“Comparison is the thief of joy”- Theodore Roosevelt
This quote sums it all up. The danger and downside of comparing yourself to someone else can steal your joy and make you seem ungrateful for the life God has blessed with you. Comparison will have us devalue ourselves as inferior to someone’s else life which will cause us to block and miss out on blessings. Comparing yourself to others is emotionally dangerous especially when it comes to social media. We start to look at what others have, what they’re doing, what vacations they have gone on, what car there driving, if there in a relationship, and we now assume they are doing better. If we don’t assume there doing better, we start to hate, “oh she only got that car because her dad paid for it, “she got that good job because her she flirted with the manager”, “she is with that boy because he has money not based on true love”. Because of this comparison, we feel worthless, have low self-esteem, depressed, stress, jealous, and envious. We don’t realize that God has designed our paths differently from others. My path is different from my sisters, co-workers, friends, and people at church. Just because that person appears to have done more or have more than you, doesn’t mean God isn’t blessing you. For all we know that person who got that good job could have been laid off for two years and now is grateful and wants to share the good news on social media. That person with the nice car could have been walking or taking public transportation for years and finally saved up to buy a new car. That person who is in a relationship probably experienced heartbreak after heartbreak and now has been blessed with a good man. Don’t assume someone is doing bad or good because you don’t know their story and the path God has them on. It’s easy to say “how come she got a promotion and I didn’t?”, “why is she in a relationship and I’m still single and heartbroken?”, or “how come she was able to buy a house and I couldn’t?”. Sometimes rejection is God protection. You didn’t get that promotion because God is planning something better, you are still single because you are not emotionally ready to get into a relationship, but God will bless you with a good man, and you didn’t buy that house because maybe you’re not financially ready and God is protecting you from ending up in a foreclosure. God is working in you, on you, and with you. You may not know how God is working it out, but know He is.
The book of Job is a great example of what it means to love God even when it’s hard. Through the mist of all his problems, he still held fast to God. We should all try to be like Job, he worships God and sees God as one he wants to follow and be more like. Job’s lifestyle shows how much he really loves God. When your living for God and realize how truly blessed you are, you will stop worrying and comparing yourself to others. God has blessed you not to experience real problems others are facing. I was so unhappy and mad at how unfair things were going at my job. There was no room to grow, very few promotions, favoritism, and low morale. I would go to work with an attitude almost every day. Don’t get me wrong every morning when I wake up I would say a prayer, before I get out of my car for work I would say a prayer, but the problem was I was making it a routine instead of being personal with God. There was one day at work we (employees) received an email about two of our co-workers who were husband and wife, their two-year-old daughter passed away from a very rare cancer. I was shocked because I remembered when we got the first email about how their daughter first got the cancer and two months later it went into remission and now she had passed away. I thought to myself shame on me, shame on me for complaining about not get a promotion or how unfair things were going at work and here this little girl had to endure cancer. Her parents now have to deal with the loss of their little girl and I was complaining about how things were going at work??? My little problems are nothing compared to what others are seriously going through. I had to once again do some more self-reflecting, instead of me being upset that someone else got a promotion or me comparing someone else’s life on social media, I need to be thankful and grateful that God has blessed me with great health, a job, a car, a roof over my head, food to eat, and so many more blessings. As Christians, we struggle with living under the will of God. We continue to compare our lives to other people, complain about our current situation, or ask why. God doesn’t have us go through ups and downs to ask why. When life goes up you go up, when life goes down you go down, that doesn’t mean you will stay there. Whether the news is good or bad God still deserves to be praised.
Stop worrying about everyone else and be humble for the will that God has for you. Just because someone appears to have it all doesn’t necessarily means it’s true. Instagram has filters, it can edit any blemishes you may have and it can be the same in real life. You will never win when comparing yourself to someone else’s social media. We must be determined to seek God and Him only. He is working things out for you, better is coming later, just be still. God will take you places for you to have more faith in Him.
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