I get in this comparison mind-game trying to keep up with everyone. “Everyone else seems to be able do this. What’s the matter with me?” I catch myself trying to keep up, then beating myself up for not measuring up to everyone else. Then I give myself more grief because I realize I am not measuring up to my own standards for myself…and then the negative spiral of the negative mind just gets to tumbling downward right into a rabbit hole. I have completely forgotten to take care of myself. There is no self-love in this game.
Yoga class is a good example of where I get swept up in The Comparison Game. Everyone else seems perfectly capable of doing whatever the teacher is asking of the class. And as I feel myself falter, I sense the eyes of the teacher cast in my direction. “I can’t do what she is asking of me, yet everyone else is right in unison with her. What’s wrong with me?” My leg goes into spasm, my body now demanding that I stop and attend to its needs, rather than my egoic imaginings.
But every rabbit hole has at least one exit and there is where I set my sights. I have to catch this first as an awareness. I notice that I have gotten lost in and hooked by the cloak of shame – which seems to me the outcome of the Comparison Game, and hardly a prize. And as I feel myself falling, I ask for help and guidance from Source, the Divine. I turn towards and into myself. I remember to breathe – in and out. And I get into the rhythm of my breathing. This is my immediate reminder of the Divine alive within me. And in that moment, I suddenly, blessedly find space expanding around and within me. It is here in the breath that I return to loving myself – who I am in the moment. “I am who I am – I AM.” And I step out of and stop playing The Comparison Game.
Now I have a conscious practice when I go into a yoga class or any other place like it. Before I even sit down, I consciously imagine a space around me and give myself permission to be whoever I am in the moment. As I greet my classmates, I give myself permission to be exactly myself – no apologies, no excuses. Here is where I make my stand. And I am so grateful for this awareness and commitment to loving myself. The only prize in The Comparison Game is the reminder to stop playing it.
#StopTheComparisonGame #IAmWhoIAm #ToolsForBetterLiving #kippinitreal
