I earn lots, but can’t stop comparing myself to others. What do I do?

My partner and I are high-income earners in the top income tax bracket. I know we’re doing well, but I can’t stop from comparing myself to others who are ahead of me. No matter how well we do, we could be doing better. On one hand, I know this isn’t healthy. But I feel like it motivates me to grow and keep pushing. Without this, I worry I’ll lose my motivation to keep growing. How do I keep growing, without the comparison?

This is a two-part question. The first part is about self-comparison, and the second is about your source of motivation. They’re not totally unrelated, though.

Comparing your financial success to that of others is extremely common, but it’s worth asking yourself why you’re choosing to do so.Credit: Simon Letch

Self-comparison

The first thing to look at is – why have you made wealth the measure against which you compare yourself? You could choose to measure yourself against any number of factors – health, weight, height, fitness ability, the list is endless. You’ve chosen wealth. Why?

I’m not saying it’s not common. It is definitely a norm that’s heavily reinforced by society. But it’s worth noticing – you have selected, consciously or not, a single metric against which to measure yourself against other people.

What have you made that specific point of measurement (wealth) mean, and why is it so important to you to measure well on this metric?

Maybe you’re already “ahead” of the people you compare yourself to, in other ways. Maybe you’re fitter, or happier in your career, or perhaps you have healthier family relationships. I’m not suggesting you start comparing yourself on other measures – I’m simply trying to challenge your idea of what being “ahead” should look like.

Once you start to do this, you might start to realise how crazy it is to measure yourself on such a singular measure. In fact, isn’t it disrespectful towards yourself?

There are many other areas you may have worked hard to succeed in, but inadvertently, you devalue these, when you make wealth the most important metric to measure yourself against.

The goal here is to try and bring the focus back to your own life. Part of the reason you might be continually shifting the goal posts is because your goals are being set with an external focus. You’re trying to compete, measure up, get external validation – but since there will likely always be someone who has more wealth than you, it will never feel like enough.

No matter how much more you attain, if you’re operating from a place of never enough, then your internal experience of your financial position will not be one of wealth, but one of lack.

Continue to strive for more, not because where you are isn’t good enough, but rather to experience the full extent of your capability.

So, if you had to feel happy with your life (as a whole, including your financial position) as it is right now, what is the perspective or belief you would need to have?

You currently have a belief that might go something like: I won’t feel X (successful, happy, good enough, etc) until I have Y (whatever your current financial goal is). But what is the belief someone would have to have, to feel fantastic about their life as it is, right now … even when they’re standing next to someone who is more financially successful?

Motivation

So, then that begs the question – if I’m happy with what I have now, why keep going? How would I motivate myself to keep growing, if it weren’t for dissatisfaction with my current position?

There’s a difference between extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. Extrinsic motivation is externally focused – it’s about the rewards, praise, or negative consequences like punishment that you might get.

Being extrinsically motivated looks like wanting to achieve a goal so someone will think, feel, or act a certain way towards you, or you will get some external reward for it. It can be effective in the short term. However, it can be exhausting and unfulfilling longer term.

Intrinsic motivation is more about you and your inherent enjoyment, satisfaction or fulfillment from making progress towards your goals. You know that feeling of accomplishment when you do something you didn’t think you could do? That feeling (and not the outcome itself) is the reward. This is a more fulfilling and sustainable form of motivation because its long-term.

So, you don’t need to lose motivation, but you do have an opportunity to shift it. You can be happy where you are now, and still excited to keep growing – not because of what someone else will think or say about you, but for the joy of seeing what you’re capable of achieving.

This allows you to continue to strive for more, not because where you are isn’t good enough, or because you feel like you’re behind, but rather to experience the full extent of your capability and see what’s possible for your life.

Doesn’t that sound way more fun than chasing some arbitrary external benchmark that keeps changing every time you reach it?

Paridhi Jain is founder of SkilledSmart, which helps adults learn to manage, save and invest money through financial education courses and classes.

• Advice given in this article is general in nature and not intended to influence readers’ decisions about investing or financial products. They should always seek their own professional advice that takes into account their own personal circumstances before making any financial decisions.

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