Why Comparison Kills: Three Things You Can Do To Stay In Your Own Lane
Do you ever feel overwhelmed, discouraged, or intimidated by other people in your industry? Do you feel they do the same thing that you're doing but seem to be leaps and bounds ahead, and seem to have gotten there overnight? Well, today we're going to talk about how to stay in your own lane - how to embrace gratitude and confidence so you can move along faster than if you're continually looking left and right, watching what others are doing. In this series, I’m giving you no-nonsense advice to get unstuck and help you get your first few or next few paying clients. A lot of times, women ask me, "Anna, do you ever get jealous of other people in the industry? What do you do if you're feeling really overwhelmed and intimidated by other people's success?" The answer is yes. I still do look around and say, "Wow! That person is rocking it." But, I will say that over the last few months, I've gotten better and better at really embracing what I am, embracing my path, and not letting other people's work detract from where I am in my journey.
Stay in Your Lane
Today I’m giving you three practical suggestions for how to really stay in your lane and because of that, move fiercely forward in your business.
Celebrate How Far You’ve Come:
The first thing I want you to learn to do - and I’m still working on this - is instead of continually looking at where you have yet to go, really celebrate how far you've come. This is a really big shift, because for a lot of people like me who are type A, we're always striving toward another goal. Once we accomplish something, we're like, "Okay, great! Now on to the next thing." It's not bad to look forward, have goals, and be working toward something, but I think we may forget from where we've come or forget what we've already accomplished. We're in the state of continually striving instead of celebrating - 'Wow! Look how far I have come or look what i just accomplished last week.' You can do this multiple ways, but the most comfortable way for me to celebrate where I’ve come is gratitude, by praying and thanking God for how far I’ve come. Even getting out my journal and writing a list of gratitudes for what I’ve been able to accomplish thus far in my business. That's my first tip for you: really looking at how you can celebrate along the way, working from this place of contentment and gratitude instead of discouragement and striving.
Be Confident:
The next thing I want you to do is find the inner confidence to be able to say, "I know that I will be successful in my business; I just don't know exactly how or when yet." I think when we have this radiant inner confidence, and there's assurance that it's going to work out, and ‘I’m good at what I do’ - 'when women work with me, they benefit from working with me’ - if you can say that from a humble, convicted, authentic place, I think that really shatters the comparison problem.
If we're fully confident in our own gifts and talents, paths and successes, then we're not going to be intimidated by others.
Celebrate the Success of Others:
My third tip I want to share with you is to celebrate others’ successes, and realize that their success doesn't threaten yours; they can be successful, and you can be successful, too. First, be rooted in your own confidence, and then allow that to empower you to celebrate others; really resist jealousy, and be able to both publicly and in your head be thankful for and proud of the work that others do, even to the point of promoting them. If there's someone in your industry that's doing the exact same thing that you're doing, I want you to realize there are some people that are going to click them and some clients that are going to click with you. And, that's okay. Rest in the fact that the people who are meant to work with you will work with you, and that all you have to do is show up and be you; you don't have to do anything weird or different to try to attract other people's audiences. There are even times when I see women in my industry doing something, and when I see them being unsuccessful, or I see it not working, I will even use that to adjust what I’m doing, and that is a bad idea too. When someone is doing well or when someone is struggling, we don't know all the contributing factors and reasons why. We end up making some weird conclusion to explain why they did/didn’t find success, and we try to apply it to what we're doing. I think we can really confuse ourselves and mess our own path up by comparing in this way.
Of course we can learn from people and observe things, but I think as we see people to the left and right of us doing things, we need to be careful of the conclusions that we draw. Because at the end of the day, it's our business, and we need to lean into our strengths, and do it in a way that feels good to us.
Lose the ‘Shoulds’
I will say on a closing note, something that's really served me in the area of resisting comparison is really losing the ‘shoulds’ in my business, losing this thought of, "I really should be doing it this way”. But remember that it's your business. Of course, you should be honest and ethical, but outside of that, really give yourself the freedom to create your business, and do it in a way that serves you and your family, and also, your clients and their needs.
Run your business by leaning into what feels good, in your own lane, without necessarily using the industry or your peers as a barometer for how you're doing.