I’m like this and you’re like that… the art of comparison.

“She’s fatter than me.”

“I’m the handsome one.”

“Tom and Andrew got 1.”

Ever since we were children, we’ve been learning to compare. Comparing not only ourselves to others, but also all the people around us. Then we can feel valued or unvalued. Everything depends on who we choose for our authority of appearance, character and attitude.

And why do we actually behave like that?

It all started with the competition we have and the idealisation of both objects and people in social media. Let’s pay attention to actors, singers, presenters and all those who use portals like instagram. They promote care, sometimes even exaggerated, showcasing to others their extreme perception of their appearance. This is why there are complexes that sometimes we can’t cope with. All ‘appearance’ focused pictures uploaded to instagram lead to a new definition of beauty. Now this beauty can be identified with artificiality and nudity. Showing bodies and bragging about them, a ton of makeup that makes the complexion appear perfect, plastic surgeries that aim to constantly improve its appearance and, of course, photo retouching – a small and innocent distortion of reality.

Very often I encounter that while scrolling through one of my friend’s profiles, on a social networking site, I also see an artificially created life. All added photos focusing on travel or great food are only to show the world “who I am not”. Are my conclusions hasty? No. I personally know the people I’m talking about and I know very well that this is a fake makeover presented to the world. A theatre that other people are jealous of.

And what does all this lead to?

It leads to our theme of comparisons.

Everyone is struggling with complexes. Some have larger complexes and are more susceptible to them, others smaller. People who begin to judge their self-worth start to compare what they don’t have to what other people (on social media) appear to have. They value themselves through comparisons leading to jealousy and joy from other people’s shortcomings. The worst thing about all of this is that they don’t heal their complexes through such behaviour. On the contrary, it acts on them as a driving force for further comparison of other people, and this leads to constant competition and falling into extreme negative mental states (depression, anger, resentment).

I remember a situation when I was little and came back from school with a poor test score. In order to alleviate the situation and the nervousness of my parents I emphasised that the whole class got poor grades. I also added that my close friend got two and I got three. My dad always answered my comparisons with:

“I’m not interested in the whole class’s grades, I’m interested in yours.”

At the very beginning this comment had no impact on me, but the more often I heard it, the more I became convinced that it is not worth comparing myself to others because it doesn’t do me or others any good.

And you?

Think about whether it makes sense to judge, compare and focus on other people?

And if you like to do it and you can’t stop…

Start judging and focusing on yourself.

Start comparing the old to the new.

And live without comparing yourself to other people, because it’s a waste of time.