Why Knowing What Demotivates You Is Key To Success

One of my biggest demotivators is being compared to someone else. 

I suspect it's because I'm an eldest child and growing up I didn't have to worry about my performance. 

Because I’m the eldest, my siblings always had to play catchup to me and my accomplishments and my grades, so that was never an issue. 

But, sometimes teachers would compare my performance to other students. And sometimes at work, my performance or my team’s performance would be compared to other teams. 

And my reaction? Rage. 

Not exactly the driving force that the comparison was probably supposed to evoke. 

My rage is destructive, especially to my own performance, mostly because it leads to resentment. 

The resentment actually hinders my performance, because my thought process goes: I’ve done this. 

You compared me (unfairly) to someone else. You don’t appreciate what I’ve done anyway. 

So what happens next? I don’t perform. 

Post-comparison, I do even worse. 

My destructive mindset is usually (though not so coherently): 

You thought that person was great. Well, go and have that person then. I’m not going to be like that for you. 

Long story short, I’ve had to learn how to channel that rage and resentment positively. I don’t mind criticism, especially if it’ll help me grow. 

So I’ve had to consciously remove the feelings or reaction of anger, and instead see any comparison as a criticism that can help me grow. With that, I can become a better person.