WHY WE ALWAYS LOSE THE COMPARISON GAME

In elementary school, I sat near Henry Ishibashi. Henry was very smart, especially in science and math, both of which were my worst subjects. When we had math or science assignments, it would be a foregone conclusion that Henry would have his paper returned with a "100%" on it. My papers, on the other hand, were somewhere south of 70%.

When it came to math, I secretly wished I was Henry. That's my earliest recollection of the "comparison game". You know how that works, you take your worst trait (like math) and compare yourself to the person who is the absolute best at it. Never mind that Henry could count to 100 at 3 years old or that he had a sister who was a top math student herself. It's the recipe for a lifelong battle of disappointment and feelings of inadequacy.

There's always going to be someone smarter, faster, cuter, brighter, more intelligent, better at crossword puzzles, who can eat more, looks more sexy, can sing better, etc., etc. It's easy to give up on something when we see others who can attain success so easily, while we struggle just to get to entry level. We spend so much time trying to be like someone else, we lose track of our own strengths, our own passions, our own purpose.

In single acorn, there is everything needed to grown a huge oak tree. In each of us, we have our own unique seeds to grow ourselves into our individual greatness. We can do so much more with life when we focus on who we are instead of who we are not.