102 | Staying in Your Lane

One of the most unproductive things you can do as you’re working to improve your finances is compare yourself to what other lawyers are doing or where you think you “should be” at this stage in life.

It ends up making you feel terrible and ultimately leads to you either giving up on your goals or slowing your progress on your goals unnecessarily.

In this episode, let’s talk about why comparing yourself to others is so unproductive and what it looks like to stay in your own lane.

Topics Discussed

• the chain reaction started by comparing yourself to others or to an arbitrary measure of where you “should be”
• the flaw in trying to keep up with what other people are doing and buying
• an important consideration when you’re comparing your financial progress to someone else’s
• how to stay in your own lane
• the benefit of staying in your own lane
• a more productive way to view what other people have been able to accomplish

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Resources mentioned

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If you’re ready to learn the mindset and strategies to master your money, let’s schedule a call. 

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Email: hello@rhothomas.com

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Lightly Edited Transcript

You’re listening to Wealthyesque. We are a community of lawyers who believe that true wealth is having control of our time. I’m Rho Thomas, and as a busy wife, mom and former Biglaw associate, I know all too well the tension between the culture of the legal profession and pretty much everything else you want to do in life. That’s why each week, I’m bringing you the information and tools you need to improve your money mindset and manage your money to create true wealth. Because ultimately, it’s not about the money. It’s about the freedom and flexibility the money affords.

Hey friend. Welcome back to the show. I hope you’re doing well and having an amazing day so far. So today we are talking about staying in your lane. So often when people start thinking about their finances, they start looking around at what other people are doing and what they should be doing and where they quote should be at this stage in life based on whatever arbitrary rules about what people should be doing with their money and where people should be with their money. And it’s very unproductive. When you start looking at what other people are doing and worrying about where other people are and where you are in relation to some arbitrary measure of what success looks like and where you should be. You spin yourself out. Suddenly, the progress you’ve been making feels like it’s not good enough. You’re so focused on how much you think you haven’t done or how far you think you have to go, that you’re not able to truly see the progress that you’ve already made. And all of those things make you feel terrible. So comparing yourself to other people using arbitrary rules against yourself, diminishing your accomplishments, thinking you don’t measure up, right you start feeling like what you’re doing isn’t working and so what’s the point I might as well just give up might as well quit and ultimately make it not work because you give up when it would have worked if you just kept going. And so I want to talk about this because I see it a lot. It’s super common. So if it’s you no worries, you’re not alone. But this is a huge reason why people don’t make the progress they want to make with their finances, and you don’t even realize it happening sometimes. But while you’re looking at other people and telling yourself that you’re not as far as you should be you make yourself feel bad and end up doing unproductive things that sabotage your progress. Like overspending, like avoiding your finances, or giving up completely not even worrying about it right. So let’s focus on staying in your own lane. How you do that. The main thing is to stop doing those things. Stop comparing yourself to other people or to some idealized standard of where you think you should be. First of all, there is no standard, right? There’s no standard of where anyone should be financially. Any rules you have about where you should be, are literally made up so there’s that don’t use made up rules against yourself to make yourself feel bad or feel like what you’re doing isn’t enough. But second of all, in the case of looking at other people, you have no idea how they’re doing the things they’re doing. So we see people’s highlight reels on social media. And then we want to compare that to our actual lives. Or even if you are seeing these people in real life, right? Like when you see a friend buy a house or get a new car or go shopping or go on a fancy vacation, you still have no idea how they’re doing those things. You don’t know if they got some money from family and that’s why they’re able to buy that house or that car or if they’re going into a bunch of debt to get all the stuff you see. You just have no idea and then you go try to match what they’re doing because you think that’s what you should be doing or what you should be able to do too. And you put yourself behind where you actually want to be financially because you’re gonna give up to someone else or in another example, you might be looking at people’s financial accomplishments and making yourself feel bad because you’re making comparisons that are not apples to apples comparisons. So for example, I got some messages back when my husband and I paid off our student loans last year from people talking about how they’ll never be able to do the same thing and it must be nice and basically downplaying their ability to do what we had done. But we had been working on that for like six years, right? I didn’t get on social media and start really sharing our story in a broader way until we were almost done. We only had a year left in the journey. And I think when you are looking at someone else, and you see that this person is doing something that you want to do before you start thinking you could never do that or thinking that it’s just hopeless for you. It’s useless. I’ve never gonna get there. Think about where they are in their journey in comparison to where you are in yours. So if they are halfway through and you’re at the beginning, or if they’re at the tail end like we were and you’re at the beginning or in the middle, it’s not a fair comparison. So don’t use what other people are doing to tear yourself down or make yourself feel less than using other people’s progress to discount what you’re doing is not productive. When you’re thinking you’re behind what other people are doing or behind where you should be, you’re not going to do the things you need to do with your finances. To get to where you want to be. Right You’re gonna be looking at your finances and making plans to improve them and working that plan until you achieve the results you want. You probably are actually going to avoid the finances because you feel overwhelmed or confused or discouraged. And you think there’s so much to do and you’re so far behind, you don’t know where to start. So you just do nothing and then ultimately you stay behind where you want to be. That’s what I mean by looking at other people being unproductive because as you’re looking at them, you’re not producing what you want to produce in your own finances. Focus on what you’re doing and your goals. Compare yourself to yourself. So where were you with your finances last month last year? If you’re in a better position now than you were then you’ve paid off more debt or you have more in savings or you have more in your investments or you’ve got your spending and control you no longer spending everything you have each month, you feel more confident with your money. All of those things are signs that you’re moving in the right direction. And when you take away that filter of what other people are doing, and compare yourself just to these previous versions of you and saying you’re only then you’ll be motivated to actually achieve the goals you have. Because one of the quickest ways to feel discouraged is to start looking at what other people are doing, you know, hearing yourself and thinking about how you’re not doing enough. There will always be someone who’s further along than you or has more than you and you will always be further along than someone else that have more than someone else. So rather than looking to other people for those markers, of where you should be or what you should be doing. Look at yourself and what you’ve done in the past and what you want to be doing and where you’re going and decide from there how you want to quote your finances. Only look at other people’s stories as proof of what’s possible for you not to beat yourself up or tear yourself down for not being where they are. Stay in your lane. Keep running your race and when you keep going and don’t let yourself get off track looking at other people you’ll find that you feel much more confident and motivated to keep going and you’ll achieve your goals faster. The power of staying in your own lane and staying focused on your own goals is huge. So if you want help doing this as you work to improve your finances, let’s talk about how we can work together you can head to rho thomas.com/call To schedule a consultation. All right, so that’s it for this week’s episode. Come connect with me over on social media. I am most often on LinkedIn rho Thomas and and rho Thomas on Instagram. Subscribe to the show and leave a review but that would help more people to find it. And please think of a friend or two who would find value in this episode and share it with them. As we close out friend I pray that you stop using what other people are doing to diminish your own progress and accomplishments. I pray that you learn to stay in your lane and focus on what you’re doing as you work to achieve your goals. And as always, I pray that you continue to take steps to regain control of your time, build wealth, and live the life of freedom and choice you deserve. Talk to you later.