Comparison constantly occurs throughout the world and in everyone’s lives. We are always trying to find out how we measure up to people around us. However, we don’t realize that the only opinion that matters about ourselves is our own. If we are happy with ourselves and feel good about ourselves, then there is no reason to search for approval from others. Unfortunately, social media has made it easy for people to spend numerous hours throughout the day scrolling through all of the perfectly curated images on the internet. There is always room for comparison and people can always find someone who is doing better than them.
As a society, we need to stop telling people that they need to do more and improve. None of us are perfect and will never be able to be perfect. Therefore, comparing oneself to professionally edited photos on social media or images of models digitally edited by the top people in the beauty industry will only create pain and frustration. Additionally, looking through social media at everyone’s resumes and seeing where everyone went to college and what internships and jobs they have done can put unwanted pressure on oneself.
How do we stop ourselves from comparing ourselves to others when we see every aspect of the best parts of people’s lives on social media? The important thing to understand with social media is that it never tells the whole truth. Most people do not post aspects of their lives on social media that are not picture perfect. Consequently, to stay grounded we have to remind ourselves of the delusions present on social media. Human beings are imperfect and don’t have lives that are amazing all of the time. Therefore, we can’t be too hard on ourselves because it is totally normal not to be flawless. It is unrealistic to compare ourselves to other people because everyone is imperfect.