A heart surgeon took his car to his local garage for a regular service, where he usually exchanged a little friendly banter with the owner, a skilled but not especially wealthy mechanic. "So tell me," says the mechanic, "I've been wondering about what we both do for a living, and how much more you get paid than me.." "Yes?.." says the surgeon. "Well look at this," says the mechanic, as he worked on a big complicated engine, "I check how it's running, open it up, fix the valves, and put it all back together so it works good as new.. We basically do the same job don't we? And yet you are paid ten times what I am - how do you explain that?" The surgeon thought for a moment, and smiling gently, replied,"Try it with the engine running.."
Reflection
After reading the above story, you can see that both the heart surgeon and the mechanic love what they do. But if the mechanic lived with the perception that his job was essentially the same as the heart surgeon and he was therefore underpaid he would certainly be unhappy. There is no way we can live our lives looking at other people, compare our skills with theirs and come to a conclusion on who should be earning more. There is a saying that goes “When you compare what you want with what you have, you will be unhappy. Rather compare what you deserve with what you have and you'll discover true happiness." There will always be someone prettier, smarter or richer than you… If you keep comparing yourself against others, you will lose your own sense of purpose. Helen Keller couldn't’t of said it any better; “Instead of comparing our lot with those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged." Stop comparing your self to others. We are all born to be different. We all have different mindsets, we interpret things differently, we have different experiences and we feel different emotions. The most successful people in this world celebrate their differences and use it to their advantage. At the end of the day, it is better to be the original you than to be a copy of somebody else as the best copycat in the world is still a copycat. Live life your way.Darren Zwiers
