First Published 3 August 2023

Are you comparing your experiences to someone else?

Have you ever seen what someone else is going through and thought to yourself: “well, what they are going through is so much worse than my stuff, so I have no right to complain”?

It can be easy to belittle our own pain and situations when we see that someone else is ‘dealing so much better’ than us when they are going through something ‘worse’.

Perhaps you were one of those people who had to continue showing up to work throughout that stuff that happened in 2020 and your friends were either on furlough so being paid less or they were being let go.  They perhaps complained about how terrible things were for them and ‘envied’ you for still being able to go through life as usual, making it almost impossible for you to want to tell them the added stress you were facing (like having to wear a mask all day, being constantly worried, having to pick up the slack due to your colleagues being furloughed etc etc).

Or maybe you were having a really tough breakup but a friend was dealing with a loved one in ICU or having died?  So you then become their supporter and push your pain down deep, stick a plaster over it and pretend like all is ok.

No matter what you are going through, your experiences, feelings, emotions and pain are just as valid as anyone else’s – because they are your experiences of the life you are living, and no one else can or will live your life.

Putting a plaster on it, or stuffing it down deep inside a box before nailing the lid shut are not helpful coping strategies as the pressure will build and the pain will fester until one day there is likely to be an explosion.

If I look inwards to myself (with the book I reading this month with my book club this is exactly what I have been doing!) I remember the language I used around being bullied as a child.

“every one is bullied as a kid so I am not anything different/special”

“it was only words, other people were abused in much more damaging ways”

There were many more ways I made light of, belittled/minimised, glossed over my trauma. 

And yes, I do use the word trauma here as my experiences when I was an 8 year old shaped me and are deeply ingrained.  If I don’t acknowledge them I can’t process them.  I can’t understand myself, my motivations and my patterns and I can’t move forwards. 

So much so that when I attended my first kinesiology session because I was being bullied at work, the first things that showed up was that 8 year old version of me and what I went through – all because I hadn’t processed it – and now I was still responding the way a scared 8 year old would when confronted with a bully… as you can imagine, that wasn’t a helpful response.

And so began my journey to now.  If you want to live your live, your way, on your terms – first notice what’s already happened in your life.  Are there aspects that you have buried that you need to address?  Are you seeing recurring patterns that aren’t healthy or just not the way you want to experience life?  Once you have processed the past it makes planning out the future a heck of a lot easier!

My suggestion is to journal your thoughts and emotions, perhaps meditate on what’s really going on inside, have a coffee or a walk with a trusted friend and tell them what’s really going on for you. (reminding them of what I said last week – that you just need to be heard!)

If you have tried these and need a bit more support, reach out to me now for a conversation, or if talking is too hard, book a session and we can just get straight to work without you even having to talk about it!