When we scroll through Instagram or Facebook we are bombarded with posts about someone else’s accomplishments. While social media is effective in pulling people close together it has also created this warped image that everyone else is reaching their goals faster than you.

And so I have learned two things from my infinite bouts of jealousy

Other people’s accomplishments do not correlate to my failure. It simply means that something good happened to someone.

A friend getting engaged does not mean that your relationship is inferior. Or that a lack of relationship is indicative of never getting married. It just means someone else is getting married.

This goes with anything whether it ranges from grades or salaries where we downgrade our accomplishments due to someone else’s supposedly superior successes.

And this leads to toxic, resentful relationships instead of nurturing ones where you can uplift each other.

Which leads me to my second point:

Success is not going to be instantaneous.

In a world where everything is literally at the tip of our fingers, we assume that accomplishing goals should be as fast as getting Postmates.

But it isn’t.

There is not a set path outlined for every goal. And there isn’t a timer for reaching destinations either. The best thing about college is that I am literally surrounded by different people with different backgrounds that share one goal of trying to better their lives.

My goal is one day to be a doctor. I am a first-year undergrad who is currently struggling with kinetics and trying to get into a research lab. A few weeks ago, I met someone who served for a few years and is currently taking required classes for med school while studying for the MCAT.

Our different paths to medical school are not better or worse.

It is just our own.