The Comparison Trap

Comparison rarely reveals what others have—it reveals what we believe we need to feel safe.

Why do comparisons have such a powerful emotional pull? In this July 4th episode, I explore how envy and comparison often arise from deeply ingrained beliefs about safety rather than simple jealousy. Through stories from psychology, entrepreneurship, family patterns, and everyday life, I examine how our inherited definitions of success can quietly shape our choices. When comparison becomes a signal instead of a trap, it can lead us back to authenticity, integrity, and a deeper sense of inner security.

Walk with me.

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Hello, welcome to Embodied Wisdom, a walk and a talk with Dr. Brook, July 4th edition. Spoken to you on actually July 4th, live from my neighborhood. I only have one AirPod in today, so I'm gonna have to be later. It's actually recorded because I so much didn't want to have my ear, both my ears clogged. It also motivates me to get my new microphone up and running because I didn't really think about how nice it will be to not when I'm walking have my ears clogged. You know, like it's great to listen to music, but when you're out in nature, it's always so great to listen to the actual sounds of nature. Wasn't no, I didn't really know about all these ideas about what to talk about. But what really struck me when I started walking, first of all, what struck me, which I think is very interesting, was that like every day this week I was like, oh my god, it's too hot to walk and talk. So hot, so humid. I was thinking back to like, I'm too cold to walk and talk. Too cold. Um I think that's the beauty of the Northeast. You always get a change in perspective, sort of when you like it, whether you like it or not, with the change of the seasons, which I deeply appreciate. So I did make a switch, which is also I thought ironic because I couldn't walk back in my hikey wooded area. I could not do that um in the winter for a lot of months because of frozen over uh areas, you know. Tried a bunch of times for the regular listeners, I think you'll recall, and then I was like, no, I'm gonna kill myself, so I turned back. So here I drove up to the wooded area. It's a little change in my step, too, so I could be shaded. And so shift, you know, especially if you find yourself in these patterns of just every day. Wake up in the morning, do the same thing. So pattern interrupts are good. Um, pattern interrupts are good. So uh that's what I was thinking about when I got out of the car and walked in here. It's quiet. It's July 4th. People are where they are doing what they're doing. Took me a while to get moving today. I kept thinking I should get out and do this, I should get do this. But really, what I was um now reflecting further on is like what motivates us to do what we do. And so, you know, last week I kept going, you know, sort of like money, money, money, money. I was like thinking like focus on that and not focused on the on the process and not focused on the development and not focused on proper timing. I was just focused on this, this is what's gonna make me feel safe. If I get this, it's gonna make me feel safe. If I get that, it's gonna make me feel safe. And there's just different areas where all of us tend to feel safe. And some people, and I and I really I talk about this a lot with people, um, because it's not, you know, I this is the type of thing where I think everybody thinks that everybody has the same preferences, you know, and it's sort of like if someone's like, I mean, and I remember this, it was it's sort of like if someone um is like, I and I've had this happen before, like someone may look like, oh, if I'm thin, I'm safe. Right? Oh, if I have this many, if I have these awesome shoes, I'm safe. Oh, if I have if I have this car, I'm safe. Oh, if I have this amount of money in the bank, I'm safe. And the star alignment, um this weekend especially, is about what what do we actually, you know, what like what does that mean? It's a good time to to think about perhaps a new way of identifying what makes you safe. You know, like perhaps those those imprints will always be there because you know, a lot of times they're intergenerational and um and so we we end up you know imprinted with those ideas, but it if but if we're finding that that that those ideas um okay, so that because I was thinking about this in terms of envy and envying somebody else's thing that they have that makes you feel safe, but maybe in their life that doesn't make them feel safe, you know, and so we always are making these comparisons, and especially now I find um my younger patients with all the social media, you know, everybody is like always making all of these comparisons, and I especially this had come up around a lot about weddings, and and and I think this does come up around holidays too. It does for me, you know. What is everybody else doing? Is everybody else doing something more fun than what I am doing? And I believe again that started as an imprint because my holidays weren't spent in like doing anything that fun, and I would notice that other people are having fun, um, and or and or my my my parents or my mom, my mom, she might have what everybody else is doing, right? So social safety was important to her, so that's important to me, or that perception that I will be safe if I do this, so you know, so then again, so that creates envy because the comparison is that person has an easier life than me because they have this security. Except this is the irony, we all need to stay in our lane because one person's feast is another person's famine. Okay, one person, it's easier to have a restriction, and an example that came to mind, and I've read about this, and I know how painful this can be for people, but one is like you know, one woman gets pregnant, she can't stop getting pregnant, and she gets abortions over and over again. And another, and that, you know, for her, that fertility is it's overwhelming, you know, because whatever's going on in her in her way of being, you know, she doesn't protect herself in this way from getting whatever it is her conflicts lead her, and it's not like, oh, that's okay with her to go and get, you know, it's it it creates, but so the point is, is then there's all these women out there, they can't get pregnant. Would would uh would, you know, and they so desperately want to have that baby because they believe it will provide them with something, even if it seems that their fate is not allowing that. So that can create great pain for us in that in that comparison because of what we believe, because we believe that this thing is gonna bring us security, and that we compare ourselves to other people who have that thing that gives them the security we wish we had it, but meanwhile, they don't feel secure because they don't have the other thing, and maybe you have that thing, and I think these things pick us, they pick us because just like our parents, you know, we don't pick our parents and we don't pick the community we come into. And and I grew up in a predominant in an area that was predominantly Jewish or affluent, and there's certain values, and I was having this conversation, you know, with a friend, it was about entrepreneurship. Like, you know, she's a teacher, and um, and I don't know, I I I'm making an assumption about this, I don't know. But the idea of being an entrepreneur in her retirement, potentially, from teaching, is very scary to her because she doesn't, you know, she doesn't have that template. Meanwhile, where I come from, entrepreneurship is um it's uh valued, valued. Um, and it's known because our parents have done it and their parents did it, right? So it's in not only is it encouraged, it's known. And someone sees someone who's like, you know, working for the man or working for corporate or what and they see, they see someone. Oh my god, you work for yourself, that's so awesome. But the work burden of working for yourself is so tremendous, right? But again, that didn't pick us a lot of the time. Like we came in with that imprint, then we came in with, I can argue, I'm gonna say, you know, an uh psych, a bio, psycho, social, spiritual alignment, you know, an astrological alignment, however you want to look at it, a parental alignment that was like, yeah, you're gonna, this is where you're gonna be, you know, and you're gonna you're gonna like it. Um, because otherwise you're gonna hate your life. You know, it's kind of like that. And then you're like, oh my God, can someone just pay me for one day without me, you know, kind of can I have a day off that I'm paid for? That I didn't work for myself, you know, and or can have a job where I naturally have a summer off or whatever it is, and especially then if you have like an imprint where the money in your bank account is what makes you feel safe. You know, that this is not, yes, it comes with beauty and grace to have your own business. And then what you do is you teach your kids, so her kids lifeguarding, and my kids like freelancing around the neighborhood, and she's gonna work half the amount of hours and make the same money. Well, okay, here comes entrepreneurship, right? Okay, so but the bottom line is when I said to her, it's like kind of like she didn't really know that. She really made me consider like, well, my dad was an entrepreneur, and his dad was an entrepreneur, and my husband's dad an entrepreneur, and I have kids, and guess what? They're entrepreneurial. Not my son wants to, you know, part of his major is to study entrepreneurship. I didn't study entrepreneurship, but I naturally, you know, my supervisor said, you know, Brooke, not everyone can be in private practice, but you can. You have the personality for it, and I had the backing for it. So, you know, it nothing's as it seems, is what this comes down to. But if we go back to the envy theme or the comparison theme, we are comparing ourselves without knowing other people's stories. We're comparing ourselves without knowing other people's burdens, and what scares one person makes another person feel safe. I mean, these this is crazy. So these these comparisons that we're making, they're all projections often. And I think that if we were to, if for me, the major lesson in life, this is for me, and this is what I teach. This is not necessarily everyone's primary lesson, but this is what comes through for my purpose here, and it is about integrity, it is about moving from personal integrity of what it is that works for you. And when we compare to others and we envy them, and envy is sort of like I mean, I can't in the darkest way, it's like wishing someone else ill will because they have something that you want, you know, to make so you know, it makes you feel better if they don't have it. That type of thing. That's how I sort of look at it, which makes it very aversive to me to be that way. But if I really own that with no judgment, and I understand, like, I'm gonna say I understand at some level my my my disappointment that leads me to envy. Right, my disappointment that leads me to envy, then I'm maybe you know, like maybe you you give yourself a reprieve. So, you know, sometimes I wonder, like, if we've been programmed in these ways, and we can't see, we can't always see outside the programming. I was talking to a patient yesterday about this, about his defenses, and he's an older man, and he can't see what he's doing, he can't see it. He's always pointing the finger at someone else rather than taking accountability. But he says, I do take accountability, I do. And I said, Well, okay, what do you mean by that? Because he's always going, it's my wife, it's my wife, it's my wife, and and I'm not saying he's not right about that. Like the hangups he has aren't real, they are, but he's not then also going me. Me, he's not doing that. He's going you. So when he gave the example, he gave it from his work life. I've always done that in my work life. I go, yes, actually, yeah, there's evidence of that. I go, but there's not really evidence in your home life. And he paused and he was like, Yeah, yeah, that's that's true. That's true. I I don't do that in my home life. So but it but he can see it. He couldn't see it, and so I think a lot of times this envy I'm talking about is produced by what our blind spots, what we can't see, what we don't know, what the only thing we do know. Like, how is that woman supposed to know anything about the burdens of entrepreneurship of my father every, you know, every other day. Uh it's feast or famine, it's feast or famine, you know, and the ups and downs and the staying steady through the and it's hard. It is hard to do that, but no one's out, you know what, no one, nope. That's not what if you don't know that. And then and then let's say I have I'm comparing myself, well, oh, I don't have to work and I still get a paycheck. Well, well, you're you know, you can't just like pivot then, right? In in your someone could just for no reason at all. Um, for no reason at all. Like basically chop your head, you know, chop your head off. Like you could just be fired for no reason at all. Now, do I believe there's a timing and there's lessons we all go through? Yeah, sure. But still, that's a part of it. Bro Brooke you don't know what that's like. Well, you know, I have my own ways I understand that, but you and okay, I don't. But if that becomes enviable, because of a perceived attachment to some definition of safety, um, since I am in a different area than usual, which I hope you guys are gonna be able to hear me, this is a cool pick. So you guys don't easily see back here. Um I was thinking of getting like a thing to hold my phone and like taking you on the walks, you know, with me. I think I might try that. I don't know if attach a video to the thing. It's interesting. And I don't know if that would be even would make any sense because I don't know if it makes sense for you to see the scenery, but I don't know. Anyway, contemplation I've been having. Side note. Um, there's not just there's only distraction from my mind today because very quiet back here, but good choice to come back here in the woods because wow, it is so much more pleasant than it was on the street. Um I'm glad I came. I'm glad I'm walking talking because I think this is a phenomenally interesting topic. I've studied this a lot myself because my heritage, especially the female members of my heritage, there's a lot of there's a lot of envy and perceived safety about trying to hoard someone else's, you know, perceived safety. And if we can crack these codes, you know, if we can crack these codes, because I think in the end, look, we're all that's what we all seek ultimately, and the only safety I know that I could tell that people have, you know, really have in themselves and in myself is integrity, the personal integrity to know what your path is and to follow it. And that is not an easy thing to do, to know your path in this world and to follow it without being influenced by what other people think and what other what other perceptions of security there are, that is very difficult. Hence, we have these uh response patterns because we are human and the seven deadly sins are what they are, and envy is one of them. So this idea we're all supposed to be pure and we're not gonna have these issues, and we're not gonna have these, um, you know, I'm in like, I don't know, we're not gonna have these icky qualities is is actually completely a pipe dream because that's just not the human condition. So if the sooner everyone looks at their shadows, whole idea, and this this is what shadow consciousness is, okay. Like I'm not gonna look at my envy because I'm don't want to see it, you know, because it makes me feel icky. So instead, I'm gonna ignore it. Now, okay, this is just interesting today. Okay, so I take this path of unusual, you know, but I I always come back to this one area. Hmm, maybe I'll take a picture of it. I don't know, maybe not. Anyway, and it's like uh definitely a space where I think people come and do some some kind of spiritual work, just because it looks like that. And I don't know, and I always end up walking when I walk this way, I always end up walking back here. Which is interesting, which is sort of like off the path, like off the path. Anyway, um, so I'm back here again today. Off the path. Trying to find the path because I have time to look for the path today, because a lot of times I get back here. I need to get back soon. We're on a time limit because um because um, it's a weekday. But then I have some more time to roam. So on the July 4th edition. Okay, so anyway, sorry about my distraction again. Um I think this concept of returning to our personal agency as a recovery tool for envy is really something, right? Because the opposite, or the the the if you want to look at the value that's associated. In the seven deadly sins with envy, which by the way, you're making a comparison. So it's I always watch people, and I say, okay, I always watch people. You see this? Here's my envy. Oops. And I just almost cut myself. Okay. Um is why I tripped myself up. Haha. No pun intended. Okay. So um, but really, it is. I'm always curious about people who I perceive, because the area where I perceive security through, let's say um, in my heritage, money's a big one, body type, big one. Okay. So that's where my bread is buttered, or that's where my imprint is. And then I'm going, or social, right? These these three areas, social acceptance. And so if I have all those checks in the boxes, I'm safe. I'm safe. So then I'm gonna go around, I'm gonna look around, I'm gonna envy people who basically have those checks in the boxes. Um, but I don't. So now I'm wanting. But if we own, and this is, and this is, I know I'm going a little bit around here, if we own the experiences, or we own the feelings it felt to be around people who felt unsafe because they didn't have these things that they thought would keep them safe. So let's say our parents are always vying for those things because they don't feel safe. So they're hoarding their money, we're not doing anything fun. Um, we have to wonder about what everybody else is doing. So you see this where I'm going with this? Well, that touches you deep in your heart. And it happened before that. It's not them, it's everyone before them. It's it's it's indoctrination, it's society, it's but this is where it can leave you. Wanted, wanted for connection, wanted for this secure connection with yourself, wanted for security, you know, wanting this, wanting this, wanting this. And that feeling creates sorrow. This desiring something you can never have. So if you have a certain build or you have a certain metabolism, you're never gonna have that body. And if that body is like, oh, you that's what brings us safety, then you're you're you're kind of screwed. Or if I have that, those types of clothes, or that type of car, or this much money in the bank. And so this is a great time to review this astrologically. It's a great time and to wonder, wonder what what do you feel? What is best for you? What where do you get your security from? And what I will say is what is it you want to do rather than the checks in the box, like, oh, I bet I, you know, I'm going to a party tonight. Um, so I better get my walk-in, so I better burn some calories so I can make up for the extra calories I'm gonna have. Okay, that's one. Now, again, if you're like, uh I like I'm down with doing that, I am not saying you should not do that. I'm saying that though, if that makes you sad, because the other thing envy can do, okay. Well, sorry, if that I leaped, if that makes you sad to do it, or you're too tired that day, or it's too hot and you don't feel well, and you end up doing this, you're overriding the truth of your own integrity, and you're not, you know, I'm saying you're doing that for the I'm gonna say the wrong reasons because it's not in line with you. Now, sometimes that is in line, and that's my point. It is in line, so you do it because you want to do it, and it kills two birds with one stone because you get your social credit, you get your your credit for in the heritage, okay. Um, and it's in line with you, and and and you see that you can see that with people when when who they are is in line with their indoctrinations, it's not hard for them to complete those tasks. It's when it's in conflict. So, and and and I I do think that can complicate self-integrity, like it can make you confused about what motivates you, because it could be for both reasons. Okay, so if I'm gonna, if I'm gonna, then so so if we wanted to use envy as an as an alerter, okay, we wanted to use envy as uh alerting us, that will show us where our integrity is flawed. You see? So if you're making a comparison, like this used to happen to me a lot with fashion, I would see someone come in and they were wearing the most fabulous cool outfit, and I would envy them so much. I I I just so badly wanted to be wearing a cool outfit. Now, the thing about wearing a cool outfit, right, what depending on what how striking it is, it it can it pulls attention, and that's positive and negative, right? It's positive. So if I'm trying to please the crowd, I am not talking about appropriate wear. I'm not talking about like, you know, showing up half naked at an event that requires you to have clothes on. Okay, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about like you're within the appropriate guides of the social calling, and you appropriate the social calling, and and and then you decide you're gonna wear this fabulous thing. Well, I mean, and here's the third and the third and a third rule, which I haven't I think brought up on the podcast yet. No matter what you do, a third of the world's gonna love you, a third of the world's gonna hate you, and a third of the world's not gonna care. Because that is the nature of the universe. However, if you are wearing an outfit you think is fabulous, you will feel beautiful. Male, female, otherwise, it doesn't matter, you will feel beautiful. Because it is what brings you comfort. It's what brings you comfort. It's what it's what makes you feel good. So the only time I feel like that, and so one day last year, end a year graduation party, I'm wearing a dress I think not much of. Now, would anyone else at that party be wearing a dress that looks like that? No. But at this point, after so many years of having integrity in this area with myself, I he said, kind of because he pretty much knew he probably wasn't gonna see me again. It was a man. And he said, you know, Brooke, I always really appreciate your choices in fashion, you know, and how you wear them. Because you're so yourself. And I thought, that's my job in the universe, is to inspire people to be themselves, not to inspire them to wear what I'm wearing. And that's what I'm saying. So I don't have any more envy in that area. But the envy alerted me. Now, what's funny is the other day, I'm just gonna close with this pretty much because I think it's funny. There's um a oh, a little longer than usual today, everybody. Um shout out to some of some listeners who want this to be longer, getting a longer one today. Um that I I noticed these these women, they're walking down the hall of my office. They're very nice neighbors, very friendly. Um, in my in my office building, just like them. They're there a lot, I'm there a lot. You know, it's nice to have always nice to have good neighbors. And and um they're wearing sweatpants all the time, and their hair is on top of their head, you know, and I'm like, and and yet I find them to be very attractive women in in a all n in a natural way. That is what is natural for them. They wear flip-flops, and I'm like, oh, I just tripped again. This is really what trips me up, haha. Ha ha. So the envy trips me up to notice, yet don't do that. So what it was, it's something about them not caring, not caring. It's not because I want to wear sweatpants and my hair on top of my head and a big t-shirt. Maybe I do. But I think what I noted is it's not like not everything's like carefully curated. And I think it was like my message, like I just want to take things a little less seriously. So here's the comparison. I don't know if they take things less seriously. I mean, that's like the biggest joke. Oh, I see you have sweatpants on and a big t-shirt. I mean, maybe they're like people are complaining to them every day, all day. That have stirs there and they have to lighten up. But I've decided because of that. So, do you see what I mean here? So if you use Envy as an alert system of when you are making a comparison because something with you is not satisfied, and you own the pain of that. So, if someone said you can't wear what you want because that's gonna embarrass me, well, okay, but they were like wanting you to be safe, goes back to that it doesn't make me feel safe for you to wear that. That's what a parent would say. I don't want you to be embarrassed, I don't want you to look like that. Don't be fat, you won't, you know, no one's gonna love you. Okay, that's not true. Just because they believe that, because if you walk down the street and you walk into another person's house, they believe something else. But they have it, they still have the structure of it because the human condition is the human condition. Nobody gets out of jail free, nobody doesn't have to deal with the seven divided sins, no one. So I think on this July 4th, what I am ultimately offering is about compassion, and especially in these days of polarization, you never know where another person's coming from, and usually their beliefs, and if they're very strong-minded about them, is coming from fear, and if we have compassion, that that people that want to get you on their side about anything are just afraid, just like you are, and that the seven deadly sins is a wake-up call to where we are afraid, what we are afraid of, and what we're afraid of is not being ourselves, because in life we can't find that peace unless we find that we find that personal agenda to be met. Okay, so okay, last thing. I keep saying last thing today, I have more time than usual. Um, a lot of times people say, Well, I don't know what that is. You do. Because it's because you feel calm. You do know what is. I do appreciate sometimes it is hard to get there. But even the struggles that you have, they're part of it. They're part of who you are. You're not supposed to just be at peace all the time and just land there. This is, in my opinion, the great work of life. In my opinion, and in many of the mythologies, or in some some of the great mythologies. Not I won't even say many, I would say some. So have faith that you know the way for yourself, and always look for ways to find it. Okay, happy July 4th, everybody. Have a good week. Thanks for being with me, and walk with me again too.