Comparing yourself to others.

 Comparing yourself to others - link to podcast

Social media seems to produce a lot of insecurity as we look at others and compare. When we find ways to celebrate others successes and genuinely care when they struggle, we find a more childlike, beautiful way to love.

It doesn’t take much to make me feel a bit insecure.  I spend 5 minutes on Social media and can see people on holidays all over the world, or at least I used to, I see people losing weight looking fabulous, owning a house, buying a car, eating nice food and snuggling up with family and friends looking supremely happy and well loved.

On the other hand, as one social commentator notes "The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else's highlight reel.”  So we can’t take social media too seriously. 

But then I meet real life people, my family, friends and colleagues and guess what?  They are often better, Smarter, faster, prettier and richer than me too. 

Some people I don’t even like much are better at lots of stuff than me and I secretly hope they break out in a rash or get caught stealing or something. 

We love to hate the opposition in our sporting teams as well and I love it when perfectly decent human beings who play for the other team, like Geelong for example, miss a goal from 15 meters out directly in front or if a pommy cricketer drops a sitter.  We cheer, laugh and spew unrestrained disrespect on their character and often the character of their mothers.

I find it hard to cope with 80 year old men with full heads of hair.  I don’t really like thin fit men and positively hate people who complain that no matter what they eat, they just can’t seem to put on any weight because they have a fast metabolism or something.   

Todays scripture reminds us that Love does not envy and we live in a world where the heart of envy - comparing ourselves to others is in plague proportions.  We look at others and can sometimes struggle to be happy with their success as it tends to highlight our own unhappiness.  This creates a world where relationships are tense because we are often looking for the chink in each other’s armor and the ways we can get the upper hand.

The lovely Sue is probably the most organized and strategic person I know when it comes to things like planning a meal or a holiday.  She has a heightened sense for this, I suspect because of her mobility challenges as she does not want to walk further than she has too, so she remembers everything.   I on the other hand leave the house three or four times get in the car, start the motor and then get out of the car and come back into the house to get my phone or my wallet of any number of other critical components of my day.  This has become a joke as she now expects this and sarcastically calls out hello fancy seeing you here each time I return.  She still only gets one kiss goodbye though, no matter how many times I leave the house.   

So I am now on the lookout for her to forget something, so I can normalize my foolishness to some degree.  So the other day, we were heading off on some holidays and we were all packed up and on the road driving when Sue turned to me and sheepishly admitted that she had forgotten her crutches.   Essential for the Lovely Sue to manage bathrooms and beach or pool based activities and of course we had to turn around and go back home.   On the outside I was a calm and reasonable husband, but on the inside I was going YES!!!   Ammo for her next jibe at me for forgetting the car keys and only realizing it when I get to the car. 

If we are to love and enjoy others we cannot always be threatened by their successes and smug about their failures.  We need a deep and sincere level of acceptance and respect for the people we love and for them to feel safe in our presence.  Our adversarial politics and the hierarchical and often showy ways we do church or work or even family gatherings, can sometimes feed this comparison sickness that makes so many people unhappy and fragile.

Park run is a great event because nobody really cares what your time is.  The fast people are as pleased to see you getting involved as the slow walkers at the back.  Mums with kids in pushers and old ladies with even older puppy dogs are as welcome and celebrated.  It’s a great level playing field and its structure and culture lends itself to a beautiful environment of respect and mutual encouragement. 

Last week I found myself cheering on the slim fit guys, who are my natural enemies.

I am reminded of a story about a 50 meter race organized with a dozen or so little kids from a kindy class.  They were all super excited to be involved together in the race with their friends.  The starters gun went off and they all raced away as best they could, but one kid stumbled and fell down quite early in the piece.  The kids nearby noticed this and stopped to see if he was OK.  He was upset and crying.  Soon all the participants had stopped and walked back to their friend.  They all put their arms around each others shoulders and walked together for the rest of the race finishing in a single wide smiley line.  Everyone was a winner.

So if you find yourself comparing yourself to others, or resenting people who are doing well, just step back for a moment and try to be a bit more childlike if you can manage it.  You’ll smile a lot more and maybe have more friends. 

 

Bless ya, 

Bryce