During yoga class, you may expect to stand like a tree, make a few ohms and turn into a human pretzel if you’re up for the occasion. Ultimately, you expect to relax and find some peace. When you’re posing in front of a mirror and able to see everyone with you, perhaps it’s not so simple. Some have practiced for years and are seemingly like a rubber band. Meanwhile, you may be straining just to keep up. It’s only natural to compare ourselves to others. We’re social creatures after all.
But we rarely consider other people’s journeys or how they feel about themselves. The only thing comparison does is sabotage our viewpoint of ourselves and feed unrealistic expectations. When we open Twitter or Instagram, our objective may be to connect with our loved ones or to be entertained. Whether we know or not, we’re also comparing ourselves by seeing how we measure up, if we’re as happy, or if we're happier than everyone else.
What we neglect is the fact that everyone posts only what they want others to see. Your feed is simply highlights. We’re not seeing the trial and error or even the photos before the filters. Without personally knowing them, we have no idea what they went through to reach where they are now.
Majority of media fails to represent life as we know it. Magazine covers display models who do not share their actual appearance before the makeup and photoshop. This leaves us aspiring to acquire appearances that do not naturally exist. It’s easy to see how this leads to negative feelings.
We’re surrounded by self-deprecating opportunities and it’s easy to humor them all. We’ve become so accustom to it that it feels natural to do so. It doesn’t have to be that way. Take a step back from everything that you’ve been comparing yourself to and focus on you. We're all works in progress and it's unfair to compare ourselves to someone who is on a different journey.
No more chasing down ways to be more like so and so. Focus on making your dreams a reality and how you can be a better you. At the end of the day, you're answering to the person looking back at you in the mirror. Do what makes you happy.
