A few nights ago, I was lying in bed scrolling through my phone, watching for the umpteenth time a friend’s Instagram story from their European vacation. Blue Aegean Sea, white Santorini, an expensive-looking cup of coffee.

My first reaction was: How nice.

My second reaction was: Why am I still here.

My third reaction was—wait, what’s wrong with “here”?

That “wait” is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time since.

We live inside a comparison machine. The essence of social media is presenting curated life highlights—the best angles, the best lighting, the best moments. No one posts on Instagram “worked overtime until 11 PM and came home to a cold takeout dinner.” You always see others’ highlights, then compare them to your everyday reality.

This comparison is unfair from the start, but our brains don’t care about fairness. They just keep saying: you’re not good enough, you don’t have enough money, you’re not free enough, you haven’t traveled far enough.

But what if we changed our coordinate system for comparison?

Instead of comparing with friends’ stories, compare with the entire planet.

According to World Bank data, over 700 million people worldwide still live below the extreme poverty line—with less than $2.15 per day for living expenses. About 2 billion people globally lack access to safe drinking water. In many African and South Asian countries, an ordinary case of pneumonia could take a child’s life because the nearest medical facility is fifty kilometers away.

This morning you woke up and turned on the tap to clean water. You flipped a switch and the lights came on. When you felt unwell, you could walk to a clinic to see a doctor. You can freely choose your profession, your partner, your beliefs.

These aren’t “basic.” These are exceptions in human history.

In the 200,000 years humans have existed, for most of that time, most human life consisted of: hunger, disease, violence, short lifespans. Everything you enjoy now—stable food supply, modern healthcare, rule of law, information freedom—has only appeared in the last century or two, and only in a small part of the planet.

You’re not an “ordinary person.” From a statistical perspective, you’re among the most fortunate small group in human history.

But I know this kind of “you should be grateful” talk sounds cheap.

Every time someone tells you “think of the children in Africa,” your internal response is probably “so what, my anxiety is still here.”

Right, the anxiety is still there. Because gratitude isn’t a switch you can flip to stop being anxious. Comparison is human instinct—you can’t turn it off with one article.

But what you can do is: adjust your reference point.

Psychologists call this the “reference point effect.” Your happiness doesn’t depend on how much you have, but on who you compare yourself to. If your reference point is “that friend who went to Santorini,” you’ll never be good enough. If your reference point is “the average standard in human history,” you’re already a miracle.

Same person, same life, different coordinates make it a completely different story.

During my years working in companies, I’ve seen various “successful people’s” anxieties.

CEOs with annual revenues breaking 100 million worried about why it wasn’t a billion. Companies that already had international clients worried about why they weren’t bigger international clients. Managers leading ten-person teams worried about why the neighboring department had thirty people.

Everyone compares themselves to someone “one level higher.” This comparison ladder has no end—no matter which rung you climb to, there’s always someone above you.

I gradually came to understand that the problem with this ladder isn’t that you “can’t reach the top,” but that “this isn’t your ladder at all.”

Kevin Kelly said something I’ve always remembered: “Don’t try to be the best; try to be the only.”

The power of this statement is that it directly jumps out of the comparison framework. When you pursue being “the best,” you’re always comparing with others. When you pursue being “the only,” you only need to dialogue with yourself.

But “becoming the only” can’t be achieved with just an inspirational quote.

It requires you to first answer a very uncomfortable question: Who are you, really?

Not your title, not your income, not your social media metrics. But—what remains after you strip away these external labels. What do you care about? What are you willing to invest time in? What makes you forget to check your phone while doing it?

It took me many years to begin approaching answers to these questions. Seminary training taught me one thing: before you can help others, you must first face yourself. Those years of theological reflection forced me to deconstruct many supposedly “missional” impulses—how much was real, and how much was just satisfying my own vanity.

This deconstruction process was painful, but it’s also the necessary path to “becoming the only.”

So this article isn’t saying “you’re already happy, don’t complain.”

Complaining is okay. Anxiety is normal. Wanting a better life is human nature.

But before you set out to pursue a better life, first look down at the ground beneath your feet.

You have clean water to drink. You have stable electricity. You have freedom of choice. You can read anything you want to read, including this article.

This isn’t the “basic package.” This is a miracle.

Not because you did something special to earn it—but because you happened to be born in this era, in this corner of the world. This luck isn’t for self-congratulation—it’s to remind you: you’re already standing in a position that most people dream of.

From this position, go walk the path that only you can walk. Not because others are walking it, but because it’s yours.

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