I have already spoken on some occasions about the danger of comparing yourself to others. First, because you usually choose people who are, in some way, more advanced than you professionally, regardless of whether they have more experience or not (of course you do not bother choosing someone who is in your same conditions or who has not arrived so far); and second, because the only thing you get is to doubt everything and be paralyzed thinking that everything you are doing is not even good. Who has never felt like this?
Comparing yourself to someone is something you are going to do yes or yes at some point, especially if you have a business and you know someone in a situation similar to what they are doing (or so it seems) much better than you. So I wanted to share with you an article by Kendall Summerhawk on this topic that I read last week and that I found very interesting.
The point, according to Kendall (and I can't agree more), is to use the comparison in a positive way. In an article I wrote recently, I commented exactly that, that if you look at people who are more successful than you do it to inspire you not to discourage you and think that you will never get to that point. That is not the way and if you find yourself doing it, stop looking at what others are doing and focus on what you do and move forward.
Apart from that, the comparison proposed by Kendall in his article is very interesting, since you cannot avoid comparisons, why not compare yourself? Choose to compare how you were before with how you are now and how you are now with how you want to be in the future. What do you get with that? First, feel good about your progress and second, be clear about what you need to change to get to the point you want. Even (I already know what you are thinking) if there has not been much change between how you were before and how you are now and you feel discouraged, at least you will be aware of the situation and you can begin to decide what you want to change.
If you want you can go deeper by making this comparison between different areas. For example, if you are a freelancer with a business, choose which areas you are going to use for comparison, some examples: income, clients, free time, help and mentality. And you compare how many clients you had, have and would like to have; how much free time did you have, have and would like to have; what kind of help did you have (coaches, mentors, assistants, employees) etc. You decide which categories you want to analyze, those that are most significant for your business or profession.
For example, when I started my business I had few clients, almost no income, enough free time and no help. I was also tied to the poor mindset of not wanting to spend money on my business and wanting to do it all by myself. Right now, income and customers have nothing to do with the past, fortunately. Free time equal or more (and of better quality because I am not worried about money), I have just hired my first virtual assistant, I have my mentor, I am continuously investing to learn from the best (depending on my situation and my tastes), and my mentality is light years away from before. Now I am aware of the importance of investing in my business and, in addition, the more sweats the investment produces, the better results I see (because, like everyone, I started with the cheapest I could find, of course).
This is very valuable to me because it helps me to realize what I have achieved and to celebrate it, that many of us forget, right? The next step would be to compare this with what I want in the future and, based on that, decide what actions I have to take to achieve it. Very useful, don't you think?
The ideal would be not to compare yourself with anyone, of course, but it is practically impossible. So the best, as Kendall suggests, is choosing who you compare yourself to and why. So now you know, grab a pencil and paper and start comparing the before, the now and the future and, from there, get the actions you have to focus on to get it.
Where are you going to start?
