Comparison

Oh that word. That word is a disease.

Comparison.

It starts as a little thought, maybe as happiness for someone else, but that thought, if not treated with caution, can quickly spread like wild fire and turn into envy. But I dare say that envy is not the most deadly. No. Comparison is far worse.

Envy drives you to pine away, sometimes quietly and inside, sometimes loudly and to everyone you hear, but envy is just thoughts.

Comparison is what drives people to action. Comparison is when people start changing their lives to make them into someone else's lives.

I worry so much about how much comparison is out in the world today. Before and after pictures. "This totally looks like that!" pictures. And then you see cute pictures of cute houses or pictures of insanely fit and trim people, or pictures of people's shoes and cute words written over them and you think "That's cute!" Which changes to "Oh I wish I was like that!" to "Why am I not like that? I need to be like that. I'm not good enough."

Social media is a large driver in the spreading of the virus of comparison.

Let me tell you about something about my journey in comparison. I could tell you about my journey in image comparison, in goal comparison, but I'm going to talk about relationship comparison.

 I've dated other people. You read this blog, you know I've dated other people. Joe is not the first guy I've dated. Let's just beat that to a pulp, eh? Can I possibly restate this in any more ways...

And with every past relationship, sure, I'd be happy. There were fun dates. There were cute stories to share. But I'd say that so much time was spent looking at my relationship, and then looking at other relationships, and realizing it wasn't good enough.

I wouldn't say that is what destroyed the past relationships. I think their quality destroyed themselves. But the comparison virus certainly expedited the process.

I'd talk about my relationships for the soul purpose of trying to make other people want them, because maybe if I had something that other people wanted, maybe I wouldn't feel like comparing anymore. But that didn't help at all. In fact, it made it worse.

And I had these couples idolized in my mind. You know, the ones with cute wedding videos. Cute blogs. Cute pictures. And eventually, I got to the point of thinking that what they have is not something that normal people have. It's something special and unique, and no one has it but them. They're different. And I wouldn't find that.

I was oh so wrong.

Ladies and Gentlemen. Mostly Ladies. There is someone out there. That love I thought was different and unique? It's different, and it's unique, but only unique to the relationship. Because no two people have the same relationship because no two people are the same. Find yourself a relationship wherein there is no need to compare. And when you see pictures and videos that make you think "Aww... that's cute..." That's where it ends. And from then on it morphs to "That makes me miss my dear."

That's how it is for me now, and maybe just reading this is contradictory because it's comparing how you think now to what you think you should think and I think that what the she and comp-I don't know what I'm saying anymore.

I guess I just wanted to express deep gratitude to my Joseph for coming into my life at the time I needed him most and staying there ever since. For showing me that my happiness is my own, and it shouldn't be determined by how I feel I rank in comparison to others. For showing me that as far as ranking goes, we're on our own scale, and no one else is on here with us. We have role models we look to for examples, of course, but the point of us being together is to be the best WE can be and NOT to be better than everyone else.

And in 16 days, I get to marry him.