Hahaha! Sorry for ruffling your feathers with that title. As you should be catching on by now, it was clickbait. Sure, it has something to do with what I am about to tell you about. So…
We all sometimes get that feeling that we ain’t shit. You look at your life, most likely compare it to someone you have no business comparing it to, then go down that rabbit hole. “I am not good enough. I am nothing. I am a failure.”
Why do you keep doing this to yourself? No wonder you ain’t shit! I am kidding.
This is all normal. Comparing ourselves to others is sane.No, you are not crazy. I promise.
Comparing ourselves can be healthy and it can be destructive depending on how you use it. But let’s start with the negative side so that we can have a happily ever after at the end. Or do you prefer a dark ending?
The negative is the easiest to relate to. It’s like the difference between working and chilling. Chilling like negativity comes easily but working and avoiding comparing ourselves is harder.
It is like one is like falling onto a soft bed when you are completely exhausted while the other is getting up to go to the bathroom in the middle of your beauty sleep.
Even those who have a healthier perspective now have gone through this dilemma.
We all start by looking at someone doing better than us and thinking, “They are better because they have rich parents. They have better degrees. They went to a better school.”
If only I had what they did, I would do ten times better! How presumptuous.
I will not lie. I have been this guy. I still do it at times but thankfully, with age comes wisdom, sometimes. We don’t always get smarter.
What I realized about myself was that my comparison came from envy yet I am from a good background. I wanted what they did without the work.
We never honestly consider the work people have to put in for what they have. What happens in the background?
“ But but the kyi guy is lazy. It’s their parents’ money.” What were your parents doing when their parents were putting in the work? That stung a little, I know.
Nobody likes the hard-hitting truth. But when we face it, we get valuable direction. It’s in facing the bitter truth that we get answers and can move on. Yeah, we need to because those people we envy don’t care one whit about our envy.
Worse still, envy digs us deeper in the mud. It is not progressive. You feel sorry for yourself to the extent that you start burying yourself.
Yet the solution is simply to put in the work. Maybe not so simple but clear.
You do not need to get there in one go. Everything worth having takes time, pacing, and consistency. Pacing because not everyone has the same capabilities. Some people can hit the gym and lift four times a day. But you may manage to lift half their load once a week. Or maybe skip a rope? Maybe lifting is not for you?
But that’s you. That is what you can manage and should be okay with.
Part of why many people fail at doing it is because they, choose something they may have no capability for, and move too fast for their capability.
Once we know what we can do, what pace works for us, and appreciate that, it is difficult to envy. We all have our race to run and wasting time envying others is useless.
Well, useless unless…you are using it for inspiration to work harder. To do better for yourself within your capabilities.
If you feel like you ain’t shit, maybe you need to work on changing that. A lot of people we envy were not shit before. Why can’t you have the same story?
It is in consistently putting in the work. We envy because we do not want to work.
