#127 How to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
In today's episode, we're talking all about comparison. Comparison is one of those things that we're all susceptible to at some point or another: we compare ourselves based on appearance, personality, success, relationships. It can sometimes seem like there's a never ending list of reasons to feel dissatisfied or inadequate when we look at our lives relative to someone else's.
How to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others | On Attachment | Ep 127
In today's episode, we're talking all about comparison. Comparison is one of those things that we're all susceptible to at some point or another: we compare ourselves based on appearance, personality, success, relationships. It can sometimes seem like there's a neverending list of reasons to feel dissatisfied or inadequate when we look at our lives relative to someone else's.
And yet, while comparison is arguably a universal human experience, it's undeniable that some of us struggle with the comparison trap more than others - sometimes to the point where it feels debilitating and destructive to our sense of self.
The Power of Self-Worth: How to Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
Comparison - we all do it. Whether subconsciously or consciously, we find ourselves looking at others and assessing how we measure up. The urge to compare ourselves to those around us is deeply ingrained in human nature. However, this tendency can become a source of distress, leading to feelings of unworthiness, insecurity, and anxiety. In this episode of On Attachment, we delve into the universal experience of comparison and explore strategies to break free from its grasp and cultivate a greater sense of self-worth and confidence.
The Comparison Conundrum
From the moment we scroll through social media feeds to the interactions we have with colleagues and friends, the opportunities for comparison are endless. The modern world inundates us with a multitude of experiences, successes, and relationships from others, often leaving us feeling inadequate and perpetuating the illusion that everyone else is thriving while we are lagging behind.
The tendency to compare ourselves intensifies for individuals grappling with low self-worth. When we struggle to recognise and appreciate our own value, we are more prone to fixating on what we lack, as opposed to celebrating our strengths and unique attributes. This internal dialogue of not being good enough or not measuring up nourishes the cycle of comparison, perpetuating and reinforcing feelings of inadequacy.
The Antidote to Comparison
While overcoming the impulse to compare ourselves to others may seem daunting, the key lies in nurturing our self-worth. Building self-worth is not an overnight transformation but rather a progressive journey requiring patience, commitment, and self-compassion.
Embracing self-worth involves a conscious effort to acknowledge and appreciate our strengths, virtues, and contributions. It's about shifting the focus from what we lack to what we embody, recognising that our worth is not contingent on external validations.
Navigating the Relational Repercussions
The vicious cycle of comparison permeates into our relationships, influencing how we perceive and interact with others. Insecurity and low self-worth can manifest as jealousy, creating a perpetual state of suspicion and competition, even in the context of healthy relationships. The constant evaluation and comparison with others disrupt our ability to authentically connect and enjoy the company of others, leading to heightened anxiety and a sense of unease.
However, prioritising self-worth catalyses a transformative shift in our relational dynamics. By anchoring ourselves in a deep belief in our intrinsic value, we foster trust in ourselves and our relationships. This trust extends beyond external factors, allowing us to embrace our worth independently of others' opinions, strengthening our resilience and empowering us to set aside comparisons and build authentic connections rooted in mutual respect and understanding.
Overcoming the Comparison Trap
The pursuit of self-worth can pave the way to freedom from the comparison trap. By cultivating self-worth, we detach ourselves from the need for approval or validation from external sources. We begin to appreciate our inherent worth, paving the way for a more harmonious and fulfilling life. Furthermore, the ripple effect of enhancing our self-worth transcends comparison, extending to other facets of our lives, such as reducing the tendency to people-please and nurturing resilience in the face of adversity.
Escaping the comparison trap is not about eradicating awareness of others' achievements or experiences, but rather reframing our perspectives. It's about acknowledging others' journeys while steadfastly reaffirming our own unique path. By grounding ourselves in self-worth, we tap into a wellspring of confidence and assurance that empowers our relationships and allows us to experience life authentically and unencumbered by comparisons.
A Journey Towards Greater Self-Worth
The road to self-worth is a continuous, evolving process, requiring active engagement and commitment. While it involves confronting internal dialogues and navigating emotional complexities, the rewards are immeasurable. As we embark on this journey, we bask in the newfound freedom from the confines of comparison. We liberate ourselves from the suffocating weight of unworthiness and usher in a profound sense of self-compassion, confidence, and empowerment.
In conclusion, as we rally against the seductive pull of comparison, we fortify our resolve to cultivate our self-worth. Embracing self-worth is the catalyst for untethering ourselves from the allure of comparison, nurturing resilience, and fostering authentic, fulfilling relationships. It's a commitment to ourselves, a testament to our inherent value, and an affirmation of our individual narratives, unencumbered by the shadow of comparison.
Embracing Self-Worth
In the pursuit of self-worth, we shatter the confines of comparison, celebrating our intrinsic value and paving the way for a life characterised by authenticity, fortitude, and genuine connections.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
How do you personally struggle with comparison in your daily life? Do you find yourself caught in a pattern of comparing your life, achievements, or appearance to others? How does this impact your self-worth and relationships with others?
How has the oversupply of information in today's culture affected your sense of self-worth and comparison to others? Do you feel pressured to measure up to the standards presented in social media and popular culture? How does this impact your mental well-being?
Reflect on a time when you felt threatened or insecure in a relationship due to comparison with others. How did this affect your ability to authentically connect with your partner or potential partners? In what ways do you feel your insecurities may have impacted the relationship dynamic?
Consider the role of building self-worth in mitigating comparisons. How can focusing on your own self-worth help reduce the impact of external influences and comparisons? In what ways can building self-worth positively impact your relationships with yourself and others?
Have you noticed any patterns of performing, people-pleasing, or seeking validation in your relationships and social interactions? How do these patterns relate to your sense of self-worth and comparison with others?
Reflect on your experiences with social anxiety. How does the fear of not measuring up to others affect your ability to authentically connect with people and form genuine relationships?
What actionable steps can you take to reduce the impact of comparison in your life and relationships? How can you cultivate a sense of self-worth that allows you to embrace authenticity and self-acceptance, regardless of external comparisons?
In what ways do you find yourself resisting the societal pressure to constantly compare yourself to others? How can you shift towards a mindset of opting out of the comparison game and embracing your own unique journey and strengths?
Think about a time when you found yourself instinctively sizing yourself up against someone else. How did this impact your thoughts and emotions? How do you envision responding to similar situations in a more empowered and self-affirming way in the future?
Consider exploring the concept of "enoughness" and how it relates to comparison and self-worth. How can you shift your mindset to embody a sense of being enough, independent of external comparisons and societal standards?
FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:
Save $150 on my Higher Love break-up course with the code PHOENIX
Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment
You might also like…
Episode Transcript
[00:00:29]:
In today's episode, we are talking all about comparison and how we can stop comparing ourselves to others. So I think that this is a topic that, although it was inspired by a question I received on Instagram, it's so universal and so relatable for, I think all of us, whether this is something that you really, really struggle with or maybe you just experience a regular human amount as we'll come to shortly, I do think that this is something that we're all going to encounter at various points in our life. This tendency to compare, to look over our shoulder to see what other people are doing and to see where we stack up relative to that. I do think that it's a very natural tendency, but I also think that some of us definitely go down that vortex more than others and can get really stuck there. And particularly if you're someone who struggles with unworthiness or insecurity, anxiety, I think these can all go hand in hand. And not only does that impact our relationship with ourself, our self confidence, our self esteem, but it can really bleed into our relationships with others.
[00:01:41]:
Again, as we'll come to talk about, I think that there's a lot of overlap. If you were to do a ven diagram of people who struggle with comparison and low self worth, with people who struggle with anxious attachment, who struggle with jealousy, who struggle with a fear of abandonment, all of these things, I think that might not be so obvious in their relationship to each other. When we start to dig a little deeper, we can see how there's lots of tendrils and webs linking them all together. So I'm going to be talking about that today. Why some of us struggle with comparison more than others, where that might be coming from, what purpose is that serving, and ultimately how we can start to build a greater sense of self worth, self confidence, in a way that allows us to not become immune to comparison. Because, as I said, I think we all go there sometimes. I know I certainly do. But in a way that we can be broadly comfortable with who we are, with what we have to offer, with our value, such that we're not so heavily focused on what everyone else is doing and how everyone else looks and trying to figure out where we sit on that scale, because I think that's a pretty exhausting way to live and almost always leaves us feeling worse about ourselves or at least feeling very insecure.
[00:02:59]:
So that is what we're going to be talking about today. Before I dive into that, a quick announcement. I'm really excited to be launching a brand new offering. It's called the secure self and it's a 28 day challenge that's going to be kicking off next month. So just before Valentine's Day, it's a four week challenge. It's going to be all about a lot of what we're talking about today, building self worth. And each week we'll address a different pillar of self worth, a different focus area. It's going to be really accessible, both in cost.
[00:03:32]:
It's the lowest cost offering that I've had for a while, but also in its delivery. So I'm going to do audio only lessons so you can listen to it all on your phone. It's just going to be a short lesson each week and then a challenge or a homework task, something like that, an implementation piece. There's going to be a pop up community so you can connect with others who are doing the challenge, which is always a really nice component. And there'll also be two live calls with me, so there's a lot of value packed into it. It's a nice, short and sweet 128 days and I think it hopefully will appeal to people across the spectrum. No matter your attachment style, no matter whether you're new to my work or whether you've done everything I've ever released. This will be quite distinct in, as I said, both the content and the delivery, and I'm really looking forward to it.
[00:04:19]:
So early bird enrollment for that is open as of today and the early bird pricing will be available for the next week. So definitely head to the show notes and cheque that out if you're interested. Or you can go straight to my website, @stephanierigg.com and check out all the details, including some more info on each of the themes and stuff like that. So would love to see as many of you in there as possible. I think it's going to be really good fun. Okay, so let's talk about comparison. So as I said at the start, I think I'm always mindful when we talk about comparison or people pleasing or self criticism, any of these things that, of course can be really challenging, but also are very human. I don't want you to feel like you have to add that to the list of things that are wrong with you? Oh no.
[00:05:07]:
I compare myself to other people. Does that mean that's another thing that I need to fix about myself? Of course. We all do this, right? We do it subconsciously and maybe we do it very consciously. We're aware of other people's appearances or other people's success or other people's relationships. All of these things. I think that we are, whether it's innate or we are all just conditioned to do it. I think having an awareness of what other people are doing, how they're presenting, how they're living their lives relative to ours is pretty normal. I think where it can get really challenging is in this day and age when we have such an oversupply of information and exposure to so many different people and so many different information sources, relationships, all of these things, we're really bombarded.
[00:05:54]:
And so there's a lot to feel bad about. It can create this illusion and this sense that everyone else is thriving and I'm not. Or everyone else is beautiful and successful and charming and funny and I'm just average because obviously the data that we're getting is pretty skewed in that direction because that's what content is pushed to us. And so I think that while this tendency to compare ourselves is a very natural one, it's probably on steroids in our modern culture. Add to that, if you are someone who really struggles with low self worth I think that you're likely to be really prone to comparison. More so than someone who's pretty comfortable within themselves. And that maybe sounds obvious, but I think that when we really struggle with believing in our own value and really kind of knowing who we are and what we have to offer and really owning our strengths and our value proposition as a person going, yeah, I'm a great friend and people really like my sense of humour and I'm really good at my job and I'm smart and I'm loyal and all of those things, we don't tend to do that very often. We don't tend to take stock of those things and really reflect that back to ourselves because our tendency is to focus on the lack.
[00:07:13]:
Right? I'm not pretty enough, I'm not thin enough, I'm not successful enough, I'm not rich enough, I don't have the perfect relationship. And that's where our attention goes. And that's really where we then end up feeling pretty shitty about ourselves. That feeds it, right? The low self worth plants the seed or makes us prone or susceptible to that comparison, and then it kind of spirals from there because the comparison inevitably feeds the low self worth and so on and so forth. So I think if you know that about yourself, that you're already quite prone to comparison, that you have those struggles with self worth, that's just a really good thing to know and to recognise, because there's things we can do about that, right? Building self worth is not an overnight thing, but it's absolutely possible, and I can speak from personal experience that I definitely used to struggle with comparison a lot more than I do now. As I said, I'm not free of it now. It's not like I never fall into that trap, but I'm definitely less bothered by it, both on a personal level and certainly in a relationship. So I did mention that I kind of talk about the relational piece.
[00:08:17]:
And I think again, to use myself as an example, when I was younger, before I had done a lot of this work, I was pretty insecure. And I found it really easy to fall into that place of comparing myself, particularly to other women in the context of relationships, and feeling kind of subtly threatened by most other women, or even the women that I didn't feel threatened by. It was because I'd gone through a process of comparing myself to them and deciding that I didn't need to be threatened by them. But that was still in that mindset of assessing everyone as a competitor or a potential threat to how I felt about myself and how comfortable I felt in my relationship. And that was pretty exhausting, right? When I look back on that now, I can see that a lot of that was coming from a place of low self worth and not really believing in my value, thinking that everyone had something that I didn't, and really feeling that sense of not enough. I'm not enough of this, I'm not attractive enough, I'm not funny enough, I'm not cool enough, my clothes aren't as nice as that person. Like all of these little things that just kept me totally on edge and so uncomfortable within myself that I really didn't get to enjoy not only relationships, but kind of friendships and social settings. It just created this constant anxiety.
[00:09:45]:
Because I think when you are in that mode of sizing people up and assessment, it takes you out of presence. You don't get to just show up as yourself authentically and connect with other people as themselves authentically. You're always kind of in this mode of not inauthenticity, but performing and assessing and self protection. I don't think that that's really conducive to connecting authentically with others, which is really what we want. And frankly, it just kind of takes the fun out of it. I think for a lot of us who struggle with social anxiety, which is maybe something we need to do a whole nother episode on, because these days, more than ever, I think social anxiety is probably not talked about enough, but is so chronic and endemic that a lot of people have a really, really hard time with socialising, making friends, feeling confident in social settings, which has no doubt been exacerbated by a couple of years of isolation. But, yeah, I think that it feels really complicated, it feels really hard, it feels really intimidating. And the more that we are in this mindset of needing to prove ourselves and needing to show up in a certain way in order to be impressive or be likeable to perform, then that anxiety is only going to skyrocket because we put all this pressure on ourselves to be a certain way in order to achieve an outcome, rather than just being and letting that be enough.
[00:11:09]:
So what do we do with all of this? How do we stop comparing ourselves to others? Again, I think that there's probably always going to be this lingering thing where we are aware of what other people are doing and we might have a voice inside of us that does peer over our shoulder, peer over the neighbor's fence, so to speak, and see what other people are up to and how they are going, and how that stacks up against what we're doing, how we're going, how we're feeling, and either feeling temporarily better about ourselves because we assess ourselves as superior, or performing better, or ticking certain boxes that other people aren't. And so we get that kind of little ego boost, or we feel worse about ourselves because we've decided that they're ahead of us, or better than us, or superior to us. But either way, I think we're in that egoic kind of mindset that doesn't actually feed us at a deep level, it doesn't feel peaceful and it keeps us stuck in that. Because if you're in that hamster wheel, you kind of just have to keep playing it in order. Even if you are ahead, you've got to then stay ahead. Whereas I think stepping off the hamster wheel altogether and opting out of the game is probably a much more fruitful and rewarding way of being. So, all of that being said, it's kind of like all roads lead back to building your self worth. And I recognise that that's not like an easy, oh, great, I'll just go build my self worth and then everything will be resolved.
[00:12:38]:
That's a path and it's work and it's a process, right? A practise, we could call it. But it's a really rewarding one. And it's one that I talk about a lot, because I think that the ripple effect from focusing on building your self worth into all of these other areas of life, we can start to see that things like comparison, things like people pleasing, things like staying in relationships longer than we should, or pursuing relationships with people who are not really aligned or not really interested in us, these all kind of spring out from this place of low self worth. And when we start to work on that in a really committed and sustained way, we really make that a priority. It's amazing how organically all of these other things kind of fall away. They might not totally disappear, but they just become less relevant to us. They feel like less of a fit and comparison, I think, is one of them. Because ultimately comparison is trying to protect us, right? It's just feeding back information.
[00:13:40]:
Because a part of us is convinced that we're in competition with these people. And when that's the story that we're telling ourselves, then staying safe means winning. And so we feel like we have to do that and we have to kind of beat away all of the threats to our identity and our relationships. Whereas when we step out of that mindset and we really start to grow those seeds of self worth from the ground up, really within ourselves, then, as I said, all of those things just start to feel a little less important. And again, speaking from personal experience, things that I used to really, really struggle with in relationship, like jealousy was a big one. I was so aware of other women, even when there was nothing untoward, there weren't circumstances that warranted that. But I was inwardly just so wary of other women. I felt so threatened by them.
[00:14:32]:
And I really don't feel that anymore in my relationship because I trust in my value, I trust my partner, but I trust that even if anything were to happen, that that's not a comment on my worth. Because I really believe in my worth in a really embodied way. And I think that that's just quite profoundly healing to do that work and get to that place where it's not about never having wobly days, where you feel a little unsure of yourself or never having social anxiety. I certainly still don't like showing up to a room of people who, I don't know, that's not my comfort zone at all, but just feeling a little bit more anchored in who you are and letting that be okay and letting that be enough and knowing yourself and just kind of removing some of the heaviness of having to perform or emulate what other people are doing or copy other people or compete with other people. Because as I said, I think that that just is really, really draining. If nothing else, it's an exhausting way of living. And it's one of those things where insecurity begets more insecurity begets more insecurity. The downward spiral is real with all of those things because it really drags us down in our energy.
[00:15:51]:
But the inverse is also true. The upward spiral is possible and available to all of you if that's something that you're really committed to choosing and creating for yourself. And I should say I have other episodes. It's probably beyond the scope of today, just timing wise, but I do have other episodes on the how of building self worth. If that's something that you're more interested in diving into, you should be able to search that relatively easily and pull up those old episodes that give you a bit more of a roadmap on how you can start building self worth. I also have a free guided meditation on my website on building self worth, I should say. So you can go cheque that out. And of course, if you really want to go all in on this whole self worth thing, the secure self challenge will be starting in about a month, but the early bird pricing is available for the next week.
[00:16:38]:
So definitely go cheque it out if you're interested. If what I've shared today has resonated for you, as I said, my intention is for it to be a really fun, light hearted, enjoyable program for you to connect with each other, connect with me. So looking forward to that and looking forward to seeing hopefully lots of you in there. So thank you so much for joining me. I hope today's episode has given you something to think about. It's been helpful for you and I look forward to seeing you again next time. Thanks guys.
[00:17:10]:
Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you want to go deeper on all things attachment, love and relationships, you can find me on Instagram @stephanierigg.com and if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a five star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here and I hope to see you again sooner.
Keywords from Podcast Episode
attachment, relationships, comparison, insecurity, self-worth, self-confidence, anxiety, worthiness, jealousy, fear of abandonment, social anxiety, self-esteem, self-worth building, thriving relationships, people pleasing, performance, connection, personal development, emotional well-being, self-improvement, overcoming insecurity, guided meditation, attachment style, socialising, relationship coach, early bird pricing, pop up community, live calls, secure self challenge.
#126 5 Hard (But Liberating) Truths About Break-Ups
In today's episode, we're talking all about break-ups. Break-ups are one of the most challenging and sometimes destabilising emotional experiences we can go through, and there is so much conflicting advice and information on how best to approach the ending of a relationship.
In this episode, I'm providing you with some hard (but hopefully liberating) truths about the break-up process, so that you can make the most of the opportunity that your break-up offers to deepen in your self-awareness and your relationship with yourself.
In today's episode, we're talking all about break-ups. Break-ups are one of the most challenging and sometimes destabilising emotional experiences we can go through, and there is so much conflicting advice and information on how best to approach the ending of a relationship.
In this episode, I'm providing you with some hard (but hopefully liberating) truths about the break-up process, so that you can make the most of the opportunity that your break-up offers to deepen in your self-awareness and your relationship with yourself.
5 Essential Truths About Moving on After a Breakup
Breakups are one of the most challenging emotional experiences we can go through. The pain, confusion, and disorientation that come with the end of a relationship can be deeply overwhelming. In this article, we will explore five hard but liberating truths about breakups to help you navigate the process of moving on and healing.
Breakups Aren’t a Competition
One of the most damaging mindsets to adopt after a breakup is to see it as a competition. The narrative of needing to emerge as the “winner” or prove something to your ex is pervasive in our culture, often perpetuated by social media and pop culture. It’s essential to understand that breakups are not about proving your worth in comparison to your ex. Feeling sad, lonely, or missing your ex is completely normal and doesn’t make you a loser. Instead of getting caught up in a futile competition, focus on nourishing and taking care of yourself. Embrace the opportunity to learn and grow from the experience.
Closure Is Within You
The need for closure after a breakup is natural, but it’s crucial to recognise that closure may not come from your ex. Seeking answers or explanations from someone who may not have the emotional capacity to provide them can be disempowering. Instead, it’s important to make peace with the unknown and accept the lack of closure as a part of the process. Reframe closure as a decision within yourself to accept things as they are, rather than depending on external sources for resolution.
Respect Their Space
After a breakup, it’s important to acknowledge that you no longer have the right to know what your ex is thinking, feeling, or doing. Unless there are specific circumstances, such as co-parenting, it’s essential to detach from the need for oversight. For those with anxious attachment patterns, the loss of control over this information can feel destabilising. However, redirecting your focus back to yourself and your needs can help in navigating the feeling of disorientation.
Seek Support Outside the Relationship
Continuing to provide emotional support to each other after a breakup can complicate the healing process. Diversifying your support systems away from your ex can help in unravelling the emotional ties. Seeking emotional support from someone other than your ex is crucial for moving on and processing the breakup. Providing emotional support to your ex can delay the process of acceptance and moving on and can be detrimental to both parties' healing.
Accept Their Future, But Focus on Yours
It’s natural to feel uncomfortable at the thought of your ex moving on and starting a new relationship. However, it’s important to recognise that they will move on, just as you will. Accepting this inevitability can help in finding peace and letting go. Comparing your own progress with your ex's can lead to self-judgment and unnecessary suffering. It's crucial to focus on your own healing and growth, understanding that everyone's journey is unique.
In conclusion, navigating a breakup can be challenging, but embracing these truths can help in the healing process. Understanding that breakups are not about winning or losing, making peace with the lack of closure, respecting each other's space, seeking support outside the relationship, and accepting the inevitability of their future can all contribute to a healthier post-breakup experience. Remember to be kind to yourself, allow yourself to feel and heal, and focus on your own journey of growth and resilience.
Questions for Discussion & Reflection
1. How do you find yourself reacting to the idea that breakups are not a competition with winners and losers? Have you ever felt pressure to "win" the breakup or prove something to your ex?
2. Reflect on the concept of closure in breakups. How do you typically seek closure in your relationships? How does the idea that you may never get closure from a breakup make you feel?
3. How comfortable are you with the idea that you no longer have a right or entitlement to know what your ex is thinking, feeling, or doing after a breakup? Do you agree that accepting this reality can be liberating?
4. Consider the importance of seeking emotional support from sources other than your ex after a breakup. How does this resonate with you based on your past experiences with breakups?
5. How do you feel about the inevitability of both you and your ex moving on after a breakup? Does the idea of your ex moving on sooner or later affect your feelings about the breakup and the relationship?
6. In what ways have societal influences, such as social media and pop culture, shaped your perceptions of breakups and post-breakup behavior? How do these influences impact your emotional responses to a breakup?
7. Reflect on the concept of self-worth and ego in the context of breakups. How has the need to prove oneself or "win" after a breakup influenced your behaviors and emotions?
8. Consider the connection between attachment patterns and seeking information and control after a breakup. How do your attachment patterns influence your desire for oversight and information about your ex post-breakup?
9. How does the idea of providing emotional support to your ex, or receiving emotional support from your ex, after a breakup align with your own experiences? How do you navigate the challenge of setting boundaries in post-breakup interactions?
10. Reflect on the role of self-care and self-compassion in navigating the challenges of a breakup. In what ways do you prioritize your own well-being and healing during this difficult time?
Remember, the reflection process is a personal journey and it's okay to take the time to answer these questions at your own pace.
FURTHER LINKS & RESOURCES:
Save $150 on my Higher Love break-up course with the code PHOENIX
Follow me on Instagram: @stephanie__rigg & @onattachment
You might also like…
Episode Transcript
[00:00:04]:
In today's episode, we are talking all about breakups and specifically five hard but liberating truths about breakups. So breakups are one of those areas. It's sort of in the top three things that I get asked about, and understandably so, given that a breakup is obviously one of those potentially really cataclysmic events in our lives and in our relationships, and it can be really disorienting and it can really throw us off centre and make us question and doubt so many things, both within ourselves, within our perception, our experience, our relationships with others. And it can really rock our confidence and our sense of certainty about the future. So many things about a breakup can really throw us into a sense of disarray, and I think the grief of that experience is really profound and really important to honour. And I'm a big advocate of really leaning into the grief that a breakup will bring rather than trying to quickly rush through it or bypass it or numb it out or avoid it.
[00:01:39]:
But in today's episode, I'm hoping to give you some frank and pragmatic advice, always delivered with love and care. But I think that there can be so much noise on social media and in pop culture around breakups, and much of it is really unhelpful. And it's probably going to send you in a direction that will keep you stuck is probably the best way of putting it. And keeping you in a mindset that's maybe not mature, not adaptive, not really focused on your growth and your healing and you learning the lessons of your breakup. Because I do think that all breakups bring with them really powerful lessons about ourselves and are an opportunity to deepen in that relationship and to really clarify who we want to be and what's important to us and what our values are and maybe the mistakes that we made and how we can do better next time. So what we're going to be talking about today is all of that and more. But before I dive into that, I just wanted to let you know that if you are going through a breakup at the moment, or you have been through one recently and you're struggling with that, I have a free, guided meditation on finding closure and letting go, which you can download on my website, which we'll link in the show notes. It's a really beautiful meditation.
[00:02:57]:
I think about 5000 people or more have downloaded it over the past maybe 18 months. So it's really very popular and always gets great feedback. So if that's something that sounds helpful to you, definitely go and cheque it out and let me know what you think. Okay, so let's dive into this conversation around five hard but liberating truths around breakups. So the first one that I want to offer you is that breakups are not a competition with a winner and a loser. So please stop seeing them that way and stop competing with your ex to try and come out on top or emerge as the victor of your breakup. This is so, again, I think, really deeply entrenched as a result of kind of basic content, to put it bluntly, on Instagram, TikTok in rom coms, this sense of needing to win, needing to get revenge, needing to prove your ex wrong by having some makeover and making them regret the relationship ending like they'll never know what they missed, that kind of thing. I really don't think that that is helpful at all because it keeps you in this mindset of needing to figure out where your worth sits relative to your ex, based on who is doing well, whatever that means, versus who's having a hard time.
[00:04:22]:
And I think what inevitably happens here is you end up feeling like you shouldn't feel sad or you shouldn't feel lonely, or you shouldn't miss them. That all of those feelings are in some way wrong and they turn you into a loser, they make you pathetic, they make you desperate, when really they're absolutely normal experiences to go through after a relationship ends. And that doesn't mean that there's anything wrong with you or that they have come out on top and you are somehow left behind. I really think that that kind of mindset only contributes to us feeling broken or shaming ourselves after a breakup. And even if it's the other way around, even if you convince yourself that you are the winner, so to speak, that you are better than them, that it's their loss, that whole mindset is just really, I think, steeped in ego. And it's a sense of like, if I can convince myself that it's their loss and I never love them anyway and I'm going to go on a diet and get a makeover, and they'll regret the day that they ever thought that they could break up with me, that kind of mentality, I don't think that you are actually addressing what is going on for you. And I think that that is almost always coming from ego, which is cloaked over really low self worth. And I think that the person who is in touch with themselves, who is emotionally mature, who is really tending to their experience, doesn't go into that trap because they know that it's messier than that.
[00:06:00]:
It's more nuanced than that. It's not some binary thing, it's not a competition. So if you find yourself getting sucked into that kind of mindset of needing to win or needing to come out on top in some way, needing to prove something with your breakup, I'd really encourage you to try and let go of that and just redirect the attention back to you, not you relative to them, but just you, to really nourishing yourself, to taking good care of yourself, to yes, becoming the best version of yourself going forward and really learning the lessons of your breakup. Integrating all of that. Absolutely. But not with a view to making your ex regretful jealous, any of those things. It's not about them anymore, it's about you. Okay, so the next hard but liberating truth about breakups is you may never get closure from them.
[00:06:53]:
Now, I've spoken about this many times before, and it is such a challenging place to be in. It's a real bind, because often when we are left needing closure or feeling this need for closure, when everything feels very unresolved, when perhaps we've been blindsided, we really didn't see something coming. Maybe someone's behaviour was very inconsistent. One week they were saying they loved us and they couldn't wait to spend their lives with us. And the next week they've totally had a change of heart and they have ended the relationship. Of course you want answers, of course you want an explanation, of course you want to make that make sense so that you can feel an internal sense of resolution. All of that is so normal, natural, human. And at the same time, I think we have to get really honest with ourselves and really realistic about a person's capacity to provide us with a cogent explanation.
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When clearly their behaviour indicates that they don't really know how they feel, what they want, when they don't have that internal sense of cohesiveness in their own emotions or thoughts or desires. And when we outsource our own sense of whether or not we can move on, when we place that power in someone else's hands, we're putting ourselves in a really vulnerable position and a really disempowered one because there's a good chance that the person who left you feeling that way so desperately in need of answers and in need of closure, who may not have had the emotional capacity to communicate clearly and respectfully and honestly and with a level of self awareness, it's unlikely that they're going to suddenly show up having developed that capacity after the breakup, when frankly, they no longer owe you that because you're not in a relationship anymore. And it's hard to force the hand of someone who doesn't want to show up in that way or doesn't have the capacity to show up in that way, particularly when you're no longer in a relationship. So getting really honest with yourself around that and really realistic, and I invite you to reframe closure as something that you get to decide that you make your peace with the not knowing, you make your peace with the way things ended in maybe a confusing way, maybe a way that doesn't make sense and that feels really inconsistent. And just recognising that your closure comes from your decision to accept things as they are, rather than from needing answers from someone that they may or may not ever be willing or able to provide you. As I said, that latter approach is really disempowering and will keep you stuck for a very long time. And frankly, I think sometimes we use this idea of closure. I just need to have one more conversation with them.
[00:09:40]:
I just need to see them one more time so that I can get closure. I think we have to be honest about the extent to which we're using that as a reason to keep holding on and hoping that if we can have that one conversation, then we can maybe change their mind, or we can persuade them, or we can coach them back off the ledge if their fear has arisen and has led them to end the relationship, any of those things, at least if we keep the line of communication open, then we might be able to influence them in the direction of what we want. But all of those things are, as I said, I think, keeping us stuck in limbo and in this place that prevents us from really moving on with our lives, try and release the need to wait for closure from them that may or may not ever come. Okay, so the next hard but liberating truth about breakups is that you no longer have any right or entitlement to know what they are thinking, feeling or doing with their time. So this one probably has a few caveats to it. Obviously there are lots of different contexts and circumstances where you might still have intertwined lives for example, if you're living together or you have children and you're co parenting, things like that. But absent those sorts of circumstances, in just a regular breakup, I think something that particularly anxiously attached people can really struggle with is this idea of like, I no longer have oversight over them and I don't really have any right to know because information can feel like such a safety blanket for you if you're someone with anxious attachment patterns. And so the sudden severing of that line of information, of knowing how to reach them, what they're up to, where they're going, what they're doing, feeling like you have no control over that can feel extremely destabilising and can really send you spinning out.
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Because I think a lot of the time your energy is directed towards that sort of monitoring and feeling like you have everything under control and you kind of know what is going on. That's often a way that you create safety for yourself. Whether that's healthy or not is a different conversation, but nevertheless, I think that's really common. And so when a relationship ends and all of a sudden the rug sort of pulled up from underneath you in that respect, it can feel really disorienting. But as with all of these other things, it is just part of the process of a breakup, accepting that that's no longer kind of within your jurisdiction. Often I'll get messages and questions from people saying my ex is going on dates or talking to these people, what do I do? Or my ex won't answer the phone. My ex, how am I meant to know what they're feeling? And I think the simple answer, again, not easy, but simple, is there's nothing for you to do there. It's actually not for you anymore, it's not yours to do anything about.
[00:12:30]:
And of course that brings up its own stuff for you to process. But again, I think there's a theme in all of these truths that I'm sharing with you, is to reorient back to yourself and not yourself relative to them, but to try and consciously, repeatedly and it will be a practise rather than something that comes naturally, but to keep bringing your focus back to what do I need right now? How can I support myself? What am I feeling? Rather than the thing that most of us do, which is when we feel grief, sadness, discomfort, loneliness, fear, is we look outwards and try and find ways to control other people, control our environment, control our relationships, so that we don't have to feel those uncomfortable feelings. But a big part of your growth, whether you're in the context of a breakup or otherwise is learning to just be with those things within yourself and increasing your tolerance for that and your resilience. So, recognising that you don't have jurisdiction over your partner anymore, that you don't get to know necessarily what they're doing, what they're thinking, what they're feeling, and that you can't force them to have another conversation with you, to answer your calls, to want to see you, all of that stuff, again, is not really within your right or entitlement once the relationship ends. Now, of course, again, if a relationship ends amicably and you're both open to that, that's totally fine. But that's not really the situation I'm speaking to there. And I suspect that if you're in that situation, you may not be struggling with the fallout of a breakup quite so much as others who are having a bit more of a severance of all contact in the relationship. Okay, so the next hard but liberating truth is that it is very rarely a good idea for you to provide emotional support to one another as you process the breakup.
[00:14:22]:
Meaning, if you are supporting each other through that period and you are calling each other and crying and processing and really leaning on each other, when you're feeling grief, when you're feeling sadness, when you're feeling loss and loneliness and all of those things, if they're still your comfort person and your go to emotional support person, that's really going to muddy the waters in almost all cases. Now, of course, as with all of these things, there will be exceptions. But I think a lot of the time when we expect the person who we've just ended the relationship with to be our emotional crutch, it's going to be very, very hard for you to actually come to terms with the fact that the relationships ended. This is why things like no contact periods can be really helpful, is because we sort of need a period of separation and space in order that we can process the fact that we are no longer in a relationship with this person. Because even though you might know that consciously, cognitively, your deeper parts of you, your nervous system, your attachment system, all of that that's really accustomed to being connected to this person needs a chance to recalibrate and to recognise that that's no longer the case. And so diversifying your support systems away from one another is really important. It's really not healthy or adaptive, as I said, in most cases, for you to be leaning heavily on each other as the support while you're trying to unravel the relationship and disentangle yourselves emotionally from one another. I do think that that will ultimately make things more complicated because you're just kicking the can down the road, delaying the inevitable and in so doing, delaying the need to move on, which then means that you're putting the rest of your life on hold and your next chapter on hold.
[00:16:14]:
So I think, in most cases, really try and seek emotional support in processing the breakup from someone other than your ex. And don't put it upon yourself to be that person for them. Again, I get a lot of questions from people saying my ex is really depressed or they're really struggling after the breakup, and I feel so guilty. What do I do? Of course, it's not about being cold or callous, but ultimately, that's not your responsibility to manage their emotional experience post breakup. And it's in both of your best interests for them to find another resource, another person, another form of support that isn't you, because that's just the reality that that's not going to be you anymore, and they're not going to be that for you anymore, at least in the short term. So coming to terms with that, and really, as much as it might be uncomfortable or challenging, knowing that that's probably what's best for both of you. Okay. And the fifth and final one is that sooner or later, they will move on and so will you.
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So I think that the idea of our ex being with someone new, dating someone new, sleeping with someone new, loving someone else, can range from mildly uncomfortable or icky. We can just feel a bit, oh, I don't really want to think about that all the way to. I can't even bear the thought. It makes me feel sick to my stomach. Totally intolerable. Right? I think there's a whole spectrum between those extremes. But either way, I do think that for most of us, there is some discomfort, at least around those thoughts. And yet it is inevitable, right? Unless you obviously get back together soon after breaking up, that if the relationship has really ended, then they will move on with their lives and you will move on with your life, too, even if that feels so far away right now and so out of reach, and you can't imagine being in that headspace or having any sort of interest or openness to being with someone else.
[00:18:05]:
That's part of life, and that's what's going to happen, and it doesn't have to mean anything. Right? I think so many people fall into the trap of, oh, my ex has moved on more quickly than I have. Does that mean they never cared about me, didn't love me. What's this new person got that I don't have? Again, going back into that mindset of comparison and competition that inevitably leaves us feeling worse. Just recognising that it will happen and that's okay. And that might feel like you're making progress and it's been a few months and then you find out that you're exit dating someone new and all of a sudden you experience this big whiplash and you're right back where you were, right in the depths of all of those post breakup feelings. Again, totally normal. So just preparing ourselves for that and managing our expectations rather than panicking, making that mean anything about us or about the relationship.
[00:18:58]:
Or they didn't really care about the relationship because they're now dating someone new, or they said that they didn't want to get married. And then two years later I find out that they are engaged to someone else. Why? What was wrong with me? All of that stuff, I think, just gets us into such a dark place and leaves us feeling so broken and unworthy and really judging ourselves. And I don't think that that is at all in any way healthy or supportive of what you really need. So again, just releasing the need to monitor them, to control them, to keep tabs on what they're doing or how their life is progressing and just coming to terms with the fact finding, acceptance for the fact that as you will move on, so too will they. And that might happen on a different timeline. And that's okay as well. It's not about you anymore.
[00:19:54]:
And so I think the sooner we can accept that, of course that will happen sooner or later, then the sooner we will find our peace with that and realise that it's not about us and it's not for us to focus on or obsess over. Okay, so that was five hard, but hopefully liberating truths about breakups. I hope that this has given you some comfort, some clarity, some redirection. If you're going through a breakup and you're feeling a bit like you're spinning around in the whirlpool of all of that complex, dense emotion, just knowing that it is really normal and natural to be feeling those things, you don't have to try and rush through it or get away from it or make it stop. I think the more that we can stay with those emotions and those experiences, as uncomfortable as they can be, the quicker we get through them. Ironically enough, it's in resisting them and trying to block them or make them go away, that we actually end up obsessing in the story of it and obsessing over what our ex is doing and obsessing over everything that happened and that actually protracts the whole experience. It prolongs the whole experience in a way that tends to exacerbate our suffering. So be really kind to yourself.
[00:21:13]:
As I said at the start, if you've gone through a breakup recently and you'd like an extra resource in your toolkit, definitely check out the free guided meditation on finding closure and letting go that will be linked in the show notes and also relatively easy to find on the freebies page of my website. Sending you so much love. Thank you for joining me and I look forward to seeing you again next time. Thanks guys.
[00:21:39]:
Thanks for joining me for this episode of On Attachment. If you want to go deeper on all things attachment, love and relationships, you can find me on Instagram at @stephanie__rigg or at stephanierigg.com and if you enjoyed this episode, I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review and a five star rating. It really does help so much. Thanks again for being here and I hope to see you again soon.
Keywords from Podcast Episode
attachment, relationships, insecurity, courage, self-reflection, intentions, fear, challenge, gratitude, personal growth, career change, coaching, therapy, psychology, values, alignment, change, transformation, self-discipline, agency, intentional living, new year, self-awareness, inspiration, self-respect, self-worth, agency, restorative, achievement, pride, satisfaction.