How to stop comparing yourself to others

Josh Kaufman and Tony Robbins both note that comparing yourself to others is a major source of unhappiness, because people have vastly different lives, values, environments, and circumstances that make those comparisons unfair and largely meaningless 1 2. And when you look at others on social media, you are often comparing your behind-the-scenes reality to someone else's highlight reel, much of which is not even real 3.

To stop falling into the comparison trap, a few strategies help:

• Compare yourself only to your past self: Josh Kaufman suggests measuring your success by how much you have improved compared to where you were yesterday, a week ago, a month ago, or years prior, rather than looking at others 1.
• Set your own scorecard: Define your own version of success and status instead of chasing external milestones that may actively make your life worse.
• Process feelings of insecurity: Robin Sharma recommends that when someone else's success brings up feelings of inadequacy, you acknowledge those emotions, journal about them, and use practices like meditation, visualization, prayer, and stillness to work through them 3.
• Shift your perspective on others' success: Train yourself to view someone else's victory as an example of what is possible rather than a sign of your own failure, and genuinely feel good for them 3.
• Limit comparison to narrow tactics: While comparing broad life metrics like net worth or marriage leads to unhappiness, comparing specific, narrow tactics, such as writing styles or marketing strategies, can be a helpful tool for building skills.