The Comparison Trap
"Comparison is a trap, unless it is against your former self."
“Comparison is a trap, unless it is against your former self.” - Ken Klein
One of the most attractive things in sport is comparison. It’s why we have competition. It can motivate us to train harder, to try harder, and to reach levels we’ve never seen before. It can also burn us up.
The hardest part of it all is that we dismiss all kinds of factors when it comes to looking at others, such as age, experience, drive, and health. There are versions of healthy competition and camaraderie, and there are the ones that can derail us. So what do we need to look for to avoid these traps? How do we keep from being dragged down by our interest in others?
Over the years, the happiest climbers I spend time with are the ones who avoid these judgements and comparisons, and instead drift toward healthier relationships with the climbers they’re around.
I’m not a psychologist or a sociologist. I’m just a coach who watches people suffer needlessly because their strain gauge numbers aren’t what they think they should be.
Why Do I Care?
I can’t count the number of climbers I’ve been around who are nervous about climbing in front of others or feel like they will be judged by people at the crag. I try to remind them that everyone at that crag is super self-obsessed and probably won’t even remember that other people were there that day, but it goes deeper than that. My favorite John Long quote is, “I don’t care what they’re saying as long as it’s about me.” I try to keep this in mind as a way of flipping the script a bit.
I think a great first step is in observing our own behaviors. Are we interested in judging others while we are at the crag, or are we genuinely interested in their success? I’ve had more than one climbing partner over the years who seemed to thrive on other people succeeding even more than their own performance. When you find yourself feeling envy or rage or jealousy, or even simply judging other people at the crag, it’s important to step back and dig into that.
When you feel feelings like this, it’s not bad to use the mirror trick, which is simply asking, “What exactly is making me envious?” Usually, your envy reveals what you want for yourself. If you’re jealous about their finger strength, it’s a sign that you are feeling that as a limiter. If you’re jealous about how calm they seem while climbing, it’s probably a sign that you are dealing with issues in keeping yourself calm.
Success Isn’t Scarce
Most comparisons come from a scarcity mindset, which is thinking there’s only so much success to go around. It’s important that we counteract this by actively paying attention to our own successes. A good, simple habit is to write down three things you accomplished and improved upon every week, no matter how slight that success might be. We’ve got to remember that the only athlete that we can train for is ourselves, and the only way to move the needle is by doing the work.
Along these same lines, I think that encouraging yourself to congratulate and cheer for other climbers is a great way of tricking yourself into understanding that their success does not diminish yours. This helps us remove the scarcity mindset and creates a more collaborative and positive environment for all of those around us. It might seem a little “woo-woo” but I really do believe in the positive energy of a group. When the people with you in the gym or at the crag genuinely want you to succeed, it helps you.
It’s What Goes In
Too many of us are obsessed with outcome goals and reflection on what we completed at the crag. If we sent a route, we had a great day. If we didn’t send it, it sucked. The truth is you can’t control the outcomes, yet you get to control every bit of the input. This is why I have encouraged many of my athletes to put a small star in their training log next to any effort that they were proud of.
Was it going for a risky move on the board? Give it a star.
Was it trying a max weight in the weight room? Give it a star.
Was it climbing above a bolt that you were afraid to pass? Give yourself a star.
At the end of the month, we look at stars, not sends. The cool thing, though, is that stars start to lead to sends…and more of them.
When we start to look at our behavior in terms of what we gave to our own efforts, the comparison trap starts to fade into the background. Good inputs eventually lead to good outputs. We need to be consistent. We need to be overloaded, and we need to be aware that performance varies while attitude and input are much more manageable.