Out of the Ordinary: The Comparison Trap

A badger stands beside the trap he is supposed to be in

I'm at Out of the Ordinary today, and I'm riffing off of Melissa's previous post. When we compare ourselves to one another, it can cut both ways.

"In Monday's post, Melissa accurately described the stress of "keeping up with the Joneses." Based on the reader response, many of us could relate to the notion that we would be better Christian women if we did [fill in subject] or copied [fill in name]. Given the overabundance of information at our fingertips, it's no wonder that the pressure to do it all, do it well, and photograph it tastefully seems to have grown with the size of our bandwidth. The number of global Joneses has far exceeded the neighbors down the street.

But this comparison trap is a rather artful device that may ensnare us in a different way. On the one hand, we compare ourselves to others and feel inadequate because we don't measure up. But on the flip side, we may compare ourselves to others and look askance at those who don't measure up to us. "

Read the rest here...

Photo credit: By Unknown or not provided (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

(For some reason, the caption and picture of this chubby badger cracked me up. I hope it was smart enough to stay out of the trap. )