‘Circling Back’ to Yourself Is a Powerful Form of Self-Care

An exercise to stop sabotaging your own happiness

Kaki Okumura
Forge
Published in
4 min readJul 31, 2021

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Illustrations by Kaki Okumura

It just happens sometimes. I’ll be scrolling through Instagram and see that someone went on a luxurious vacation to a country I’ve never heard of, or see on LinkedIn that an old classmate got a great job promotion at a fancy tech firm. Sometimes it’s not even someone I know, but it’s an article titled “How this 22-year-old made millions in revenue in just 6 months” or “These 2 teens are changing the world with their innovative app idea”. I don’t even need to read the full print, I’ll just suddenly feel a bit inadequate, a bit ashamed.

What am I doing with my life?

We’re all heard the old adage — comparison is the thief of joy — but just because we know it’s true doesn’t mean that we are impervious to it. Humans are naturally wired to compare and compete, and we often do it against the people who we determine to be in better standing than us, whether this be physically, financially, or socially.

Some might say this helps motivate them to do better and to be better, but if you are not comparing yourself to the right measures, you end up preoccupying yourself with measures that will never matter.

In my life, I have given a f- about many people

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Kaki Okumura
Kaki Okumura

Written by Kaki Okumura

Born in Dallas, raised in New York and Tokyo. I care about helping others learn to live a better, healthier life. My site: www.kakikata.space 🌱

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