Ah-hah!

I'm sure you've experienced an "Ah-hah" moment, right?  I love them!  It's like all of a sudden the light turns on and you have this moment of clarity.  And just for that moment, your world feels balanced.  I had that recently and I am trying to hold on to it because I think it could help shift my world view in a very positive way.  Or maybe I mean my self view... because it was about how I've always viewed myself.  For my entire life of 49 1/2 years I have compared myself to others.  It's just the way I've always operated.  Why???   The only explanation I can come up with is that I am the 5th of 6 daughters.  That's right, I grew up with 4 older sisters and 1 younger sister.  I know, I know...my poor dad!  I hear it all the time.  Actually he loved his baby girls and tried his best to make each one of us feel very special and unique, but because I literally looked up to 4 older sisters and was constantly compared by others to my younger sister, it became the most natural thing in the world to compare myself, constantly and in every way to them.  I didn't JUST compare myself to them I mimicked them.  I competed with them.   And I felt victory when I outdid them and absolutely miserable when they outdid me.  So, being second to youngest I remember feeling like a miserable failure quite a bit...until I became a teenager which leveled the playing field.  Then I actually could compete!  Fast forward all of these years and believe it or not the sibling rivalry doesn't quite go away.  I desperately want it to go away and have for years.  But it wasn't until last week after an especially engaged meditation session (my mind was actually quiet for part of it), it came to me - out of the blue, it seemed. My inner voice exclaimed, " I AM NOT COMPARABLE!  I HAVE NEVER BEEN COMPARABLE...Even to my sisters!"  I love the expression, "It's like apples and oranges, you can't compare the two" because upon hearing this you stop trying to compare.  You become satisfied with the differences.    You realize that an apple is an apple and an orange is an orange.  It was with this realization that I stopped this constant comparing in my head...not just to my sisters but to all the women I waste time and energy comparing myself to. I loved realizing on a completely new level that I am unique and not like anyone else and therefore am free of wondering if I stack up or am good enough.  It seems so simple and I should have figured this out long, long ago.  And, in fact I did know it in theory.  Most of us have heard that we are unique and we have our own special qualities - things we are good at and things we are not so good at.  So, we of course, try and get better at those things we are good at.   We are taught this early on from loving parents and teachers who want to boost our self esteems.  But somehow, still,  the notion of competing with and comparing ourselves to others gets ingrained.   For some of us it's ingrained very deeply.  Call it human nature, perhaps?  I'm discovering that with mindfulness practice these kinds of ingrained and unconscious notions are able rise to the surface and once you become aware of them, there's a new kind of clarity which can free you from negative habits and beliefs about yourself that keep you from living fully.   I know I will continue to struggle with comparing myself to others.  But now with this new awareness I am starting to understand how mindfulness practice can start to bring lasting and positive changes to our lives.