When Comparing Your Yesterday Comes Up Short

Have you ever been disappointed or frustrated with where you are because it doesn’t feel as impressive as where you once were? Whether that’s a fitness level, a relationship, a project at work that’s completed, or just a general stage of life, there’s not much worse than feeling that you have had better days than the one that you’re in. I think we’ve probably all been there, one way or another. So maybe the real question isn’t then have you ever felt this way. But rather, what can you do when you do when you find that comparing your yesterday to your today has you coming up short.

Over the weekend, I headed out for a hot, probably sluggish run, when I ran into a neighbor. We got talking and naturally, running came up.

“I have to start leaving my GPS watch at home. It bothers me, you know. My pace isn’t what it used to be, and it’s frustrating,” my neighbor confided.

“I do know,” I told him. I know exactly what you mean. I have been in that exact place of discontent.

Having competed in multiple marathons and two Ironman triathlons, I have known what it means to be in great shape and have high levels of fitness. Having also completed and recovered from two pregnancies, I have known great challenges and the humility that comes with recovery and rebuilding. At times, often far removed from the post partum experience, I have been dissatisfied and disappointed with my the current fitness state. It has always been because I have been noticeably comparing my current situation and results with ones from the past. Ones that appeared to be much better.

Last year I was in that place. My naturally positive, energetic and happy self was having trouble getting out of bed each morning, though the rest of me was rising and carrying on as usual. I went through the practices that bring me joy, adjusting and defining, trying to fix things. I was running and writing, actively pursuing goals, counting my blessings, taking snatches of extra sleep in the morning to try to recharge. I was trying to be intentional with my kids and my husband, choosing kindness and connection. I made small important adjustments and improved, but still, something was not quite right.

Thanks to an amazing podcast by one of my favorites, Ed Mylett, I figured it out. “Happiness cannot exist where there is comparison.”
Bingo. I knew in that moment, that this was the unsolved part of my missing happiness equation. What I had been doing that truly knocked my mental game down severeal notches is that I had been caught in a slew of comparisons and I’ve been coming up short.

Comparison is the thief of joy.

I was caught up comparing myself over and over again to…myself. This might possibly be the worst kind of comparison of all.

Comparison to the people that live down the street, or that you see on social media, is a dangerous thief. That one I know to avoid as much as possible. When those thoughts arise, I’ve learned that it’s much better to cease and desist as soon as possible. Nothing good comes from it, and none of our lives are free from trouble and challenges. I choose to love my life as best I can.

But what I was doing this time was comparing myself to myself a few years and maybe a couple of kids ago. Myself today against myself at the top of a very different mountain than the one found myself climbing now today.

And that is the whole thing. Each season of life, and each day sometimes, is a mountain and an opportunity that is valuable, important, unto itself. Each one builds upon the other, and they are not meant to be compared to another in order to be valuable.

See, this adversary, this type of comparison is more insidious, more covert. It, too, is a thief and a liar, though it may cloak itself in sentimentalism or self-improvement. It will steal your confidence as well as your joy. It’s comparing myself to myself, Courtney from about 6 years ago, and I had been coming up short. (If I had chosen a Courtney from other times, I may have been winning, but see, this is what makes it so tricky. This type of self comparison’s entire attempt is to make you think of things that you cannot change or control, to try to discredit the importance of what IS, and thereby steal your chance to fully embrace it, and do so with joy.

Joy is a powerful thing. Joy IS opportunity, joy sees opportunity, joy creates opportunity. All joy comes with the express ability to be present with and participating in the miracles that are all around you.

There’s not much worse than being disappointed and dissatisfied with yourself. That’s especially true when you can point to a time where you felt better, stronger, or more capable than you do right now. Your goals are not just an enticing pie-in-the-sky idea of what you could be. There is a concrete and tangible person that you know well, feel, and can almost touch. Except you actually can’t because that person is you, and he or she feels buried in yesterday.

People like to say sometimes be better than you were yesterday. If you’re just starting, or peaking, that might be a great motivator. But that doesn’t always work out. When we compare ourselves to what we did before or accomplished in the past, and you’ve had great successes, it doesn’t always work out that trying to be better than yesterday should be your goal. Because life doesn’t always work like that. Life is not linear. Only time is. Growth doesn’t happen in a bubble, and and all of our measuring sticks are interconnected, yet independent in measuring value.

At some point, athletic careers plateau, fast times and championships are behind you, and you wonder what that means for your success today.

Now, here’s the thing-

I firmly believe that success looks different for each person at different stages of their life, and honestly, even each day. There are so many variables. Success six years ago was working out for 5 or 6 hours each weekend, consuming incredible calories, covering ridiculous miles swimming, biking, and running, and falling into be at night exhausted and exhilarated. I loved each of those days, though vastly different. But if I start comparing and measuring them against one another, I may actually be stealing the joy from today and creating my own heartbreak. No matter how much you love or don’t love your current life, if you stop seeing the current opportunities for the blessing that they are, you’ll stop using them well, and subsequently miss out on today’s possible greatness.

See the man with the stiff leg, the tired mom, the mom with grown children, and the new graduate who had to say to goodbye to a school that she loved and now stares ahead at yet- to-be-filled future. They all have something in common. They can compare their “now” with their yesterday or their last week or their 20 years ago. They’ll find blessings and pain, both.

But whatever is found, if they dwell there, there will be no winning today.

When you play the comparison game, sometimes you’ll win and sometimes you’ll loose. It’s a gamble. But the cost, the currency is always this: you’re trading in some of today and its joys, just to play this often-loosing game. Having once had or been something “better”-as you see it at least- can be harder to handle. Because it’s not just theory .

The thief of comparison will bring your former wins and stack them against your current situation just to stifle you. In showing you how you’re failing to tell you that they aren’t measuring up. But this type of measurement is all wrong. Because see, who you were then and what you accomplished then made you who you are today and allowed you to grow into the strengths and talent that today requires.

So why trade in today’s joys? Why compare at all? Why use last year or last month’s measuring stick to gauge success now, with different circumstances? (In fact, the measuring stick you held yesterday might not have been all that accurate, anyway.) With each days’ sunrise there also arises new variables, goals, and opportunities. In fact, even a new chance to be a better you. You just have to make sure you’re measuring things that matter today.

Maybe it’s time to set down yesterday’s measuring sticks. Good self reflection will make you feel empowererd about what you can do, not make you feel defeated

“You should just run for the joy of it,” was my response to my neighbor, as the conversation continued.

“You know, I did that once and it was awesome. I was taking pictures, I was so happy! It was great.” He already had been on the right track. He knew the watch had been frustrating him. He just had to say it out loud. And give himself permission to set it down.

So if you are struggling. If your positive, happy self is still there, but a bit buried underneath disappointment, and having trouble breaking through. If it’s heavier to walk around and today has gotten you down, maybe it’s not actually today that has gotten you down. Maybe by comparing your current self with your past one, you think that you’re coming up short and feeling a whole lot of less-than.

The previous wins don’t show today as a failure. They enable you to succeed at what is ahead of you today. If you allow yourself, that is.

Today, who are they? Today what does success look like? Not last week’s or yesterday’s or a decade ago. TOday, in this skin, what does it mean to be successful? Measure yourself only in this way. Use the past or the future as fuel to help you get in positive directions, but do not use it to measure yourself, because time changes things, changes your success equation. Accept it, let your past measuring sticks go, And go boldly forward into today. With JOY and not comparison.

Here’s the funny thing. I have been writing this post over a series of many months, and even over a year in fact. My perspective continues to shift and the lessons deepen and grow. Looking at what I wrote yesterday and the day before that and the months before that, I find new things, and greater clarity.

I am living again, and discovering, how our choices, our decisions and our thoughts focused in any direction are so powerful They guide our energy and create future paths.

Take what you learn, and keep going. Don’t discredit who you were yesterday or the importance of what has brought you here. But never allow it to hold you back. Your Best days are yet to come. Especially if you believe it.

Lay down the things that would make you think otherwise.

Stop measuring what WAS.

Start counting what IS and make today something beautiful.

One last parting note. I would be remiss I’m not saying this. I trust One, who IS making all things beautiful. 💗👏🏻