Comparing

You see someone beautiful, successful, funny, or accomplished.

What happens next in your mind?

Do you appreciate what you see? Or do you use it as evidence against yourself?

Comparing is not automatically a problem. The way you do it matters.

I want to invite you to compare in a way that creates appreciation, inspiration, and motivation instead of discouragement.

Notice when admiration becomes self-criticism

While walking along a beach in Hawaii, I saw a beautiful woman in a bathing suit. Then I noticed another woman watching her.

From where I stood, it looked as if the second woman was using the first woman's beauty against herself.

That was my interpretation of what I saw. To me, both women were gorgeous, with different bodies and different looks.

The moment gave me the idea for this teaching because so many of us do something similar.

We compare bodies, personalities, success, accomplishments, and lives. Then we decide the comparison means something negative about us.

When you use someone else's magnificence that way, you can block your own.

Remember the whole human life

Everyone has a 50:50 life.

Seeing someone's beauty or success does not mean you are seeing every part of their experience.

When I was young, I was obsessed with Whitney Houston. I thought she had the perfect body, voice, success, and life.

I used that picture of her life to make my own life seem horrible because I could not be like her.

Looking back, I can see how painful and unnecessary that comparison was.

I was comparing my human experience with an imagined version of someone else's life.

She was human, too. Having extraordinary beauty, talent, or success does not remove the negative half of life.

Appreciate what you do not need to become

Sometimes you see something in another person that you cannot have in the same way.

They may be younger or taller. They may have a natural quality very different from yours.

That does not mean their beauty has to create pain for you.

Think about looking at the ocean, flowers, or palm trees.

You can find them beautiful without thinking you have failed because you are not as beautiful as the ocean.

You do not need to become the thing you appreciate.

You can approach people that way, too. You can enjoy their beauty, personality, or talent without using the difference to criticize yourself.

Let an available possibility inspire you

Sometimes the thing you admire is something you do want to create.

You like how someone takes care of themselves, builds a business, dresses, or accomplishes something.

You can think about having some of that in your own life.

That kind of comparison can give you energy. It can introduce an idea or possibility you had not considered.

I encourage comparison that helps you appreciate, feel inspired, or become motivated.

The question is how you are using what you see.

Are you becoming more interested in your own life, or using theirs to shut yours down?

Wishing they had less is not wishing you had more

If someone makes more money than you, notice whether you want to make more or want them to make less.

Those are different thoughts.

Wanting someone else to lose what they have does not create abundance for you. It creates scarcity in your own experience.

You can celebrate their success and consider what you want.

You do not have to make their result smaller to make room for yours.

The same applies to attention, beauty, and accomplishment. Someone else's contribution can add something wonderful to the world.

Check the feeling, not only the words

A thought can contain positive-sounding words and still work against you.

You might think about wishing you could do something, wishing you were different, or how lucky someone else is.

Ask how that thought feels.

Does it create a feeling that drives you to make something beautiful in your life? Or does it encourage you to hurt and discourage yourself?

Your thoughts create feelings, and those feelings drive what you do.

The emotion gives you useful information about whether the comparison is serving you.

If you cannot find appreciation, inspiration, or motivation in it, there is an opportunity to understand your own mind and coach yourself.

You may not need to avoid the beach

A friend told me she did not like going to the beach because she compared her body with women who were thinner and imagined people judging her.

She can choose not to go. But I also see an opportunity to examine the judgment.

Are you sorting bodies into good and bad, acceptable and unacceptable, deserving attention and not deserving it?

Is that how you want to think about yourself and other people?

Then ask why you want to be at the beach. Do you want to sit in the sun, play in the water, and talk with friends?

You may be able to go with the intention to appreciate beauty instead of spending the experience judging bodies.

The solution does not always have to be avoiding the place where comparison happens.

Notice the pattern without attacking yourself

If you feel a catch of jealousy, pain, or self-doubt when you see someone's outfit, hair, or success, you do not have to be mad at yourself for it.

You can recognize a pattern your brain has learned.

Social media gives us many opportunities for painful comparison. Likes and comments can seem more important than our own opinion of ourselves.

I want that to become a conscious choice.

What do you think about you? What do you appreciate about you? Do you want to give someone else's attention more authority than your own?

Bring your own contribution

Nobody else has your brain.

Your experience, knowledge, and thinking can combine to create something unique.

When you spend your life trying to be an imitation of someone else, we miss what you could offer.

I could not be Whitney Houston better than she was. I was meant to be me and make a different contribution.

I want you to look inside and bring something new into the world rather than only look outside for a person to copy.

Your version of beauty or success may not fit the traditional picture. That can make the world more interesting.

Choose the comparison you want to practice

Someone may be better at basketball, making money, or creating art.

Use that to inspire you where you can. Where it does not inspire, you can still appreciate it.

There is no one more worthy than anyone else. We are all human, and we all have something to offer.

Ask how you can shine for your own life and growth, with the experience and qualities you have.

I do not want to compare myself with other people in a way that makes me feel bad. I want comparison to help me feel good about them, the world, and myself.

I invite you to make that choice, too.