Winner Takes All

  How many of you out there would consider yourselves to be competitive people?  Maybe half of you?  But I want to ask you to consider competition on another level.  How often do you compare yourself to the people around you, your co-workers, your family, friends, or social media network?    Comparison is always a losing game, and here's why.  We are all in the game of life, but we did not all start at the same point; we are not all heading for the same finish line, and we do not all come equipped for the same challenges.  It would be absolutely silly for a person completing a marathon on foot to beat themselves up because someone in a car was faster than them at the 26 miles.  Yet, so many times this is the kind of pressure we put on ourselves.  We look around at others and assume because they look good on the outside or because they're farther along in their career or their 401K that they are "winning" at life, but that is not always the case.
  Maybe your life started in poverty, or abuse, or being an orphan.  You certainly did not come out of the same starting gate as someone born into wealth, privilege, or a stable household.  This means you had more ground to cover, more hurdles to jump over, and more obstacles in your path.  Do not assume that you are losing if you are not at the same place in life as someone else. 
  Similarly, even if you started from the same back grounds, it does not mean your race is the same.  You may have had a family challenge that gave you a career setback, or a financial struggle that limited your funding for college, or a health crisis that slowed you down.  Not everyone in life faces the same obstacles, and it's because we are each running our own individual races.
  In addition to all this, we are not all headed to the same finish line.  You may be purposed to be an amazing stay at home mom, wife, and friend, or you may be destined to be a career wage earner at the top of your field.  You might be somewhere in between.  None of these things is bad, but we can very easily start to feel badly about ourselves if we compare where we are to where someone else is when in reality we aren't even headed in the same direction.
  The only way that comparison is ever beneficial to us is to compare who  we were yesterday to who we were today.  You are the only one who can accurately compete with you.  Are you farther ahead than yesterday by even one step?  Great job!  Are you striving to be better tomorrow?  Fantastic!  Did you trip up today and fall behind?  It's ok.  That's the great thing about another day.  You can get back up and keep going.  Learn to compete with yourself and no one else.  This mindset will free you to cheer your friends, family, and co-workers, while not feeling sorry for yourself.  When you realize that we are all running different races, and we can all win a prize in our own race, you don't feel stressed when someone else succeeds.  Someone else's success does not take away from your opportunities for victory.  Keep your eyes on your own finish line, and don't get brought down by playing the comparison game.  I can't wait to see you win!  Cheering for you!

~K.W.