“Don’t compare your life to others. There’s no comparison between the sun and the moon. They shine when it’s their time.”
—Unknown
“I don’t know if I’m good enough to do this. She seems to write a beautiful sentence effortlessly, all while sitting in a room full of people, and without having to shut herself inside a quiet room for hours. When do I find the time to write, much less think, with a toddler?”
“She has all the good ideas for a blog. I can’t think of anything!”
“Do I really have anything to offer? Maybe I’m just fooling myself.”
These were all my thoughts on Repeat contemplating beginning this blog with my co-writer and sister (in-law) Sarah while I drove my mud-covered SUV back home from shopping toward that windy, five-mile country gravel road with my toddler in the backseat. Funny enough, one of the few moments I do have to think with a toddler is when I’m driving the car on my long trek to town and back. He often gazes out the window with a pacifier in his mouth or falls asleep, leaving me a few quiet moments to myself. But how I was spending my scant peaceful minutes to think were spent in discouragement and fear because of all the time I was spending comparing myself instead of coming up with my own thoughts and stories from my own personality and experiences. NOT a good or productive use of my time.
What is Comparison Keeping You From Doing?
A blog is something I have pondered a lot for the last five years as something I might love to do. Maybe it could just be a hobby, a creative outlet. A way to put together my love of photography with my love of reading and writing; a way to put together my fascination with the way a beautiful photo can make someone feel and the way a simple but profound sentence can make someone think or heal. Maybe I could have a little fun with it. Maybe I could actually help people. During these five years, I’ve spent quite a bit of time studying and researching, brainstorming what my personal niches could be, almost starting a blog, maybe even writing an article or two…then fizzling and dropping it when I traded all my passionate thoughts on a subject for thoughts on my fears, insecurities, and comparisons.
I felt as if I was off to a good start—writing a blog with someone and having accountability with someone, being encouraged by another person with the same interest and same subject matter…that was sure to keep me from fizzling this time. So I thought.
Sometimes it’s not our actual skills or gifting, or even the lack-of, that keeps us from enjoying life and being productive or doing something we love or dream of; sometimes it’s simply our mental comparisons with another person.
Well, I thought I had this comparison thing beat.
Truly, have made huge headway in that war…until I start something new. Like, a marriage, a baby, a blog. At least the battles get easier to fight each time because I’ve done it before. Comparison is a nasty foe that likes to pop up again and again telling you you’re not good enough or not as good as somebody else—so why try?
Can you relate?
“The fastest way to kill something special, is to compare it to something else.”
—Craig Groeschel
YOUR Story is Different, and Not Worthy of Comparison
One of my first defining-moment battles I fought in my mid-20s and conquered that makes me so passionate about dealing with paralyzing thoughts, emotions, and patterns in life was that of comparison. Comparison makes you think, “I’m not good enough.” “I’ll never be good enough. I’m not like him/her.” “I’m not smart enough.” “I’m not pretty enough.” “I’m not organized enough.” “I’m not patient enough.” “I’m not strong enough.” “I’ll never be as good at _________ as that person.” “That person doesn’t struggle with _________ like I do.”
While I often have great freedom in this now in my day-to-day life, sometimes I still have to fight smaller battles when I begin to do something new and unfamiliar to me. After all, there are skilled veterans there to compare myself to. Even now as I type my stomach tightens, my breathing shallows, and I feel short of breath, like I just can’t quite get enough oxygen. But then I remember truth. And I keep typing. And I remember you, wanting so badly to feel normal, to feel accepted, to feel like you’re good enough, to not be paralyzed, to do something with your life. And I keep typing. Because you have so much to offer. The world needs you.
“Your story is unique and so, so different…and not worthy of comparison.”
—Unknown
I don’t know your background, your current situation, or your beliefs, but I can tell you what happened for me. What transformed my life and my thoughts for the better. Conquering these self-defeating thoughts and learning to accept and love myself as I am…as God made me…was really one of the first freeing truths I began to walk through that made a big change in my life.
So how did it begin? How did it happen?
I believe there is a God who, with intelligent design, created not only the entire universe from the largest planet to the smallest creature to the most invisible atom, but also created each human being on this planet with intentional, intelligent design and specific purpose. It is with this as the foundation that I find great freedom and acceptance of who I am as a person. And for whom every other human being on the planet is as a person. I find the Bible has some significant wisdom on the subject of comparison, which can all be beautifully illustrated within nature itself—another thing I am passionate about as a country-loving, farm woman.
My help began when a very gentle and sincere friend of mine suggested from her own studying that this hatred of self and thinking other people were better were a subtle form of negative pride—thinking that you know better than a loving and all-knowing God what He should have made you to be.
“You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it…Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand!…”
—Psalm 139:13-18 NLT
“You turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay! Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘You did not make me’? Can the pot say to the potter, ‘You know nothing’?”
—Isaiah 29:16 NIV
But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’”
—Romans 9:20 NIV
While of course that was never my intention—some overly puffed up pride in myself or in my knowledge felt the furthest thing from my thoughts—I began to feel she was right. Certainly, if I really believe in a God like this, then surely He made me the way He wanted me, and that should be a good thing. I should trust Him in that! Unquestionably, I don’t know more than God! So, whenever I would begin to hate myself or compare my talents and myself with other people, I would catch myself and say, “No, God made me this way for a reason. There must be something good I can do. There must be a good purpose for me to be made this way.” And I began to finally accept myself as I was. That it was good the way I was. Maybe I’m not good at making conversation, or being outgoing and extroverted, or painting a beautiful painting or sewing an intricate quilt (yes, I have literally walked in depression about those things). But maybe I could be good at something else God has for me to be good at.
And what is so wrong with that? Why do I envy someone else’s talents when I have my own talents? What’s so wrong with the talents I do have? Maybe the things that come so naturally and easily for me that feel like nothing…maybe those are my God-gifted talents. And maybe they aren’t nothing after all.
I read another Bible verse during that time that felt like it hit me with such truth that it gave me all the muscle I needed to knock all my negative thoughts past tomorrow.
“We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise.”
—2 Corinthians 10:12 NIV
Comparison is “not wise” for daily living.
Why?
Because it leads me down the wrong path. Because it paralyzes me. Because it makes me think I am nothing.
It’s like I suddenly had permission to just be me; permission to no longer compare myself; permission to no longer make myself “better” by becoming like somebody else.
So, then I must remember:
“…For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”
—Ephesians 2:8-10 NIV
You Have Permission to Be Yourself, to Run Your Own Race
Back to the car drive, I began to catch myself in that negative thought pattern. When I realized how I was spending my time, I put my thoughts to a skidding halt. “God, do You even want me to do this blog? And if so, I don’t know what to write about. If it’s Your plan for me to do this, help me know what to write,” I silently prayed. Those things I thought weren’t talents for all those years—writing, photography, encouragement—I began to accept over time, one at a time, that maybe they are! Is this how He might use my gifting? Maybe I can help people. I then drifted back to my thoughts and immediately began to think of my comparison journey over a decade ago. I began to think it out in a real life example, with my current activity as my picture.
Life is like this highway I’m driving on. Multiple lanes, multiple cars. I could spend my time focusing on my drive, where I’m going, my lane, the scenery, my car. Or I could enviously look at all the other cars, comparing mine, wishing mine was “as good” as theirs, “prettier,” “bigger,” “cleaner”—you name it. Now my drive is immediately ruined. Perhaps it went from, “Wow, life is beautiful. This drive is beautiful. I love the people I get to fill my car with,” to now suddenly life is not good enough. After all, maybe I’ve been having car troubles and my car could break down at any moment. Maybe I don’t have enough money to fix my car or buy a new one. Not only am I now depressed at how I think the other cars and the other lives inside are better compared to mine, now I’m in danger of drifting into a terrible wreck or onto another route than I intended to go on, perhaps never making it to my destination.
All because my eyes are no longer focused on my lane and where I am going, but on those other things I wish I was or wish I had. You have your own car to drive, your own lane. You have your own race to run. Run yours with courage, with boldness. Don’t run someone else’s race! If I don’t focus on my car and my lane I may never get to where I am going. And even if I somehow miraculously do, I certainly won’t get there with any kind of joy or gratitude.
This is not beautiful living.
“…So we must let go of every wound that has pierced us and the sin we so easily fall into. Then we will be able to run life’s marathon race with passion and determination, for the path has been already marked out before us.”
—Hebrews 12:1 TPT
So How Do We Learn to Live This Imperfect Life Beautifully?
Yes, life is imperfect, and we are imperfect, but that does not mean we cannot live it in joy and gratitude and beauty.
Here’s where you can put on that flannel of yours with me, roll up your sleeves, and put some intentional work to your thought life so you can live life the way you were meant to!
Give yourself permission to be YOU. Give yourself permission to be imperfect and grow in your talents. I am with this blog! I am sure I need improvement and growth!
Put a halt to your self-hating, self-defeating thoughts and focus on what you’re good at. How did God make you as a beautiful masterpiece? Maybe it’s something that always came easily for you and you didn’t see how it could be important or useful. What are you seeing as negative that might actually be positive? What is something that you like about yourself and you can be thankful for—even if you can only think of one small thing? Take the time to think through or write down your answers in a journal or on a piece of paper. Then take those things, make them your new thoughts (with practice), and run with them! Put them on like a pretty pair of heels, learn to walk in them (because it takes practice), and take on the world in joy! Because there’s only one YOU in this world—and the world needs YOU! Don’t rob the world of that treasure!
Take your first action toward kinder thoughts of yourself, and let me know in the comments where you’ve struggled comparing yourself with another, and what is something you’re good at and like about yourself?
I just read this….I love it!! I’m so glad you are doing this blog! You were meant for this journey we have embarked on together.