Month: October 2018

Categories
Coffee Break

152 – Vulnerability and the Real You

Vulnerability and the Real You


 

Get Uncomfortable With Yourself!

Why is it hard for us to be vulnerable, especially when it comes to those we care about the most? Partners, children, family, close friends – if these are the people we are the closest to why would be afraid to be ourselves around them? In this weeks episode we’ll talk about vulnerability and the real you.

One of the hardest things in this world is to be vulnerable around others. To show people the messy, honest, truest parts of ourselves. And why is this? Why are we often so afraid to be ourselves around those that we consider the closest to us? If these are the most important people in our lives, why do we feel like we need to protect ourselves and not share the deepest, darkest, and most intimate parts of ourselves?

Who do You Think You Are?

“I have often wondered how it is that every man loves himself more than all the rest of men, but yet sets less value on his own opinions of himself than on the opinions of others.”

—Marcus Aurelius

I talked about this quote on here before, with regards to worrying about the opinions of others, but I want to talk more about the opinions of ourselves.

A few weeks ago I was discussing the idea of identity with a good friend of mine. He’s struggling at the moment with figuring out who he is and who he wants to be. Basically, he’s going through a midlife crisis. In talking about letting go of all the expectations that were heaped upon him by his family and church while growing up, he feels a bit lost because he lived with a mask, an identity of who he felt like he was supposed to be for most of his life. Over the last few years, he’s been shedding a lot of those ideas and beliefs, and while he knows who he isn’t, he’s not sure who he is. Just as people who’ve suffered job losses or divorce and other kinds of loss, often find themselves lost as a core piece of their identity is gone. He’s struggling through this difficult process of self-exploration and is finding it both exciting and very scary. Exciting because he’s exploring the world and beginning to choose who he is, but also extremely scary because the identity he has is no longer reflective of who he truly is.

And this idea really struck me, that when we hold on so tightly to an identity of who we think we are, it makes is very difficult to become who we want to become. When we’ve built up an identity, and presented this idea of who we are to the world, then when we find discrepancies with that identity, we try to defend who we think we are. And I think holding onto this identity, the ego, is the root of why being vulnerable is so scary. Because much of this identity is created from the expectations that we think others, especially those that we love, have about us. Whether or not these have been explicitly communicated or not, I think that many of us feel like we’re supposed to behave a certain way and do certain things. We’re afraid if they knew that we aren’t necessarily the person we present to the world, and if they knew how deeply flawed we truly are, they might reject us. They may no longer love us. But the thing is, we judge ourselves more harshly than those around us. We think they notice every flaw, count every mistake, and keep a tally of every fuck up we make. But the truth is, they don’t. Most people are too busy with their own thinking and their own business pay that much attention to someone else. And if they are that kind of person, they aren’t people we want to be around. If their love and acceptance are conditional, they are probably not people that we want to spend time with.

Unapologetically You

“Above all, keep a close watch on this — that you are never so tied to your former acquaintances and friends that you are pulled down to their level. If you don’t, you’ll be ruined. … You must choose whether to be loved by these friends and remain the same person, or to become a better person at the cost of those friends … if you try to have it both ways you will neither make progress nor keep what you once had.”

— Epictetus, “Discourses,” 4.2.1; 4-5

What would happen if you were just unapologetically yourself? What if you didn’t hold onto this identity so tightly? This is a scary proposition for sure. I know in my own life, I find it often difficult to admit what I truly think or feel about something for fear of being rejected by friends and loved ones. But we should be open to the idea that being truly ourselves may mean that we need to change our lives. We may need to end friendships. We may get divorced. And that’s scary. That may mean a lot of change. Far too often we hold onto these identities far longer than they are useful, often to the point of damaging ourselves and relationships. I’ve seen friends stay in relationships that were not working for fear of change. I’ve done this myself. But living your life as someone else means that you may get to the end of your life never having really lived.

Brené Brown, a social scientist and researcher, has delved into the area of vulnerability rather deeply, and written several eye-opening books on the sense of shame that we internalize which keep us from loving and being okay with the person that we truly are. It’s this fear of rejection and a sense of shame that others will judge us that makes it so hard for us to share that deeper side of us with those that we love.

“Because true belonging only happens when we present our authentic, imperfect selves to the world, our sense of belonging can never be greater than our level of self-acceptance.”

― Brené Brown, Daring Greatly

What if we could own our flaws and just recognize them as a fact, that they are simply an attribute of who we are at this moment? How much more confident could we be in our life if we could just accept who we are, warts and all? The first step to being vulnerable is to learn how to love ourselves. I know that sounds all kinds of new-agey, but think that there’s a lot of truth in this. If we don’t like ourselves, then it’s going to be hard for us to accept that others can like us.

Now self-acceptance doesn’t mean that we give ourselves a free pass when we make mistakes, because that is much more about self-delusion and ignoring our mistakes. What I’m proposing is shine a light on our flaws, and own them. When we can do that, we take away the shame of our flaws. Self-love is the shame killer. The more we can accept ourselves, and see ourselves as we truly are, the easier it is to be forgiving and accepting of others.

Get Uncomfortable with Yourself

“Vulnerability sounds like truth and feels like courage. Truth and courage aren’t always comfortable, but they’re never weakness.”

― Brené Brown, Daring Greatly

I want you to take some time this week and write down some of the uncomfortable and scary thoughts that you have running around in the back of your mind. Things that you’re afraid that if others knew about you, they may not like you. Things that you’re afraid of addressing because you’re afraid of where those thoughts might take you. And I want you to take some time and just sit with those thoughts, and practice being okay with them. Look at them without judgment, just as facts about you. Admit those truths to yourself, because I think we all lie to ourselves to some degree. We gloss over the uncomfortable parts, the dark parts of us because we want to present this beautiful picture to the world. We’re scared of what others might think about the darker parts of us. We want to look like we have it all together. It’s okay if we don’t. Nobody really does. Everybody has some area of their life where they struggle.

And the thing is, we often find that those things aren’t really so bad once they put down on paper. They are much scarier and darker in our heads. Getting them out and on paper is like shining a light on a shadow. It’s not nearly as big or scary as we made it out to be.

Owning who you are is a very uncomfortable thing. It means that you accept that you are full of flaws, that you aren’t nearly as great want others to think you are, and that you let other people down. It means may mean making choices that shake the very core of who you think you are. It means that those closest to you may not even recognize who you really are. But if they only see the person that you pretend to be, do they really love the real you? Why not give them the chance to know the real you? Why not give yourself the chance to know the real you?

——

Hey friends, thanks for listening to the podcast. If you like what you hear, I would really appreciate it if you could help support me by making a pledge on Patreon. You can find me at patreon.com/stoiccoffee. Even just a small amount helps in keeping this podcast going. Also, head on over to my website at www.stoic.coffee and sign up for our weekly newsletter. And lastly, if you know of someone that might like or could benefit from this podcast, please share it with them. Word of mouth is one of the best ways to help this podcast grow. Thanks again for listening.

Categories
Coffee Break Tranquility

151 – To Be Unshaken

Do you struggle to live up to your principles? Do feel like when you make a mistake that all your efforts were not worth it? In this weeks episode, we’re going to talk about how to approach mistakes in a much more helpful way.

Some of Seneca’s best works are in the form of letters to his friend Annaeus Serenus. In these, they carry on a dialogue as to how to live a better life. In one of the letters on tranquility Serenus writes to Seneca, describing how he feels he is afflicted with a sickness of mind because while he is very frugal, he is dazzled by the great wealth around him, and feeling dissatisfied with his humble house. He wishes to dedicate himself to public service, yet finds when he runs into difficult patches that he simply wants to give up and head for the leisure of his home. When writing or speaking on behalf of causes that are important to him, when he wishes to keep his language simple and clear, Serenus says:

“Then again, when my mind has been uplifted by the greatness of its thoughts, it becomes ambitious of words, and with higher aspirations it desires higher expression, and language issues forth to match the dignity of the theme: forgetful then of my rule and of my more restrained judgment, I am swept to loftier heights by an utterance that is no longer my own.”

In a nutshell, Serenus is having a hard time living up to his ideals and is getting discouraged and disappointed in himself because of his shortcomings. He feels as though he is gradually losing ground in his struggle to become a better person. I think this is something that we can all relate to. I struggle with meeting my own ideals all the time. I want to be kinder, less selfish, more compassionate, less judgmental…so many things that I struggle with and could easily beat myself up over when I fail to live up to my own ideals.

So how do keep going when we falter? How do keep growing and move past these setbacks?

Seneca’s response is long, but I want to read a portion of it:

“In truth, Serenus, I have for a long time been silently asking myself to what I should liken such a condition of mind, and I can find nothing that so closely approaches it as the state of those who, after being released from a long and serious illness, are sometimes touched with fits of fever and slight disorders, and, freed from the last traces of them, are nevertheless disquieted with mistrust, and, though now quite well, stretch out their wrist to a physician and complain unjustly of any trace of heat in their body. It is not, Serenus, that these are not quite well in body, but that they are not quite used to being well; just as even a tranquil sea will show some ripple, particularly when it has just subsided after a storm. What you need, therefore, is not any of those harsher measures which we have already left behind, the necessity of opposing yourself at this point, of being angry with yourself at that, of sternly urging yourself on at another, but that which comes last — confidence in yourself and the belief that you are on the right path, and have not been led astray by the many cross-tracks of those who are roaming in every direction, some of whom are wandering very near the path itself. But what you desire is something great and supreme and very near to being a god — to be unshaken.”

― Seneca

So let’s unpack this. Seneca likens this to be a sick person that has been healed, but is so used to being sick, that anytime they get even the slightest fever, assumes that all it lost again. And this can be like us. When we fall back into old habits and ways of thinking we often feel like because we didn’t meet the ideals or standards that we have, that we are a complete failure, that we are ill again. That it’s kind of an all or nothing proposition. And what Seneca recommends is that when things go off the rails a bit in our efforts to grow, we shouldn’t be too harsh or angry with ourselves, that we should instead be kinder on ourselves and that we should be confident in ourselves that we’re on the right path. This kind of confidence is a virtuous cycle. By being confident in ourselves, we handle our failures better and gain more confidence. And it’s this confidence that allows us to be unshaken.

You’re Going to do it Wrong

So how do we gain this kind of confidence? How do move past our failures? My oldest is now driving and is often so worried behind the wheel that he’s going to do something wrong. And my partner simply says, “Yes, you are going to do it wrong.” Because truth is, we rarely doing something right the first time, especially if it’s something difficult like driving a car or being a less selfish person. Being okay with being wrong, that you will make mistakes is a necessary part of learning. Making mistakes is inevitable. Learning from them is optional.

It’s up to you to decide what your mistakes mean. For those of us that are often too hard on ourselves, just because we make a mistake doesn’t mean we are a bad or unworthy person. It means we’re human. So go easy on yourself.

But how can we be easier on ourselves without allowing ourselves to skate by?

Sincere vs. Serious

A few months ago I read Out of Your Mind by Allen Watts. Now Allen Watts was an interesting character. He was a professor of Asian Studies and an author of several dozen books on Buddhism and Zen. His approach to life was one of self-development, and growth, and not taking life so seriously. And as I was reading I stumbled across this gem:

“I may be sincere, but never serious, because I don’t think the universe is serious.”

— Allen Watts

When I read that quote I laughed out loud, because far too often I am the exact opposite. But it stuck in my head and over the past few weeks, I’ve found it to be a helpful filter on viewing the world. I think that being a sincere person mitigates so much of the self-shaming and anger that we point at ourselves when we fail.

When you make a mistake, and you approach it with sincerity, you can look at the situation more clearly. If you need to you can sincerely apologize. You can be sincere about forgiving yourself, knowing that you are sincerely trying to do your best. Sincerity is humble because you aren’t trying to prove something, or protect your ego. There are no ulterior motives because sincerity is about being honest with compassion.

If you think about it, you can be sincere in almost any context and it’s appropriate. If you are laughing and joking, you can still be sincere. If you’re in a situation where there is sadness, sincerity is a great approach. When you are in an argument with someone, if you can focus on being sincere you’ll probably resolve things much quicker. If you are being sincere, you’re more likely to listen and speak honestly. You aren’t trying to push the other person’s buttons and make the situation worse.

Trying to live up to our ideals is not easy work. The more we grow, the more we see how much more we have to grow. Never satisfied with just resting on our laurels, we set the bar higher, but then feel bad because we’re not as good as we want to be, often ignoring the growth we have made. And that’s kind of a great thing because if we never had something to improve on, some way to grow, then we would have no purpose. It’s also kind of a bad thing because we can perpetually feel like we’re never good enough. Learning to approach life sincerely yet not seriously can help us gain that confidence that we’re on the right path.

——-

Hey friends, thanks for listening to the podcast. If you like what you hear, I would really appreciate it if you could help support me by making a pledge on Patreon. You can find me at patreon.com/stoiccoffee. Even just a small amount helps in keeping this podcast going. Also, head on over to my website at www.stoic.coffee and sign up for our weekly newsletter. And lastly, if you know of someone that might like or could benefit from this podcast, please share it with them. Word of mouth is one of the best ways to help this podcast grow. Thanks again for listening.

Categories
Coffee Break stoicism Tranquility

150 – The Un-Pursuit of Happiness

The Un-Pursuit of Happiness

 

Be Useful!

Do you struggle to find happiness within yourself? Do you despair every time you watch the news? In today’s episode, we’re going to talk about how to get over this despair and how pursuing happiness may not be the best to actually finding happiness.

There’s an interesting trend in a lot of things I’ve been reading online, namely a sense of despair, hopelessness, and depression almost manifesting itself as nihilism. And why is this? Why do we feel like we’re in such hard times? Is it that things were better in the past and we’ve just lost our way, as many in some circles seem to think?

If we look at how things were 100 years ago, most people were likely to be farmers, living a life with a lot of hard work keeping farm animals and harvesting crops – certainly not a life of leisure or comfort. If you lived in the city, you were very likely a factory worker, with less than ideal conditions, often with very long hours because there weren’t a lot of labor laws in place.

So why are we, with so much leisure time and modern conveniences, so unhappy?

I think that ironically it’s because as a society, we focus so much on trying to be happy. Now, why would this, the search for happiness, make so many people unhappy? Isn’t this what we’re supposed to do with our lives? It even says in the American Declaration of Independence from the British that we have the right to “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

But that’s the thing – we’re not guaranteed happiness, we’re only given the opportunity to pursue happiness. But I think it’s this dogged pursuit that gives us so much anguish. So why does pursuing happiness not bring happiness? I mean we’re taught from an early age that when we want something that we go out and get it. I think that happiness it a byproduct of doing useful and good things in our lives. When we try to make ourselves happy, we can’t. It’s like trying pet a cat. The more you chase after the cat, the more it runs from you until you stop chasing it and ignore it, then it suddenly shows up trying to snuggle itself right into your face. It isn’t until we stop trying to be happy, and just focus on trying to live a good life, that happiness finds us. Happiness is what happens when we making other plans or while we’re doing other things.

Gratitude

“If what you have seems insufficient to you, then though you possess the world, you will yet be miserable.”

― Seneca

If you were to ask yourself what you want in your life, what would be on that list? Would you list the things that you already have? One of the most important things that I’ve learned in studying stoicism it to be grateful for what we have, and to learn to want what we already have. If we’re always chasing some shiny object to fill that hole inside of us, we’ll always feel empty. Appreciating what we have – a place to live, family and friends, food, even the most basics of things, can immediately improve our level of happiness.

When I was in high school me and my friends used to say, “Wherever you go, there you are.” At the time it was just us being silly. I think we’d heard it on some TV commercial or show, but as I’ve gotten older, I realize that there is a profound truth in it. You can’t ever escape who you are. If you’re unhappy with who you are, if you don’t like yourself, nothing that you have, nothing that you do will ever fix that. Learning to be okay with yourself, learning to love yourself, and be good to yourself, is one of the biggest keys to happiness. I think loving who you are is an overlooked part of loving what you have. To recognize you are worthy of love despite, or maybe even because of your faults, is not an easy thing. But remember, we are all imperfect and messy and full of doubts, and every single one of us is worthy of love.

Purpose

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.”

— Emerson

I read an essay a while back from Darius Foroux and he proposed that life is not about being happy, it’s about being useful. That idea really struck a chord with me, because when I really think about it, the times in my life when I’ve felt the best are when I’ve taken on the challenges that I’m facing and I work at them, and I make some headway. When I’m serving other people, and I’m trying to help others through their challenges, I feel energized. When I’m working on creating something, whether that’s music or writing or this podcast, I feel like there’s purpose to my efforts. When I’m challenging myself in some way that somehow adds value to the world, I feel like I’m contributing, and that I’m helping move the world forward in some way.

Service

“One cannot pursue one’s own highest good without at the same time necessarily promoting the good of others. A life based on narrow self-interest cannot be esteemed by any honorable measurement. Seeking the very best in ourselves means actively caring for the welfare of other human beings. Our human contract is not with the few people with whom our affairs are most immediately intertwined, nor to the prominent, rich, or well educated, but to all our human brethren.”

— Epictetus

I think the last, and most important part of allowing happiness to find you, is serving others. When we focus on ourselves and only look after ourselves, we miss out on adding to something to the world. When we only look after our own happiness, remembering that happiness is a byproduct of action, the more we can give to the world, the more chances happiness will have to show up in our lives. Rather than complain about all the things that are wrong with the world, what can you do to be part of the solution? We all have something to offer, some unique talent that the world needs. Even if it’s just showing up and supporting causes that you believe in. Every good movement in the world needs people that are willing to show up.

I know that it seems like there’s so much wrong in the world. I think every age has had its struggles with problems that seem insurmountable and it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. But remember, you can only do what you can do, and that will be enough. Don’t get discouraged because you can’t save the world in a day. But add something good, be on the positive side of the equation, and know that you’re being part of the solution.

Hey friends, thanks for listening to the podcast. If you like what you hear, I would really appreciate it if you could help support me by making a pledge on Patreon. You can find me at patreon.com/stoiccoffee. Even just a small amount helps in keeping this podcast going. Also, head on over to my website at www.stoic.coffee and sign up for our weekly newsletter. And lastly, if you know of someone that might like or could benefit from this podcast, please share it with them. Word of mouth is one of the best ways to help this podcast grow. Thanks again for listening.

Categories
Anger Awareness Coffee Break

149 – The Vocabulary of Anger

The Vocabulary of Anger

I talk a lot on this podcast about anger because it’s something that I’ve been working to manage in my own life. And today, I want to talk about the language of anger, and about learning to redefine and talk about anger in a different way.

For those that struggle with anger, we often get stuck in a bad pattern of mismanaging how we deal with strong, negative emotions. Something comes up and kicks off your fight or flight instinct kicks up and you find reacting in a way that is way out of proportion to the situation. And the worst part is that we often feel so helpless like it’s a split second reaction to things that are happening around you. You often go from 0 to 60 in just a moments notice. Often, that response is left over programming from things that you had little control over as you were growing up. Trauma can miscalibrate our ability to read a situation properly. Something that might just be annoying or frustrating gets treated with the same level as something more threatening.

And it sucks.

Once you finally get back in control of yourself, you feel like shit and feel ashamed of your behavior. You feel like you’re a bad person. You feel like you’re broken. You feel like it’s just one more instances showing that you fail at being the kind of person that you want to be. You feel unworthy, unlovable, worthless. That your failing as a human being.

And it sucks.

And after you blow up, you just want to hide. You want to push everyone away because you don’t feel worthy of being loved by others. You feel damaged at the core. Maybe even irredeemable.

So what do you do?

“When you have been compelled by circumstances to be disturbed in a manner, quickly return to yourself and do not continue out of tune longer than the compulsion lasts.”

— Marcus Aurelius

You listen to that anger. You sit with it and listen. You can question it. “Am I doing this to cause hurt, or is it really what I feel about this situation?” Because if you really feel that strongly about something, then maybe that anger is telling you something important. It is something that you should listen to. Maybe it’s anger at injustice. Maybe it’s anger at how someone else it treating you, and you really do need to take some action. If something upsets you that much, it should not be ignored.

Part of the problem, when we ignore our anger and feel bad about feeling any anger, at least for me, I feel terrible after I feel angry about anything. Even when it’s something that is probably okay for me to feel angry about. Because there are things that we should feel angry about, but when we blow up at seemingly trivial things, we start to feel shame towards any anger. Appropriate anger and inappropriate anger get lumped in the same pile.

And it’s hard sometimes when you’re caught up in it to know the difference. But when you’re in an argument and you feel that urge to just lash out, and you can catch it, count to 5 or even 10 before you say it. And ask yourself, “Do I REALLY mean what I’m going to say?” And if you do, then say it. Maybe try to say it in a way that is not confrontational. Maybe try to say it softly.

But if the compulsions that you have are things that you are doing or saying only to cause harm or to push someone’s buttons, then it’s probably better that you stop and sit with them a while. Give yourself some time to cool down. Take a break.

Being a stoic about anger doesn’t mean that we don’t feel it. It means that we learn to manage it. That we don’t let it ruin our lives. That we learn how to communicate what we feel in more productive and helpful ways. That we find new tools to talk about these things.

“For if anger listens to reason and follows where reason leads, then it is already not anger, of which obstinacy is a proper quality; if, however, it fights back and does not become quiet when it has been ordered, but is carried forward by its desire and ferocity, then it is as useless a servant of the soul as a soldier who disregards the signal for falling back. And thus, if it suffers a measure to be applied to itself, then it must be called by a different name, and it ceases to be anger, which I understand to be unrestrained and untamable.”

— Seneca

And what I think Seneca is telling us here is that we should learn how to label things better than just anger. It’s kind of like the old saying, if you only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you only know how to be angry in one way, or to express distress, irritation, annoyance, sadness, depression as anger, then you can’t deal with these strong emotions in an appropriate and useful way.

So what are some of the tools that we have? I think the biggest thing is to expand our vocabulary on our emotions. Rather then everything boiling down to anger, can we learn to identify more nuanced emotions. Maybe what we’re really feeling is frustration, or humiliation, or rejection. If we can learn to better identify what we’re really feeling, then we can start finding different ways of viewing the feelings we’re having.

When we can identify our emotions better we can see that dealing with annoyances is different than how we deal with frustration or resentment. But if we only have one word for it, then we don’t deal with effectively.

On my website, I created a worksheet that I’m calling the emotional vocabulary worksheet and basically what it is, it’s an exercise you can go through when you’re dealing with the strong emotion. And maybe you are in a situation where you didn’t deal with things very well. And it kind of walks you through trying to identify some of these different emotions and look at how these emotions maybe were appropriate or inappropriate for the situation. And if our reaction was appropriate or inappropriate for the situation.

Dealing with strong emotions in life is something that all of us have to do. But in order for us to actually deal with these different emotions that we have, we need to be sure what we’re actually feeling. So expanding our emotional vocabulary will give us the words to be able to really identify what it is that we’re feeling and then respond appropriately. So if you’d like a copy of this worksheet, if it’s something that sounds interesting to you, you can go to my website and download it from there will be a link on the front page. My website is www.stoic.coffee and I’ll have the link sitting there on the front page.

And that’s the stoic coffee break for this week. Remember, be good to yourself and be good others, and thanks for listening.

Categories
Coffee Break stoicism

148 – Comparison and Self Judgment

Comparison and Self Judgment

 

Be the best version of yourself!

How often do we compare ourselves with others? Why do you we get down on ourselves when someone is better than us at something? This weeks episode is about comparison, and how to get past the need to compare ourselves with others, and change the inner critic.

In Episode 146, Fear is the Killer I touched briefly on how one of the biggest fears in life is the fear of judgment. And while I was mostly referring to the judgments of others, in this episode I want to talk about self-judgment and comparing ourselves to others.

For most of us, the person that judges us most harshly is ourselves. When we want to try something that is outside our comfort zone, that voice in our head may tell us that it’s a bad idea or that we’re stupid for even trying. Why is that? Why would sabotage ourselves? I think it’s because our brain’s job is not to help support us in our growth, but to keep us alive. And because so much of our society has been based upon our station in life and being better than others, we equate not being as good at something as someone else as something that might cause us harm. And that fear can stop is from accomplishing so many great things.

“No person has the power to have everything they want, but it is in their power not to want what they don’t have, and to cheerfully put to good use what they do have.”

— Seneca, Letters From a Stoic

When I started this podcast, I was often worried that people would think I was an imposter. I thought that if I put out a podcast about stoicism that others might put me down for it because of my lack of credentials. My wise partner reminded me that if all I’m doing is talking about how these things impact me and what I learn from it, then there was no expertise needed beyond my own experience. Thankfully, I listened to her and here we are 148 episodes later, and thankfully, you have supported me and listened to my podcast each week.

What I had to do was to be better about what I defined as success and not compare myself against others. I mean, if I was worried about trying to be as successful as Tim Ferriss and be upset that I’m never going to hit 300 million downloads, then I would never be successful. So I learned to be happy with what I have – a podcast that I can feel proud of, where I’m improving every week and I’m learning and growing each week, and I’m connecting with more and more people each week.

I know one impact of being so self-critical for me was that because I didn’t think I was all that great of a person, I would try to talk myself up to other people. Because of that insecurity, I would tell all these stories about how great I was, because I really wanted them to like me. Deep down inside, I felt like if I were just good enough at all of these things, I would be worthy of their love.

So how do we move past comparing ourselves with others?

I think the first step is finding ways to look at the success of others is not a judgment on us. The world is not a zero-sum game. Just because someone else is successful, doesn’t mean we lose. Contrary to what others try to make us think, the world isn’t made that way. We need to celebrate the success of others. We need to let go of the striving and the posturing, and the ego that makes us think that if someone is doing better than us then we’re doing worse.

William Irvine, the author of A Guide to The Good Life: The Ancient Art of Stoic Joy says that we should be okay with our mistakes, and learn to give out praise for the admirable traits we see in other people. He says, “You may be extremely reluctant to do that, because in some way, they’re your competitors, but sometimes people do things that are worthy of praise, and to openly praise them in a certain culture is an act of courage because you’re admitting that they’re outplaying you in some way.”

When you can be honest about someone else’s success, then it makes it easier, to be honest with yourself. When you can remove your ego from the equation and be honest about your own skill, you can look at it as simply a measure of skill, not a judgment of whether you’re a good or bad person.

The next big step, which is still a hard one for me, is to remember the only person that you should be comparing yourself to is yourself.

“Your potential, the absolute best you’re capable of — that’s the metric to measure yourself against. Your standards are. Winning is not enough. People can get lucky and win. People can be assholes and win. Anyone can win. But not everyone is the best possible version of themselves.”

― Ryan Holiday, Ego Is the Enemy

I love that part – be the best possible version of ourselves. We need to define our own version of success that is not dependent on things outside of our control. You can’t control how good someone else is going to be at something, and when you compare yourselves with them, you are tying your success to something we can’t control. You can only control yourself and your own skill, so the only real measure should be, are you improving. And remember, failing can be improving as long as you are learning.

Lastly, we need to have self-compassion. When you screw up, don’t look at it as a failure of character, look at it as being a fallible imperfect human. Your skill at something doesn’t make you more or less worthy of love.

Be good to yourself. Be good to others.