now, I make myself compare myself to others with two things in mind:

FIRST: I am happy for the accomplishments of others. This has taken me years to work on but I am honestly and genuinely happy for them. No matter how they come by their good fortune, I've found it's better for me to be happy for them than jealous of them.

SECOND: I am inspired with hope that I can accomplish things, too. If they can do it, maybe I can do it, too. I'm neither going to be a physicist nor an astronaut. I can't be a professional dancer and I'll never be a professional athlete. But for the things that matter to me, the things that I really want to be, maybe I can do those things. Or things close enough to give me fulfillment.

When I see someone come from nothing and find some financial success, that inspires me. I recognize there are many variables (age, resources, family circumstances, personality, etc.), and considering those, I figure out what their success could mean for someone like me.

I'm telling you what, this is more fun and mentally healthy than the alternative.