"Comparison is the thief of joy," as they say, but it's not as simple as knowing that and being immediately freed from its clutches.
I looked up a former friend from high school today and found she's now super successful with her own startup doing cool science shit that might actually improve people's lives. When I look at my own life and what I've done in the same time it feels so insignificant, worthless even.
Normally I'm content to just chug along my path and try my best to better the world, but I've got some wounds surrounding this friend and our falling out (largely due to my own insecurities and inability to reconcile my unrequited crush on her :cringe: ) that never healed. Even thinking about her makes me feel so wretched, and all the more hateful towards myself for feeling that way, for being so weak and ill-accomplished. Is there anything to do but just try to block it out of my mind? I wish I could tear out and burn the piece of me that cares about this.
Edit: Thank you to everyone who's responded to this. Talking about it has helped me feel a lot better and think about some goals for how I want my life to go and what I want to prioritize moving forward. Who knew internet strangers could be so helpful?
Remember that careers are decades long, and a lot of really cool shit is the result of decades of not making much progress. I come from a math background and work in tech, and there's a lot of :brainworms: about people peaking in their late 20s, like if you don't make some huge breakthrough right out of school, you're just spent. This, of course, is
- Obviously nonsense based on all the 70 year olds doing wacky work in their fields
- Exactly the mindset capital wishes to cultivate to create maximally pliable cogs to rip through their spyware startups and graduate programs to burn through grunt work with youthful enthusiasm and a lack of responsibilities (e.g., family)
HOT TAKE EDIT: This latter point is also the defining feature of Western leftist organizing, and a significant hindrance to building any serious power base. "Professional" organizers and their professionalized orgs are in large part imitations of corporate structures and reproduce the same corrosive effects, because colonybrains have difficulty conceiving of any other form of organization other than "LLC but woke". The systematization of dissent and corporatization of resistance are the wedges necessary for elite capture of that same dissent.
Extra edit: the other reason that capital in particular loves to chew up youths is that most of them haven't developed any significant theory of ethics due to lack of exposure. It's much easier to make the Bitcoin-that-rats-you-out-to-your-boss Helmet with an army of 25 year old programmers who have never read Sartre/Foucault/Marx/etc. or recognized the exploitation of an employer before than with people who have had to seriously grapple with the reality of work under capitalism (even if they don't recognize it, per se).
Took me a long time to sort of cope with this.
cw: trauma
spoiler
So when I was raped my brain just melted. Couldn't take tests of any kind (including job interviews, god, I have bombed so many). Really messed up my train of thought, I regularly zone out and can hardly hold a sustained, coherent thought anymore, so much so that if I'm talking with someone, I can only say around 2 sentences before losing myself as the thought eventually hits my brain's trauma wall. That delayed my life significantly, including meaning I gotta suffer a lot cause I never got the surgeries I need, so I would feel extreme jealousy at people that weren't forced into fucked up situations like I was. Eventually through the power of extreme lying and having a literal earpiece so a friend can coach me as I say things like I'm some sort of Bond villain's marionette, I got a decent job and have held it down for a while now. It helps people and stuff. But even when I'm helping people, its all faceless so it doesn't even feel like I am helping. No one knows I'm helping them. It feels insignificant. Personally, I care far more about my interpersonal relationships. Ultimately, nothing matters, death comes for us all, and life is nothing but pain and struggle. But I find it useful to help people I meet have a little bit less pain and struggle in their lives. Sometimes that just means giving a sick friend a free room for a few months or something. I literally did that and helped wipe their ass and stuff and clean some wounds. Seeing them get even a little, minuscule bit better holds a special place in my heart that gives me some meaning. Oh, and also if you find yourself thinking about this too much, I suggest sleeping medications. I only get fucked up thoughts when I don't sleep well or something hits me bad.
Thank you so much for sharing this. I really do want to help people close to me but I've had trouble cultivating those relationships, especially since moving back home after graduation. I think I need to make it more of a project to connect with my community and find valuable connections.
Also wanted to say that I love your posts and comments! Idk what it is but they just hit different, especially when you talk about your partner it's very wholesome and makes my day better :stalin-heart:
Yeah I know it can be harder for masc identifying people to get that sort of vibe going. My bf included, he pretty much pours everything he has into helping me. Sort of a trickle down effect though lmao. Wheres the Reagan salute emoji
There's a line from a Scatman John song that I've always found soothing: "I wanna be a human being, not a human doing. I couldn't keep that pace up if I tried."
Listen, folks. I know what you're saying, that you want to break free. Well, if you want to break free, you better listen to me, because you've got to learn how to see in your fantasy. Believe me. Believe me. :a-little-trolling:
I unironically love his music. He was taken from us to soon. :deeper-sadness:
Fwiw, I love the person reading this and think they're just the best.
Nihilism's the only way to go. It's always healthy to remember that the whole of human effort will lead to nothing and everyone is equally insignificant and irrelevant. Do as much or as little as you want to, it all amounts to the same thing. Insignificance is incredibly liberating. I became exponentially happier when I stopped thinking that I mattered. When you realise that there is nobody on any plane of existence that truly cares about what you or anybody else does, then you can do anything.
:yes-chad:
It's funny because this is my attitude like 90% of the time - we'll all be forgotten eventually so just love as much as you can, try to make the world a little better, and make art. This particular issue just has a special way of boring through my personal growth until I'm 15 years old again.
Stop posting my thoughts on this public forum, it's extremely irritating.
Jk, I feel you comrade. We do our best but some things get through
:brow: if you didn't want me posting them you shouldn't have been transmitting them so brightly on the astral plane
spoiler
:meow-hug:
Damn this is pretty liberating. Guess the whole Earth will be engulfed eventually by the sun anyway.
The problem with nihilism is that I don’t get to be alive to witness the death of the universe but I get to be alive to witness other people’s successes
When I feel sad in this way I think it’s a form of self-alienation. Humans derive satisfaction from performing meaningful, self-directed labor (not dictatorial work) so I try to do something useful I’ve been meaning to do, or take on a new creative task like editing a video or starting a graphic design project. These things don’t have any monetary value but they make me happy and occasionally make for a fun gift later on.
When I feel useless I try to remember I’m not a thing and certainly not a thing with a predestined role to “be useful” to some exploitative society. Doing creative shit for fun is a helluva good reason to exist. I’m just rambling here
"Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not who somebody else is today."
-:jordan-eboy-peterson:
If mr hierarchy good capitalism good lobsterpissface is less stringent on having a competitive way of thinking then surely you can.
Im pretty sure he stole that quote from Naruto too lol
I know what it feels like to have someone you crushed on go on to be more accomplished. It hurts a lot. It helps to remember that you're feelings are most likely making you idealize her situation and you're only seeing what she's posting in public. As someone who worked at a cool science startup for several years, they can be complete messes behind the scenes. I bring this up not to encourage you to tear this person down in your mind, but to remember that she's probably just plugging along and doing her best as well and that her days are also probably mundane and filled with bullshit same as yours. Your mind is busy constructing an ideal for you to identify with and then castigating you for not living up to it. You can mitigate that a little by pushing back and reminding yourself that she's having bad days and may sometimes feel inadequate as well. I recommend you stay off social media for a little while because otherwise you're just finding fuel for your imagination.
In the meantime, remind yourself that you're doing well if you're doing what you're capable of, not what someone else is. I've struggled with depression for pretty much all of my life and realized that it's prevented me from doing a lot of things that I would've done otherwise. But all the same I've built a life for myself. I've gotten out of bed, found ways to fill my day, do things that I can be more or less ethically satisfied with. Could I be doing better? Sure, and I'm going to keep trying to improve. But not being at that better place right now doesn't make me worthless, it makes me human. You're human too, and you deserve the admiration you're giving your friend.
I bring this up not to encourage you to tear this person down in your mind, but to remember that she’s probably just plugging along and doing her best as well and that her days are also probably mundane and filled with bullshit same as yours.
I think this is the way forward, it's just hard because I've got such a bevy of emotions around her that makes it difficult to balance. Like logically I know I should wish the best for her because we were good friends and I cared about her, but I can't deny that there's a part of me that wants her to crash and burn to vindicate itself and "win".
Yeah, it's a fine line to walk. I think you'll find that even if she does crash and burn it won't make you feel any better and that wishing for it will simply stoke resentment. A lot of the process of moving on is accepting that there won't be any closure, and that the odds are she's not going to see either Earth-shattering success or failure but will end up in the middle somewhere. Keep your focus on the fact that you have options that you wouldn't have had if things had worked out like you'd planned or hoped. Not better options or worse ones, simply different and unanticipated ones.
I sympathize. I can't watch any of the Channel 5 stuff because what that kid's doing is more or less what I always wanted to do with my life but I just never had the drive or confidence to, well, actually do it.
I don't got any advice for you though. Life is painful. But hey, at least there's good snacks every now and then.
Desire is a false promise. Become "successful" and you will find no satisfaction as subconsciously you will end up shifting the goalposts of your desire as you approach them. Be true to yourself, act with intention, do what is important to you and set goals for yourself. But don't view others success through the lense of desire - this way leads only to suffering.
Don't dwell on the past if it's not pleasant or helpful for you. You can't forget the past, obviously, but you can choose to spend your mental energy a different way. Not sure if that helps or not. Solidarity! :red-fist:
Become “successful” and you will find no satisfaction
Classically, for a middle class white dude, this is presented as a "mid-life crisis". After a life of hard work you have all the hot dogs, but remain empty inside.
All my friends are way more successful than me in their lives. Yet they still come to me for advice about shit because I'm good at putting ideas into words and I read a lot. If I can't give them advice they know I am a nonjudgemental listener who will be patient and empathetic. There's other ways to be valuable. If you improve yourself a little each day other people will notice it. Especially if they go a long time without seeing you. Keep working on yourself.
You have one life: don't think you aren't valuable because of somebody else's standards.
You only have the time you have left and nobody knows how long that is. Nobody knows how close the second hand is to midnight in any of our lives. Agonizing over comparing yourself to others is wasted time and time is something you can't get back. I know I can't help it sometimes, I still do this, I look at my friends with kids or marriages and my increasingly old ass and it stings a bit. But you know what? I'm also in better shape now, mentally and physically, than I was in my mid 20s. When we were all peers back in those days I was also secretly miserable every damn day. Getting out of bed was a chore. I drank too damn much. It wasn't working for me back then either. Time flies. Things change. Everyone admits things change. Nobody denies that things change. So you know what that means? You can change.
Also: It'll be alright, okay? It does get better. Either you slowly learn to forget these people or you better yourself and you forget them anyway because you're onto newer things. Maybe right now it doesn't feel like things are getting better. That's fine actually. Your job right now is to stop them from getting worse. You can do this.
Look at you, being inspiring and almost making me cry over here. I really hope it will get better and that I can find a way to be proud of myself.
I wish I could tear out and burn the piece of me that cares about this.
I’m assuming based off your pronouns that you’re a man or at least AMAB so apologies if that’s inaccurate. I know as an AMAB person that this was my default response to intense emotions for a long time. Regardless of how much of this is just me projecting, I’d recommend against it. Some of my earliest experiences processing strong emotions were dealing with loss of a friend and I learned a lot about myself in the process. Journaling works.
Your assumptions would be correct. I'm honestly a little scared of journaling. My only experiences with it are when I was hospitalized for a suicide attempt and that's enough to spook me. Do you have any suggestions on baby steps with it?
Ah yeah if you’re expecting someone else to read your journal that can be hard. I have a password protected note on my phone that I use. And my “suicidal thoughts” have usually been more intrusive thoughts about me being suicidal. Even then, I talk about it in coded language. As long as I know what I mean, that’s what matters. I talk about which basement I’m in. A bad day is basement 1. A bad week with a couple instances of suicidal thoughts is basement 2. Anything longer than that or suicidal thoughts that are more persistent or involve planning, and that’s basement 3. I’ve only been in basement 3 once and couldn’t have brought myself to journal anyways, but at that point a hospitalization may have been warranted anyway. That happened while I was on a new med that was “working really well” until I realized it was to blame for my intense depression.
As far as journaling baby steps go, depression aside, just trying and pull out your phone to write a sentence or two throughout the day. If it’s more, it’s fine. Any time you notice an emotion and have a few spare seconds. If your journal is initially filled with entries like, “Jaina said hi to me earlier. She pisses me off.” that’s fine. It’s mostly about starting a habit at first and then you can decide what is and isn’t helpful as you expand your writing.
If you think about it, the need to prove yourself comes from insecurity. You see someone doing something you value as successful, and you realize that you're not doing anything you value as successful. So the obvious answer is to do something you value as successful. It doesn't have to be the exact same thing the other person does, but you can still set goals for yourself. Then the next issue is what is preventing you from reaching your goal? Is it mental health? Then work on that and realize that you're still working towards something. Is it just a money thing? That can be difficult to just magically solve through advice on the internet.
The next issue could be that what you value as successful just isn't for you. It can seem like a weird contradiction. You like cool science shit, you would like to do it, but attempting to do it just feels like a huge drag and you can't get started. Well it may be that it's not for you. You don't like it for the reasons that allow people to pursue it as a life goal. You like the idea of it, but you don't like doing it enough to work through the pain of accomplishing it. That's okay. I mean it can make you feel like a phony but you're not. It's okay to like stuff or have a passing interest in something, as long as you don't make it part of your personality. Like if you don't try to be the cool science shit person then you're not really faking it. You just like something a lot of other people like but don't really do. But there can also be a tie-in with other insecurities here like intelligence. People who want to be perceived as intelligent might affect an interest in science but then fail to actually learn much of it. That can make you feel fake too. So really it's a matter of getting to know yourself which is a journey on its own.
It's likely a tangled mess of emotions and ideas about your life that need to get sorted out. It won't be done overnight and it's going to be a chore to fix. But it won't change unless you start working towards the goal of change.
Cool science shit is cool but definitely not where my skill lies. It's not so much that I wish I could do it, but that it appears more valuable than my skillset, which ties into the classic STEM v. Liberal Arts issue. All I do is write, and that hasn't exactly paid off in changing the world as her [very specific science project that might doxx her if I actually named it] has.
You're absolutely right on the tangled mess thing. This basically ties into all my problems as a developing person and I've never quite known how to deal with it besides shoving it into a dark corner in my mind.
There will always be those "less successful", and why cant that be you? If its inevitable that some portion of the population is something then there is nothing wrong with being that something, thats the mindset i use at least
There will always be those “less successful”, and why cant that be you?
Because that state of things over time is what Class is made of.
