The Sunday Reset
Stop Measuring Your Race by Someone Else's Track
This week I have been thinking about why some people seem to move faster than the rest of us.
Grab something to drink. Let's go.
Quote of the week
Someone with a strong support system will often move faster than you. That does not mean your effort is wasted. It means your race looks different.
Oyinkansola's reflection
I wrote this to myself this week before I wrote it to you.
Here is something nobody tells you when you start chasing a goal.
Two people can graduate from the same university, on the same day, with the same grade. One has parents who are connected, a job is practically waiting before they even finish their final exam. The other is a regular person with nobody pulling strings. They have to find their own way, slower, harder, with more rejection along the way.
Both are working hard. Both want to succeed. But their starting line is not the same. Their race is not the same.
If you compare your mile-marker to someone running a completely different race, you will always feel behind, even when you are actually doing exceptionally well given where you started.
This week, stop checking how far someone else has gone. Check how far you have come from where you started.
Action
Tonight, write down three things you have achieved this year that you would not have believed possible two years ago. Not compared to anyone else. Just you, then, versus you, now.
Your weekly recap
Before you plan ahead, sit with these honestly:
- What did you accomplish this week that had nothing to do with comparing yourself to anyone else?
- Did you spend more energy this week building, or comparing?
- What is one piece of progress you are not giving yourself enough credit for?
- What would change if you measured this week only against your own starting point?
Comparison steals more momentum than almost anything else. The goal is not to stop noticing other people's success. It is to stop letting it define how you feel about your own.
Something to carry into this week
Growth is hard. It gets even harder when you do not have a strong support system or connections that can fast-track things for you.
That is simply true. And you cannot use that absence as a measuring stick against people who have it.
Nobody will force you to grow. You have to force yourself.
I am not saying this to tell you to give up or slow down. Life waits for nobody. We have to keep striving until we make it.
But give yourself credit for how far you have already come, even if it does not look like much from the outside, even if someone else's race looks faster than yours.
Different starting points produce different speeds. That does not mean your effort is wasted. It means your race looks different.
Run yours anyway.