I once had a classmate named Susan who never seemed to miss a question.
I began comparing my marks with hers from middle school through high school—and the comparison did not make me feel good about myself.
Once, our class was given a very hard biology test. At first, I was proud to get a 93 percent—until I found out that Susan got a 105 percent! (She’d gotten the extra credit question right too!)
Even worse, it didn’t look to me like she was even working that hard.
I found myself losing motivation. “What’s the point?” I thought. Because I was busy comparing myself with Susan, I began to think less of my own abilities.
And then I made a bad decision. I thought that since, because of Susan, I couldn’t be the smartest in the class, I wasn’t going to bother being smart at all.I was going to focus on being “cool” instead.
And that was a big mistake…and not JUST because there was NO CHANCE I was ever going to be considered “cool” in my high school!
Thankfully, sometime between high school and graduate school, I learned to use my potential more fully. And when I did, I discovered that the comparison I had made between Susan and me had been meaningless from the very beginning—as were all the other comparisons I made during those years.
Not just false—meaningless.
All along, I had only one game to concern myself with—and that was my own!
FOCUS ON YOUR OWN GAME, AND NO ONE ELSE'S! Wherever you are in your learning journey has nothing to do with where anyone else is.
Keep your eyes on your own work, where they belong, and you'll find yourself learning and improving faster!
