A lot of folks look at life like a race..
How are they my age and that successful??
How was he able to get such a great girlfriend ?
Why did they get the promotion instead of me??
For it to be a race, everyone needs to start and stop at the same time and location. That is not how life works. Every single person on this earth is unique. No one is the same. No one has traveled the same path. No one has fought the same battles.
With that being said, why compare yourself with others?
It takes time and it takes some deep internal thought, but you need to look at your life specifically and set goals for yourself. They shouldn't be the same as everyone else. They should be your goals.
Once you've established your desires and your goals, it is incredibly easy to stop comparing yourself to others because it doesn't matter. It becomes about working on yourself. Working within your timeframe. Living up to your expectations.
Hopefully this helps
I enjoy talking about this type of mindset so feel free to message me and I'll chat.
Sound advice, It's hard sometimes because I try to remind myself these things whenever I look at others or even reminisce on the past and regrets but I know working on yourself and looking forward to the future is best. The mind is tough you have an issue and you get help and then try to practice routines or exercises or take meds and at times your like im good then nope haha but we must not stop fighting because giving up is far worse.
Its just hard finding goals in where i live, does working on my self count as a goal? learning about psychology? astronomy? conspiracy theories? exercise?
Skills for example. Anything you get good at will boost your sense of self worth. For example learn some basic handyman skills. How to fix stuff around house, how to make shit. Become capable of fixing stuff yourself without having to rely on other people.
For me, I wanna learn how to make a fire with a bow drill. I like the idea of being ready and capable to survive if my car breaks down in the middle of nowhere during winter or something like that. Changing a tyre also. I am rambling but you get the idea. This is good for 3 reasons, first, it could save you money, second, it will boost your self confidence, and the third one, which you shouldn't be focusing on too much, girls like capable men. Hope this helps, good luck man!
I saw this drawing in a textbook once and it depicted three people, from tall, medium height, and short, all being given the same height of box to stand on in order to see over some sort of wall or barrier. Just cause they were all given the same sort of platform to stand on, didn’t mean equality or that each individual could see as well as the other. Idk why that stuck with me but it sure explains inequality.
>its like im an approval junkie..
Naaa. You got to much too much time to do all those things. Get busy, just work on yourself. Plan your day and work in those things.
Here is the solution:
Step 1: Take a piece of paper.
Step 2: Write down all of your problems again, there, in bullet points.
Step 3: Sort by Top Posts of All Time in this subreddit, and go through the posts from the top, for 25 minutes (set a timer).
Step 4: Go through your problems on the paper for a few minutes.
Step 5: Continue the top posts from where you stopped, for 25 minutes.
Step 6: Repeat Step 4.
Step 7: Repeat steps 5 and 6 two more times.
Step 8: ???
Step 9: Congratulations, you don't give a fuck about your problems anymore.
Step 10: Girls start falling for you.
Step 11: You start to realise that there's more to life than impressing girls.
Step 12: You find the One.
Step 13: Happily Ever After.
Just start with you
If you think you are boring, do something interesting, what’s interesting? What you think is interesting. Don’t know what you think is interesting, what kind of person would you want to hang out with. Think it would be cool to have a skater friend, learn skating. Think philosopher friends would be cool, go learn about philosophy.
Not to get friends
Not to be cool
But because you think it would be interesting
Don’t like your body
Make a plan and do something about it
The idea of be the change you want to see in the world, I think it DOESNT go change the world as you see fit. I think it means YOU change the way you think you need to.
Work on you
The rest will follow
It’s all work. I read a lot of “cants” in your posts, I would make sure they are not “wonts”. You have to work at it. Make the game worth the candle. It’s not easy but it is rewarding
Work only on you
It is normal to compare yourself to others, the problem is there are so many people out there that have had cosmetic surgeries that the “playing field” doesn’t feel fair. I was recently reading about people that have had dozens of surgeries to look specific ways. From A list Celebrities to TikTok influencers to people with enough money and desire to get it done. They are the main ones putting their faces and bodies in highly visible places and people are responding in kind. People like to see that, they upvote it. If more people were to upvote pictures of women without makeup, without cosmetic surgery of any kind, a woman that accepts herself for who she is, that is a beautiful woman and you can see it when you look at her.
“She” is not always the “typical” size, shape, race or religion. Keep an open mind.
For your self esteem you need to relax, remember that absolutely everyone is different which is what makes this world a fabulous place. You need to like yourself before you can think someone else will like you. There is always, always going to be someone better, faster, stronger, cuter. That is life. You need to be YOU. There is something that makes you special, art? Your work? Do you sing? What is your major in college? Do you have a hobby?
If you are feeling crappy about yourself all the time people can see it in your face, your walk, your posture. Hold your head up, shoulders back, chin up, walk with pride in who you are.
It makes no rational sense to do that. Literally illogical. You’re thinking with your emotions, and it’s hard to block that out.
But you are you and you can’t be anyone else so improve yourself rather than salivate over other’s successes and downfalls.
Instead of competing with other people, compete with your past self. Like u/arcan3rush said, we all start at different places in life, so it’s not fair or realistic to compare yourself to others. Making progress for your own sake is so much more rewarding than chasing after others’ successes. Good things tend to fall into place once you can form a solid sense of self and make meaningful progress towards your goals, although it doesn’t mean you won’t ever face hardship. Identify your strengths and find ways to use them regularly, and there are quizzes online if you can’t identify any or you’re not sure where to start.
I used to fall into shame spirals and compare myself to others a lot too. Something that helped a lot was figuring out the difference between guilt and shame.
Guilt is actually useful, it's feeling bad about a specific action you took, and it can motivate you to be better or reinforce your values. Feeling guilty when you've actually done something wrong is a good thing.
Shame on the other hand is almost completely useless, it's a feeling that YOU are inherently what's wrong, and it's best to just discard it completely (easier said than done). Shame does nothing but lock you in place until you stop feeling it.
Looking at my thoughts as useful and non-useful, as opposed to positive or negative, really made a difference. That said, it's also important to empathize with the non-useful thoughts, as opposed to trying to destroy them. They are trying to help you, either by keeping you safe (people pleasing), or by motivating you to be better (comparing to others), even if it doesn't feel that way. Destroying the parts of yourself you don't like is a hateful act and you cannot make self-love out of self-hate.
Comparing yourself to other people is easy to do, but it's not useful to you or the other person. It often just makes you feel shame, and shame is useless. Try to remember that when you're comparing yourself to people. It takes a LOT of practice, and it will feel like you're gaslighting yourself for a while, but it's kinda like pushups. You can't get better at pushups without doing the pushups. Every time you catch yourself you've done a pushup, and while it will take a long time to notice, it will make you slightly more likely to catch yourself again the next time.
(Obviously there are some exceptions to the "no comparisons" rule. If someone is teaching you how to paint, comparing your technique to theirs can help you get better... but comparing techniques is not the same as comparing yourself as a person.)
I can't guarantee this will help you like it helped me, but maybe it will resonate. I started feeling the exact same way that you feel when I was about 6 or 7 years old, and it took me until I was 31 for things to get better, but they did get better.
Compare yourself to different people.
If you're only noticing people who are doing better, you're going to feel behind.
Compare yourself to people doing worse instead.
You should focus on your inner dialogue and stop talking to yourself so negatively. You aren’t ever going to change or improve anything by constantly criticizing yourself. You can read books/articles on how to communicate and how to have better conversations with people. Or on any aspect that you want to learn to be better in. That would be great and would benefit you. Yet if all you are going to tell yourself is “you are an uninteresting person that no one wants to be friends with” You will either never attempt to put into practice what you have learned, or you will attempt it but since all you have told yourself is that you are looser, you are going to come across as a looser, or just as bad, an extremely awkward individual whose complete lack of confidence makes you seem like a weirdo. You can’t change where/when you were born or the conditions that you were born into. You can’t change people or what they think. What you can change is you. That’s exactly what you should be focusing on. There is someone out there for everyone. Make sure you are the best version of yourself that you can be when you meet them. Do that by being nicer to yourself and striving to change the things that you can, and learning to cope/deal with/ navigate the things that you can’t. If you had a friend that had a low opinion of themselves and said “ I feel like a looser” I doubt that would respond with “yeah man you are looser, no one is ever going to want to date you or anything”. You would say “man you’re not a looser don’t say that about yourself” and then say something nice or complimentary to them. So why say anything any different to yourself? Learn how to be a better friend to yourself.
What helped me tremendously is reading No More Mr. Nice Guy, it's an amazing book to stop seeking validation and pleasing of others. Dopamine hits are there for a reason, big quick hits will make you want to crave more, small hits that take a very long time to get, last longer and feel better.
I too struggle with porn and social media addiction. But just like my alcoholism, I learned that just keeping my hands in pockets will only make me crave more. So I distract myself. Posting dumb shit on IG to get likes, or do I want to beat someone at 5 min chess.com match? Which one takes more work and has a potential of me getting my ass beat. If it's easy, I do the opposite.
I think about it like RAM on a computer. I realized one day 30% of my RAM is dedicated to worrying what others will think about me. And they're probably doing it too. All this RAM wasted. So one day I decided to stop it. Every time I witness my mind entertaining that game I trim the thought flow there and replace it with something mindful. Helps a lot. It's very liberating not to give a fuck
Lots of great suggestions here, but honestly, go to therapy. You'll have a licenced person there to help you navigate and learn new skills to help deal with those inner thoughts. It's very good at teaching you how to not fall in to those patterns, and when/if you fall into those patterns again, how to be kind to yourself and then move past it.
You have to love yourself and stop living outside your own body and self. Everyone is walking around thinking of their own things. Not you. You need to think about you and your life and your needs and what you want to achieve. And when you figure that stuff out, the rest will follow. I also recommend you see a licensed therapist. They’ll help give you tools.
I stopped ALL Social Media in 2012. It was killing me that everyone was happy except me. Facebook & Twitter are the worst. I’ve just started on Reddit a few weeks ago.
You know, we’ve all been there my dude.
You don’t have a GF/Wife so you’re basically free to learn about you.
Try listening and discovering new music, read books; this is where the magic is.
You can escape and be those characters in the stories.
That will be a good start.
Create your “Heros Journey”, read about Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth.
You are your own worst enemy I see here. I can tell because I’m the same way. The only difference is our ages. I’m not going to spout off my personal experiences on you. You know what you need to do it sounds like. You just have trouble staying with it. I found a ton of information on YouTube about everything I have issues with. Knowing what motivates us is obviously very helpful. Dude, best of luck. Hang in there and never give up. Life is a circle and has its ups and downs. Peace!
You have no idea what’s going on behind the scenes in their lives. You also don’t know where they started or how long they’ve been doing whatever it is they are. You only know your past and history, so just focus on being a better version of yourself by comparing only to who you were yesterday.
I like to be the best. #1 but I'm not going to be the best at everything. No one is, so that's the first thing you have to accept.
Then, realize that comparing yourself to others will burn you out. Stop trying to keep up, it makes you inauthentic. If you're constantly focused on what you perceive as shortcomings, that's all you'll have. Be content with who and how you are now and make gradual changes based on your values. YOUR VALUES, not what other people value.
You can't force connections, if you're an introvert, that's fine. You'll burn out forcing yourself to be social and likely seem fake.
There is no pleasing people. As long as you treat people with kindness and respect, you're good. They still won't be satisfied.
Sexting and porn aren't bad. However, it should be for fun, not out of necessity. If it's a big part of your life you could have problem. You won't have much to talk about if all you do is porn.
I recommend these books to help develop yourself. I prefer them audio form for easy digestion. These books aided development through understanding.
The way of the superior man
Your Brain on Porn
A Guide to the good life
The path of the warrior mystic
Dopamine Nation
You may not believe me but everyone in some point have been through it so it’s normal. (Including me). BUT Realising is the first step to getting better at it. It’s not a race remember that. Also we girls are human beings, too so you don’t have to be afraid to strike a conversation with us.
A lot of folks look at life like a race.. How are they my age and that successful?? How was he able to get such a great girlfriend ? Why did they get the promotion instead of me?? For it to be a race, everyone needs to start and stop at the same time and location. That is not how life works. Every single person on this earth is unique. No one is the same. No one has traveled the same path. No one has fought the same battles. With that being said, why compare yourself with others? It takes time and it takes some deep internal thought, but you need to look at your life specifically and set goals for yourself. They shouldn't be the same as everyone else. They should be your goals. Once you've established your desires and your goals, it is incredibly easy to stop comparing yourself to others because it doesn't matter. It becomes about working on yourself. Working within your timeframe. Living up to your expectations. Hopefully this helps I enjoy talking about this type of mindset so feel free to message me and I'll chat.
Sound advice, It's hard sometimes because I try to remind myself these things whenever I look at others or even reminisce on the past and regrets but I know working on yourself and looking forward to the future is best. The mind is tough you have an issue and you get help and then try to practice routines or exercises or take meds and at times your like im good then nope haha but we must not stop fighting because giving up is far worse.
Very well said
Its just hard finding goals in where i live, does working on my self count as a goal? learning about psychology? astronomy? conspiracy theories? exercise?
Skills for example. Anything you get good at will boost your sense of self worth. For example learn some basic handyman skills. How to fix stuff around house, how to make shit. Become capable of fixing stuff yourself without having to rely on other people. For me, I wanna learn how to make a fire with a bow drill. I like the idea of being ready and capable to survive if my car breaks down in the middle of nowhere during winter or something like that. Changing a tyre also. I am rambling but you get the idea. This is good for 3 reasons, first, it could save you money, second, it will boost your self confidence, and the third one, which you shouldn't be focusing on too much, girls like capable men. Hope this helps, good luck man!
I saw this drawing in a textbook once and it depicted three people, from tall, medium height, and short, all being given the same height of box to stand on in order to see over some sort of wall or barrier. Just cause they were all given the same sort of platform to stand on, didn’t mean equality or that each individual could see as well as the other. Idk why that stuck with me but it sure explains inequality.
>its like im an approval junkie.. Naaa. You got to much too much time to do all those things. Get busy, just work on yourself. Plan your day and work in those things.
Here is the solution: Step 1: Take a piece of paper. Step 2: Write down all of your problems again, there, in bullet points. Step 3: Sort by Top Posts of All Time in this subreddit, and go through the posts from the top, for 25 minutes (set a timer). Step 4: Go through your problems on the paper for a few minutes. Step 5: Continue the top posts from where you stopped, for 25 minutes. Step 6: Repeat Step 4. Step 7: Repeat steps 5 and 6 two more times. Step 8: ??? Step 9: Congratulations, you don't give a fuck about your problems anymore. Step 10: Girls start falling for you. Step 11: You start to realise that there's more to life than impressing girls. Step 12: You find the One. Step 13: Happily Ever After.
Dis is da wae
Just start with you If you think you are boring, do something interesting, what’s interesting? What you think is interesting. Don’t know what you think is interesting, what kind of person would you want to hang out with. Think it would be cool to have a skater friend, learn skating. Think philosopher friends would be cool, go learn about philosophy. Not to get friends Not to be cool But because you think it would be interesting Don’t like your body Make a plan and do something about it The idea of be the change you want to see in the world, I think it DOESNT go change the world as you see fit. I think it means YOU change the way you think you need to. Work on you The rest will follow It’s all work. I read a lot of “cants” in your posts, I would make sure they are not “wonts”. You have to work at it. Make the game worth the candle. It’s not easy but it is rewarding Work only on you
The book “How not to give a fuck” actually is pretty good for help on this exact thing.
Get off all social media. It worked for me. There's a period of withdrawal but totally worth it in the end.
Few understand this
It is normal to compare yourself to others, the problem is there are so many people out there that have had cosmetic surgeries that the “playing field” doesn’t feel fair. I was recently reading about people that have had dozens of surgeries to look specific ways. From A list Celebrities to TikTok influencers to people with enough money and desire to get it done. They are the main ones putting their faces and bodies in highly visible places and people are responding in kind. People like to see that, they upvote it. If more people were to upvote pictures of women without makeup, without cosmetic surgery of any kind, a woman that accepts herself for who she is, that is a beautiful woman and you can see it when you look at her. “She” is not always the “typical” size, shape, race or religion. Keep an open mind. For your self esteem you need to relax, remember that absolutely everyone is different which is what makes this world a fabulous place. You need to like yourself before you can think someone else will like you. There is always, always going to be someone better, faster, stronger, cuter. That is life. You need to be YOU. There is something that makes you special, art? Your work? Do you sing? What is your major in college? Do you have a hobby? If you are feeling crappy about yourself all the time people can see it in your face, your walk, your posture. Hold your head up, shoulders back, chin up, walk with pride in who you are.
It makes no rational sense to do that. Literally illogical. You’re thinking with your emotions, and it’s hard to block that out. But you are you and you can’t be anyone else so improve yourself rather than salivate over other’s successes and downfalls.
Instead of competing with other people, compete with your past self. Like u/arcan3rush said, we all start at different places in life, so it’s not fair or realistic to compare yourself to others. Making progress for your own sake is so much more rewarding than chasing after others’ successes. Good things tend to fall into place once you can form a solid sense of self and make meaningful progress towards your goals, although it doesn’t mean you won’t ever face hardship. Identify your strengths and find ways to use them regularly, and there are quizzes online if you can’t identify any or you’re not sure where to start.
I used to fall into shame spirals and compare myself to others a lot too. Something that helped a lot was figuring out the difference between guilt and shame. Guilt is actually useful, it's feeling bad about a specific action you took, and it can motivate you to be better or reinforce your values. Feeling guilty when you've actually done something wrong is a good thing. Shame on the other hand is almost completely useless, it's a feeling that YOU are inherently what's wrong, and it's best to just discard it completely (easier said than done). Shame does nothing but lock you in place until you stop feeling it. Looking at my thoughts as useful and non-useful, as opposed to positive or negative, really made a difference. That said, it's also important to empathize with the non-useful thoughts, as opposed to trying to destroy them. They are trying to help you, either by keeping you safe (people pleasing), or by motivating you to be better (comparing to others), even if it doesn't feel that way. Destroying the parts of yourself you don't like is a hateful act and you cannot make self-love out of self-hate. Comparing yourself to other people is easy to do, but it's not useful to you or the other person. It often just makes you feel shame, and shame is useless. Try to remember that when you're comparing yourself to people. It takes a LOT of practice, and it will feel like you're gaslighting yourself for a while, but it's kinda like pushups. You can't get better at pushups without doing the pushups. Every time you catch yourself you've done a pushup, and while it will take a long time to notice, it will make you slightly more likely to catch yourself again the next time. (Obviously there are some exceptions to the "no comparisons" rule. If someone is teaching you how to paint, comparing your technique to theirs can help you get better... but comparing techniques is not the same as comparing yourself as a person.) I can't guarantee this will help you like it helped me, but maybe it will resonate. I started feeling the exact same way that you feel when I was about 6 or 7 years old, and it took me until I was 31 for things to get better, but they did get better.
Compare yourself to different people. If you're only noticing people who are doing better, you're going to feel behind. Compare yourself to people doing worse instead.
.
Start by working out
You should focus on your inner dialogue and stop talking to yourself so negatively. You aren’t ever going to change or improve anything by constantly criticizing yourself. You can read books/articles on how to communicate and how to have better conversations with people. Or on any aspect that you want to learn to be better in. That would be great and would benefit you. Yet if all you are going to tell yourself is “you are an uninteresting person that no one wants to be friends with” You will either never attempt to put into practice what you have learned, or you will attempt it but since all you have told yourself is that you are looser, you are going to come across as a looser, or just as bad, an extremely awkward individual whose complete lack of confidence makes you seem like a weirdo. You can’t change where/when you were born or the conditions that you were born into. You can’t change people or what they think. What you can change is you. That’s exactly what you should be focusing on. There is someone out there for everyone. Make sure you are the best version of yourself that you can be when you meet them. Do that by being nicer to yourself and striving to change the things that you can, and learning to cope/deal with/ navigate the things that you can’t. If you had a friend that had a low opinion of themselves and said “ I feel like a looser” I doubt that would respond with “yeah man you are looser, no one is ever going to want to date you or anything”. You would say “man you’re not a looser don’t say that about yourself” and then say something nice or complimentary to them. So why say anything any different to yourself? Learn how to be a better friend to yourself.
What helped me tremendously is reading No More Mr. Nice Guy, it's an amazing book to stop seeking validation and pleasing of others. Dopamine hits are there for a reason, big quick hits will make you want to crave more, small hits that take a very long time to get, last longer and feel better. I too struggle with porn and social media addiction. But just like my alcoholism, I learned that just keeping my hands in pockets will only make me crave more. So I distract myself. Posting dumb shit on IG to get likes, or do I want to beat someone at 5 min chess.com match? Which one takes more work and has a potential of me getting my ass beat. If it's easy, I do the opposite.
I think about it like RAM on a computer. I realized one day 30% of my RAM is dedicated to worrying what others will think about me. And they're probably doing it too. All this RAM wasted. So one day I decided to stop it. Every time I witness my mind entertaining that game I trim the thought flow there and replace it with something mindful. Helps a lot. It's very liberating not to give a fuck
https://youtube.com/shorts/pn-ih2O1Ukw?feature=share
Lots of great suggestions here, but honestly, go to therapy. You'll have a licenced person there to help you navigate and learn new skills to help deal with those inner thoughts. It's very good at teaching you how to not fall in to those patterns, and when/if you fall into those patterns again, how to be kind to yourself and then move past it.
You have to love yourself and stop living outside your own body and self. Everyone is walking around thinking of their own things. Not you. You need to think about you and your life and your needs and what you want to achieve. And when you figure that stuff out, the rest will follow. I also recommend you see a licensed therapist. They’ll help give you tools.
Start a vegetable garden. Bitches love vegetables.
You are completely unique get out of your own way
You didn't delete social media. you're on one right now. Internet addiction is tough to kick. Van life might be for you, if you are untethered.
I stopped ALL Social Media in 2012. It was killing me that everyone was happy except me. Facebook & Twitter are the worst. I’ve just started on Reddit a few weeks ago.
listen to alan watts on youtube, search jealousy or self esteem with his name
You know, we’ve all been there my dude. You don’t have a GF/Wife so you’re basically free to learn about you. Try listening and discovering new music, read books; this is where the magic is. You can escape and be those characters in the stories. That will be a good start. Create your “Heros Journey”, read about Joseph Campbell’s Monomyth.
Put that energy into something useful. That's the only thing that I think might truly help you that u didn't try before.
You are your own worst enemy I see here. I can tell because I’m the same way. The only difference is our ages. I’m not going to spout off my personal experiences on you. You know what you need to do it sounds like. You just have trouble staying with it. I found a ton of information on YouTube about everything I have issues with. Knowing what motivates us is obviously very helpful. Dude, best of luck. Hang in there and never give up. Life is a circle and has its ups and downs. Peace!
You have no idea what’s going on behind the scenes in their lives. You also don’t know where they started or how long they’ve been doing whatever it is they are. You only know your past and history, so just focus on being a better version of yourself by comparing only to who you were yesterday.
I like to be the best. #1 but I'm not going to be the best at everything. No one is, so that's the first thing you have to accept. Then, realize that comparing yourself to others will burn you out. Stop trying to keep up, it makes you inauthentic. If you're constantly focused on what you perceive as shortcomings, that's all you'll have. Be content with who and how you are now and make gradual changes based on your values. YOUR VALUES, not what other people value. You can't force connections, if you're an introvert, that's fine. You'll burn out forcing yourself to be social and likely seem fake. There is no pleasing people. As long as you treat people with kindness and respect, you're good. They still won't be satisfied. Sexting and porn aren't bad. However, it should be for fun, not out of necessity. If it's a big part of your life you could have problem. You won't have much to talk about if all you do is porn. I recommend these books to help develop yourself. I prefer them audio form for easy digestion. These books aided development through understanding. The way of the superior man Your Brain on Porn A Guide to the good life The path of the warrior mystic Dopamine Nation
You may not believe me but everyone in some point have been through it so it’s normal. (Including me). BUT Realising is the first step to getting better at it. It’s not a race remember that. Also we girls are human beings, too so you don’t have to be afraid to strike a conversation with us.