Live Event - How To Be Free From Comparing & Ego

Okay,

Let me just check if that's recording.

Okay.

So,

Comparison is a thief of joy,

Exactly.

That's it,

It's a thief of joy.

Because here's the thing,

Like,

One thing is one thing is like having pride in yourself,

Having,

Like,

Self-respect,

Dignity.

Like,

Yeah,

This inner knowing that I'm actually great at what I do.

But the other thing is,

Well actually,

Back to this,

This thing is just me versus me.

Just this knowing inside.

But when it becomes like comparing an ego,

It's me comparing to others and saying,

I have to be like this or measure up to this.

That's when it becomes a challenge,

Because it's like,

We are this unique person,

But we're trying to measure up to another unique person.

And I told you I'll tell you some of my background.

So,

I had challenges being accepted.

And it started from a really,

Really young age.

The furthest memory I've been able to kind of go back into is when I was only about,

Like,

Three years old.

And I had this sense of rejection.

I had this sense of I'm rejected from,

By society,

By people.

Because I didn't really fit in.

I didn't really mix with groups.

And people would say all the time to me,

They'll say,

Like even my family,

They'll say,

Everyone else is mixing,

Like,

Why aren't you?

And I took that really personally and hard,

Right?

So,

It developed this belief that I am wrong.

There's something wrong with me.

I'm not mixing.

Everyone else is.

Everyone else is good.

So,

It developed into this,

This thing where I had to prove myself or I had to be like everyone else.

I was constantly looking at others and trying to be like them.

Trying to fit in all my life.

It started from young and then it carried on until school.

I used to see other people and I used to be like,

Yeah,

I've got to be like that.

That person's cool.

So,

I never really had my own identity that I was proud of.

It was like I was chasing this image of what good looks like,

You know?

This idea of what good looks like.

Good looks like what that person's doing.

Good looks like what this is.

And it was just this constant,

Like there was no end to it.

University,

It continued.

Even jobs,

I started working in like corporate jobs.

I wanted to be like that guy.

He's cool.

And that,

Like to some level,

Is okay.

To have people you want to look up to and you want to learn from.

Mentors and things like that.

But I just felt empty inside.

I didn't feel like I had anything to be proud of about me.

Me was actually this combination of things I've pieced together from others and tried,

It's almost like getting different jigsaw pieces from different jigsaws and trying to piece them all together.

Doesn't really work,

Right?

There's no final jigsaw that you have a wonderful,

Beautiful picture from.

That beautiful picture is actually just our own jigsaw.

We get that beautiful picture when we figure out the pieces of us purely inside.

That is beautiful.

But yeah,

I did that for a long time.

And then I really got into things like bodybuilding because I said,

If I get very amazing looking in my body then I will be worth something.

And the thing is,

I didn't know most of this at the time.

I wasn't conscious to it.

Now,

And when I was on my growth journey I became conscious to that.

At the time I didn't realize it.

I just thought I was doing what life was.

I thought,

This is life,

This is life.

You just go and do stuff to feel good and you do like what everyone else is doing or what seems like a good idea based on what everyone else is doing again.

So,

It got really bad because I class myself as having social anxiety.

I don't know,

If anyone has challenges with social anxiety just put yes in the chat.

Because it was general self-worth,

Self-esteem.

That was the root.

That was really what was going on,

Rejection,

Fear of rejection.

But that evolved into social anxiety.

I couldn't be around others because I would sweat,

I would go red and I would just be uncomfortable.

And actually,

It was a fear of being rejected.

It was a fear of being rejected.

The symptoms of social anxiety are this happens.

And that's all I knew.

I knew that and that's it.

I knew,

Okay,

I feel uncomfortable in these things.

So,

This is what I have and that's it.

I molded life around that basically.

I dimmed my light quite a bit.

Taking jobs which allowed me to stay under the radar a little bit.

And not be seen or not put myself at risk.

Because I put everyone else on a pedestal.

And I would just look at others and just think,

They're so cool,

I want to be like that.

So,

The whole comparing thing was just,

It just felt so natural for me.

And like I said,

I thought that's what life is.

I thought this is just how life is.

We look at others,

We compare to others,

We want to beat others,

We want to be better than others.

But the challenge with that is that it's vicious.

Can be vicious actually,

Let's just say.

Because there's no like happy ending.

Where's the happy ending?

Where's the peace?

If there's this external search all the time.

If there's this like me versus you world.

And I think that's the key.

That's really how I got out of that pattern.

When I went inward.

When I really went inward.

Because the me versus you is like,

Hey I am this physical body,

Raj.

And then you guys are these separate physical bodies,

You guys.

And I used to just look at me versus you.

So,

Of course there's comparison.

Because I didn't see anything that we had in common.

And even if I did find things that I had in common with people,

I would still compare.

I remember like just even with my own friends and people I saw online,

I would just look at them and just be,

Get that,

Get this like,

Get this lens on of,

Yeah,

Everything is good for them but they have this problem.

So,

I feel better about that.

And just like this,

This vicious mind came through.

And that's what ego really does.

This ego,

It separates us really.

The part of our mind which I call the intellect,

People might use different words for this,

Its job is to separate things.

So,

I see two colors here.

I see the black and the white.

So,

I can separate them and I can say different colors,

Right?

So,

It's useful.

It's useful for this.

Or I see myself and I see you.

I know that physically I am a different entity to you.

So,

It's useful for this.

If I am walking and I see a lamp post,

I don't want to walk into it,

Do I?

I want to know there is a lamp post here.

I want to have that frame of reference to be able to separate things.

So,

Our mind is good in that sense.

But also what it does is it separates us from people.

It makes us believe so much that we are separate.

And what I have noticed more now is that we have way more things in common than we have that are separate.

And if we put the focus on the things we have in common,

The shared,

You can call this whatever,

The shared space,

The shared consciousness,

The shared energy,

Whatever you want to name this,

Right?

I am not a teacher who is like,

Yeah,

This is exactly what it is.

No,

Whatever serves you best.

But we have this shared thing,

Let's just say.

And that's what I did.

I started focusing on that kind of stuff.

And it began with spiritual practices of yogic techniques.

Not like let me bend myself into a funny shape yoga.

It did start like that.

So,

No judgment by the way,

I am just saying what I did.

It was actually just really inward focused yoga.

Just slowing down,

Slowing,

Slowing,

Slowing,

Slowing down.

Because when we can slow down and really be here,

Just like we did earlier,

Our perspective starts shifting out of the rush that we are in.

And the other thing with this comparing mindset,

Ego,

Is when we slow down,

It's easier to get out of that.

But when we are rushing around and we are frantic and our physical body is frantic and pumped and fired up,

That can come into play because we enter this,

We allow tension to come in to our physical body.

And then,

For example,

If you are hungry,

There is this term called hangry.

If you are hangry,

It's hunger induced anger.

You are going to be seeing things differently.

But it's not just that,

It's collected stress from your day.

It's just things that we have collected and we are in this rush,

This cycle of the day.

When we are more tense,

Then it's harder to see clearly.

It's almost as if I had these glasses on that were colored.

So I'll start seeing everything in how I am feeling.

I am feeling tense,

My body is tense,

So I am going to be tense,

My mind is going to start coloring things in a different way.

I color the world in this way.

Hey,

If someone is going to get in my way at this point,

I am just going to fume at them.

What are they trying to say to me?

Do they think I am stupid?

How dare they?

All of these thoughts start churning up quickly,

Right?

Quickly,

Quickly,

Quickly.

But when we start slowing down,

We have more awareness.

And with awareness,

We can see that look.

Yeah,

I am.

.

.

I don't really care.

I think that's the easiest way for me to say it.

I don't really care.

I am so relaxed and chilled that these things that bother me,

They don't bother me as much.

So that's number one for how to slow down this comparing mindset.

That's the lens of.

.

.

You can call it mindfulness if you want.

You can call it mindfulness,

You can call it presence.

Some people practice or are aligned to certain ways.

You can call it Zen.

You can just call it meditated,

Whatever,

Right?

Slowing down.

I just like to use slowing down most of the time.

If you are slowing down,

That's going to allow you to slow down how you are seeing the world,

Right?

So that's the first thing that I think is useful for this comparisonitis.

How to ease the symptoms,

Let's say.

Number two,

Which I kind of mentioned earlier,

Is realizing that we are more connected than we are separate.

And there's a few ways to do this.

What I did without really knowing what I was doing.

That's why I am on this thing,

Right?

I am sharing all this stuff because I experimented everything.

I spent years and years just playing and trying things,

Learning,

Looking up things,

Researching.

Just years and years.

And that's why I am here,

To share these nuggets that I think are most useful.

So you don't have to spend all this time experimenting,

Right?

But what worked for me was really connecting to things I actually love to do in life.

And not just like in a heady way.

Oh yeah,

I love to play golf.

Why do you love to play golf?

What is it about that?

Oh,

I like to hit the balls.

Well,

Tell me more.

Let's go deeper.

This is the kind of conversation I'll have with someone,

Right?

If I am coaching them.

Tell me more,

What is it about it?

And eventually,

Maybe,

It depends who I am talking to,

We might get to this place where I like to play golf because I am in nature and I am having a good time with my friends.

Why do you like to spend time with these friends?

Because it makes me feel like I am just connected to people.

It's like this shared thing we are doing.

So you see,

If you go deeper on this,

You really figure out the things that light you up inside,

Deeply inside.

Light you up.

Really make you feel good.

Speaking to someone yesterday,

One of my clients,

And she said to me,

I asked her this and she said,

I don't really like meditation and all this stuff,

Raj.

And I said,

Yeah,

You don't have to just go and sit cross-legged and meditate to build this joy inside.

That's one way,

Which I mentioned earlier,

But what else do you like to do?

And she said,

I like kayaking.

And we got into this deep conversation about what kayaking means to her.

And it ended up at this place,

Like she started surface level,

Yeah,

I just like to do it,

It's fun.

I like to move my body,

Yeah,

Yeah,

Yeah.

And I said,

Let's slow down,

Like,

Why?

And she said,

Well,

Really,

After a while,

She said,

It shows me that nature is bigger than me and I have to just stroke and let the water move me.

And I like the fact that kayaks,

You can't really move fast,

So it's one stroke at a time.

And I can feel the boat moving slowly.

I'm just seeing things around me.

I'm not in my head.

I'm just with life.

I'm with something bigger than me.

So you see how that could be impactful to figure out those things for you.

Figure out what lights you up.

How do you know you're alive?

Not just some physical thing,

Oh look,

I've got a pulse.

No,

I mean something deeper than that.

How do you know you're alive?

What lights you up?

It feels like a fire is burning.

That's number two.

The first is slow down.

The second is what lights you up?

What makes you feel alive?

Because when you're doing this,

You start knowing yourself better.

What lights you up?

Not this thing that you have taken because you think it's useful or because someone else is doing it.

You.

Knowing yourself better.

Because then you start doing this stuff.

You just start doing it with complete assurance that this is a good idea,

I like to do this,

This is fun,

This is me.

So you compare less because you're with yourself.

Number three is around the.

.

.

It's again around knowing yourself.

But to a deeper level.

Because what I had to figure out was,

Like I said earlier,

I only knew that I had these symptoms of social anxiety and general anxiety.

I didn't know what it was.

I was just like,

Okay I feel sweaty and I just feel uncomfortable,

I want to get out of here.

So I went and lifted weights and did things that made me feel good temporarily.

Or drank a lot of alcohol temporarily that helped me.

But when I started knowing myself more deeply,

Like what is it that causes these thoughts?

Feeling a rejection I figured out.

So how can I,

And some people go into deep inner child work on this,

But this is the way I look at it.

How can I give myself the thing that I really always wanted?

Like what does it take for me to really parent myself almost?

I like to call it parenting yourself.

Giving yourself what you feel like you lacked.

And what you still feel like you lack.

Because that's where this ego stuff comes in.

It's trying to complete itself.

You see,

It's this feeling of like incompletion.

So I have to look around and everywhere.

I have to compare if someone else is better than me.

Because I am not full.

I am not full.

I have something which is incomplete.

This is just my understanding,

This is my experiences.

And working with clients,

This is my experiences.

But once you figure out like,

What is it that I feel like I'm lacking?

And get to this place of acceptance in the now,

Of the now.

You start getting this like deep inner peace.

And these realizations come through.

These realizations came through for me where I didn't really realize that I was,

I felt so deeply rejected.

And I didn't realize how painful it was.

So I went through these processes of like,

Like tears and things were coming out.

Constant tears were coming out because I was,

It was almost like grieving.

Grieving myself.

But it was growth,

It was a realization that look,

Everything I thought that I was lacking and everything that I thought was wrong about me.

Everyone I thought rejected me.

It's not actually true.

And that's a big one to say,

It's not actually true.

It's just the mind's creation.

What is true is that there is this deep,

Almost,

I like to call it a golden orb sometimes.

It's like a golden orb that's buried underneath sand.

That's us.

The sand is all of our thinking.

All of the thinking is covering it.

The unconscious patterns.

But when you become aware of them,

It's like you can move the sand now.

Look I found this orb and that orb is the me that is alive.

The me that was born without thinking.

Was born just as this source of energy from my parents.

It's almost like getting in touch with that again.

And here's the last thing I want to say about this.

That these thoughts that come up where we start comparing ourselves to others.

What if you didn't have to do anything with them?

Like I said at the beginning.

What if you didn't have to do anything with them and what if you didn't value them?

These thoughts.

And here's the thing,

I still get these thoughts coming up here and there.

They come up saying Raj,

What if this doesn't work out?

Or what if you need to plan better?

What if you need to figure this out?

The intellect working.

And I just realized that it's okay to have these thoughts.

I don't have to believe them.

Because I know that there's this golden orb.

So if I focus on that golden orb,

Which is the real truest part of us.

Some people call that spirit,

Some people say heart.

If I focus on that,

Then that starts expanding.

I like to think of it like,

Imagine you had a really small candle inside you.

And you're just,

You're like feeling that candle.

And you're almost brightening it.

Once you brighten that candle,

You have these thoughts.

But this candle is so much more powerful now.

So you align to this.

And that's basically the summary of my journey.

Which was,

I had this like,

The tiniest candle look like this size.

This is so small.

And it was just finding that first.

And then brightening it up.

And using that power of this candle to find acceptance,

Find love.

Find my own value.

Because when you know your own value,

And this is actually the last thing I'm going to say.

When you know your own value,

When you really are proud of that.

Not from a comparing place.

From a pride place.

A self knowing.

Having this like,

Just this like,

Yeah,

Just this knowing that,

Yeah,

I'm actually,

I've got some things that I'm really good at.

I am OK.

I'm OK.

Once you find that,

Then you actually see others having that in them.

You see everyone as a beautiful orb.

Even if the people are saying these things bad about you.

Even if the person seems like he's annoying you,

He doesn't align with your mental beliefs.

You still find like,

Love for others.

So even if someone is doing something and you think they're better than you.

You start like,

Almost like saying,

Ah,

That's really good for them.

Them being here doesn't mean anything towards me.

It doesn't at all.

It's only a mental projection.

Them being here is actually good for them.

Great.

Like,

That's what's going on for them.

Great.

And if you have that feeling about others,

Then you bring that into yourself.

Because if you judge others,

You're really judging yourself.

So,

And it's hard to mentally do that,

Right?

So that's why I say to brighten this flame.

Once this like,

Heart flame is open,

It just becomes natural for you to love others.

And to not compare.

To just know your worth.

Because that thing inside,

That orb,

That love,

We share with others.

That's the thing we share.

Mind and body,

We don't share that.

That's why,

Of course,

When we look at it from mind and body,

It is comparison.

Because my mind is separate to yours.

My body is separate to yours.

But that's it.

This heart connection is not.

We know that,

Right?

Why else do we feel so nice when we're around certain people?

Why do we want to connect with people?

Why do we feel this warmth when we have something in common with someone?

This like,

Bodily feeling.

Because we're connected,

That's all.

And when you start connecting to that heart,

That thing that you have in common with everyone,

Then comparisonitis basically drops away.

It still comes up.

I'm not trying to tell anyone to get rid of,

Remove.

This is not a surgery.

It's not like that game,

You know,

Operation,

Where you're like trying to put the little thing inside the thing and slowly get it out and then it buzzes you.

This is not an operation to try and remove stuff.

It's brightening up of some of the other part of you.

Yeah,

Thoughts might come,

But this part's brighter.

So it's all good.

This is the part,

This is not something that is elusive and like you have to be a yogi or a zen master to try and feel this.

No,

That doesn't,

That's not true.

Because you're walking down the street,

For example,

You're walking down the street and then you see a family who are just like,

With like three kids and they're just laughing and having fun and they're like playing around with each other.

You smile,

You feel this something inside you,

Right?

So it's natural.

You don't have to be an awakened yogi to experience this.

Or you're walking in nature and you see the trees and the scenery and the birds and you're just like,

Oh,

Beautiful.

That's natural.

It's happening inside you.

That's the same thing I'm talking about.

Or somebody you love is just in pain and they're crying and they need some help.

You feel their pain.

That's natural.

You don't have to be a yogi to do that.

When you come from this place,

More often,

Comparisonitis doesn't exist as much,

Let's say.

Because when you're in love with life,

You see everything is like just nice,

Right?

And the ego is a separation tool.

Ego is me and my thoughts and my psychological perspective versus you,

Versus everyone,

Versus myself,

Versus my parents' beliefs,

Versus all these things that happened earlier.

And it's happening very unconsciously,

So it's a part of our lives.

Psychological world.

But when you enter into heart,

The thing that we already all experience anyway,

Like I said with those examples,

When you expand that,

You're in the existential world.

Spiritual,

You can call it if you want as well.

Whatever.

Whatever you call this.

You know what it is.

There's no need for even names sometimes.

Because naming of terms is a logical way of thinking.

Whereas when it's just a feeling,

A knowing,

An experience,

Then you just know,

Right?

You don't need to name it anything.

So this is the biggest thing I want to share with you around comparisonitis.

Comparing ego,

First slow down.

Slow,

Slow down.

Then you give an opportunity for yourself to be in that heart state.

Slow down.

Use your body.

Your body is an amazing tool.

And this is the thing a lot of people don't talk about.

The fact that we have this body is a tool.

There's a lot of personal development gurus,

A lot of people who are in spirituality,

Zen and yoga.

Well,

They do talk about it,

But I want to just emphasize it.

I want to emphasize that we have this amazing tool as our body to be able to use to help us to slow down.

If we're feeling tension and all that kind of stuff,

Yeah,

Like use this thing to slow down.

And then maybe you can practice the art of meditation to really go there.

Body,

Slow down,

Doing something.

And then heart,

Connect with others.

What are your thoughts guys?

I've been talking for a while and you know how I am.

If you've been to one of my events before,

I go into a flow and I don't have anything planned.

There's nothing in front of me.

I haven't thought about what to say.

It just comes,

It's just flowing.

So if you've been listening so far,

And if you've been here since I've been talking,

Even if you haven't,

Whatever you've heard,

I'd love to know what you've got from this so far.

What was the thing that when you heard it,

You felt like this insight moment,

Something just clicked?

Or what are you still like feeling right now?

I'd love to hear guys.

Yeah,

There's books out there,

There's things we can learn.

And that's information.

It's everywhere,

Right?

Google,

YouTube,

There's information everywhere.

But we want transformation.

Transformation is when we go inside and we absorb the information,

We use it for something.

And we have these realizations,

These like insight moments where we start seeing things differently.

We start just,

We just start knowing without it being heady,

A collection of knowledge.

Instead it becomes like a deeper knowing.

And from that place,

Transformation can happen.

Your body can be involved in this thing.

Like for me,

For example,

It was these reactions,

These physical reactions.

And when these physical reactions occur,

It's very uncomfortable.

So your whole fear response gets kicked off,

Right?

And when you're even comparing against someone,

It's like a real like,

It can be like almost inner anger occurring,

Frustration.

And your body starts listening to that and saying,

Yeah,

He or she is fired up.

So this is a,

This is danger.

Body is saying danger as well.

So it's very convincing.

But like I said before,

We have that.

We can become the master of both of these.

It's like the body is the master,

The mind is the master.

Them two might conspire together.

They might conspire the whole psychological world,

Right?

But what I believe in is that there is the master sits right here in the heart.

Once you take that seat of higher consciousness,

We can call it,

Owning,

Owning all of this,

Then you no longer become a victim to your own systems.

It's almost like if an alarm system in your house started putting shutters down and it didn't let you out of the house.

The alarm system is going against you instead of helping you.

Our body is an alarm system.

The alarm system is triggering,

Is useful for some things,

Right?

Is useful.

Hey,

If I start walking across the road and there's a car coming,

I want my body to react before I can consciously know.

If there's a dangerous tiger around,

I want my body to increase my adrenaline levels so I can run.

So body is useful.

Body is useful.

I guess the point I'm going to end on is that the intellect that is the challenge with all of this is how we take meaning to things.

And if we can change the way we are relating to things,

The meaning we put on things,

Then the thing changes,

The situation changes.

And that can happen in the ways I described.

And when we realize that thought is a thought and we have full control over what we do with that thought,

We're free.

We're free.

The same with the body.

So I'm going to leave it as that,

Guys.