I am intelligent, I am driven, I strive to be the best.
But with all this, I also exhibit A-Type tendencies.
And here comes the second BUT.
Alongside those A-type tendencies is a nasty, dirty little habit I’m trying to kick.
COMPARISON to others.
Phew, I said it.
That was like standing up in an AA meeting admitting that one. I barely drink a drop but while striving forward at full-speed, I still suffer from what Marie Forleo refers to in B-School as a “comparison hangover”.
My now husband and I have talked at length on this subject many times. Our evening conversations will frequently start with me telling him about the newest wellness guru I’d discovered that day and how they’ve got this amazing website and they hang out with these other rad gurus and they live the so-called “dream life”, and on I rattle.
With my best interests at heart, he’ll lovingly listen but then politely say that I’ve gone into idolisation mode again.
I’m quick to put them up on a pedestal.
Yes, it is important to know the people who inspire you.
It is another to want to be like them – all the time.
I know you’re all thinking, that’s a bit harsh, comparison can’t be that bad can it?
Don’t match up to every detail of your idols work, income, look, writing, podcast?
You soon feel weighed down by the striving.
Constant analysis of the minutia – your goals become less of your own and you stop moving forward altogether.
A constant “comparison hangover” can be draining.
I used to know a real hangover most weekends back in uni days and that ain’t a fun place to be.
But when I constantly compare myself to others, I quickly feel stuck.
Not enough.
My authentic self no longer determining my path.
Comparison is the stuff of what Eckhart Tolle calls “ego”
Eckhart Tolle writes extensively about the ego in his novel ‘A New Earth’ – a book that was a life changer for me.
Tolle describes comparison as an “unconscious state” and in order to reverse the unconscious, the first thing I do is:
“make peace with the present moment”
In the present, I am not in my past (resentment) or in my future (comparison). I am concerned with what I am, in the here and now.
“being at peace and being who you are, that is, being yourself, are one”
The second thing I do to spin this limiting belief off into the yonder, is I re-align with my core-desired feelings.
I can testify wholeheartedly that choosing my core-desired feelings has been one of the most profound and grounding tools I have come to know. By learning to live each day through my core-desired feelings, I craft goals and a vision for my life that is not the “Jones’s” dream, but one that is from my true authentic self.
If you can do one thing, PLEASE let that authentic, passionate self, radiate from every cell.
That is the sexy stuff ladies!
Finally, a little wisdom from Danielle LaPorte:
1. When you’re tempted to compare yourself to others, stave off the comparing by feeling your way into your dream.
2. Bless the people you feel envious of.
Try it, you just might learn to KAPOW that comparison out of your way!
Tell me beauties, do you suffer from a comparison hangover? have you managed to kick the habit?
