I am reading a book right now by our Pastor, Jeff Little, called Who Am I – Discovering the Person You Were Created to Be. One of the chapters, and the topic of last Sunday’s message at church, was called “Who Am I When I’m Compared to Others.” The ideas have been dancing around in my brain for a week and this morning in the shower (I do some of my best thinking there!) this idea came clear: “Comparison is a liar.”

 

After 46 and 47 years in our hometown Derek and I pulled up our roots and moved our lives across the country. We came for our kids and planted them in a great school. The rest? We’d figure it out. We arrived in July. By October we knew God was directing us to start or own business. He was asking us to use our gifts, our talents and our story to build homes for other families. See Every Home, Like Every Family, Has a Story

 

Over the last few months we have formed a company, done all our legal and tax filings, written a business plan, found a bank, a CPA, an insurance broker, a realtor, a title company. As community-minded people living in a brand new community, we’ve jumped right in. We found our church, I’ve joined the Rotary Club, we’ve joined two chambers of commerce, we’ve joined the local, state and national homebuilding associations. We’ve joined two men’s groups, two women’s groups and a family Bible study. We’ve invested our time in building relationships. We’ve confirmed that we are relationship-driven. I think we always knew that, but it becomes more apparent when you have always had lots of people and suddenly have none.

 

Through this journey of meeting new people, we have met people in many walks of life. Among them are people our age with one or more successful businesses, people our age who are already retired, people well-established in their careers and their finances. Today I had the thought “all these people are well down the road on their professional journeys and here we are at square one.”

 

Then it hit me like a lightning bolt (sometimes that’s the only way I get God’s memo): we are NOT at square one at all. We are twenty-plus years down the road on this journey.  Our next step just happens to look like a new beginning, but it really isn’t. Derek is a third generation home builder – his Grandpa and dad both built homes throughout their entire careers. He literally grew up on jobsites side by side with his dad. He is now also using 1) his degree in architecture, 2) his years of designing and building custom homes, 3) the 12 plus years estimating, project managing and helping to run a subcontracting business,  and 4) his last two years working for a general contractor project managing guys, crews, subs, clients, owners, etc.

 

My own background is also coming into play daily, from my work as a lawyer specializing in construction defect representing contractors, then as a business and real estate transactional attorney, later as a risk manager for a national subcontractor, overseeing their safety, HR, insurance programs, etc. and even my current role as a health and fitness coach where I have learned the ins and outs of marketing on social media.

 

God is using EVERY SINGLE DETAIL of our careers. Every single piece of our professional backgrounds is coming together at this time for this next chapter of our story.

 

Those people around us who we could readily compare ourselves to? They can be resources. They are mentors. They are friends on their own journeys, in whatever chapter of their story they are currently walking through. Those relationships are in no way meant to make us feel inadequate. In fact, they give us hope.

 

Together the hope and opportunity we find here in Texas daily propel us forward in our adventure.

 

Friend, it’s time to stop comparing yourself to others. As we often say in our health and fitness groups, “you cannot compare your chapter one with someone else’s chapter twenty.” People will often say to me “I can’t do what you do, you are so fit.” Well, yes, but I have been on my fitness journey for a long time. Be encouraged instead that you have made the decision to start. Look to the people around you who are steps ahead of you and seek their guidance. Find a mentor. Find people who can speak life into your story.

 

This is especially true of our kids, namely our teenagers. They are inundated daily with comparisons – grades at school, positions on the football field, roles in the school musical – all of these areas give our kids ways to compare themselves and come up short in their eyes. Don’t even get me started on Social Media. It is our job as parents to help them be their very best, only comparing to the person they were the day before.

 

Know that if you are ever looking to compare yourself to someone else you will never find a good apple-to-apple comparison. Our circumstances are unique. Our talents are unique. Our stories are unique. Thank God, right? We shouldn’t want to be the same. This is especially hard for teenagers to embrace when their biggest concern is to NOT stand out from the crowd.

 

As I start to close the gap on 50 and grow daily in my faith walk, I realize I care less and less about what others think about me and more and more about how God sees me. What do my actions say? Do the fruits of my life represent who I profess to myself and others to be? That’s the only “comparing” I should be doing.

 

Comparison is a liar. It will always leave us coming up short.

 

A motto posted outside the Varsity football locker room this year read “1% better.” If we want to compare ourselves, we should only compare ourselves to who we were yesterday. This is the only fair comparison. That person had the same life experiences, gifts, talents. Have we taken steps since yesterday to improve ourselves, our relationships, our careers?

 

Compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.

Jordan Peterson.