#119 - Comparison and Envy

In today's episode, we're talking all about comparison and envy—when it can be detrimental to your creativity, when it can be healthy, and tactics for how you can make a mental shift to get out of your head and do the work. Sponsored by Freshbooks Cloud Accounting.

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Transcript

Unknown: 0:46

Hello, and welcome to being boss,

Emily Thompson: 0:49

a podcast for creative entrepreneurs. I'm Emily Thompson.

Kathleen Shannon: 0:53

And I'm Kathleen Shannon. Today we're talking all about comparison and envy, which I'm actually really excited to have this conversation. It's not something that any of us are exempt from. As always, you can find all the tools, books and links we've referenced on the show notes at WWW dot being boss club. Alright, you guys have heard me talk about making $100. Today, I think it's a great way to tap into the energy of making money. But guess what one of those ways that you can make $100 today is to wrap up your projects and send out some invoices. Fresh books, cloud accounting has created a super intuitive tool that makes creating and sending invoices ridiculously easy. You can use fresh books to create and send invoices in about 30 seconds. There's no formatting, there's no formulas, it's just really simple, clean and professional looking invoices. But you can also add your own logo and color scheme so that your invoice reflects your brand. It's super professional. Also, there's no guessing game, you can see when your clients have opened an invoice and freshbooks makes it super easy for them to pay you right there. So get paid faster by using fresh books, cloud accounting, and you can try it for free for 30 days. unrestricted free trial just for you guys. To claim it. Just go to freshbooks comm slash being boss and enter being boss in the How did you hear about us section? Alright, enough of that. Let's start talking about comparison and envy.

Emily Thompson: 2:34

Ooh.

Kathleen Shannon: 2:36

So we got a question. I actually got a question a direct message from one of our clubhouse members. And I'm gonna go ahead and read this. We might not answer her question specifically to begin with, but just to kind of spark off. Here's what started this conversation for us behind the scenes. Alright, so here's the direct message I received. Hi, Kathleen, thanks for all the wonderful content you put out, especially your periscopes I get really real on my periscopes. I was wondering if at some point, you can address the issue of handling comparison and envy. I seem to really be struggling with this. Especially Recently, there is one girl in my neighborhood who seems to have it all great job works on Google, great social life, etc. My goal is not to get into Google or work for Google. But this envy thing gets on gets onto me at times. Do you have any recommendations on how to handle this, please, please advise. Another person in the Facebook group was recently talking about being jealous of someone who is younger, achieving so much success so soon and feeling like they're too old or behind the game. And so all these conversations about comparison and envy have been happening. And so I thought it would make a great Secret Episode topic.

Emily Thompson: 3:51

Yeah, let's not do this one publicly.

Unknown: 3:54

Alright.

Emily Thompson: 3:56

So I want to know when it is that you fall into the comparison trap, because you're all like, badass boss bitch with the crazy awesome hair and coolness. But we all do experience it. So when the when does it get you Kathleen?

Kathleen Shannon: 4:14

Probably. I mean, you know, it's so cliche and I feel like I should, like I know that it's happening when it's happening and that I should be exempt from it. Because I do kind of feel like a little bit of a badass or like I'm above the envy feelings. But probably again, and this is for most people whenever I'm comparing my daily grind or my struggle to someone else's highlight reel. So I'm not anti social media at all at all at all. And I recognize that people are curating the best parts of themselves. But I do spend quite a bit of time on social media so it's easy to feel like everyone else is just living the dream. And meanwhile, I'm fighting with my baby for an hour to get them to go to sleep or, you know, like, like just the daily grind or feeling like I'm looking at one of my favorite Instagram feeds that I follow is the jungalow or even Atlantis home. I don't know if you follow her at all. She's the mom of Jane Aldridge who is sea of shoes, who I've been following, since she was probably like blogging 13 I was following her and Tavi Gevinson. So that's style, Ricky. So talk about feeling like you're too old. Like I'm following these teenagers who have reached massive amounts of success and are incredibly stylish and have millions of dollars and deals with Vogue. So anyway, I follow them and their houses are So beautiful. But it's all from thrift stores fines. So it's totally doable. And I'm like, I look around at my house and I'm like, I've got, you know, my cat is shitting on my bed while I'm on vacation, or

Unknown: 6:00

you look around at real life,

Kathleen Shannon: 6:03

I fall into the comparison trap and to with other creative entrepreneurs who I feel like are just crushing it, and are always launching something or launching the same thing over and over again, and have seemed to have found that formula for success. Anyway, how about you?

Emily Thompson: 6:19

launching, launching is probably one of my biggest ones. And especially as like, I feel like we're gearing up for a couple of law, or we just did our podcast, like a boss launch, which did really well. And then I want to launch my, like, indie shot biography thing soon. And it was just some things, we have up our sleeves for being boss. Like, for me, I'm doing lots of launch research. So whenever I see people who are like, you know, my first launch, I made $40,000. And by my fourth launch, I was making 2.3 million. I'm like, Oh, my God, I hate your guts. But I want to be you and tell me how you did it. So um, so that, for me is probably one of it. Like I've been in this game for, or I've been like in the online business realm for six years. And I feel like so much of that was spent, like with my head down, like hustling out client work. And it makes me really mad to think about where I could be if I hadn't been so client focused for so long. Because I don't know just all that's where I fall into the comparison trap really hardcore.

Kathleen Shannon: 7:19

And you know, it's so funny is like, Are you ever jealous of people who had a bunch of clients like who had a filled Ross? waitlist? I mean, think about us five years ago, I just was jealous of anyone who seemed to always have clients.

Emily Thompson: 7:35

Yeah. Oh, definitely. Oh, yeah. It my my jealousy shifts from season to season, depending on what what stage in life I'm in. But probably another one of mine is, again, Instagram focused. And this is one of those things do where sometimes I'll go my Instagram feed, I'm like, Damn, my life is pretty. And I look around, and I think you know what my life is really pretty. Like, of course, I'm not showing you the pile of stuff that's in my hallway that David will not donate. That's a sticky conversation. But um, but my life is like it pretty generally pretty. But what gets me is travel. So I love love travel a ton. And so whenever I'm watching people's Instagram feeds, and they're always in these beautiful exotic locations, while I'm sitting, you know, in my studio hustling out something else, like, that's where I sort of get pretty envious is like, I shouldn't be on a beach right now. Or I want to be walking around some like ancient city or, or eating in a cute pub and having some, you know, locally, I don't know, made wine or whatever it may be. So travel is probably like people who have these glorious travel lives. And it's funny as I do have a glorious travel life, like I'm always like, I'm always going somewhere. And I try to Instagram make it beautiful, too. So I have it, but sometimes I'm not where I want to be in that moment. And that's where it hurts. But I get over it.

Kathleen Shannon: 9:03

I think that that word should is a good, like indicator that you are in the comparison trap. Right? So as long as I feel perfectly fine about my life and my business, and I do like it's great, until I see someone else doing something that I should be doing.

Emily Thompson: 9:26

I agree that's a nasty little word. And I mean, right? Like, what you should be doing is what you're doing now to like live your version of your life, not someone else's version of their life. But it's we're human. I mean, like, I think, for me, at least a little bit like the envy that I feel is what I use as fuel to like make me hustle it out. Like whenever I see someone on a beautiful vacation, I think well Damn, it's time for me to book that vacation too. So um, so I think that's I think that's when we begin talking about like, how you can flip this how you can how you can take you know, envy or jealousy or like the comparison trap. And instead of using it as something to damper your like passion to move forward use it as fuel to do what you need to do to get there too.

Kathleen Shannon: 10:16

And I think that's whenever envy can be really healthy as whenever you flip it into kind of um Oh, let's say you're jealous of a specific person, rather than being jealous of them or mad at them or annoyed by them instead, become friends with them and figure out what it is that they're doing or look to yourself and say okay, what is it about what they have that I want and how can I get there too, and really more than anything, what they become is someone who shows shows you that it can be done?

Emily Thompson: 10:47

Yeah, absolutely. I love that mindset around comparison and envy so much more like I can think of a couple of I give you a one person in particular named Mendes didn't know Do I need to? Actually I can't I don't know how to pronounce her last name. So maybe I shouldn't name names yet. Um, so no, this this girl contacted me a few years ago, she's a designer, wanted to be a web designer had been following me for a while, totally loved what I was doing and like, maybe a little like envious comparison ness going on there by um, instead, she contacted me and wanted to like, chat with me and pick my brain. And she sent me a cute little gift and asked me at one point, if I'd be interested in like a mentor ship, she later joined a mastermind group that I like that I was running. So complete opposite, like, instead of sitting in her little corner, wishing she was me, like trying to do like, recreate what I was doing, she invested in creating a relationship with me, where I intentionally taught her some really big things that got me where I was, and totally helped her be successful, too. And I think that, obviously, that mindset is way more constructive than, than the opposite. So I think that, in that flipping it, making friends with the people that you're jealous of does really great things for humanizing, but also putting you in a position where you can use those feelings to be healthy for your ongoing success rather than detrimental.

Kathleen Shannon: 12:24

Amen. And I feel like I've talked about this before, specifically, I will name names. So I've mentioned this before that I was incredibly jealous of promise tanjun. I've told you this story, but I don't know if I've told our listeners this story. But I will share it again. So I was really jealous of this gal named promise. I met her the first year, the first time I ever saw her was actually at alt summit. And I

Emily Thompson: 12:50

went to her hair, maybe your hair's arch nemesis,

Kathleen Shannon: 12:54

I think that's what it was, is that like, I felt so cool. My hair is huge. And I had leather leggings and cool boots. And then I show up at all summit and promise tangent is like a supermodel who's incredibly talented. And she has even bigger hair and even cooler leggings and even better beards, you know, that sort of thing? is feeling pretty damn awesome is a brunette version of you. And instantly, yeah, and then instantly, I I felt like a sense of animosity or, you know, I felt mad about it. And so it's kind of that like women being pitted up against other women. And I was again, I was young too I should mention, I was maybe 2423 or 24, I think he was still even working at the advertising agency. I hadn't quite gone freelance yet. And so the next year, and this is whenever I first started working with J prior, and I bet that I bet that it was right when I went freelance, I was going back to alt summit. And I remember telling him I was like, Man, I'm just so jealous of this girl. And he was like, Kathleen, you need to just walk into the room. And this is whenever he taught me about turning on the taxi light. He goes pretend like you have a taxi light on your head and you are switching it on and just radiating your own light out into that entire room. And so I did that. And lo and behold, promise comes up to me. And it's like, hey, Kathleen, I didn't even know that she knew my name. And I was like, what,

Emily Thompson: 14:27

oh my god.

Kathleen Shannon: 14:28

So then instantly, there was like more of a human connection. And then later that year, she invited me out to come out to designer vaycay which is out at Palm Springs, and we became friends. And so that's my biggest way of dealing with jealousy and envy is humanizing the person on the other side of all the success right and on the other side of all the beauty or fame or whatever it is that I'm jealous of. And so that's been huge for me and even whenever I can't quite humanize someone, like let's say I'm jealous of Marie Forleo she's someone who's incredibly successful and just seems to be rocking it out. And I really admire her and then I whenever I start to humanize her and imagine like what struggles she deals with, man like there's there's no more jealousy because you can tell that she's working just as hard for what she's got. And and she's probably jealous too. Like even Beyonce probably deals with the comparison trap and envy.

Emily Thompson: 15:27

Oh, yeah, I mean, I

Unknown: 15:27

got there.

Emily Thompson: 15:28

Right Well, in sometimes like I you have to think backwards to like, I don't know, at some point what At what point do you look back and wish that you were a couple steps behind yourself even like I feel like sometimes we can get into this comparison trap or like we just want to go further and further and further but not Being mindful of where to where it is that we want to be. And then you find yourself further along than you actually want to be like deeper in work like working more hours than you want to be trying to reach someone else's dream. And you sort of forgot what yours was and left it behind. And I think that I think that's a, that's a really important thing that I try to keep in my mind a lot is, you know, what do I want, like, of course, everyone else's lives look super amazing. But my life can look its own kind of amazing. And it's not the same thing as everyone else is amazing. Like, whenever for the travel, for example, like I have plenty of travel on my calendar. So whenever I'm looking at someone who's, you know, vacationing in Tulum, at the moment, like one screw you, I want to be into loom. But on the other hand, I could be is just, I also like to have a good amount of home time in my life, like if I were traveling consistently, that's not really my version of happy. So. So I think that keeping in mind what your version of your happiness is, is a really important tactic for keeping comparison and envy at bay.

Kathleen Shannon: 17:00

Right, so like to our clubhouse member who has sent me that direct message, I think that the thing is, is really knowing exactly what it is that you want, and standing sacred, you know, standing in that sacred ground, rather than looking outside of you for what you want. And trust me, like I am dealing with this myself all the time. So I'm constantly writing lists, like let's get really tactical, tactical, sorry, tactical that is. Let's get super tactical and actionable here. And what I will often do is pretend like if I'm on a desert island, what does success look like to me? What is it that I actually want? And whenever I can take myself outside of anyone else's dream, I'm able to see like, Okay, what is it about this girl that works at Google that I want about her life? Or maybe it's just that it's like all of her friends and her social life? Okay, what do I need to do to make more friends or to have a social life like hers, right? And so I'll just write down what it is. And instead of thinking about what it is I envy about someone, it might be what it is I admire about someone and how can I get there as well. I have a quick story about like, one time, the comparison trap showed up for me, and it was quite the learning lesson. So I was working with a business coach, and her name is Viviana and Viviana was asking me and my sister about what our goals were. And so we were sharing very specific financial numbers. And I remember asking her, is that enough is that what other people are asking for is that more is that less like I was obsessed with? How my goals for how much money I wanted to be making stood up next to someone else's, and I could not let it go. And I remember she even said, it doesn't matter what anyone else is making. It's about what you want to be making. And it's about what how you define success. And I was like, No, but I need to know like, Is this good? Or is this bad? And so I think that almost letting go of that need to be right, or that need to be competitive in the market really helped me reframe competition and envy and really keep my eyes on my own prize. Put my little What are they? What do people put on horses blinders their eyes blind, I put on my blinders. You I keep my eyes on my own work and my own happiness and my own wants and desires. Yeah, I

Emily Thompson: 19:37

agree. I agree with all of that. I think that I think it's all about perception and perspective, like both of those things together. And I think that we can get a little beyond ourselves sometimes when we're looking at the world and what everyone else is doing. But we need to bring it back to ourselves and not even think about everyone else. And I love the I love the desert island are deserted island. Hopefully it's not desert island. That'd be horrible. But deserted island would not be horrible for a minute. But I think that putting yourself in that position where you're just sort of in it alone. And you're thinking and like even like going home right now if I go home, like what do I want to go home to? And is that a life where you're working 40 hours a week to have a launch that you may not like, may not go out of the way you want. And you're living this life in the moment where you're totally hustling things out and you're stressed about someone else's vacation and all these things or do you want to like go home, have your ideal day have things go off the way you want them to so that you're hustling things out on terms that you're happy with. I think it's all about perception and perspective and how it is that you're looking Get your life and potentially not looking at everyone else's life. One of my favorite things that I heard recently, so I'm a big RuPaul drag race fan love rebels drag race. And Bob, the drag queen won this season. Really fantastic man. Super hysterical. And one of the things that he was talking about as he was like accepting his crown was, uh, was that you have to focus on what you love about yourself, because they're, like drag queens, all the things super competitive. And like, how do you deal with the life where you are consistently judged for deep being who you are, and but also wanting to win at this thing and dressing up like a woman and being a clown, because Bob drag queen is hysterical. And he says, you have to focus on what you love about yourself, period. And his thing being like, you know, if you sit and think about yourself, and the thing that he loved the most is your teeth, and focus on your teeth, and figure out a way to make your teeth work for you. And I think this can be like if you're comparing your skills, or someone else's skills, or your life to someone else's life, or whatever it is, take your eyes off of everyone else's prize. And think about your your own life and your own self and your own skills and focus on what it is that you love about that. And then work with that. Because if you are focusing in on that thing, you're not thinking about anyone else, you are simply playing to your strengths, do create what it is that you want to create. And I feel like that's just some drag queen wisdom for you right there. Focus on what you love about yourself, and nothing else will really matter.

Kathleen Shannon: 22:26

I love that you say that so much, because I was thinking about ideal day. And what I have found is a lot of the creatives that I coach are, in fact living their ideal day on paper, but they're still not superduper happy with their lives, and myself included like this can happen to all of us, right. And what I found is the case there is that there's not enough gratitude around what you do have. But I love the way that you phrase it as focusing on what you love about yourself versus focusing on what you're grateful for. Because lately I've been finding that focusing on what I should be grateful for sends me into another shame spiral where I'm like, everything is so good. Why am I not happy? Right? Right. Whereas if I focus on, okay, here's what I love about myself, I love that I can just hop on a podcast and record something and feel good about it, right. And if I focus on that, then I'm gonna be building my business around a podcast and this is all stuff that we've done. But um, but I think that it really highlights gratitude, or you know, it shines a light on it in a different way. Because that is definitely being grateful is loving yourself. And we've talked about this before, where the most radical thing you can do is love yourself.

Emily Thompson: 23:39

Right? Amen to that I know, well, and I agree with the gratitude thing I find myself, I find myself being being very uninventive with my gratitude. Sometimes, like in my bullet journal, I try to go in every day and write three things I'm grateful for, and like family and food, and my job like those are in like, I just have cycled through those three things over and over again, I think Emily, you can definitely do better than this. But those are obviously the biggest things and the most impactful things. But whenever I do reframe that and do what it is that I love about myself, or I love about my life, I can come up with so many more things. And it's just a nice little reframe, like coming at it from a different from a different direction. But it sets you up to do have the, or have the openness to be grateful for more things that you're probably not thinking of in that context. Which just opens you up to being a lot more productive with the gratitude that you do feel so so yes, focus on what you love about yourself. Something else I really like to do whenever whenever I'm falling deep into the trap, is to hang out with someone who loves me, and especially someone whose advice is important to me and someone who knows me and especially if it's around something like like my work, like I'm going to hang out with someone who appreciates my work or at least sees sees the good in the work that I do so that for me sometimes it's getting out of your head and like chatting with someone else's head for a minute. Because that can be really huge. It's so easy for us to spiral into emotions, like especially that time of the month ladies like I was recently they're spiraling like a bitch. No kidding. And but like sitting down with David and just sort of talking things out or simply having having him be nice. Or if I needed to talk about work him you know, being able to reassure me that what I'm doing is good for me or if it's friends or even past clients who I can schedule up a call and have them schedule up a call and have them tell Tell me about what's going on in their business, which shows me the impact that I've made with them or whatever it may be. I think that, that talking to someone who loves you, who understands what you do and who understands, like, what you're good at, and is appreciative of that will oftentimes take me completely away from comparison and envy. And right back into, here's what I do great to hear is what I'm going to be accomplished in the world. Now let's make this shit do. Because really, I think all comparison and envy is, is it's a different form of procrastination. Why? Right? I never thought about that. If you are spending your time, all like caught up in comparing yourself to everyone else. You're just procrastinating doing what you're supposed to be doing.

Kathleen Shannon: 26:34

Or Yeah, or like trying to make excuses why you shouldn't be doing the work. Yeah, that's genius. You're welcome. That's incredibly insightful. And, you know, I think that we're lucky that we have the podcast as a platform where people are constantly emailing us and saying, Thank you. And I was recently reading in Tara Moore's book playing big, which we had her on the show once about getting into the comparison trap and getting into like the feedback loop, whether it's good feedback, or bad feedback that can be kind of dangerous, like relying on feedback. And I think especially as creatives who are used to being the straight A students are always getting praise, and then relying on that to be happy, is huge. So definitely check out that chapter entire Moore's playing big if you haven't already. But um, but what I was gonna say about that is one of the things that I feel a lot of comparison or envy around, or one of those shoulds is my location, I always feel. And I go through waves of this, but I always feel somewhat embarrassed about living in Oklahoma, especially during political seasons. But even just just physically being here, I'm always feeling a little embarrassment and a little envious of people who live in cooler places, or more beautiful places. Until I get emails from listeners who are like, Wow, I can't believe that you're rocking it out from Oklahoma City that makes me feel like I could rock it out from anywhere also. And so then I'm able to take that thing that I was embarrassed about, or often feel comparison or envy around and really twist it into a positive thing like, okay, yes, if I can do this, From here, I can do it from anywhere. And the fact that I'm giving other creatives permission to do their best job from anywhere they live is so cool.

Emily Thompson: 28:28

Yeah, well, and that's, that's just another example of like flipping it, like, you have a choice. Whenever looking at someone else's life, you can either be inspired by it, or you can be envious of it and like the detrimental kind of envious and i think that i think that's just a conscious, conscious decision you have to make like consistently in your life every day for the rest of your life, whenever you see something, doing something that's potentially cooler than you are living somewhere cooler, or whatever it may be, is just choosing your frame of mind around that thing. Are you going to be jealous? Are you going to? Or are you going to be inspired by it or assembly like, in all of like, I think there's nothing wrong with looking at someone's life, and suddenly being like, Oh, look at her go high five. And now let me get back to work, which, which I think is huge.

Kathleen Shannon: 29:19

I have something that's a little woowoo when it comes to dealing with feelings of jealousy and envy. But that's at some point, I was able to reframe jealousy and comparison into really feeling someone else's success as my own. And whenever I've been able to recognize that we're all connected, and that a rising tide lifts all boats. It has really helped me see okay, that's coming my way too. And so for example, going back to the promise example. So whenever I learned that promise, tanjun was able to do something like triple her income by going from client work to offering a product. I have felt that initial pain of jealousy and like, ah, and then it helped me see what was possible. And then I decided we're all in it together. And that her success is my success. And what's funny is saying this out loud right now I've realized you and I, Emily are going from client work to releasing products and we're probably going to be tripling our income because of it right? And so it's like recognizing what it is that I want. And celebrating the successes of other people is really almost a way of cultivating feelings of celebrating my own success, and then just waiting for it to happen.

Emily Thompson: 30:38

I agree so in that sort of brings me to my my like big point about comparison envy. And even that fun little realization, I'm going to do that it's just another form of procrastination. I think the idea is to not let comparison and envy stop you in your tracks, where you are, you know, doing something, you see something and you think, Well, shit, there's no sense in me doing this thing because someone else's life is cooler than mine done. Like, you just you have to get back to work you have to consistently like, keep in mind what it is that you're working towards. And again, let someone else's life inspire you like, I will gladly accept the possibility that promise tangents move from client work to releasing products is has somehow brought you and I to this place like and thank you a promise for doing that like for inspiring get gasoline to jump on this ship. So we can do it too. Because I think that, I think that that really is the key is like finding inspiration in those things reframing, comparison and envy and jealousy and do inspiration. And then you just getting back to work on whatever it is that you're creating, and be inspired by it. Take the best of what someone else is doing. And use that as a lesson for you or take the worst of what they're doing. And let that be a lesson like, because there's good and bad and everything. But otherwise, get to work and create what it is that you're wanting to create for yourself. For

Kathleen Shannon: 32:06

me that comes back to our episode that we did with I think it was Paul and Jason on New Year's where we were talking about our new year's goals for the upcoming year. And this is something I've really learned from Paul Jarvis is to be enjoying the process along the way. And if you're not enjoying the process, it doesn't matter what benchmarks of success, you end up hitting, you know, a miserable path will lead to a miserable place, right. So for me, that's like always the goal is for the process to be something that I'm enjoying as I go. And speaking of the process, like part of our process is getting to interview really amazing creatives who are totally rocking it. And I would say one thing that's come out of every single interview we've ever done is that everyone has their struggles, right? Everyone is just doing the best they can. And even the most successful people that we've interviewed, still struggle with feelings of comparison, or envy or scarcity, all the human feelings that we all feel. And so there is a certain amount of not that misery loves company, but a certain amount of I don't know compassion that comes from knowing that we're, we're not in this alone, and that we all struggle with these things. And that's what I love about the boss community is that we've been able to open up these conversations and have them in the open is no longer a secret, but we feel jealousy, or envy or comparison or scarcity or all the things, all the negative feelings that we might feel.

Emily Thompson: 33:39

Yeah, I agree. I think having a place to share those and like community or hanging out with someone who loves you, or whatever it like having another person there to pull you out of the depths of wherever you've found yourself,

Unknown: 33:53

and how are you

Emily Thompson: 33:55

helping you pick apart the good parts of things that are coming out of this or to sort of put your feet back on the ground, if you're getting, you know, two up in the air with all the things that you want that you don't have yet or whatever it may be. We're just talking things out seeing the flip side, I think I think community and having people that you can trust is such a huge part of getting over comparison. And because I'll also say like, I really had to sit and think for a minute about what it is that brings up jealousy for me, because on the daily, I don't think I feel it or if I do feel it, I don't pay it any damn attention. Because I'm too busy doing my thing to really have time or want to make time or even think about stopping to be sincerely envious of someone. And it's I know part of that's because I have created such a great system of people around me that I know if I'm ever feeling it, I'll just hop on a phone call with Kathleen bitch about something for a minute and then we're done. Like if it really gets really bad. But on the daily, I don't really feel it not in a way that I find detrimental to my process in any way, shape or form. I'm sure those two loom Instagrams always give me a bit of a twinge, but I just keep on scrolling and I think about that next time I'm going to be booking a trip to to loom so I think that's a really important thing to think about too is is get yourself out of the habit of feeling comparison and envy and jealousy. And instead use it as fuel tap into your community and, and just be the boss that you are. Bosses don't have time to be jealous.

Kathleen Shannon: 35:38

Alright, so my action steps that would come out of this for anyone who is feeling jealousy or envy or maybe isn't feeling jealousy or envy is to one write down on a piece of paper really what it is that you want in your life and what success looks like for you to I would email a fellow boss and tell them what you love about them. And again, like this goes back to just making the gratitude pie bigger. So Emily, you talked about listing what you love about yourself, but I would say reach out to someone else and tell them what you love about them. I just think it's good karma. Yeah. And then what else would I say about oh three is interview the most confident person you know, so hopefully, it's someone that you could get on the phone but, but email someone that you could get on the phone or via email or over Skype or an in person coffee chat, and interview the most confident person that you know about how they deal with jealousy and comparison and, and how they've been able to reframe that in their lives.

Emily Thompson: 36:42

Love it, those are some solid action steps. And otherwise, get back to work. Don't even don't don't even make the time to be envious or jealous. Instead, give it a little salute half of all the things that whoever is accomplishing, and you go accomplish things for yourself. Don't use jealousy and envy as a way for you to procrastinate reaching your own destination.

Kathleen Shannon: 37:07

Amen. All right, and you guys just a reminder to invite your friends if you want to see the clubhouse full of people that you admire and love and maybe at one point were jealous or envious of

Emily Thompson: 37:21

going down the club. kick you out,

Kathleen Shannon: 37:23

no cat bites, but just send your friends to being boss club slash clubhouse and they can submit an application to join this episode of being boss was brought to you by fresh books cloud accounting, thank you to fresh books for sponsoring us and you guys can try it for free by going to freshbooks comm slash being boss. Thank you for listening to being boss. Find Articles show notes and downloads at WWW dot being boss club.

Emily Thompson: 37:54

If you're a creative entrepreneur, Freelancer or small business owner who is ready to take your goals to the next level, check out the being boss clubhouse, a two day online retreat followed by a year of community support, monthly masterclasses book club secret episodes and optional in person retreats. Find more at www dot being boss club slash clubhouse.

Kathleen Shannon: 38:18

Thank you so much to our team and sponsors who make being boss possible our sound engineer and web developer Corey winter. Our editorial director and content manager Caitlin brain, our community manager and social media director Sharon lukey. And our bean counter David Austin, with support from braid creative and indicia biography.

Emily Thompson: 38:36

Do the work. Be boss and we'll see you next week.