The Killer

About a couple of months ago, I was having lunch with my son. He is the student of Nursery class and those days he had learned about shapes. Looking for examples in the everyday life is the best way of strengthening concepts. So I pointed towards the bowl and asked him what shape it was. He kept on thinking as if he was trying to remind him of the word. I told him it was circle. A circle shaped salt shaker was lying beside the bowl. I pointed towards it and asked him, "what about it?". He said, "It is small." I didn't know he had learnt about comparative words in his school by then. His answer made me realize so. (Here, I need to mention that English is not our first language, so the words were new to him). After getting his answer I asked him, "Who else is small? Are you small?" He replied in negative. I asked who was small then. He pointed towards his youngest cousin and said she is small. With a thought of giving an example of big, I pointed towards the water cooler (which is quite big in size) and said "It is big." He looked towards it and replied, "No, it is small, because it is smaller than us." We had discussion about several other objects. He learnt his lesson and I learnt mine. The discussion made me think deeply about comparison.

Nothing is small or big at its own place. Everything is unique with its own special and specific characteristics. However, when we start comparing them, they lose their speciality and are only recognized with comparative words.

In this world, there is no objective standard for comparison. It depends on our perception what thing is compared to what else. As in the conversation with my son I had thought the water cooler was big (I had compared it to other coolers) but he thought it was small because he had compared it to us.

Likewise, there is no objective standard for success. Most of the time we use social comparison to assess our progress. We compare our gains, attainment and every concerned aspect with others; and this is the point where we are likely to lose the worth of everything we have.

We can be on the top of a mountain but what if we compare it to someone else who is on the top of a higher mountain. We won't feel the joy of bein on the height but the sorrow for being down from another height.

Comparison is the poison that wickedly adds negativity to the positive attributes, and robs off all the pleasure. For instance, you hold something that is good but what would happen if you compare it with a better thing? Will the good thing will remain good any more? How will you state about the thing you have. "It is NOT as good as that." The negative (NOT) attached to positive (GOOD) snatches every charm of it.

Comparison often let us focus on the wrong things. I remind me of an incident when I was in class 8. I struggled so hard to stand first in my class. In the final exams I acquired 98.36 % marks but I was not first. I was fourth and I literally cried with tears. What made me cry?; the comparison. I was not looking at my marks I had obtained but the position I couldn't obtain.

*Comparison has the tendency to give us the feeling of loss even when we have gained profit. Sometime ago, I was on another crypto-blogging site that gives payout in BCH. I read the post of a user there who was feeling sad because she had sold her BCH on 1500$ rate, while after placing her order it pumped to 1600$. She had gained profit in her sell but when she compared it to the pump, she regarded her profit as the loss. In this way, the comparison makes us ungrateful.

I have often seen people casting the quote of Bill Gates

I am not in competition with anyone but myself source

Lol. I also casted it but now I have changed my mind. Let me say the competition and thus comparison (as there cannot be any competition without comparison, can there be?) with one's own self is also not always a very positive attitude. We are not likely to give an equal performance all the time. With time our circumstances differ and so our resources and responsibilities. Sometimes there may be more obstacles than the other time. Our optimum efforts of one time may not bring as good result as that of other time. If we compare our performance of both the time and the former is better than the later, will we have any good feelings about ourselves? Instead of patting our back for the attainment despite the difficulties, we are likely to face desperation and disappointment.

There is no rocket science to understand how comparison kills creativity, uniqueness, joy, relationship and induces negative feelings of ingratitude, sadness, anxiety and depression. Comparison is the killer of all the positive feelings and emotions. If you want to enjoy your life's journey stop comparing yourself, your relationship, your successes, your wallet 😉, your followers 😂 with that of others. You never know what others are having behind the scenes. If you have applied your optimum efforts in performing a task, there is no point of being dissatisfied with the results even if they are low. By the way, how can they be low if you are not going to compare it?

This is my post for challenge organized by @dreemport in collaboration with #thoughtfuldailypost of @wesphilbin

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