Before diving in this inspirational list of quotes about comparing yourself to other people, let's get some things straight. Setting yourself side by side with others is deeply ingrained in how we perceive the world and our place in it. In childhood, it is the way we get a sense of the common ethical rules, hence building our very own moral systems.
But things change and get less optimistic when we start going to school. The whole Western educational system is grounded in the practice of comparison.
All your academic and sports achievements, all your grades, all the exams and tests you take (all the psychological tests, no less) are based on matching your results to that dreadful standard. How do you not compare yourself to others after spending the majority of your childhood and adolescence in such an achievement-oriented environment?
The preschool years are when a child has the beautiful opportunity to thrive in their individuality and openness to the world. We need to constantly work hard to reclaim and celebrate our uniqueness just like we, hopefully, did back then. But it is possible and it is very much worth it!
Here are 20 clever quotes about comparing your life to others'.
Comparing yourself to others: Quotes
- “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.” ― Oscar Wilde
- “When you are content to be simply yourself and don't compare or compete, everyone will respect you.” ― Lao Tzu
- “Comparison is the root cause of all evil. Why compare when no two people are alike?” ― Haresh Sippy, Indian industrialist
- “After so many years struggling to keep up with you, I finally realized we’re not even running the same race.” ― Scott Stabile, writer and speaker
- "Trying to be someone else is a waste of the person you are." ― Marilyn Monroe
- “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson, American transcendentalist philosopher
- “Other people’s lives seem better than yours because you’re comparing their director’s cuts with your behind the scenes.” ― Evan Rauch
- “Personality begins where comparison leaves off. Be unique. Be memorable. Be confident. Be proud.” ― Shannon L. Alder, life coach and author
- “You don’t have to do what everyone else is doing.” ― Oprah
- “Being a successful person is not necessarily defined by what you have achieved, but by what you have overcome.”- Fannie Flagg, American actress and author
- “Always be a first rate version of yourself and not a second rate version of someone else.” – Judy Garland, American actress, singer, and dancer
- “To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.” – E.E. Cummings, American poet, painter, and author
- “The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
- “There is nothing more awful, insulting, and depressing than banality.” – Anton Chekhov, Russian writer
- “If you cannot be a poet, be the poem.” – David Carradine, American actor
- “It is better to be hated for who you are than loved for something you are not.” – French writer
- “Don’t be into trends. Don’t make fashion own you, but you decide what you are, what you want to express by the way you dress and the way you live.” – Gianni Versace
- “Comparison is a slippery slope to jealousy.” – Danielle LaPorte, Canadian author and speaker
- “Comparison with myself brings improvement, comparison with others brings discontent.” – Betty Jamie Chung, Chinese author
- “Where’s your will to be weird?” – Jim Morrison
