I wanted to share some amazing things that I learned from a podcast from Breakaway Ministries. Much of this is from Timothy Attek’s teaching, but it really helped me out so much I wanted to share some of it with you all. i felt the urge To just open up more about my struggle with comparison and how Jesus is helping me overcome it.
Why do we compare our unfiltered lives to peoples filtered lives on insta? Seriously though! We compare the highlights of other people’s lives to the lowlights of our own. Why do we do that to ourselves? Because comparison is real! Comparison comes in and tries to steal EVERYTHING from you!! WAKE UP PEOPLE, YOURE GETTING ROBBED!
If we are getting robbed let’s answer the questions: Who? What? And When?
Who: who do you compare yourself to? For me it’s other girls, specifically girls I’m with or see on social media.
What: what’s important to you? What are you comparing about yourself? Mostly for me it’s my outward appearance, once in a while I compare my personality to others through.
When: when do you compare yourself to others? For me it’s constantly through out my day.
Let’s talk about the ER and AS factor. Which one do you struggle most with?
The ER factor is when we want to be better than others and our comparison feeds off of that! For ex. I want to be skinnER, prettiER, godliER.
The AS factor is when you need everyone around you to fail so you feel like more of a success, you want to measure up. You might say “well if I was like this girl I would finally be satisfied” ex. I want to be AS strong, AS funny, AS adventurous.
However, there is a fault in both of these ideas. For the ER factor it is that we will always find people that are better and will always try to meet their standard. For the AS factor, perfection isn’t reality! The people that we compare ourselves to are comparing themselves to others too! It’s a vicious cycle. Unless we break it!
Like a disease comparison comes with some serious side effects. No matter how good it may make us feel at times (because of pride) it really hurts us so much in the end and robs us of joy!
Side Effects if Comparison:
1. Competition: comparison ruins relationships because we are always trying to be better.
- Pride: we look for people who we think will make is look better
- Envy: we wish we had less of what God gifted us with and more of what God gave someone else.
- Anxiety: never feel like we are enough
- Exhaustion: never feel like we are doing enough
- Resentment: we start to hate peoples success because we think that it indicates our failure, and we begin to resent God for not giving us what someone else has
- Unhealthy Gratification: we inwardly celebrate others failures because it makes us feel like more of a success
- Dishonesty: we live a lie and act has if we have it all together, and that we are assured in our identity, when in reality we are stressed out and depressed.
I can honestly say that I have dealt with all 8 of these side effects in my life. Have you? If you have, WAKE UP YOURE GETTING ROBBED!!
I encourage you to read the story of King Saul, starting in 1 Samuel 18:6. Comparison RUINED his life!! He constantly compared himself to David! At times there would be whole parades FOR HIM, but he would compare himself to David because David struck down more people than him in the battle. Comparison made Saul live out the rest of his life in full resentment for David and spending all his time trying to kill him. Saul lost the respect of his wife, kids, and all his men, and committed suicide. Now I’m not saying that if you find yourself having these side effects that you immediately will lose you family, but I am saying that comparison is real, and if we aren’t careful it seriously can tear us apart!
LADIES AND GENTS! We were not meant to live like this, chained down feeling like we can’t escape the consuming thoughts that you aren’t good enough, that you won’t measure up.
Well friend, I have something to tell you, we compare because we try to determine our worth and value in this world. But because the world’s values are constantly changing our value and worth is too…unless we look somewhere else!! “The cross of Christ does something that comparison can’t!” (Timothy Attek) It DECLARES and cements our value! God has proclaimed that you are worth his most prized possession (his son, Jesus). You are worth him dying on the cross just so God could have a relationship with you!YOU ARE WORTH the body and blood of Jesus, the son of the Living God!!! Brothers and sisters, our value was determined 2000 years ago on the cross! We can’t change our value, worth, or identity!! Our worth comes from freely receiving it solely from The Lord. Our identity can only be found in him, any other words that people attempt to place on is a label and lie, not your true identity!
So I simply have one question: God says that YOU ARE ENOUGH, is that enough for you to stop comparing yourself to other humans who Jesus calls enough just as equally as you? Seriously ask yourself: is the King of the Universe calling me enough, enough for me?
so enough with “being enough” because you are. And that is final.
