When you’re single, you may succumb to the temptation of comparing where you are in life against where your friends are in their lives. Resist doing that! There are always people you perceive as having a big jump on you, and there are always people that perceive you as having a big jump on them. Measuring yourself against what you perceive as other people’s superior accomplishments is pointless. We each have our own path.
I caught Dax Shepard on a podcast recently, discussing his struggles with sobriety. A friend had stayed at his house, and found his Big Book, which is the book used by Alcoholics Anonymous. There were many dates written in the book and crossed out. The last date was not crossed out.
His friend asked Dax about it and Dax was embarrassed. Each of those dates crossed out were times when he’d relapsed. His friend told Dax he hadn’t seen failure in the crossed-out dates. What he saw was a person that just refused to quit. Dax didn’t quit quitting. And that wasn’t something to be ashamed of, that was something to be proud of.
Get hold of the fact wherever you are is right where you're supposed to be. Once you get hold of that, self-condemnation falls away. You no longer have a need to measure yourself against others. And eventually, although it's been a slow process for me, but eventually, you get to a place where what others think of you no longer has significance. Only what you think of you matters. And that place is where peace of mind lives.
Never assume the way you look at yourself is the way others see you. We are always harder on ourselves that we need to be. Give yourself grace. Always. Grace.
