One of the interesting things that people do and value in this information age is the drive to garner much 'likes' or 'follows' on social media platforms. How well you rate in such respects of 'likes', 'subscribers' or 'follows' is rewarded by social media operators, and often attract some reward in one form or the other. Good for business—and good for those using social media for business. But when people are trapped by allowing their self worth to be a factor of comparisons with others and they are not able to handle its negative impact on their self-esteem or mental health, that is where such social comparisons become problematic.

The comparison trap, the tendency to gauge your self worth based on how people compare or rate you,—particularly on how you compare yourself with others—is a cankerworm that could destroy your self esteem. You may not be able to stop people from comparing you with other people, and this is expected in the corporate and business world. For example, this would happen when you are job hunting or seeking a business contract. That would not be a comparison trap.

The trap would be when you accept that you are not worthy beyond what people see you in comparison to others. This is even made worse when you deliberately indulge in comparing yourself with other people, particularly when you focus on rating yourself less favourably to others. In doing this, you would be undermining your self-esteem,—you would be hindering your development of a healthy self-esteem.

If you find yourself unjustifiably compared with others, it may be well and good to stop it if you could. But just dismissing it, moreso when it doesn't have any effect on aspects of how you rate your success could be a wise decision.

The comparison trap, the tendency to gauge your self worth based on how people compare or rate you,—particularly on how you compare yourself with others—is a cankerworm that could destroy your self worth.

Making a deliberate choice,—resolving never to compare yourself negatively to others should be a standard rule; and this would be healthy for your self-esteem. Doing this is not about refusing to acknowedge that there are people out there very much ahead of you in certain aspects. There is always somebody out there that would be ahead of somebody else,—and that is a fact of life. It should never be the basis for seeing yourself as less worthy than others.

Focus on Making Yourself the Best You Could Be!

Focusing on making yourself to be the best you could be—and keeping on improving on yourself—is a far better scheme. Doing this promotes healthy self-esteem.

Knowing yourself is key to productive self-improvement, and it is often a beginning step in self-growth towards self-fulfillment and sustained personal success. Working on improving yourself in areas where your personal weaknesses could hinder your personal success is far more important and should be embarked upon as a personal development project.