They’re not openly competitive. But I can tell they sometimes look to measure my life against theirs in areas where they’re on top, to feel less shitty about their own.

Example:

  1. Visit a friend who’s been struggling with a lot of misfortunes. I’ve been living comfortable but put on a little weight. She looks me over. Declares proudly “Well the one thing I’m glad about is I was able to lose all my pregnancy weight.” In other words, I’m failing at life but at least I’m not as fat as you.

  2. Shes really been struggling financially. Like barely making it. I’ve moved up at work and my salary has increased. It’s common in my culture to live at home. I do even though I make enough to live alone, more so to help my parents financially. Whenever we don’t speak for a while the first thing out her mouth is “Are you still living at home?” I think to be able to compare herself to me and say even though she struggles and can barely pay rent at least she’s better than me on that point.

How do you shut down these questions when you know they’re only being asked for the sole purpose of making a comparison where they know you’ll come out the loser and they get to quietly feel better about their lives

I’m not a person who’s competes with friends and would like to opt out. But find even defending yourself is validating the game they play. I don’t want to respond by justifying my life as better because that’s playing the game. Just shut down the game altogether