Why You Can't Stop Comparing Yourself

0:00Hey, it's a massive week for High Performance and we have a special bonus episode dropping this Friday with Richard Hammond. Make sure you hit follow.

0:10Hi there, welcome along to another episode of High Performance with myself and Damian Hughes. How are you, Jake? I'm good, mate. Yourself? Very good, thank you. I've really been enjoying these Wednesday episodes. They're a little bit shorter, they force us to think a little bit and I was listening to one actually a couple of days ago with my mum and dad in the car. They've just moved house and I was driving them to their new house. My mum was like, oh, aren't these eclectic? And I think what she means by that is, don't we hear from lots of different guests? So we thought we would do another one today.

0:40And the topic that we've come up with, because we hear about this so much from our audience, people listening to this, people watching this right now, is that people struggle with comparison culture, with sharing their real world, with comparing their real world to the worlds of other people. So we've got some cool clips. Dina Asher-Smith, the athlete, she's going to talk about her approach to competing against people by deliberately avoiding watching them. Alex Albon, the Formula 1 driver, is going to tell us what it's actually like to be measured against someone because his life is literally, here's how you compare to your teammate.

1:13We're also going to hear from Nick Cox, the former head of the Manchester United youth setup. Really interesting guy. He's now a technical director at Everton. He is, yeah. Which is an amazing job. and doing a really good job there. And also Phil Heath, Mr. Olympia, bodybuilder extraordinaire, will share the advice to his teenage self. And you've got a bit of research as well. Don't share it yet. Go on. But this is interesting. It's about medals that people win and the way it impacts them, isn't it? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Counterfactual thinking. We'll explore it in more detail. If only I knew what that meant.

1:45Well, look, welcome along to the episode. If this resonates with you, if you enjoy it, please send us a message. Tell us what you're struggling with when it comes to comparison culture. Explain to us the things that you do to avoid comparing yourself to other people, the things that make you happy, the things that you're struggling with. Because the more that you listen to this, can leave comments on Spotify or Apple or on YouTube, wherever you're enjoying this, then the more it helps other people in the high-performance community. So how about a bit of vulnerability to start with? Go on. Is there someone that you compare yourself to and you can't help it?

2:20Oh, that's a good one.

2:21Jake Humphrey: um so i'm one of four children so growing up um as a kid it was you weren't compared to but we were all at the same stage together and so that idea of competition i think it was knocked out me a little bit like i think my mom and dad always made clear that you lift each other up you don't compete against each other when that instinct came in so from a family point of view i've been really like I've never really had that sense of comparison with the people closest to me I think I've met people in the past that have triggered me though people that have sort of aroused it and and I'll tell you what does it for me when people um sort of suggest that in a competition that I didn't know was happening so do you remember over the summer me and you met somebody and we found out that they'd been uh comparing themselves to us to other people telling them that they were better than us at what we did.

3:19Jake Humphrey: And I found that really quite difficult to manage that. Really? Because that's just their hang-up, not yours. Yeah, yeah. But it was more like a competitive instinct then. I didn't realise... You hate unfairness as well, don't you? You don't like them having those conversations behind your back. Yeah. Yeah, there was that bit about that lack of authenticity because they were being really nice to our face and then we find out that they weren't being so generous behind our backs. So that bothered me. but it was almost the idea that I didn't think we were in competition. I thought we were helping each other.

3:50Jake Humphrey: And then to find out that somebody was doing that, I found that really triggering. So that's when I really especially struggle. Don't judge others by your own standards. I don't even think it was that. It was more the idea that I then thought, oh, if we're in a competition, that's different. Yeah, let's go. But I didn't like myself for doing that. I'll tell you a daft story. I remember years ago when the kids were little and they started at school. My wife sort of signed me up to help out at the school fair. And I thought I was going along and putting tables and chairs out and things like that.

4:24So I turned up and the organisers of the school fair said,

4:28Jake Humphrey: oh, we've got a penalty shootout competition. Would you mind supervising it? And I was like, yeah, sure. What do you want me to do? And they went, well, we need you to go in goal. So you just stand in goal, give the tickets to the kids and then they get a prize. So I was like, yeah, fine. So I stood in goal and I was jumping out of the way and letting the kid score. And then this one fellow turned up and he gave me a book of 30 tickets. And I was like, you only need one ticket, mate. He's like, no, no, I bought 30 tickets for my son. So there was already a queue building up. So I was like, okay, fine.

4:59Jake Humphrey: And then his son took the first penalty. I jumped out of the way, let him score. And then this guy called his son over to him and said, this guy's really weak on his left hand side. Drilled the next shot there. And he was sort of coaching his son how best to score against me. How weird. Well, it was weird, but what I was ashamed of was my reaction. Because as soon as I heard he did that, I went, I'm not going to let your son score again. And I became like prime Peter Schmeichel. Stopped everything. And it was after it was over, I was so ashamed of myself that I'd been dragged into a comparison culture that I hadn't wanted.

5:36Jake Humphrey: And I had to say to my wife, I said, please don't ever put me forward. I can't be trusted, a man, competitive parents. yeah i hated i absolutely hated it uh so i mean it doesn't reflect well on me but it was an example where i try and avoid being in those situations where i know i'm going to be triggered go on that's a long answer but what about you i um i don't have big issues in my personal life like i'm so happy and stable with where i am as a person personally right no friends no other families, no like local people. I don't like what you just mentioned. I don't like the ultra competitive sports parents.

6:16Jake Humphrey: Yeah. But it also doesn't bother me because that's their, that's their world. It's probably their upbringing. Those are their hangups. I laugh at that because A, there's no such thing as an elite 10 year old. So what are you getting your knickers in a twist about? B, my son and daughter and your son and daughter, they're never going to be a professional sports person. So just let them enjoy it. Because what kills people in sport at a young age is a lack of enjoyment so i don't have comparison culture on a personal level i've never have professionally everywhere i bloody look you know like i want high performance to be bigger than joe rogan experience and diary v ceo and i'm envious that those shows are bigger um i'm envious of laura woods who replaced me on bt sport to present their champions league coverage because there's a part of me that would still love to be a presenter on there we'll be right back after a quick word from our partners

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9:44But we'll talk about this. And obviously we're having this conversation because a lot of people struggle with it. I don't have a huge issue with that. I think that that for me is an energy source. It's a mark on the map. um it's i'm envious because it's something that i want it's not jealousy it's envy and i and i definitely compare myself i compare what we're doing as a team the numbers that we get the success we have but i think it's also great from an energy perspective for me and uh and i kind of let's just keep going okay you know we've been going for seven years on this podcast and my energy is greater than ever before yeah because i see what other people have done and i love the phrase as you know their success is our success if they can do it we can do it yeah so i actually before we get into this conversation i have a real i have quite a positive vibe around this but i also know that it can be really damaging to people and can really derail them which is i think what we're

10:36Jake Humphrey: going to get into well let me give you like an example then where i think we've got two contrasting views that i remember once you telling me about um you had to keep an eye on what was being said when you were working on TNT. Oh yeah, yeah, BT Sport, yeah. Yeah, sorry. What, the comment, the online comments? The online comments, because not because you needed to see them, but you knew that the decision makers were going to see them. And you were really sanguine about it of that's the way it is and I just need to be aware of it. Whereas to me, I remember thinking, that sounds really, I think I would really struggle of being in that world.

11:14Jake Humphrey: So how did you uncouple that? Well, not uncouple it because you never had it, but how did you perceive that? Whereas I would have found it really difficult. I mean, my take on the, because that is actually also comparison culture. Yeah. That's, you know, the only reason why someone is angry with someone, and I still get it now. I put up some video about mindset or mental health or helping people or optimist, and it would just get like, there's one, well I can't even remember the name there's like a podcast that like basically just takes the piss out of everyone and they all share the videos on Twitter or X purposefully because they know that that's the kind that's the kind of audience that will have a pile on almost like they're just trying to encourage a pile on they don't even put a comment they just put it up and they're like oh look at this bellend and it's like that that sort of hurts a bit because it's people in the same industry that just think it's great to be pulling other people down when you're trying your best to bring value and be useful.

12:13And also a lot of the stuff I do is opening up, talking about mental health, talking about the challenges of life. I'll be really in a place where guys are still tearing other guys down for talking about those kinds of things. Maybe some people are, there they are. So that for me was always their problem. They're the ones with the issue. They're the ones that are inferior. They're the ones that are being triggered. I'm not being triggered by anyone. I genuinely, I'm not. I'm being inspired by people but not triggered. That's how I feel. Should we get into a couple of clips? Yeah, go on. Because one of the things that is really interesting for me is how I definitely used to think that successful people don't struggle with any of this stuff.

12:52But what we're about to do is hear from a number of people that are at the absolute top of their tree and they still struggle with comparison culture, inferiority complex, comparing their real life to other people's highlights reels. Even if they have taken the steps to mitigate against it, they've only taken the steps to mitigate against it Because it was a struggle, right? You know, we don't solve problems that aren't problems. So I want to start with Dina Asher Smith, who, she was so interesting. She kind of talked to us about the fact that you see a picture, you see something online, you see a video, and immediately you're like, why is that not me?

13:29Why do I not look like that? Why don't I achieve the things that they achieve? So let's have a listen to the things that Dina Asher Smith does to kind of protect her mental health and protect her self-esteem as well. Here she is, you know, arguably one of the greatest athletes this country has ever produced, still comparing herself to other people. Dina Asher Smith. I actively try and limit what I take in. I actively try and control whether it's good or good or bad. And that also comes into track because I don't need to be seeing the people that I'm racing, what they're doing in training. Like, why do I need to know what the girls that I'm racing is doing in December?

14:03Like, I like them, so I'm not going to cause a feud and unfollow them. but I don't need to see it like and especially as December we don't race in December we race in August so I don't need to know what you're doing until like eight nine months time so why do I need a constant feed of what they're doing what their physique's looking like I don't need that for my own kind of self-belief self-confidence we all move at different paces uh track and field is we're all unique and it's a sport where you can 100 % be yourself and people just line you up and see on what day which self is the best. It's about making it work for you and yeah there's no point comparing because we're all different.

14:46Jake Humphrey: What Dean has described brilliantly there was almost validated in a piece of research back in 2011 by Alexander Jordan and Carol Dweck, two psychologists at Stanford University. I'll just read the name of the paper that they produced. It was called Misery Has More Company Than People Think, underestimating the prevalence of others' negative emotions. And the conclusion of the paper was that we often underestimate other people's struggle. And the people that do that underestimation the most have actually proven to be the loneliest because we always assume that you don't have the same issues I do.

15:20Jake Humphrey: You've not had to go through the challenges I've gone. You've not had the luck that I've had to contend with. so we're isolating ourselves even more when we can't appreciate other people and their struggle I mean what's that lovely phrase that you introduced us to that lovely word sonder tell us about that so sonder is understanding everyone's in 3d you know we live our lives seeing our own life in 3d everyone else's life in 2d and because we don't see their life in 3d we don't think about their struggles their challenges their doubts their setbacks we assume that we're the only one dealing with all of the thoughts in our head.

15:57And, you know, it's the root of all mental health problems, really, is this sense of loneliness, this belief that we're the only ones fighting it. And let me play you something that I was once sent. Because when you talk about the fact that we don't take into account other people's struggles, I think we've already spoken about some of the shit that still gets flung my way. Have a listen to this. Hi, sweetie. It's Mum here. I've just been browsing Twitter see what's going on in the world or in your world you've got loads of horrible messages are you okay? is it you know is there anything we can do or say?

16:34Jake Humphrey: speak soon bye you know the bit that gets me on that whenever I've heard it is your mum saying is there anything we can do? yeah because that's like the love of a mum and dad that wouldn't that thing whatever like they must just have felt powerless and how can we fix this for you? It breaks me out when I hear Liz talk like that. You're right. And look, mum, if your son presents football programmes or hosts podcasts, don't go on social media, is the number one thing. But also, it's a reminder to people that, you know, we've spoken about some other people that like to fling stuff my way. You will just assume, oh, that guy.

17:09I hear the word smug or read the word smug written a lot and it's like, you've got no idea. Like, I'm just doing my best to pay the mortgage, feed the kids, cover the bills, build a business, spread some good, look after people. But all of that still comes with self-doubt, lack of confidence, a belief that you're not good enough, a comparison culture, a fear you're about to be found out, a lot of work, quite a lot of exhaustion, quite a lot of stress, the stakes are high. But when you do this job, whether it's sitting on a podcast or whether it's standing in a TV studio, what are you employed to be?

17:44fucking confident. You're employed to ask the questions, to look like you know what you're talking about, to have a stride in your step, to command the screen. So what does that make people think? Oh, you're smug. Oh, you're a bit self-confident. You're a bit self-assured. You're literally paid to be self-assured because you've got pundits that have never done TV before or guests who've never been on a podcast. You're trying to carry them through. You're trying to be the confident one. So you create that, then you get criticism for it. And I think it's a really great reminder that while we're all sitting, comparing ourselves to other people, it's not doing us any favours and it's not doing them any favours.

18:21They are struggling more than we think. And therefore, we are only looking at the great moments in their life. And if you see someone and you think, well, I want their business or I want their career or I want their car or I want their house, you can't just have one bit of their life. You have to have the whole lot. So you want to give up your kids and your husband or your wife or your parents or your holidays or your house? you want to give everything up you can't just have the good bits that other people have in their lives because what gets you the good bits are the bad bits yeah yeah i think the other message for people if you're listening to this and comparison culture is someone that you're struggling with and by the way if this conversation resonates or is helpful please let us know please ping a note in the comments or um share this conversation with someone you might think it's helpful for but the reason why so many people need to solve their problem with comparison culture is because it's not just about comparing what other people have got it's also another way of saying that what you've got isn't good enough yeah so here is nick cox who you said is now technical director at everton former head of the academy at manchester united he spoke brilliantly about this helping us understand more that what we're not actually saying is i want what they've got what we're actually saying is i don't want what i've got which is like the saddest thing imaginable here's nick cox comparison is a it cripples parents comparing your child to other people's children is a is a no-no because you can only ever be disappointed right so i've got a lovely back garden my neighbor's got a bigger one doesn't mean my garden is not nice right so if you compare to other people there'll always always be someone who's got a bit more than you and you're left disappointed so in terms of trying to support young people you can only look at the individual their journey and the progress that they're making so i mean again i think nick's got a voice there

20:17Jake Humphrey: for late night radio but i think his wisdom's great and again i just want to share some stuff where it's validated by plenty of pretty robust research on this there's a study that was done at Warwick University by Chris Boyce and Gordon Brown, who found that what matters most, if you compare and say your income, it's ranking it against people like you, with those above you counting more than those below you. So as Chris Boyce put it in the paper, a million, if you make a million pounds a year, it doesn't make you happy if all you make is making two million pounds a year. This is that counterfactual thinking.

20:52Jake Humphrey: There's other research that's been done where athletes that win a silver medal tend to be less happier than athletes that win a bronze medal. Now you think, well, why? Because silver's better than bronze in terms of you came second rather than third. But it's a counterfactual thinking. If you're a silver athlete, you're looking at gold thinking, I could have won that. If you're a bronze athlete, you're looking down and going, I could have finished fourth and not have any medal. We'll be right back after a quick word from our partners. Hey, it's Jay Comfrey here from the High Performance Podcast.

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23:23Jake Humphrey: so that counterfactual thinking is happening all the time around us so making sure that we curate our inner circle well enough so that we're surrounded by people that we don't feel that jealousy towards but maybe that envy of how can i get that how can you help me progress yeah i like the idea as well of curating you in a circle we'll give some hopefully some tips at the end of this conversation about how people can deal better with comparison culture but i think surrounding yourself with people that tell you you're enough is really important but i think we also have to be kind to ourselves and remember that you know there's a reason why we started living in caves and smashing nuts on rocks for our meals and now we're living in metropolises and we're using ai to design pictures is because we have a desire to be better all the time and i'd like to pull up a clip from rich osmond because i think he was really good on this he kind of came on the show and said like, well I'll let him say it really, like we're all flawed.

24:17Here is the amazing Richard Osman explaining why if you're struggling with comparison culture you need to remember to be kind to yourself. You know we're all flawed, none of us live up to the thing that we think we should be and the things that we're naturally good at we dismiss because we think well yeah but of course I can do that and the things that we're bad at are the things that we obsess about because you think well other people can do it and I can't do it and you think you need to get that balance. I always like that quote that you know we judge our we judge other people's highlights real and we judge our blooper real you know we're looking at what other people are good at and we're looking at what we're bad at and you just you don't need to it's really interesting that isn't it and i've often felt like we all want to achieve great things in life and the moment that we achieve that great thing we give ourselves no pats on the back or no time to enjoy it because suddenly something bigger is more appealing.

25:14And the thing that we've just achieved that we've worked so hard to achieve is suddenly a distraction from the bigger thing. So that constant need to be more, of course, leads to a comparison culture. And we've spoken at the beginning that there is value to that because, you know, I disagree slightly with Dina Asher Smith, right? She doesn't look at what her fellow athletes are doing. Why does it matter? Well, I think it does. Like, I love to see what other people in my space are doing. How are people parenting? How are people producing content? How are people running businesses? How are people working out in the gym?

25:44How do we get better if we don't look at someone on Instagram with a banging six-pack and ask ourselves, what exercises did they do to get that six-pack? That's development. But I also think along the way, we have to remind ourselves of all the things that we are good at. I think comparison culture, along with a lack of self-love, is really dangerous. I think a comparison culture, but then reminding ourselves, well, I'm also enough. I'd love what they've got, but what I have is cool, I think is important. It's all about balance. I think it's not healthy to not look at what other people have got and want it.

26:21It's also not healthy to only want what other people have, you know? Yeah, yeah.

26:25Jake Humphrey: I like that. I was recently talking to some coaches of a sports team on this and we were talking about pressure moments. And the point I was making to them was I was sharing the research from Angela Duckworth, the psychologist, that did a study on what she calls copy and paste thinking. So what I was suggesting to the coaches was, go and find the person that's really good at that skill of coping under pressure that's already there in your team and there was a couple of standouts. Go and explore with them. Go and ask them, what are you doing? How are you doing this? Tell us and share it. So copy and paste there with them.

27:05So instead of sitting in the shadows, feeling angry that they've achieved something that you want and allowing comparison culture to eat you up, you can see the person that's in a place where you want to be and then take some action to find out how you can get there. So turn your frustration into a behaviour.

27:22Jake Humphrey: Yeah, definitely. And then go and pick their brains. Go and ask them, would you give me some advice? What are you doing in that moment? How could I do that? And Angela Duckworth's research says that people can make like quantum leaps of improvement by using that copy paste why would you want to try and explore your own way when somebody's already solved the problem for you and your job is simply just to go and ask them how did you solve that problem i'll tell you actually who spoke about this really well on the podcast was marcus waring a celebrated chef at the end when we asked him drummer he said what's your what's your golden rule for living a high performance life should we hear what he said yeah and um your final message for people that are listening to this or watching it on YouTube is your one golden rule to living a high-performance life.

28:06I suppose in many ways, what's the final message you'd like to leave ringing in the ears of the people that have tuned into this episode? I think you have to be reflective of what you want in life and set the goals that you know that you can reach, that you know you're going to have to work hard to get to. I think it's really important that you don't dream too much and that you have to be realistic about your own individual capabilities and do not be distracted by one of the biggest distractions that we all have. It's in our hands. It's called an iPhone. That is the dangerous thing to have because that thing there shows you more than you need to know.

28:44And it's the biggest distraction. And I think we have to be very careful that you need to stay focused on you as an individual and focus on your own goals and stop worrying about what everyone else is doing. Other smartphones are available. But this is, I mean, this is really the crux of this whole conversation. I think that's the reason for a conversation about comparison culture in 2026 rather than in 1926 is you didn't freaking know what anyone was up to in 1926. I remember actually interviewing Eddie Hearn and saying, like, what's the worst thing about what you do? And he says, well, when Barry was running boxing events, you'd come to the end of the night.

29:23Were the fights good? Yep. Did we sell the tickets? Yep. Did everyone have a beer and a good time? Yep. well done lads, the whole night's a success and let's go to the pub. Eddie's lived experiences, I just go on social media and see what people think of the night, oh the card was crap, the fights were crap, Eddie you're a bellend, I hate match rumbly, all of these negative comments, but they've put on a brilliant night of boxing, Eddie's done an incredible job, he's someone that we should be celebrating, yet there's a deflation and off he goes home feeling everything's a disaster. It's changed the game, it's changed the game, which is why we have to be super careful with young people because their brains are developing in this world of comparison culture um well i'd love that because this is on the back of like the

30:08Jake Humphrey: the legislation about smartphone free childhoods and the building work they're doing but this is where i picked up this research from amy orban she's an oxford university psychologist looks at the data more than 17 000 teenagers over here in the uk and in the us and found that the amount of screen time you spend has actually minimal impact on your mental well-being of teenagers compared to other activities so she's really clear that getting enough sleep matters for your well-being but then she does say that if it's not the time on the phone that's a problem it's what you're actually watching on the screen that's the issue and it's then who you're measuring yourself against where you're getting that feedback from so it's not how much time you spend on it is the content that you're looking at that is actually the real issue that affects us so that goes back to the point that we're making of curating your feed like you wouldn't go to eat fast food every day and expect that you'd feel healthy and vibrant after a week of eating that and it's like what's your mental diet what are you feeding your brain and if that's constant the idea that somebody's bigger better faster stronger richer than you well again it leaves you'd like the Eddie Irn thing of coming away from a great achievement but feeling shit about it I think young people especially feel that a comparison culture can be a positive thing because it's where they're going to glean their information or learn stuff I I know that Eddie will also go online thinking well at least I can find out what people think about the fights of the night as you know I went online going well at least I can know what my bosses are thinking and I say this in the context of already saying that I actually think there are benefits to comparing yourself to other people or at least understanding what other people are up to but there is also the moment where it becomes really toxic and doesn't do anything for you because it creates a sense of helplessness it creates a sense of you doing things that you wouldn't normally do to try and achieve the result that other people are achieving and it's not your result so Alex Albon spoke about this really well because obviously he went up against Max Verstappen in a Red Bull and quite rightly because this is the way that Formula One works he was compared constantly but it was his reaction to the comparison not the comparison his reaction to the comparison is the thing that kind of derailed his career at Red Bull and he spoke about it brilliantly with us Max wants this front end in the car he wants his car to be sharper sharper and as it goes sharper and sharper he goes quicker and quicker and for you to catch up you have to start taking a little bit more risk you might be a couple of tenths behind one session just try a little bit more okay I've gone off, I've had a crash then you've got to restart then you've lost a little bit of confidence it takes a little bit more time that gap's growing a little bit and then the next time you try and go out and do another job another spin or another whatever and it just starts to snowball and every time the car becomes sharper and sharper you start to come more tense and I think it's like any sport if you start to not be in that flow state and you're having to really think about it and every time you go into a corner, you don't know how it's going to react.

33:25You don't have that kind of, well, it's purely the confidence in the car, the flow. I spent so much energy in trying to find the solution, trying to find the problem when really I believe I should have took a step back a bit, trusted myself a bit more, not go through the data so much. I was looking at the data non-stop, having meetings non-stop, coming back to Milton Keynes at the factory, doing all that kind of stuff, doing extra sim days, trying to find solutions for the car and all this kind of thing. Forcing it almost. Forcing it, forcing it, exactly. You know, he's not the only guy, right, who that's happened to.

34:01You know, Sergio Perez, we've had him on the podcast. He ended up leaving the team. Pierre Gasly left the team. Liam Lawson left the team. Alex Albon left the team. and I maintain that the issue here wasn't that Max Verstappen was super fast and people couldn't keep up with him. The issue was that there weren't provisions put in place by Red Bull to let the other drivers know that you don't need to compare yourself to someone like Max Verstappen who the team is being built around. I mean, what did Sergio say to us when he joined the team? He told us that Christian Horner said, if we could only run one car, we would.

34:35So you already know that the cars aren't stacked in your favor. therefore you just need to do the best that you can do but as Alex explained the more you think about Max the more you try and push to compete with him the more you compare the more it derails you so I also think that we have a responsibility in this conversation to help the people around us realize that they're in a place where they're going to feel like they're comparing themselves yeah we need to be the ones to say listen that's not serving you I like leaders do you remember

35:05Jake Humphrey: Adam Grant told us that, that he said, I might get a C for the report I produce, but I want to get an A for the way I respond to the C. And it's almost like, so the grade is one thing, how I respond to it is another. And I like that idea of giving people the idea that you might come second to Max Verstappen, but you can get an A for how you respond to coming second and how you're going to deal with that in a healthy way. Should we go for another clip? I'll let you choose who you want to hear from next. Should we listen to Jameela Jamil? I know. Yeah, you always bring up. Yeah, I like Jameela. What do you want?

35:42A Jameela Jamil clip, please.

35:44Jake Humphrey: No, no, but. Stalker. Don't say that. She'll work out the truth. No, I liked it because. She was so cool. Yeah, because she was talking about this idea of, like when we said, I've not met a mentally stable billionaire yet. she was talking about so she's been in that refined company of people that we often see and go if you had their money i'd be happier and she was talking to us about that mental diet be careful of um of what we're watching but more and more importantly question who's feeding us this information and what do they want us to respond to like you've remembered that episode well it's almost like you watch it every week shall we hear from her the algorithms are showing us completely different events.

36:31Like the last three months of the world, and we don't need to get into the politics of that specifically, but everyone's seeing a different version of events, of the same event, right? Because the algorithm is pointing us towards more of whatever it is that we happen to have clicked on. Whether we agree or disagree with it, we've clicked on it, the algorithm goes, oh, she likes that. We'll send her more of that. So we get sent off on this, like, I don't know, down this rabbit hole of that type of information. The problem with our society right now is that we think we are all having different reactions to the same information we are having different reactions to different information and that is the crux of the problem so now we're like oh my god we've seen the same thing and you have a completely different reaction to me you're not a human being you're a bad person it's like we're not even aware of what each other are seeing it's so good it's the first time that someone had said this that we're not all seeing the same thing and actually if we think about the way that algorithms work right algorithms are designed so that they pick up when you're triggered about something whether you're angry about it and leave a post whether you love it and click a like whether you're disgusted and immediately go onto another web page or whatever so we are seeing the things that trigger us yeah so therefore we live in a world where our our fears and our doubts and our worries and our insecurities are being heightened specifically for us by the algorithm understanding that that's what it does to us yeah so of course we can't then say well hey young person over there don't be triggered online because online is literally there to trigger you it's a madness and congratulations jamila for kind of pointing that out in such a smart way we should think about that do you remember john

38:14Jake Humphrey: height when he told us when we had him on and we're talking about his book the anxious generation and he was talking about an experiment he'd been involved in where he looks at teenage girls and if you pause just for a nanosecond on one particular earmise, they could show you that within a certain relatively short time span, young girls would then assume you're interested in health and fitness, you're interested in losing weight. And then there was only a few beats until they started to sort of be exposed. Dangerous images of eating disorders. Like dangerous images. And there was an article in the Wall Street Journal back in 2021 that actually managed to publish leaked internal Facebook research on the impact of Instagram, especially on the topic of teenagers and their mental health.

38:57Jake Humphrey: And they found that in 2019, there was a slide once that was presented within Facebook that actually read, we make body image issues worse for one in three teenage girls, specifically amongst girls who already struggle with body image and not teens overall. So the wider reporting of this in the Wall Street Journal at the time said that Instagram's focus on bodies and lifestyle content made it a bigger driver of negative comparisons than other platforms. So it almost re-emphasizes Jamila's point of if you're pausing and it's something that triggers you, the algorithm will feed you more and more of it.

39:37Jake Humphrey: So being really aware of the content we're consuming is, again, another really handy way of stepping away from this comparison culture. I think it's really good. I'm enjoying this chat, are you? I am because it's making me think. Do you get certain things that now come up on your phone because you reacted to them either positively or negatively, it's all you get? Do you know what I get every time I go on X and I just scroll to random videos, I just get fights. Fights? All the time. Fights, yeah. Like, oh, check out this scrap in New York. It's just people on the pavement scrapping with each other.

40:08I mean, I don't know why. But that's fascinating to watch, isn't it, then?

40:13Jake Humphrey: Your eyes are drawn to it and you're like, oh, no, that's going to play out. Yeah, because you go, you know, like, this bully got what they... I'll tell you what it was. It was like, I think it was a video once of like karma, like this bully got what was coming to him. Right. You know I was bullied, right? So I like, I was like, yeah, let's have a look at this. And it was like some horrendous bully getting knocked out by the person he was bullying. And I was like, yeah. And then that's all I seem to get now is like people fighting. But it's so interesting that this is the world in which we're living.

40:42Jake Humphrey: Yeah. I just get doom, doom scrolling about Manchester United. Do you? Yeah. Yeah. On what platform? Instagram. Do you use any others? No. I don't really use Instagram, so I often feel if anyone's listening to this and they go, I'll drop you a message, it might be a week or two before I'll pick it up and see it. But again, that's very deliberate over the last few years of just trying to regulate where I'm spending most of my time. I'd rather be... I found that I'd stop reading as much as normal and that really bothered me because I really like reading. So realising that a lot of it was because I might be sat on the train and then you end up scrolling.

41:27It's a reminder that everything you're doing is preventing you from doing something else. So if doing scrolling is not working for you, pack it in and we can sit here and say that all we like. But how about we listen to Mr. Olympia, Phil Heath?

41:41Jake Humphrey: Oh, when I think of him, do you think of like his really piercing? Blue eyes, yeah. And his gentleness. his eyes and then the size of him but the grace with which he carried himself yeah lovely voice here he is stop talking negative to yourself stop comparing yourself to other people on social media and start living your life and giving a damn about your own success more than anybody else can there you go look what a what a way to finish as phil says stop talking negatively to yourself stop complaining stop comparing yourself to social media like i mean we've heard the same things over and over again i think the final thing the final point i'd like to make really is we know it but it doesn't make it easy like we know we shouldn't do this stuff but the world is equipped to conspire against us in this fight against comparison culture so be kind to ourselves as well yeah know that we're going to trip up but again this is where we like knowing it and doing it are very different so like the stuff that we wrote about for micro habits like when we spoke to james clear use systems to help us like use the apps that lock your phone like what you were doing or you know just find ways of uh replacing one habit with another so that what if idea that if i feel i'm inclined to scroll on my phone maybe just take five minutes to read the page of a book and see which one gets the momentum first.

43:08Jake Humphrey: Just little things that I like. Use your environment to facilitate helping avoid comparison culture. And thank you to all of you for not just listening, but for sharing your comments as well. Adam Fala once, as a parent and a coach running a youth sports club, Nick Cox's episode was so valuable. Viewer 53789 says, Nick was such a cool guest. What a good podcast. Keep up this amazing product. And Spencer Scott 7573 says, I like that Alex Albon is not afraid to show his vulnerability. An amazing conversation. Well, of course, huge thanks to all of the guests that you've heard from in this episode of High Performance.

43:43You can listen to their full episodes just by delving into the High Performance archives. From myself and Damien, thank you very much for joining us. Remain humble, curious, and empathetic. Try your best to solve this problem with comparison culture. Ping us a message. Share your thoughts. Tell us what you're doing to solve it. You might just change someone else's life. And we'll see you next time on High Performance.

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