Working Towards Our Purpose

Welcome to episode 69 of Working towards our

purpose. Today's episode, we are going to talk about

how to get yourself out of the comparison trap. But

before we get into that, we are going to check in with ourselves

and see where we're at today. So take a moment and see how you're feeling.

For me, I'm feeling excited

about sort of a perspective switch that I've had

this morning, and then also a little bit nervous because

I decided to record this episode kind of

not in my normal manner. So

I'm hoping that I'm prepared enough to talk about it, but I think

it'll be. Might be a little bit shorter of an episode. But, um. But yeah,

I just had something happen this morning, and. And it was a

nice lesson for myself, so I thought that I'd bring it to the

podcast and share it and talk about it some more, get

into it and. And hopefully ingrain it in myself, and

hopefully it could be an example for you if you struggle with comparison.

Um, so. So, yeah, getting into the episode,

I was on substech this morning, just sort of

trying to, like, interact and engage with people.

Sometimes I do that to, you know, grow my substack

and to try to make connections with people. And

I stumbled. I stumbled upon this person

who, in the description said that they were a

mindset coach. And for whatever reason, that sort of,

like, triggered my comparison, and I started going

down the rabbit hole of

like, oh, this person's got to figure it out. They're a mindset coach,

and they probably are making money, doing

what they want to do, like, and supporting themselves and getting to do

what they enjoy and helping people. And I guess I

just sort of made this story up of what this person

has and then compared myself to that, and I was like, oh, I don't

have that. You know, I don't have it figured out.

And, you know, if you've ever compared yourself to somebody, you know how

that feels, and it

makes you. It made me feel like I

was less than. It made me feel like I

wouldn't be able to get there. It made me feel

like sort of stuck where I am. And

in that moment, you're very.

Just sort of discouraged that, you know, you

think somebody else has it figured out and you're. And you're, like, looking at it

and you're comparing it with yourself and just thinking that

you'll never get there. So I was feeling really

down and questioning

and, yeah, just

sort of not making myself feel good. And then

I started thinking about it some more, and

Then I remembered that I can

journal. And so I got my journal

out and I just started, like, writing down my thoughts. And

this is where the perspective switch happened.

I do this thing called morning pages, which I've talked about before, and I haven't

done it in a while. And I've said that

on my last episode that I've been feeling a little bit more anxious recently. And

I realized that I haven't been journaling. And I was talking to a friend the

other day, and it was just. Yeah, I

pointed out that I was like, I need to get back to journaling when I

start maybe going down these rabbit holes. So

I grabbed a piece of paper and I started just, like, writing down how I

felt. And I was like, yeah, I feel like I'm less than this and that.

And as I was writing,

I somehow had this

perspective switch. And I thought about it in a different way.

And instead of comparing myself to

this person that I'm making up in my head because I don't know them at

all, I looked at it

as they were just maybe further along the path than me. And

that's totally fine and normal. Like, you

know, it's. It's sort of like, you know, when you're in, like,

third grade, you never really look at, like, a fourth grader

and be like, oh, man, I wish I was a fourth grader. I'm never.

I'm never going to be able to be a fourth grader. Like, that sounds silly

and ridiculous, but that's kind of what I'm saying

when I'm comparing, like, I don't know who this person is. They likely have

been doing something longer than me. And

at the end of the day, none of it matters. Cause I don't need to

be comparing myself to that. But. But when you're feeling this

comparison trap, this, like, trap that

you're putting yourself in, I think this could be a helpful way to think of

it. So. So, yeah, thinking of it

more so in the fact that, like, there's people that are

further along than me and there's people that aren't as far along as

me. There's people in first grade, there's people in third grade, there's people in fourth

grade, you know, all the grades, there's people, and nobody's better

than the other. Like, fourth graders aren't better than third graders.

Person that's maybe further along with helping people

isn't better than me, and people who are less further along isn't better.

So all just like this scale. So I sort of Visualize

this scale of people that are further along than me and

people that aren't further along than me. And what really helped

for me was to think that, like, I'm trying to help

people and encourage people that are maybe

older versions of myself. So

in that regard, you know,

I can think of a certain group of people, but

there's also another group of people who are further along than me. And

instead of comparing myself and feeling like I'm less than, I can

use them as encouragement. And for some reason,

that really broke the comparison trap for me. And

I was like, oh, yeah, I also need to be encouraged,

and I need to be inspired by other people. And instead

of comparing myself to somebody that's further along than me, I can use

it as encouragement. And that

was super helpful for me because it immediately snapped me out of my comparison

trap. And then to go along with that, the other

piece of it was that

not everybody's. For you, maybe this lady that

I found, maybe I don't resonate with her, and

she's further along with me, further along than me. And that's okay too,

because the people that I need to encourage me and inspire me,

I need to resonate with. So. So that was really helpful,

too, to just think that, like, not everybody who's further along than

you, you need to, like, pay attention to and, like, listen to and all

that stuff. So that sort of made it less

overwhelming for me too. So, yeah, just sort of

visualizing this. Like, I literally drew a line,

and I put me in the middle, and then to the right side, I put,

like, people ahead of me, and then to the left side, I put, like, people

not as far ahead, and again, not in a negative way, but to

just see this scale of, like, oh, okay, I'm in the middle here.

I can help these people, and these people can help me. And

that was just, like, really a nice

perspective switch. And, yeah,

I just wanted to share that because I think that a lot of us

struggle with comparing ourselves to others. And I do it all the time.

And, you know, social media is just such,

for me, a place where that happens. And

even substack, that's like, a nicer social media, I still fall into

that. So, yeah, I was excited that

I was able to have this perspective switch today, and

I wanted to share it with you. So

hopefully that's. That's sort of helpful for you.

And, yeah, we don't have to. I think the last thing that I want to

say is that, like, when we do

feel jealous of people that maybe are further along

on the. On the path than we are, you

then can't take whatever it is that they have to offer,

because when you're acting out of jealousy, you're angry,

you're looking at it as, like, this negative thing. You're not open. But

if you remove the jealousy part of it, then you

open yourself up to the opportunity for learning. And

instead of being jealous, you can look at them as an ally and

as somebody that's helping you along as a mentor. Um,

so, yeah, just a reminder that, like, we all need people

in our lives to inspire and encourage us. So.

So, yeah, I know this is sort of not the normal,

you know, structured podcast episode, but. Yeah, just.

Just wanted to share that and got sort of a quicker episode today.

But I hope that that was helpful for you and let me know in the

comments, you know, maybe what you do to

stop yourself from comparing yourself to others. And,

yeah, that. That's all I got for you today. We're going to end it here.

It's going to be real short, but thank you for listening.

As always. I appreciate all of you, and I will see you on

another episode. Real

Sam.