How Do You Stop Comparing? Group Chat on Comparison and Christian Women Part 1/2 [Podcast Transcript]

Title: How Do You Stop Comparing? Group Chat on Comparison and Christian Women Part 1/2

Podcast Date: November 5, 2024

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Description

Today Heather invited her team to a group chat to discuss comparison and how it has affected them. The team gets real, talking about their challenges with comparison, how they compared themselves to others, and what they believed about themselves in the process!

We dive into an enlightening discussion about pride, humility, shame, and comparison, exploring comparison's impact on our self-worth and relationships. Heather's team members: Tara, Jackie, Presli, and Rachel share how they've struggled but also how they've learned to conquer comparison.

There are so many pressures, demands, expectations, and challenges women, even Christian women, face around comparison and body image. Today's conversation will encourage you that you are not alone if you're battling comparison and there's great hope to be free from the battle. 

Are you ready to stop comparing and start living? Consider joining the 40-Day Journey which begins in January. Learn more here: https://www.improvebodyimage.com/40-day-challenge

Ready to live comparison-free? Check out Heather's book, The Comparison-Free Life now available here: https://amzn.to/3A7zboT (Amazon affiliate link)

Transcript

Disclaimer: This transcript is AI-generated and has not been edited for accuracy or clarity.

Heather Creekmore [00:01:23]:

Today, we are having a group chat. I brought my team in, and we're talking all about comparison. The ways that we've struggled and how we've really find found different strategies to conquer the struggle in some ways. But we're gonna get real. We're gonna get authentic, and it's a fun group conversation between 4 lovely women. So I think you're really gonna enjoy it. If comparison has ever bogged you down, if you've ever found yourself comparing yourself to others or even comparing yourself to who you used to be, oh, friend. There's some good stuff for you in today's episode.

Heather Creekmore [00:02:01]:

And hey, I'm glad you're here for it. If you're brand new to the show, welcome. You're in the right place. If you struggle with body image, comparison, the scale, the mirror, all the things, we wanna get to know you. So go to improve body image.com, you can learn more how to connect with us and find the best podcast episodes for your struggle. Now let's get to today's show. Welcome to Compare To Who, the podcast to help you make peace with your body so you can savor God's rest and feel his love. If you're tired of fighting body image the world's way, compared to who is the show for you.

Heather Creekmore [00:02:37]:

You've likely heard lots of talk about loving your body, but my goal is different. Striving to fall in love with stretch marks and cellulite is a little silly to me. Instead, I want to encourage you and remind you with the truth of scripture that you are seen, you are known, and you are loved no matter what your size or shape. Here, the pressure is off. If you're looking for real talk, biblical encouragement, and regular reminders that God loves you and you're not alone, You've come to the right place. I hope you enjoy today's show, and, hey, tell a friend about it. Okay. Isn't this fun? This is our first ever group chat.

Heather Creekmore [00:03:17]:

And the group I have for you today is my team. This is the compared to who team. So I am I've not really introduced the team to my podcast listeners and YouTube viewers before. So I'm excited that they are all here. And today, we're gonna have a conversation about comparison. And we're gonna get real about all the different ways that comparison has shown up in our lives. Gonna talk about some of the strategies we've used to overcome comparison, what we've learned, what maybe we're still learning, what the Lord's still teaching us. But I am glad you are here for this conversation.

Heather Creekmore [00:03:56]:

It's it's gonna be special. So let me start by introducing you to the team. I'm gonna start with Tara. Tara, if you would just tell everyone what you do as a part of the compared to who team.

Tara [00:04:09]:

Yes. I would love to. I'm so excited to be here. I'm so excited for this. So, as Heather said, I'm Tara, and I basically just do coaching now, and it is one of the big big greatest gifts that I have been able to do. So I coach, Heather's freedom framework, body image freedom framework class, and I walk the groups through the 12 week program. We start with 8 weeks, and, I'm also just privileged to be part of the 40 day, journey, and I get to sit in and just be a part of that and just really speak into the lives of of all all of us here who have struggled with body image, and I'm just so grateful to be a part of the team. And then I just kinda do whatever else Heather needs and whatever any way I could help, I'm here because the freedom I've gained through this is just so life changing, and I just wanna give it back.

Heather Creekmore [00:05:03]:

Oh, I I love it. And just, like, there's a whole what? There's 2 episodes. Right? Two episodes where Tara tells her story because

Tara [00:05:09]:

Oh my gosh. Yeah.

Heather Creekmore [00:05:10]:

Tara started as a client, emailing me out of desperation around these issues. You can listen to her whole whole story. We'll put the those links in, the show notes. But we're glad you're here, Tara. And also, I don't know if we should let the cat out of the bag, but we've got a brand new program that you are gonna be exclusively coaching for us called the attunement reset, which we've just recently licensed from, an intuitive eating dietitian. And we are so excited about that. That's only gonna be available to women who walk through the body image freedom framework course. That'll be available kind of as a a last stage of your freedom journey, but, we're excited about that.

Heather Creekmore [00:05:53]:

So and Tara will be exclusively coaching that.

Tara [00:05:56]:

I am so excited about that. Yes. I cannot wait. What a beautiful addition and just it's it's such a seamless transition from Heather's course into this. And so, I'm so happy that we can now offer that too.

Heather Creekmore [00:06:09]:

Hey. Yay. Okay. Jackie, tell us what you do on the team.

Jackie [00:06:14]:

Sure. Yeah. I'm Jackie. I am a social media manager along with Presley, and I mainly work on the YouTube or video content creation. But like Tara said, if there's ever a need, we all try to pitch in and help wherever it might be needed. I'm happy to be here.

Heather Creekmore [00:06:27]:

Oh, love having you, Jackie. You've been an awesome addition to the team. Presley, tell us about what you do.

Presli [00:06:37]:

Hi. I'm Presley. So, yeah, I'm the other social media manager that Jackie mentioned, and I help out with content creation and, yeah, uploading stuff about the pub the podcast to, the social media pages to keep that going. And just, yeah, whatever else Heather needs and yeah. I also found Heather, from the podcast, emailing her out of desperation. So I think that's a common thread among us here.

Heather Creekmore [00:07:05]:

It may be. And if you wanna learn more about Presley Yeah. Presley has been the guinea pig for coaching. And so what we've done like 6 episodes. So you're just like all out there with your fear of butter and all the things.

Heather Creekmore [00:07:19]:

So if

Presli [00:07:19]:

you All my businesses out there.

Heather Creekmore [00:07:21]:

If you haven't listened to those yet, you can go get to know Presley really, really well through listening to those episodes. But I appreciate your courage to to do that, those live coaching sessions. That's been awesome. Rachel, tell us what you do.

Rachel [00:07:36]:

Hey. Hey. Hey. I am the just newest most excited, I guess, rookie member of the team. I've been working with Heather for about 2 years now and it's just been amazing the way God pulled me out of body image idolatry and being trapped there. And now getting to walk in freedom and getting to do that with a bunch of teenagers. And so I feel like my calling and, my contribution to this team is going to be to love on the teenage girls in this arena and try to create content for them and, put this in a language and a format that they'll want to interact with. So I'm just so excited to do whatever God calls me to, whatever the next yes is.

Heather Creekmore [00:08:17]:

I love it. And I am so excited too because, I mean, I'll be honest, I turned 50 this year. And I have a 16 year old going on 17 year old. But you are uniquely gifted to work with teens. It's just that's just been your story and the way God has, like, led you so far. And so I am just really excited to see what's gonna come of of your addition and what we can create so that we can start engaging teen girls. And if you're a mom of teen girls, hey, you you just you connect and and you watch and wait and get all your mama friends to connect too. So you are ready because, because Rachel knows what she's doing on this front and it's it's gonna be good.

Heather Creekmore [00:09:00]:

So It's

Rachel [00:09:00]:

gonna be fun. It's exciting.

Heather Creekmore [00:09:02]:

Yeah. Okay. Introductions aside, let's let's get into let's get into comparison. Now, actually, let me let me just maybe ask this general question first. Like, how many of you recognize that you were maybe a chronic compare? Were you aware of all the ways you were comparing yourself to other people, or is it just kind of like an under the radar natural thing? Thoughts.

Tara [00:09:29]:

Oh my gosh. I was so I'm so glad you asked that, Heather, because I was actually thinking about that this morning because I realized that I had no idea. Absolutely no idea that that was even an issue. That was just something you did. I thought it was completely normal. I had no idea that it was a root of some of the most horrible, like, just, you know, bondage I was in. And it was actually reading your comparison free life, formally known as The Burned of Better. That was the book that, like, it it defined it for me.

Tara [00:10:07]:

And I finally realized like, oh my gosh. I had absolutely no idea until you gave me the language. It was like compared to who hooked me and made me feel seen and made me feel like I wasn't alone. And then the comparison free life started me on that freedom of, like, oh my gosh. This is this is so much deeper. So, yeah,

Tara [00:10:31]:

it's Yeah. So I think

Tara [00:10:32]:

it's something that people don't know. Yeah.

Heather Creekmore [00:10:34]:

They don't recognize it. What do you what do you guys think? Jackie, did you recognize it?

Jackie [00:10:39]:

Yeah. I think I I I recognize something was wrong. But if you would have asked me, I would have told you I was depressed. I would have told you I was anxious. I would have told you something was not right. I I had this kind of overbearing feeling that something was wrong, and I didn't I didn't attribute it to comparison until I started working through my own recovery journey. So I'm part of celebrate recovery, and then I started working with you. And I think just having those words of, like, oh, and and then you see it everywhere.

Jackie [00:11:14]:

Right? Like, there is a then it's like, oh, wait. This is not just my body. This is showing up in my friendships, in my marriage, with my parenting. I mean, it's everywhere that I just see I'm either 1 up or 1 below, 1 up or 1 below, and that has been so eye opening to actually give it the right name.

Heather Creekmore [00:11:30]:

Yeah. Rachel, jump in.

Rachel [00:11:33]:

Yeah. I was just thinking, like, I've grown up in church my whole life. My daddy is a pastor, still is in a big church in Texas. And so I knew, you know, we don't need to compare. We don't need to compare. It's, you know, you hear comparison is the thief of joy. And I'm like, yeah. Okay.

Rachel [00:11:46]:

I know that. I didn't know how deep it went in my heart and I didn't know how connected to sin it was in my heart. I mean, I didn't know that. Because, like, even just looking at before and after pictures of a weight loss program that's comparing that person's body before and ever. I was doing it with myself too. So, yes, you helped me put language to it. You helped me start to see what diet culture is and just how I was in such bondage. But it was so I was so blind to it that the grace of God is what woke me up.

Rachel [00:12:14]:

But I yeah. I thought I was doing good in that area as a good Christian girl quote unquote, but come to find out I was completely in, enslaved to that.

Heather Creekmore [00:12:24]:

Yeah. Jackie, you said something subtly. I wanna tie this back around. You said you felt like something was wrong. And I feel like maybe that is kind of a driver for our comparison. You said you felt like something was wrong. And I feel like maybe that is kind of a driver for our comparison. And Presley, this is kind of what you've talked about, you know, in our coaching sessions is that this you have this deep feeling, something is wrong with me when I look around really, I guess it's when I look around for identity, like, who am I in relation to these other people Absolutely.

Heather Creekmore [00:13:07]:

Me? Like, Pres, you wanna talk about that at all?

Presli [00:13:12]:

Yeah. So I feel like comparison for me, I feel like I was more aware of it. It was but I maybe didn't have the language for it, but I it was like a dirty little secret for me. It's like if someone could hear my thoughts, I would be so embarrassed. But it was, like, constantly, I knew I was measuring other people, like, based on my insecurities. Like, I've always hated wearing swimsuits. I feel like a man in a swimsuit. So I instantly, when I see other women in a swimsuit, I'm saying, do they look really feminine and nice in a swimsuit, or or do they have a thigh gap? Are their legs big like mine? So I was aware of it, and, like, I would say chronically aware of it.

Presli [00:13:48]:

Mhmm. So, yeah, that's a little bit different for me.

Heather Creekmore [00:13:51]:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, where are you now? Oh, Jackie, go ahead.

Jackie [00:13:58]:

Well, I just wanted to add to kind of off of what Rachel said. Like, I think part of the reason I didn't recognize it, I just recently was talking about the difference between jealousy and envy in one of my groups, and jealousy is I never thought I was a jealous person because there's kind of a negative attribute to jealousy. Like, oh, I don't like them, and I'm jealous of them, and I wanna take what they have. Kind of like like Saul was jealous of David. Right? But he really wanted to kill him. But envy is like, well, I admire that person, and I'm kind of discontent. Right? There's this admiration that goes with envy. So I thought for you know, I just really love what they have, and I didn't see my idolatry in that.

Heather Creekmore [00:14:39]:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, in so Tara spelled it out. But so my book, The Burden of Better, was really my book on comparison. Right? And then no one understood that it was a book on comparison. So it's actually getting a makeover, which is irony of ironies for this show. It's getting a new cover, so you can judge the book by its cover. But it's gonna be called the Comparison Free Life, and it should be available really soon.

Heather Creekmore [00:15:03]:

So if you haven't read that yet, I'd encourage you to do so. But Yeah. I mean, I talk about really underneath our comparison, right, is is jealousy and envy and pride. I mean, okay. And and covetousness to some degree. Right? And, you know, jealousy, right? God God is a jealous God. Like jealousy is often merited when someone has something that you're kind of entitled to. Like if your husband's talking to another woman, like, it's okay to be jealous because he's yours.

Heather Creekmore [00:15:37]:

But if you hate that other woman because she has a great body and you wish you looked like her and you despise her for it, like, that's just envy. Like, you don't you're not entitled to her body size or shape or whatever. Right? But the pride part. I don't know. I feel like even in the whole body image freedom journey, like seeing the pride is so hard because it's so sneaky, first of all. And when you don't like yourself, right, or when you feel like I'm not doing as good as her, I don't look as good as her, like, that can't be pride. Right? At least that's what I think the enemy commences us of. Like, what do you guys think?

Rachel [00:16:21]:

Yeah. If I think of this is the pride in me. If I'm if I'm thinking about pride in me, I picture him like a little tiny figurine. Like, yeah, I've got a little pride, you know, because I just wanna I wanna look pretty. I wanna feel good or, you know. But the truth of the matter is is it's this cancer that was in my entire body, mind, and soul. But I didn't see it as that because I feel like the enemy was like, it's just something small, you know, just put on the back burner. It's not a big deal.

Rachel [00:16:49]:

But through this, the grace of god is like, no, Rachel. It is a big deal and what you're really craving is intimacy with me and we cannot have that if you're coming at this wanting glory for you because glory is only for me, you know? And so, I've had to do a lot of business with that because in my own mind, I was really downplaying the role of pride in me thinking it I didn't really have that, you know, with just pride all the way.

Heather Creekmore [00:17:14]:

And I and I just remember that you share your story on the podcast too.

Rachel [00:17:18]:

Yeah. And it was so long. It's in 2 parts.

Heather Creekmore [00:17:20]:

Yes. Yeah. So I have to link to that as well. Sorry. I forgot to say that earlier. What about pride? Anyone else?

Tara [00:17:27]:

Yeah. Well, I was it's it's just exactly what you said. And I think this was oh, gosh. It's one of the greatest gifts you gave me was to recognize and okay. So follow me here. I did not even realize that I was priding myself on not having pride. Like, that is where I was because if you had asked me, I had so much self loathing. I was so insecure.

Tara [00:17:49]:

I felt, I hated myself.

Tara [00:17:53]:

You

Tara [00:17:53]:

know, I went through a period in my teens where I was suicidal. So that level of self loathing, it was like, I could never have pride. Right. Because there's nothing about me that I I see as anything good. And I I think what then started to happen was it was like that self loathing and that was gave me this false sense of humility. Like, I really misunderstood humility Yeah. As, like, this internal, like, kind of, like like, looking in and just being, like, I'm nothing. I'm no good.

Tara [00:18:27]:

And so when I when I came to you and thinking of things like pride and idolatry, it was like, oh my gosh. I have pride that I don't have pride. I have pride that I I don't have idols. I don't worship a golden statue. I'm not like those Israelites, you know, turning earrings, you know, not having any real understanding of that that self loathing. And I love how it's like, you know, you say, like, the what is it? The opposite side of the coin. It's like the other side of the coin. It's just that it's still all about me.

Tara [00:18:57]:

Yeah. I am at the center of everything. I am so self consumed. How do I relate to, like, to my world? Everything around me is how does it relate to me? How do I relate to it? And all my worth and value was tied up, and I didn't know anything about myself or who I was if I couldn't compare myself to someone else. And when I would compare to somebody, I was either better than and so there comes the pride. And but yet, that that wasn't me, you know, that that's not pride. That's just me disciplined and working hard and striving. Or it was such such inner self loathing that it was, like, I'm so inferior.

Tara [00:19:41]:

And so I'm either puffed up or deflated.

Heather Creekmore [00:19:44]:

Yeah. Well and I'm thinking about the conversation we had in both really in both groups of the 40 day journey with our our big group sessions of the 40 day journey yesterday. We talked about shame. Right? Because we're at that chapter in the 40 day body image workbook. And it it's almost as if shame masquerades as humility. Right? It's like, because I have shame, I don't have pride. And we are somehow, like, convinced that that's, like, being humble because we feel, like, so really, like, flawed. Right? To kinda cope badly.

Heather Creekmore [00:20:15]:

We feel like there's something deeply wrong with us.

Tara [00:20:18]:

Yeah. Absolutely.

Heather Creekmore [00:20:19]:

And take that as humility. But, you know, that's oh, it's just it's so fascinating. Right? And the enemy is just, it just makes me angry how he robs our identity in that. Right? And makes us feel like there is something wrong with us. Makes us, you know, fills us with that shame. We're convinced it's humility that we don't see the pride. And we keep comparing ourselves to other people trying to, I think, feel better about ourselves. Right? But instead, I don't know if that never works.

Heather Creekmore [00:20:53]:

Does it?

Tara [00:20:54]:

Oh my gosh. Never. It never works. And that's why I love in your comparison free life book, like, you call it, like, the beast of burden. Like, the beast of better. Right? It's that it's that it really is. There's no there's no you say there's no top rung to the comparison ladder. You never get there.

Tara [00:21:13]:

It's just you do more and you strive more and you're stuck in this vicious cycle and you're forever feeling less than. And and and you raised the question and it hit me so hard when I read that book, which was like, how how do I even define better? Like, where did I get my definition? Why do I believe what I believe? And I think you're so right. Like, the enemy just gets in our head and our culture. Oh my gosh. Our culture. We just fill our minds with these images from culture. And we believe that those are the truth and we're we're striving. And I had to really ask myself, like, what is better even? What am I striving for? Because it's certainly not what God's saying in the bible.

Tara [00:21:54]:

It's certainly not what he talks about.

Rachel [00:21:58]:

Yeah. Jackie, I was thinking about when you said, you just felt like there was something wrong. You know, if I think about and I try to keep this verse in the forefront of my mind a lot that the greatest commandment God said is to love the Lord your God with your heart, soul, and mind. And some versions say strength. Okay? But in mind, my mind was so full of me that it couldn't be full of any of God because I was so concerned with what I was gonna eat for breakfast or lunch, what my workouts were, what I was gonna wear, who's gonna see me today, how should I be, how should I be. And, yes, you're in your comparison free life, like, you say, Heather, comparison demands discontentment. It's like this job I didn't sign up for, but I work for it, and I can't get out of it. It's like, wait, I'm an involuntary worker here, and I I can't quit because I just it's everywhere.

Rachel [00:22:48]:

And I don't know how to not be discontent, and I think that discontent is that dark cloud of a blanket in my heart and mind that is making me feel not right. When in reality, if I'll free my mind and just love God with my mind and spiral out looking for Him rather than imploding, spiraling in trying to find what's wrong, maybe that would lift and maybe there would be that rest, you know?

Heather Creekmore [00:23:12]:

Yeah. Yeah. Because it's like whack a mole. Right? It's like, okay. I got my hair good. Oh, shoot. Now she's doing better at parenting. Okay.

Heather Creekmore [00:23:20]:

I'll hit that one better. Oh, dang. Like, now she's she got a new car. Now what do okay. We gotta get a new car, you know, whack a mole. Like, oh. Yeah. I mean, it's just like there's always something else, like, where you gotta keep up.

Tara [00:23:37]:

You know what it makes me think of too is that as we're talking too, and I think about all the years I yearned so desperately for connection with other women. Like, all I wanted was a friend, and I really just never ever had a good close intimate friendship when I, going through my teen years. And I and it's like God created us to be relational beings. Right? He created us to be in relation with him, in union with him. And it's like when the fall came and that relationship, that first most beautiful relationship was broken, it's like this is just such a reminder to me of how much our relationships get so broken by comparison. It's like we're striving so much. What we really are wanting is to connect, but we're so terrified and we're so scared that it's like we keep trying to be like, but I need to be better. And it's like, we're trying to create these relationships in such a broken way when and it's like, when we think of Jesus and how he talks about, like, the upside down kingdom when it's really, like, in our weakest moments, that's when we are strongest.

Tara [00:24:45]:

And it's like, if we were to just accept the vulnerability, I think we were talking about this in our 40 day journey. Right? Like, everybody's putting these masks on. Everybody's trying to compare, and everybody's feeling this internal thing. And all along, if we just opened up and shared that vulnerability with one another and gave each other permission to not know, to be weak, to not be the best at everything or to be better Yeah. Would we then be able to finally connect in a way that I think so much of us yearn to?

Heather Creekmore [00:25:15]:

Yeah. Think we have an epidemic of loneliness. And what I think happens is we get lonely. Right? Because we are, like you said, Tara, we're disconnected from each other. And I mean, in comparison, like, okay, let's just kinda brass tacks. Right? Like, it is thin that separates us from God and other people. Right? If you are envying a woman because she has a faster metabolism than you have, like, you are not loving her well. You're not gonna be best friends.

Heather Creekmore [00:25:43]:

You might have some sort of shallow friendship, but it's not going to bring you closer. And and so we go to social media when we're lonely. And what does that do? It just like throws us in a pit even further. Right? Like, I I have a little theory here, but, like, this hasn't been scientifically tested. But I honestly think I can tell how lonely someone is by how much time they're spending on social media. Because I love it.

Jackie [00:26:12]:

Oh, yeah.

Heather Creekmore [00:26:12]:

The more engaged you are there I mean, you're not finding what you're looking for. And and I've kinda watched it with with people I know where I'm like, oh, all of a sudden, she's on there a lot. Uh-oh. Is she doing okay? And, like, that's kinda my signal. Like, I need to check-in because she's been Facebooking way too much.

Jackie [00:26:33]:

Jackie. Yeah. I just wanted to speak to what you just said about not connecting with with others in a real way because you're comparing to them. And it's actually one of the the things I thought about while I was preparing for this is just when I'm comparing to moms in particular because I I have a I have 2 young kids. They're 3 and 4, and so I'm spending more time with moms of young kids. And it's so natural to compare my parenting, like, oh, am I doing a good enough job? Or, oh, I'm a little better than them, and it's always this kind of pull. And I think what I'm not doing when I'm in those moments is I'm not even thinking of them as a person. It's like they're just this object.

Jackie [00:27:10]:

Right? We talk about objectifying people in our body image, but this happens in other ways too. So I think I've been recognizing that one of the solutions when I find myself in that spiral of comparing to another mom is to just get to know them and, like, invite them over and and really become friends with them. And as I become friends with them, all of that comparison, all the walls come down, and it's like, hey. They're just trying their best just like I am, and I can relax around this person now, and I can love them well.

Heather Creekmore [00:27:42]:

Yeah. You can't love someone well that you're hating.

Rachel [00:27:46]:

Right? And I'm draw I'm drawn to the people. Right. I'm drawn to the people that are confident in who they are that are not trying so hard because I heard this quote once. Oh, yeah. Free free people, free people. So if I walk around free in who I am and I'm not trying to impress you, man, I'm not in I might unlock something in you that you go, oh my gosh. I can finally rest. Like, when I when when someone is in my presence, I don't want them to remember what I was wearing, what did I look like.

Rachel [00:28:17]:

I want them to remember how they felt with me because I want them to feel and see Jesus. So when I'm talking to them, I'm trying not to go, this is all about me. Here I am. But if I live with the mentality of there you are, there's always something that you can get to know about that person. When I go into restaurants and coffee shops, I'm always, like, calling trying to call people by name that work there because, like, they're people. And we all like you said, we just wanna connect with those people. So I am drawn to the people who are not trying hard to impress me and who are just themselves. And that is we just need so many women to walk around like that because that's I tell you that's what the younger girls want is a free older woman to look up to that is not worried about what they weigh and what they eat and what they wear.

Rachel [00:29:01]:

But they just love Jesus and they're just trying to live their life for him.

Heather Creekmore [00:29:04]:

And isn't it ironic? Right? Because why do we, like, stress about what we look like, what we eat, what we wear? We stress about it because we're afraid we're gonna be rejected. Right? Like it's so oh, my word. It's so like, like spin cycle. Just what? But so so I stress about how I look because I am afraid you are going to reject me. And so then I come into our encounter, our meeting, and I'm like, what do you think of me? Right? And you're like, you know, not responding to that. And then that makes me go back and like, one must need to do better. I must need better hair. I must need to be thinner.

Heather Creekmore [00:29:40]:

I've gotta watch what I eat more. It's like, now what do you think of me? And you still don't respond to that. And like, all the time, what if I just changed and showed up as there you are. I love that, Rachel. There you are. Right? Because what do we really want when we, you know, meet someone else or, you know, have the opportunity to sit down with someone else? We want them to see us and not like like you said, not our hair, our skin, our body. We want them to see our hearts, and we mask that by trying to be perfect on the outside.

Rachel [00:30:14]:

Or it looks

Heather Creekmore [00:30:15]:

like we've got it all together. Oh, the irony. Go go ahead, Jackie. You wanna jump in with something? Go for it.

Jackie [00:30:21]:

Sorry. I was just gonna say it's kind of like when you clean your house before people come over, and you're like, I need to make it look like nobody lives here.

Heather Creekmore [00:30:27]:

Nobody lives here.

Jackie [00:30:28]:

Yep. Right? And, and we found in hosting that actually the less we clean our house, the more people love coming over because they just feel so com comfortable and relaxed. Like, oh, okay. We know that we can come here and just let our guard down, and that's been something that's been really fun.

Rachel [00:30:44]:

Yes. I no longer apologize for my messy house. I say, because I love you and we're great friends, you get to see my mess. And I'm not sorry for it because we live here.

Heather Creekmore [00:30:52]:

Yeah. Yeah. Although I say, and there's a blog post that has done really well. I think I might might have been done a podcast on it too. Like, I do think there's a connection between, like, how we take care of our house before someone comes over and where we're at with our body image issues. I think there's a a little bit of a connection there. It's like, I want you to see my house as perfect. I want you to see my body as perfect.

Heather Creekmore [00:31:15]:

Right? So that that might be a work in progress

Heather Creekmore [00:31:19]:

for a lot of people.

Heather Creekmore [00:31:21]:

Well, friend, come back next time as we finish this fun group chat conversation all about comparison. Hey, I'm glad you're listening today. I hope something helped you. Stop comparing and start living. Compared to new podcast is proud to be part of Life Audio podcast network. You have great Christian podcast. Go to life audio dot com.