A Mindful Perspective
Welcome to my podcast! I'm Nick Levesque, and I'm on a mission to help you navigate life's challenges with a mindful perspective. Join me every week as I dive deep into the realms of mindset, spirituality, and personal growth. Drawing from my own experiences, I want to provide you with tools, strategies, insights, and inspiring stories that will help you go from where you are now, to where you want to be.
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A Mindful Perspective
How to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others (Even When You Feel Behind)
Do you ever feel like you’re behind in life? Like everyone else is achieving more, growing faster, and somehow, you’re just… stuck?
I get it, because I struggled with this too, and still do. Comparison is something we all struggle with, but what if it’s keeping us from seeing our own progress?
In this video, we’ll talk about:
✅ Why we compare ourselves to others & how it’s wired into our brain
✅ The hidden cost of comparison (it’s damaging more than you realize)
✅ The Golden Shadow – how what you envy in others is actually a reflection of your untapped potential
✅ Practical steps to break free from the comparison trap and start celebrating your own journey
🚀 Key takeaway: Instead of comparing yourself to others, what if you started comparing yourself to who you were yesterday? The only person you need to compete with is YOU.
🎯 Timestamps:
0:52 Why We Compare Ourselves to Others
10:56 The Problem With Comparison
12:33 Tips
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🎙 Podcast: A Mindful Perspective
🌎 Website: nickspiritualcoaching.com
👉 If this video resonated with you, drop a comment below! What’s one thing you’ve compared yourself to recently?
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Hello everyone and welcome to A Mindful Perspective. I'm your host, nick Levesque, certified Spiritual Life Coach, and I'm here to share insights into my journey of mindfulness and self-discovery. Each week, we'll explore mindset, spirituality and personal growth to help you navigate life's challenges, with practical strategies and inspiring stories. Let's dive in. Do you sometimes scroll through social media and then, all of a sudden, you start to compare your life to someone else's? Maybe you're comparing a specific component of your life, maybe you're comparing your body, for example. Okay. Or maybe you're seeing someone achieving great things and then, all of a sudden, you start to feel like you're stuck, like you're behind, and that you should be further along than you are right now.
Speaker 1:Comparison is something that I have struggled with personally for years and, if I'm being completely honest, I still do to a certain extent. Okay, sometimes I'll even catch myself. I'm scrolling. I'm like, oh, I'm comparing myself to this person. Right and truly. I truly believe that comparison is the thief of joy.
Speaker 1:So in today's video, I really want to talk about comparison, why we compare, what it does to us, and also I want to give some tips and tricks on how to break free from that comparison trap and how to kind of shift the perspective on comparison, that you can use it for you rather than against you. So, first and foremost, I want us to talk about why we compare ourselves with other people. Okay, so there are obviously many different reasons as to why that can be. But a few that I've noticed personally in my life and just overall, is that, first and foremost, comparison used to be kind of a survival instinct. Right, it was really a survival instinct. Our brains are wired to assess where we fit in. Okay, if you look at our ancestors as an example, right, being parts of tribes and always being parts of groups, we needed to compare ourselves to other people to make sure that we are part of the group and how we can be of contribution to the group, so, obviously, that our survival needs are met and that we don't get kicked out of the group, because at that point in time, if we get kicked out of the group, that's literally a threat to our survival. Okay, but the thing is, comparison was meant at a certain point, to be a tool for survival, but it's not a reason to doubt yourself anymore. Okay, and it the key word here is also tool, and I think comparison can be used as a tool, which we'll talk about in a bit. But also, I truly believe that when we are comparing ourselves so this is something I've noticed personally, right, I think sometimes we start to compare ourselves with the best in a specific category okay, whether that's fitness, wealth, whatever category you want it to be okay, this is something that I notice is that I was comparing my chapter one to someone else's chapter 10.
Speaker 1:So when I started playing drums okay, obviously, like anyone else, when you start something new, you're not great at it, right? Um, so I, I started playing, I signed up for drum lessons online and, you know, it was a really good way to start. But I found myself looking at these amazing drummers, right, these gifted, talented drummers, and I would often compare myself. I'd be like, you know, this guy is amazing. Like, oh, my goodness, I'm never going to be that good. And then I, you know you start to feel this. You know, I started to feel a sense of like I'm not good enough, or like I'm never going to get to that extent. I'm never going to be as good as he is or she is as an example, right, and as I was looking at them, I Like it's not even realistic to begin with, first and foremost, and also the thing about comparison sometimes is we get stuck in this comparison trap and we compare ourselves, like I just said, to the best in a certain category, but also we have to take a step back and kind of dissect that a little bit.
Speaker 1:Okay, when we're comparing ourselves to someone who does this for a living or someone who's been doing this for 25 years, again it goes back to comparing our chapter one to someone else's chapter 10, right. And for me, what I noticed was like okay, first and foremost, not only am I doing that level of comparison, but I need to reassess what is my goal with drumming? Okay, so I'm comparing myself to one of the best who's been doing this for 20 plus years as an example. I'm just starting out, and also my goals are not even to be a professional drummer or to tour or to do this as a full-time job. Okay, so, like at that point I was like okay, I can really cut myself some slack here, because obviously our goals are completely different. They're professional drummers, they do this for a living. I don't do that for a living, nor do I intend to do that for a living at all. Right, so this is what I'm saying. Sometimes we need to take a step back and truly realize and acknowledge that what we're comparing ourselves to is completely unrealistic and we have completely different goals. Okay, so that's another thing that I want to share as well.
Speaker 1:Now, obviously, another one is social media. Okay, obviously, I think we all know this, but social media skews reality. Sometimes we see people on there and oftentimes what we'll see is 5% of people. We don't see their full lives, and the key point that I'm trying to make here is we absolutely do not know what happens behind closed doors. Okay, sometimes we'll see these social media couples or whatever people posting selfies and they seem amazing, they seem all happy, but behind closed doors it's a completely different story, and sometimes we compare ourselves to these people Like I wish I was that happy, or I wish I had a partner so supportive, or I wish I had that type of relationship. Okay, and unfortunately, like I've known some of these couples where they post all these different things, all these selfies, you know, making themselves look good like the happiest couple and behind closed doors, that's not at all the story, absolutely not Right. Maybe they're fighting a lot or maybe they're having their own difficulties in the relationship but that isn't being advertised online whatsoever. Okay, so it's this, it's this false image that we're seeing and that we're kind of attaching ourselves to. So this is what I'm saying.
Speaker 1:Okay, a lot of the things, and I know we all know this intuitively that what we see on social media isn't necessarily real, but I feel like we forget sometimes this is something personally for me as well is I feel like I forget, and sometimes I'm comparing myself to someone else's life, when I absolutely don't know the picture behind the life, right, or what we're comparing ourselves to, and oftentimes like as an example. One thing that I've heard before is, like, you know, we compare ourselves to, uh, or we wish we had the life of someone else, right, maybe like a rock star or something we're like, wow, I truly wish I had that life, I truly wish I was living the dream, like they are as an example, right? But again, how many people or celebrities, for example, that we know, okay, that have unfortunately taken their own life or unfortunately suffer from a specific addiction or something along those lines? Right, again, because we don't see the full picture of what you know. We see only half, not even half of the true picture right Now. Obviously, there are certain celebrities that obviously do well and have great lives, but a lot of them we actually do not see what happens behind closed doors. So oftentimes what we're comparing ourselves to is completely unrealistic and if we truly take a step back, we wouldn't even want that life. Okay, so this is really what I mean.
Speaker 1:A lot of times, what we see on social media is so skewed and so not real whatsoever. Okay, especially also when it comes to body image, right, I think, especially in a day and age, uh, in our digital day and age, I think we compare our bodies so much, right, women, men, all of us, I, I myself included right, I've come, I've caught myself in that comparison trap many times, wishing like, wow, a, that person looks good, I wish you know, I wish I looked that good, or all these different things. Right, and you scroll through social media and you see all these influencers, these fitness influencers, and you're like man, I wish I could look that good. Right, and that's the thing I think the good part about this as well.
Speaker 1:What I've noticed is kind of this shift lately where a lot of influencers, the fitness influencers have actually kind of been talking about this more openly and doing videos about how unrealistic it is right. And they're showing themselves when they're not under a specific lighting, when they're not all pumped up, when they're not, all you know, jacked up from a workout, for example, right, and a lot of times we see these pictures, we see these people that are we are comparing ourselves to and they don't even look like that in real life. They don't even look like their photos. Okay, and with all the ai tools and everything. Now so many people are using video editors and all these different things to photoshop themselves and such right, and there are a lot of people that are coming out with that like showing tools on how they do that to their own bodies, to show you that it's completely unrealistic Right which I find is so powerful. So I've really appreciated that shift when it comes to kind of the fitness community and people are, I think, are talking about it more openly.
Speaker 1:But I feel like you know, I've talked to young men as well and a lot of times, like we want to get jacked, we want to get. No, I, if I look at myself 10 years ago I was like man. I would look at all these guys like I want to get jacked, I want to get big, but oftentimes, like, you see these people in real life and they don't look like that at all, and then you're like, wow, you don't look like that, right? Oftentimes people will actually take photos from their contest preps or their photo shoots, for example, and use them all year. There's nothing wrong that.
Speaker 1:What I'm trying to say is that we're comparing ourselves to something that's not real, something that's not realistic, right? So if you are someone who's struggling with, like, the body image and such, you know, please, please, I really hope that you understand this that what you're seeing there is completely not accurate. There's specific lighting, specific angles. You know it's an art of itself to be quite honest with you, right? And also, I think another thing that's important to note as well is that I was kind of doing some research on this as well, and there's a few studies that I came across that show that about 10 to 12% of our thoughts daily are comparison, right, comparison thoughts of whatever it may be. So this is a good indicator that a lot of people struggle with this. A lot of people actually struggle with comparison of some sort, okay, and if I look at myself a few years back I've mentioned this on the podcast before, but I just I really think it applies to this episode here.
Speaker 1:But basically, for me, I was caught in this social media trap. I was caught in comparing my life to so many other people Okay, to the point, actually, where it really started to impact my mental health and I took a break Okay, I just, I took a break from social media. I deleted all my social media, or I pause it, basically deleted all the apps and everything for six months and in those six months, it completely changed how I see comparison. It completely changed my life personally, right, and one thing that I started noticing was a few things.
Speaker 1:But the key lessons I think I took that really changed me from that six month break is a few things. One being I wasn't comparing myself to anyone else. I didn't have anyone else to compare myself to, right? So I realized that all the time and energy that I used to compare myself to other people was now invested towards me. And this is true, by the way, like it takes so much time and energy, like it physically takes energy, to constantly be comparing yourself to other people, right. So when you reciprocate that towards yourself, imagine the life that you can build for yourself, right, because now that time and that energy is invested in the person who matters most, and that is you. Okay, very important to say.
Speaker 1:And the second thing is I realized how much abundance I have in my life that I wasn't seeing because I was constantly comparing to what other people were doing. Right, those people are doing those things, those great things, which kind of diminished my stuff. So I didn't see any of my wins, I wasn't seeing any of my progress because I was comparing my own progress and what I was doing to someone else, which made me feel like, again, my wins weren't good and I wasn't doing enough type of thing, right. But when I wasn't comparing myself to anyone, I realized like, wow, I made so much progress in my life and I've done great things that, you know, I didn't see before because I was so blinded. But also it made me realize how much abundance I already have in my life and the things that I was taking for granted that I should be so grateful for, right, so grateful for.
Speaker 1:And sometimes we compare ourselves to these other people but we're not realizing the amount of abundance that we already have in our lives, right, and the problem with comparison is that if it goes unchecked for too long, it becomes so detrimental to our mental health. Okay, because, again, not only are we missing out on the progress that we're making, our wins, the abundance that's already in our lives and the things that we truly need to take a moment to be grateful for, but it's causing us a bunch of anxiety and self-doubt because we're comparing ourselves and our comparisons are completely unrealistic and the expectations of our comparisons are completely unrealistic as well, but also it's making us feel behind, like we should be further along in life, and sometimes we start to use what I call the shameful shoulds. Right, we start to shoot ourselves I should be further along, I shouldn't be wasting my time, I should be doing this, okay. Or sometimes, if we see someone with a better body, all these different things, I should be better looking, or I shouldn't be eating that, I should be eating this, okay. So again, social media is a great tool. It can be a great tool, but just my message I hope is clear is that really take time to acknowledge and recognize how you're using social media and if you're comparing yourself to other people and how you're comparing yourself to other people on social media and I want to read a quote by Stephen Bartlett which I think really encapsulates this quite well, and what Stephen says is that social media is designed to make you think maybe I should be somewhere else, doing something else with someone else, but if you always think your happiness is somewhere else, it will never be where you are. Okay, and I think this is so important and really ties back to the message that I'm trying to say. Okay, comparison can be a good tool, which we'll talk about in a second, but when it goes unchecked for too long, you miss out on the things that's already in your life and you think that the grass is greener on the other side and most often than not, it actually isn't.
Speaker 1:The first thing that I want to share is that you need to identify your triggers. You need to understand what's triggering you, okay, so what is triggering you, who is triggering you and when are you triggered? Okay, so, as an example, if you are scrolling through social media and then, all of a sudden, you see someone with a jacked body, right, they're jacked, they look great and then you start to compare yourself oh, I wish I had that body. Oh, I wish I looked that good. Oh, I wish I could go to the gym as much, or, you know, I wish I could eat that well, or I should eat better, and then you start to compare yourself and then you go through the spiral, right? Well, that's a trigger and that's so important for you to start becoming aware of, becoming aware of what are the things that are causing you to spiral into this comparison loop.
Speaker 1:But what I noticed for myself is that even before I could start asking the questions and, you know, getting an understanding of the story that I was telling myself and diving deeper into that narrative, I needed to catch myself in the act. Right, I needed to catch myself when I was comparing, because what I noticed in my life was that oftentimes when I was comparing myself, it was to someone on YouTube or social media, but oftentimes I opened these apps without even knowing. I opened these apps unconsciously, so I would just scroll and scroll and compare myself, scroll and scroll and compare myself, scroll and compare my life, right? Unconsciously, comparison became a habit. So I needed to catch myself in the act before even diving into that narrative, and something that truly helped for me was tuning into how my body responded. Okay, so, as I was scrolling, for example, I catch myself in the comparison trap. Okay, wow, I'm comparing myself to someone else.
Speaker 1:And before even going into the mind and asking all these different questions that would tune into my body, what is my body trying to tell me right now? Okay, I'm feeling extremely anxious at the moment. There's there's anxiety in my gut right now. But, more specifically, what are the sensations that are going through my body at this point in time? For me personally, a lot of nervousness, a lot of jitteriness, of butterflies, right, those types of sensations, but not in the good way, not the good butterflies, like envy butterflies, if you will, right, being jealous of that person. But also, a lot of times I would notice my palm is getting like sweaty or very heated because I was a bit frustrated and envious of that person. Maybe it was the body, maybe it was the life they were living, maybe it was that they're living their dream lives, all these different things.
Speaker 1:And then you can actually start going deeper into that narrative and questioning where this is all coming from. Right, maybe you've got certain beliefs, maybe there's deeper wounding that you need to address, but until you can start catching yourself in the act, right, this is what truly helped me to understand my comparison and obviously, a lot of the times it's like I'm comparing myself to people, that the comparisons are completely unrealistic. We're not even on the same wavelengths of life, for example, right, we're not even trying to accomplish the same goals. I'm just jealous of that. You know of his life or whatever, but I can build that life for myself If I stop using all that time and energy onto someone else and reciprocate that onto myself. So tip number one is to truly take a moment and try to identify your triggers, and also, you can actually journal these, by the way. You can write these down, you can keep like a journal and identify what patterns keep coming up, what you know. What are you comparing yourself the most to?
Speaker 1:The second tip that I want to share is that you need to reframe comparison. Okay, comparison is a motivational tool. It can be used as a motivational tool. Okay. So let's say you're scrolling Instagram, okay, and you're comparing your body to someone else's. You see this fitness influencer and you're comparing yourself. You're like I wish I had that body, I wish I had his life, I wish I had his successes, confidence, all these different things, right? Pause for a moment. Instead of comparing yourself. What can you learn from that person? Okay, that person has obviously been a chapter one at a certain time and now they're on their chapter 10. So, instead of you comparing your chapter one to their chapter 10, what can you apply? What can you learn from them that you can bring into your chapter one where you are at right now?
Speaker 1:A lot of times, these fitness gurus and fitness influencers will post really good content, really good workouts, all these different things. Why not try that? Why not learn from them? Go to the gym, apply what you're learning, right, apply what they're teaching. They've obviously gotten there because of years and years of effort, right, years of years of progression, of training and all these different things. Right, it's the same thing as an example.
Speaker 1:If you admire someone in the financial department, for example, right, maybe you know someone's extremely wealthy and you're admiring them and you're like, wow, I really wish I could be that good in real estate, for example, right, well, oftentimes these people will teach something, or maybe they have courses or maybe they have something, right. If you truly admire that person and you're kind of envious of them, right, but you know secretly, you really, you really do admire them, right. You're like, wow, I wish I had that confidence, that wealth. Well check, do they have a course that they can offer? Do they have classes that they can teach? Do they have free content online that you can learn from and apply their wisdom to your chapter one? And this is so important, right? Because, again, we reframe that comparison to why am I not them or why am I not there yet, to okay, what can I learn from them, what can I apply to my life right now. That will help me get to my chapter 10 and not anyone else's chapter 10 is what I'm trying to say, right? And here's the other thing as well that's so important to understand. I want to bring a bit of Carl Jung's psychology into this, right.
Speaker 1:Oftentimes, when we talk about projection, we talk about insecurities and all these different things, but there's also something called the golden shadow projection, where oftentimes we will project good traits onto other people. We will oftentimes hero worship. Other people, for example, the people that we envy, are often showing us parts of ourselves that we haven't fully owned yet. There's a reason you see these qualities within them. The reason you see these qualities within them is most likely because they are also in yourself, but you have not owned up to that yet, you have not stepped into your full potential and you have not embodied those qualities within yourself, for whatever reason that may be Okay. So maybe you can start asking yourself, like do I secretly have this potential too? Do I have this potential in myself? Okay, you can also start asking yourself am I holding myself back from stepping into this version of myself, for whatever reason? Right, if you admire someone who's truly confident and you're like, wow, you know, and you see these qualities in other people, they're probably in yourself, but you just have not owned up to them yet. You have not allowed yourself to fully own into them yet, for whatever reason that may be. So that's something that you can also dive into. But again, oftentimes the reason you see these qualities in these people is because you also have them within yourself.
Speaker 1:The third thing that I want to share is to do a social media detox. Okay, so for me personally, what that looks like is what we talked about earlier. So, taking six months off entirely. You don't need to take six months off, obviously. You can take week, two weeks, three weeks, whatever works for you, and that time and energy will be focused on you.
Speaker 1:The second option is simply just unfollow people that are triggering you. Right, if you're trying to learn from them and you're just you know nothing's working and you're trying to understand your comparisons and your triggers and all these different things, but you're overwhelmed and it's just, you're not, you're not ready to receive that at the moment. That's completely fine, it's completely normal, right? Unfollow these people that are really triggering you for the moment, right. Take that time, that energy, that mental clarity, and pour it onto yourself. Take that time to make your social media a good place to be, that when you're scrolling you're not caught in comparison. That when you're scrolling it's positive stuff, funny stuff, people that you want to be following okay. And then, if at a certain point, you are ready to follow them again later, once you've done more inner work and you're growing on your journey, then follow them and then, obviously, use that comparison as okay.
Speaker 1:Instead of comparing is like what can I learn from them? Right, what can I learn from these people and how can I apply what they've applied in their lives to my own life? And I think sometimes just doing either of these things is so, so, so beneficial. The last thing that I want to share is the only person you should be comparing yourself to honestly, is yourself, right, and you, who you were before, who you were yesterday, who you were six months ago, as an example? Okay, because, yes, we can use comparison as a motivational tool and learn from the greats and learn from people that we truly admire.
Speaker 1:Okay, but at the same time, if we're not applying that in our life, then what is the point? Okay, so this is what I'm saying it's you versus you, it always has been and it always will be right. So, basically, we can start making these you know these daily changes or weekly changes or whatever, how many changes you want to be making, but it's what are the habits and systems that I need to put into place to get me from where I am right now to where I want to be? Okay, so, again, truly, it's you versus you. So, that being said, that's all I've got for you guys on today's episode. If you did like the episode, please feel free to leave a comment or review, share it. It really helps bring awareness to what I'm trying to do, which is really kind of, you know, spread this podcast on a broader scale to really help people just navigate everyday life challenges. So again, with that being said, I hope you have a good week and I will catch you guys next week. Thank you.
