Tag: comparisons

Comparisons


All our joy and sorrow in life is due to comparisons. We tend to look at others to feel happy or sad. Why does this happen ? I do not know but it is most often a reality in our lives. We tend to compare ourselves with our siblings as a kid and then our classmates in school and college. Then may be our colleagues at work.

I used to live in a city, where people bought a car or a house bigger than what their neighbour had rather than what they needed. This was because the societal norms in that city was to live by comparison. Imagine you buying something in life not because you need it but because your neighbour has it.

How do comparisons affect us ? It makes us less tolerant and also tends to create a complex within us. We either think we are superior or inferior to others. This leads to negative behaviour, which in turn impacts our relationships with others.

What do we do ? How can we live without comparing ourselves with others ? Yes it is possible. We could compare ourselves with people having more troubles than we have. We can compare ourselves with people who are less fortunate than us and this will make us grateful to God. We can compare ourselves with people who are better than us in behaviour and relationships and learn from them.

However, in reality we do not do that. We tend to compare with those who have more than us. This leads to jealousy and in turn leads to undesirable behaviour and actions. Thus leading to both physical and psychological illnesses, which definitely can be avoided.

Another positive way to compare is to do it with oneself. How was I when started my career ? How am I today ? How was I when I was a child and how am I today ? All these comparisons will make us feel better and more grateful to life and God.

We can learn from the sportspersons from individual sports. They prefer to compete with themselves than with others. This is healthy and absolute. It energises them to do better and excel every single time without losing any energy. They remain positive in life and are always focussed on what they want to achieve.

As in the photo above, two artisans do not compare their pieces (boats) of  art, as they create it.  Each is a masterpiece in itself.   They always try  to do better than what they have created previously.  This is the lesson we need to learn in life.

Even the most successful people in all walks of life tend to excel by bettering what they have done before. They are not feeling bad of others around them, who have done better than them. They learn from the best but always set high standards for themselves in absolute rather than relative terms.

Let us learn to live life on our own turf from today.

S Ramesh Shankar

Life

Do we live life to its full ? Most of us are not willing to enjoy the moment. We are not investing in our own happiness. We are spending more time worrying about things beyond our control rather than rejoicing all that God has bestowed us with to enjoy life.

We live life comparing ourselves with others and dying out of jealousy. God has given equal capacity to all of us. Each of us craft our destiny by our own hard work. Why are we worried about others ? It is like a sprinter looking at all his co-participants behind him while running a race. The chances of his failing are higher than his success. The best sprinters in the world trust their capabilities and focus on their efforts. They are always confident of their success as they are determined in the efforts they put in every day. They are confident that the results have to follow their efforts.

Life is a journey. Every day is like the page of a book. We need to read every page of the book and move on to the next page. Most of us tend to turn back and not move forward. While, it may be useful to learn from the mistakes of the past, it is more important to focus on shaping our future. If we keep turning to the back pages, we may never move forward and read the whole book in our lifetime.

Life is full of possibilities. We have to make the best of everything in life. We have to dream big, work hard and aim for the impossible in life. If we put in our best, we can make the impossible, possible. After all, it is mankind who dreamt of walking on the moon and made it possible almost five decades back.

It may be inspirational to look at achievers in life. The successful people in life we are not born with silver spoons. Most of them were born in families with limited resources. But, they had a clear vision of what they want to achieve in life and they worked zealously to achieve it.

I have met people in life who have represented my country in Olympics and could not even afford the sports kit when they started learning their sport. Nothing is impossible for the human mind. It is our own limitations in the mind, which makes the possible look impossible. We draw our own curtains and encircle ourselves with self created limitations.

If we look at life as half full glass rather than half empty, the impossible looks possible to us. It is all about our attitude to life. We have to be clear in our mind. We need to set our goals, work hard and always believe in ourselves and our team. Our family, friends and colleagues will always support us if we believe in them and in ourselves.

We need to make life exciting for us. Imagine taking a train without a destination in mind. While we may travel a distance but may be moving in the wrong direction. So, lets set our vision, work conscientiously towards achieving it by believing in ourselves and all people around us.  Life is colourful (as in the photo above) if we live it that way.

We can make the impossible, possible.

S Ramesh Shankar
November 2016