What’s in this issue:
💭 Thought: The crush of comparison
🖊️ Reflection: How and when do you compare yourself to others?
📚 Read: Situational Team Decision-Making (aka how teams can make decisions more effectively)
😆 Today’s Laugh
An oldie, but a goodie. Wait for it… that last fall is the best.
💭 Today’s Thought
The crush of comparison
Comparison is the crush of conformity from one side and competition from the other—it’s trying to simultaneously fit in and stand out.
Comparison says, “Be like everyone else, but better.”
- Brené Brown
“Be like everyone else, but better.” Yikes, when put that way, that’s an awfully hard task. 😓
It’s made even harder by the fact that we tend to compare what’s going on inside ourselves to what we see going on for others on the outside.
(For example, we might feel unproductive and disorganized, and then see we someone else’s calendar that’s perfectly color coded and organized and assume we’re way less effective than them.)
That’s literally comparing apples and oranges, and it’s not fair to you or to whomever you’re comparing yourself to.
I’ve come to learn (the hard way) that in life, the only comparison worth making is to yourself — to the kind of person you want to be and to the kind of person you’ve been.
You are the only human being who will ever live the exact journey you’re living — don’t waste it trying to “be like everyone else, but better”.
🖊️ Today’s reflection
If you’re new to journaling, I highly encourage you to read Nancy Adler’s article: Want to be an outstanding leader? Keep a journal.
This week, find a quiet place and gift yourself 10 minutes to reflect on any of these prompts (or invent your own!):
How have I grown in the last year? What do I want to celebrate about that growth?
In what situations or settings do I tend to compare myself to others? When are those comparisons helpful and when are they harmful?
When I catch myself drawing an unhealthy comparison to someone else, what might I do instead?
📚 Today’s Read
Situational Team Decision-Making
In this article, Jesse Lyn Stoner outlines six ways in which teams can make decisions, and which might be most effective in various circumstances. If you’re part of a team struggling to make decisions effectively, you’ll want to check this out!
See you next week!
xo,
Anne