Why do I constantly compare myself to other people? And how to fix?

Question

I know this might sound a little.. unnecessary might I say but,

I always compare myself to other people. if someone has more friends than me, i worry. if they get better grades, i worry. but mostly about friends. (since i had social phobia and basically didnt talk to people until this year.) now that i have tons of friends, im afraid of loosing them. how can i stop this obsessive thinking of mine?

thanks:D

Answer 1

That is the way that we are taught to think from birth here (US). We constantly attach right ideas like beauty, strength, wisdom, etc to people. Often times this leads us to  honoring the person more than or instead of the virtue that we extole. For instance, if some celebrity or even one of your peers has a 'hot' hair style, then you will find more people wearing their hair that why. This is where trends and fads come from.

In Reality we should consider what virtues we would like to be a part of us and pursue those. Often times we will those physical things like the way we dress, wear our hair, even speak start with how we think about ourselves. So this means before even starting this process one must have a firm understanding of who they are , love and have confidence in that, and then develop one's outer sel;f from there.

Answer 2

Hi there, the answer is in you self esteem and self confidence.  I would think that you need to compare because you are determining how much you are worth compared to others.  Really we should measure ourselves against what we are capable of, not what others are doing.

Get a little more confidence and you will stop doing it.  I have a website that deals with this, it's got some advice, tips and stuff.  There are some good links there too.

http://www.dream-life-coaching.com

good luck

Answer 3

Hey I had this same problem. I found what help me was not focusing so much on what others are doing in comparison to you, because those same people are comparing themselves to others.(and sometimes even you)

What works though is to have a sense of what you want to be. Like if you want to be a straight A student or a more confident person for example, you focus on what YOU have to do to achieve that. Then after a maybe 6 months or year of working on that goal compare yourself to who you used to be  and who you are now. Buy doing that, it build yourself esteem because you have achieve something that you want. When you start doing that, you realize that you don't need to compare yourself to other to know what you are worth. You will know what your worth everytime you achieve a personal goal of yours and your confidence will grow