How do we fall into a “Comparison” trap..

Comparison in a relationship is a poison. A slow and deadly poison. Now due to social media, its rate is shooting up. Let’s face the truth.  We check out what other couples are achieving, how successful their relationship is, how happy they are and start feeling low. We start weighing our relationship with those of others. And most of the times our relationship weighs far too less, all we can see is the negatives of our relationship.

How I know this? Because I was in that place. Exactly I did all those things.. Welcome to my world, you are not alone to have such fretful feelings.

Once upon a time, I was addicted to social media. I followed all updates religiously. But most of the time I felt sick after I checked FB or WhatsApp status/dp, or Iinstagram etc. Those were real. No escaping from the reality. Those sweet couples (of course my friends) did seem happy. That used to make me see all  the bad things in my relationship. Why my spouse is not doing those fantastic things like that friend of mine? I felt life is unfair. It spoilt my mood and my day used to be dull and I used to feel lethargic. One day I realized that the root cause was my addiction to social media or so I thought and better not to use it. I deactivated my social media accounts. I totally disappeared from the online world. Yeah, it seemed like I was chained down and my fingers wanted just to open those apps. Next step, I removed apps from my phone as well, in that way the urge would be less.. After a few days it became easy for me. I was successful in abstaining myself from using social media and peeking into other’s private lives.  It felt great and I stopped comparing our relationship……until I started seeing couples in real world!! Of course, I had to meet my colleagues, friends and family. The comparison factor resurfaced. Again I went back to the vicious circle of comparison. What could I do to stop this?

I had to do it long time back when I knew the problem..But as they say it is never too late for correcting the damage. The solution was not keeping myself away from social media. I needed transformation in my mindset. I had to be positive in my relationship and have faith in my partner. He/she is trying his/her best to keep me happy. See all the positives in my relationship. Accept my partner with all the flaws. See where our relationship stands. Every relationship has ups and downs. May be this is the rough time I am going through and all my partner’s and my energy is going to fix things up and not having great time as such. But it wont remain same and I will get to have my share of enjoyment/ happiness. I need to understand this and inject it into my blood stream. Moreover, patience is the key.

It was difficult for me initially. I was still falling in the trap. But I got better each time I was falling in the trap and as soon as I got the hint, I started recalling all the positives of our relation. I have improved a lot ever since.

So, do I ever compare our relationship with other couples? A simple answer is yes… sometimes..What do I do then? I try to keep myself positive and smile at all the good times we had in past. If it doesn’t work then I just see the negatives in others relationship. [oh that’s a bitchy way], but it works as a last and final weapon.

I just mentioned above that “Stay positive”, but did not tell much. So I would be coming up with another piece of article soon with “How to stay positive in a relationship”.

I would like to know if you ever had such an unyielding trap and how did you feel about yourself when you went through that phase. I am keen to hear it from you. Please leave your opinion in comments section below.