Good morning. I want to remind you of an old proverb that says, comparison is the thief of joy. Don’t look to your right or to your left. It is important to know what your competitors are doing, but do not follow them. When I was a competitive swimmer, if I look to my left or to my right, I was no longer looking forward. And that changed not only how I attacked the wall in front of me, but it also brought feelings of worry or stress that negatively impacted my performance. When I was racing against myself to be the best that I could be, then I would win races over and over again. When I was racing to beat the person next to me, the person next to me became my ruler for how well I was doing. However, what if that person that was next to me was actually nowhere near as fast as I could be if I only wanted to beat him? Then I was cheating only myself because I wasn’t doing my best. I was simply doing just enough to stay ahead of the person that I saw. I want to encourage you to focus on you, look at your goals, set up your next steps based on where you want to go, not and what your competitors are doing.
