On a recent episode of The Ultimate Health Podcast, host Jesse Chappus, chatted with bestselling author, Melissa Ambrosini, about how to stop comparing yourself to others, the difference between upward and downward comparison, and the miracle that is you. 

Ambrosini on the miracle that is you: 

“When you know who you truly are, and you know that you’re a miracle, you stop comparing yourself.” She followed that, “there’s a one in four hundred trillion chance that you were born…one in four hundred trillion—that is a lot—that is a miracle.”

How to stop comparing yourself to others using the ACES technique: 

  • A = Awareness:  Ambrosini noted that the first step to curing comparisonitis is to become aware of the areas where we’re comparing ourselves to others and knowing what our triggers are. 
  • C = Choose a different path: “Every second of every day, we are making choices, and we can make choices from fear and we can make choices from love—and we want to be conscious about what choice we are making—and if we are choosing to compare and then go down that comparisonitis spiral, that is a choice we are making, and if we don’t like that choice we can choose something different. We can choose to feel light, we can choose to feel love, we can choose to feel abundant.”
  • E = Eliminate the trigger: Once you’re aware of your triggers, you can eliminate those triggers. For example, identifying a situation that has previously caused you to “spiral into a comparisonitis trap” and taking steps to remove yourself from that situation. If removal is not possible, simply “exhale” by taking a really deep breath, exhaling, and deciding to come back to the present moment by getting out of your head. 
  • S = Shift your state: Dancing, jumping up and down, doing some squats, and “just [taking] a couple of moments to consciously raise your vibration in your body, raise your energy.”

Is comparison ever healthy?

In short, yes.

On the pod, Ambrosini explained that there is both upward comparison and downward comparison. In upward comparison, looking to others can be a healthy motivator (I.e. going for a run with your best friend and if she is speeding up the pace, it makes you think that you can speed up the pace too).

However, Ambrosini noted:

“It turns toxic—and it becomes comparisonitis—when we compare ourselves, and then we attribute meaning to it and we make it mean something negative about ourselves.”

Do we need to constantly compare?

Data shows, in a lifetime, we spend 6 years of our lives on social media, 10 years in total on our phone “and a lot of it is just scrolling and comparing, and it’s just unnecessary and it causes a lot of mental health issues…and we just don’t need to do it. Life is so precious, it’s so sacred, it’s so beautiful, and we don’t need to waste any of our precious time or energy comparing ourselves to anyone else, because the truth is we are a miracle, we are magical…when you truly know you are a miracle, you won’t compare yourself to someone else.”