By Matata Mercy
Have you ever bought something and later found out that it is not what you want but just because you were around your friends and saw each of your friends buying one.
Image credit: weight scale comparison art by Unsplash.
And then you decided to get one for yourself. If you have, then you are not alone,I'm also a victim.
One time I was meeting with some longtime friends of mine whom I had taken long to see and we chose one of the cool restaurants around town as the meeting place to catch up on the past and present events happening in our lives.
When I arrived at the venue, I found the other friends of mine had already taken their seats.
They had even bought drinks on the table. In order for me not to appear as the odd man out, I also bought for myself a drink.
Although this was a small purchase, something that can be ignored the decision to buy that drink didn't actually come from my mind.
I was under the influence of the behaviour of my friends. In simple terms, I could say I was comparing myself to my friends at that moment.
Today, I will write about how comparing ourselves to other people affects our spending habits.
And also what is causing some people out there to compare themselves to others.
1.Social media envy
In this digital age that we live in, there are many people who are sharing their lives on social media like never before.
Some people are even sharing the food they eat for lunch or dinner and the restaurants that they have visited.
Some are posting their latest gadgets like the phones, or watches for all to see.
And for others, it is the new car that they have just bought. Sharing it off in their friend's timelines.
With all this showing off going on, others are feeling envious and wishing that they could live that kind of life. The life full of the cool gadgets and latest cars.
As a result of envy, and in order to fit in the group of the cool guys some people are forced to buy gadgets and the new cars that they do not need.
In the worst case scenario, the things that they cannot afford.
This leads to the life of borrowing money to buy stuff to keep up with the cool guys. This influences our spending habits.
2. Work place comparison
This is not something new, it has existed since time memorial when humans started working.
This idea of work place comparison involves comparing our earnings with others and also the work that we do with the work that others do.
For the case of our earnings, some people wish they could earn more or even equivalent to others.
There is a belief in our society that the more you earn, the more things you are able to purchase.
As a result of this mindset, no amount of money will ever be enough to satisfy our appetite for buying the things that we desire.
It is like for most people, their desires increase as the money in their pocket increase.
In the end, their earnings are equal to their purchases or desires that can be fulfilled by the amount of money in their pockets which is a phenomena called Parkinson's law.
This law states no matter how much money people earn, they will spend all of it and also a little bit more.
The antidote to this would be for us to know that the things we buy are not a true reflection of what we are.
Our true value does not lie in the things we buy or possess but it lies within ourselves and self appreciation and belief.
We can exist in an empty room and still feel okay about it.
3.The perfect home syndrome.
The idea that something called a perfect home exists some where around us has made many spend thousands of valuable money.
With the hope that the money will one day buy it for them.
I know of a friend who looked around his one bedroom apartment, and compared it with that of his other friend, the so called cool neighbourhood, and 8 bathrooms.
That day, he made a decision to shift to a bigger house that has thrown him deep into debt.
Just because of the admiration of the lifestyle of his friend, this man ended up in debt and soon was homeless.
Thank God, he learnt his lessons and today he is living like a minimalist, buying only the things that he needs.
4. Keeping up with the latest trends.
In this world that we are living in today, technology and fashion are setting up new trends almost each and every year.
New kinds of gadgets are released by corporate companies while new fashion trends come up from the fashion brands around the world.
These new gadgets and fashion trends are advertised on televisions and on online platforms and we are convinced to buy the clothes and the gadgets.
Through advertising, these corporate companies make us feel like the things that we currently have are obselete.
The clothes we have are old fashioned and the phones that we have are not good enough.
When in actual sense the the phones still work well and we do not need to buy another.
And the clothes are still good enough and we have enough of them in our closets.
As a result of all this pressure we feel like we exist in the age of dinausours and are out of touch with the world around us.
This kind of feeling makes us buy new gadgets like phones and new clothes making us spend more money on the things we actually do not need.
5. The perfect life syndrome.
When we see our friends and colleagues at work or other people driving expensive cars and having the latest phones in their hands or putting on expensive fashion designs.
Let alone going for luxury vacations.
This might make us believe that these people have the perfect life and have it all easy and okay.
All this makes us wish that we could attain such kind of life.
We are then forced to start spending more money on these luxuries like the new cars, gadgets and clothes.
Hoping that these things will give us the perfect life that we have always desired.
In conclusion, to help us avoid these pitfalls that make us to spend more money, we need to do the following in my own opinion.
1. Understand your triggers.
The number one solution to all this comparison syndrome is to first and foremost, understand what is actually triggering all this feeling within you.
Could it be social media, what you hear from your friends?
Or what you watch on shows that are screened on television or online?
2.Always define success on your own terms.
Ensure that you set personal goals and focus on achieving those goals other than trying to compare yourself to the people around you.
Those goals should be based on your values, aspirations and not the standards that have been set by the society.
3.Learn from others and avoid competition.
When we compare ourselves to other people, we might end up competing with them. And yet on the other side of things, we could learn from them.
Learn how they were able to achieve such success and borrow a leaf from them to help improve ourselves.
Finally , we should learn from the people who are better than us than competing with them.
Good luck.🤠ðŸ¤
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