When Their Win Feels Like Proof You’re Falling Behind

In this episode, Martina dives into the uncomfortable truth of how you hold yourself when someone else is winning, and your life feels like it’s in a void, a pause, or a season of uncertainty.

This is not about “be happy for others” advice. It’s about what actually happens inside you when comparison hits your nervous system and you’re trying not to lose yourself in it.

Inside the episode:
 • watching others win while you feel stuck or unclear
 • the emotional shock of “their yes vs your not yet”
 • why void seasons make comparison louder and more intense
 • how shame makes jealousy worse and more toxic
 • staying kind, grounded, and in integrity while you’re triggered

A raw, honest exploration of how to stay emotionally anchored when life feels unfair, uncertain, or painfully slow — without disconnecting from your own truth or turning bitter in the process.

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Disclaimer: This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered professional advice.

Transcript

When Someone Else’s Win Hurts

Martina 0:00

On to today's episode, we are talking about something that's most psychologically confusing and challenging as an experience in adulthood. It is watching someone else achieve something, has tremendous results or a success while we are struggling, being in a void, or not seeing the meaning or purpose in your life at the moment. And what makes it even harder is that you don't want to be the bitter one. You want to be happy for them. But underneath that, there is grief, there is comparison, there is panic, there is this quiet fear of what if that never happens to me. And I feel like nobody really talks honestly about this. And because I think this is a full-on conversation that I want to have with you because it's my felt and lived experience. So without further ado, let's just jump right into it!

Friday Check-In And Travel Jitters

Martina 1:06

Hi friends! Oh god, uh work week is coming to a close. So happy Friday. Obviously, I'm recording this on a Friday. My favorite week or day of the week, to be honest with you. Not just because work is wrapping up, it's not that I'm living only for the weekend, but we are having a long weekend here in the US. We have Memorial Day coming up on Monday, so we have three full days, and of course, my husband and I planned a trip abroad. We are going to Canada, Calgary, there is an Echo Toll event on tomorrow, basically. Tomorrow it's already Friday, so time flies. And then we have a full day on Sunday for the national park in Banff. So super excited. It's not the first time in Canada, but first time on the West Coast or more closer to the West Coast to Canada. And yeah, so excited, excited, excited. And it's gonna be a long day because I have a full day of work, I have to park, and I have this weird obsession, I could say. I would say that whenever we go on a travel, even if it's just for three days, I have this urge to clean the house. I always feel like everything needs to be perfect. Like I wash the bad sheets, I w I clean both bathrooms, I I mop the floor, and I'm doing all those things because I'm always like, yeah, my future self, my future me on Monday when she comes back, she will appreciate that. But every time I come home, I never really, you know, care as much. I don't know. It's really weird. I maybe it's also I think you know what that is. I think, and I'm processing this with you, but I promise you a jump we're into the podcast episode in a moment. But I think that is this, you know, my nervous system knows we're traveling. That's exciting, at the same time, also like you know, scary because we are going somewhere else, we are we have to sleep over in a new place because we are having a transfer overnight, so we sleep in a hotel and then go to Canada tomorrow and all that stuff, and and travel always brings up excitement but also fear, it's a change, you know, out of the routine, and then I get this surge of energy in my nervous system that I don't know what to do with it, you know, because I I notice I cannot sit still, I cannot take a power nap, I cannot meditate, and then I kind of use this energy to clean up and make my place really neat because it's also satisfying, you know, when you clean up and things are really clean and everything is sparkly. I think that's what it is. Anyway, so real life processing here with you. Anyway, so I wanted to dive into today's episode, and it's a good one.

Letting Go Of A Coaching Identity

Martina 3:51

I love the topic, and it is something very dear to my heart because it's my real life experience, and yeah, it's this you know, I have been the last I don't know, six, eight months, nine months, maybe going through a lot of changes internally for myself. So I it's first started with my business, so I I do life coaching and I really love it. Or let's say I I used to love it really a lot, it was my absolute passion, my life, my my meaning, my purpose for a good six years, and I felt like this is my calling. I want to do this and I want to turn this into a profitable business, I want to live off it. And I, you know, moved to the states at the same time and then built a business, went back to corporate America to pay bills because obviously, you know, I didn't have the luxury to have that many savings to just live off my savings, and also it's always good to have a job with a stable income while you're building a business, and I actually got clients and had, yeah, as well, I wouldn't say like the most driving business, but I could have gotten it there. I I made money, I made enough to you know have a bit of profit left after all the expenses. But then the end of the day, at some point, I I mean I chuckled corporate job and coaching my clients, and it was all fine, but at some point I I don't know. It's not that I lost interest or passion for it, but I felt like there's something else that I want to do. Maybe additionally, maybe instead of who knows. I also, you know, stopped posting so much on social media. I dabbled a little bit in posting daily and giving tips and advice and then kind of, you know, had fun with it and then kind of dabbled out of it. I have my postcard podcast now for two years now in summer, so this is something that I've definitely been having on a consistent basis. So there are changes, and it frightened me that the coaching business is something that I might not, you know, I really asked myself this question secretly. Do I want to give it up? Do I wanna let go of my clients? And kind of over the past few of past years, my clients got pregnant. They got pregnant, yeah, they gave birth, and so they kind of put a hold on coaching because obviously they had not the time and the energy to to put that into a weekly session because obviously, you know, a big life change was ahead of them or just happened. So I have right now one client and I have her weekly, and and it's it's it's it's it's lovely, I love it. But kind of the other clients fizzled out, and since my energy wasn't into like doing something with my business, like client acquisition for a lack of better word. I was like, yeah, you know, when you're not into it, the energy you're not attracting people either. So I was like, yeah, maybe I just let it go and keep my one client and then see what happens. And then I was in this void. I I didn't know, let me take a sip of coffee. I didn't know what to do. I mean, I'm over 40, I have a corporate job. I knew I wouldn't let that go for the next two or three years because I kind of like my job, and so that was out of question. So my corporate job is is what it is. I didn't want to change anything there, but then business-wise, it was really scary to be honest with you. Because for six years, life coaching coaching was my part of my identity, it was something I was really proud of and interested me for such a long time because prior coaching, I was into self-development, all those things, obviously. So, long story short, I was in a void. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to do anything on social media, like you know, posting thing because of doing this as well. So I didn't know what is else, what else is there for me? Having a corporate job, yes, but it I don't want this to be my sole focus. So I started with language learning. So I started Spanish in August, now I started with French. Uh, French I have background in school. Spanish was something I learned from scratch, so I didn't know where to take that. But I thought like it was always a dream to be multilingual and speak many languages. And I speak German, I speak English. Uh I learned in grad school and university, grad school and school French, so it was a no-brainer to advance here as well. And then because there's so much there that I could build on, and then Spanish from scratch, and I got really great with Spanish. So I have a private tutor, so actually two, one in Spanish, one in French, once a week a class. So it's it's really great. It's a great investment, and I also did it because I know learning a new language is very healthy for the brain, you know, it keeps you from being rusty and and you know, forming new neuron pathways, neuron neuronal pathways, and also steering away from being on my phone all the time, because this is a weak spot. I still don't have this phone addiction in kind of uh a grip on that. I think we all have a phone addiction because it's not that I'm social media all day long and doom scrolling, but you know, I have my Kindle there, I I message with people, I get all my information, like it's all on my phone. So, anyway, language learning, I have learning books, studying books, and and and and that was something where I was like, yeah, it's great. But then it's it's a hobby. It's not my calling now to be built bilingual. I it's a call, it's it's it's a hobby, I'd say. I it's not giving me the purpose that I had with coaching or partly in my corporate job. So, and you know, I just didn't know what to do. I didn't really have the plan to advance my corporate career. I was I'm happy where I am right now. I have my corporate career in my 30s. I hasted success, career progressions, driving up the corporate ladder. So that was just it.

Why Comparison Explodes In Uncertainty

Martina 10:32

So that was now a long, long intro, but I think the context is really important because when you ended Void, and it's not something that was easy for me, you are kind of unsure, maybe grieving, letting go of what used to be part of your identity, maybe even completely your identity. Just my coffee machine in the background is turning off. If you wonder what the voice noise is here. So there was grief, there was fear. What am I? Who am I when I'm not like doing like my business full coaching? Like, I can do with my LLC whatever I want to do, but letting go of coaching, and I mean I keep my one client for now, and I might pick up coaching in a half a year again. I don't know. But the identity is shifting. I don't want to call myself just like or want to focus that I'm just but that I'm a coach. I want to let go of this because there is something else I knew that might open up, but I didn't know what it is. Obviously, I love my podcast, I love talking to you, and I want to advance this too. But anyway, so and this is hard. I was in grief, and then also how do you hold yourself when you are in that state of grief, fear, uncertainty, letting go of what used to be your identity, and then you see people you know, you love, or people on the internet succeeding tremendously, or stepping into their new meaning, into their new calling, into a new, I don't know, they build a business, they have received a new uh revenue milestone, they got a promotion, they completely changed career. How do you hold yourself in that moment? Because other people's wins hit harder when your identity already feels fragile. So let's talk about the void season in psychology and why that is. So comparison, I don't know if you have noticed this in your life, but for me, comparison intensifies during seasons of my uncertainty. So when, for example, you might feel directionless, lonely, stuck, rejected, invisible, then you tend to become more emotionally sensitive to others, other people's progress. And to me, it doesn't really matter if I know that person or if it's a person on the internet that I've never really met, it triggers me. It really triggers me. And it triggers a lot, it triggers jealousy, and then I feel like all the feeling of like, oh my god, I am not doing great, I am not, I am not a failure, like all those stuff. So and then obviously someone else's striving can feel like accidental evidence against you. So the pain is amplified when the success reflects your deepest unmet desire. Maybe it is love, maybe it's money, you want more money, or you want the relationship someone else you just see has the purpose, motherhood, confidence, I don't know, belonging, recognition. And then of course, your nervous system starts creating catastrophic stories. Like there are things like, oh my god, I'm behind, or I missed a chance, an opportunity, everyone else is like moving ahead, everyone is super successful, just about me. Or maybe life works for others better than it does for me. So in the brain tries to create certainty for for you, for me. So it wants to feel it wants to remove everything that's ambiguous or that's yeah, uncertain, that's we don't know. And then of course, comparison becomes an attempt to measure your worth and future safety. And very often it's not you know that the success of others hurt, it's the meaning, of course, your mind attaches to it. And then yeah, social media makes things so much worse worse because we are not used to see hundreds of people successing, successing, suc being successful in in a matter of a minute of scrolling. And everyone presents their highlight reels in social on social media, most of the people. And that's fine, you know, I've nothing against that. But then, you know, unconsciously things come up for you. So we were never designed to compare ourselves to a thousand people on a daily basis. But that's what social media does, and it creates this perceived urgency, this detorted distorted timelines where you feel like someone comes out of nowhere and suddenly has that, what you want, but you took years to even get close to success, but then suddenly someone has what you wanted out of nowhere. And then there is also this success saturation. So we are so used to see people succeeding, the achievements and the great stories, right? And there is this. I watch sometimes reels where there is this music in the background, and it's like kind of like in a movie, and that it tell us their moment of success or hardship and where they came out of a hero out of a hero, and then I'm like, oh my god, that's also manipulative. Not that they are like manipulative, but obviously it's created to hook you in, to keep watching. And a hero story is never that clean either, I have to say. So, but that's something else we will talk about another day. And there's this visible, like, you know, so yeah, you see everyone's highlight reels, while inside you have your own raw humanity, and your brain starts treating those isolated examples of people succeeding as universal truths. Like everyone is is succeeding happy and ahead of you. So there's this visibility bias. So you mostly see people during their visible wins, we don't see them during their quiet period of suffering, and comparison intensifies when people confuse obviously visibility with worth. That's where it gets really hard because the internet turned other people's timelines into psychological background noise for you. So, you know, you always see it's fast, it's winning is fast, winning is actually easy, you just have to put in the hard work and stuff like that. This is what we are fed, right? So, so I want to jump into why other people's success can feel so threatening.

Success As Survival Threat In The Brain

Martina 18:07

And I use myself as the example because in a period where I just didn't know, and honestly, a friend of mine said to me, Oh, journal about it. And I'm like, No, it doesn't really help because I didn't want to journal about it. I just wanted to sit with this discomfort and let myself find certainty in the uncertainty, and it was absolutely discomforting, it was really scary. And even my husband, like, he got he's doing another fellowship next year, so he's got offered something, a really an amazing opportunity, and I was always so happy for him because he wanted it so bad and he worked really hard and he deserves it on every level and aspect, and 100% great, and he did so much for it, and it's a great outcome for us, for our marriage, and for our future. At the same time, I'm like, wow, he has it all lined up, he knows what he's gonna do, and he has something he looks forward to, and like hard times he faces right now. He can like, you know how it is when when you know things are lined up and you will jump into something that is really a great achievement for you. Then every hardship or challenge doesn't feel as hard or bad because you know, well, anyway, I'll have something lined up, so I have something that motivates me, I have a goal ahead of me. So even that felt like as happy as I was for him and for us. I was like, yeah, and I don't have anything like this, you know. So obviously, people's success, was it a friend changing completely their career and posting about it and sending pictures in group chats got me really triggered. And on one hand, I felt happy for them. I'm not a vicious person. I wish well for everyone. And at the same time, I was triggered. I was envious, I was jealous because for me I sat with nothing. I sat with blank terror sometimes of like I have nothing to prove, nothing to share. Obviously, there's a worthiness thing behind it, so I worked on this and I knew it's a matter of time, then things will change for me too. But your nervous system often interprets social comparison as survival information. So let's get into this a bit. Human beings, as we all are, are deeply we are so relational, relational, and also we compare each other. So you can never say don't compare yourself because you still do, but you can lessen the comparison by slowing yourself down and really question the narrative that your part, your brain, your ego is telling you. Because it's so inflated of like, oh, everyone is so great, and or this person has this great career change, and you don't, you know, even though my life is full of good things. Anyway, so historically speaking, obviously, status, belonging, resources, or being the chosen one really had an impact on your survival. And our brain, my brain, your brain can subconsciously interpret someone getting chosen for a new position or succeeding in their life or in in their profession or being admired, being loved as evidence that you or I are falling behind. So the emotional brain is not logical at all. So, what I usually do with my clients when we process emotions and we regulate the nervous system due to experience that is highly triggering for them, we also go into questioning all the thoughts and Patterns that are coming up, and that is very important. And so someone else's or friend's engagement, promotion, or success can unconsciously trigger in me like the fear of exclusion, the fear of inadequacy. Inadequacy. I cannot I cannot I like that word, but I cannot speak it. Inadequacy. Fear of scarcity and the fear that your moment to shine is never to come again. And envy is often less about I want them to lose. So I never wish any of my friends or people on the internet when they succeed ill. It's more of like I'm scared, I will never experience this myself. And that is an important distinction because jealousy can feel so shameful. I used to be so ashamed for being jealous that I couldn't touch base with the jealousy, but you know what? It also did not go away. And then sometimes your jealousy, my jealousy is grief. So jealousy is something that emotionally initially, but if I go into it and really process it, I come up with grief. And jealousy feels shameful because people moralize emotions instead of really processing them and understanding them. And of course, we are we we got raised that good people don't feel jealous. It's also very tied to my religion. I got raised as a Catholic. So it was always like good people are not envious, they are not jealous because in the Bible, people that were jealous or envious really did nasty things. Really nasty things. And as a child, with all these stories that you get told, that are beautiful stories in a way, you get taught like bad people are jealous, and good people are always compassionate, always balanced and regulated. And that is not human, that's not true. So and we as women, we are conditioned to be supportive, agreeable, obviously, emotionally pleasant, right?

Jealousy, Shame, And Women’s Conditioning

Martina 24:16

Not oversensitive, not competitive, please, and please also just self-sacrificing all the freaking time. So women kind of never really learned to process the ugly emotion of jealousy. So we got learned, also we got taught to suppress that emotion, but not to process them. And I know the same obviously will go for men too, but I'm now speaking just about us women here, because that's where I can relate the most, because I am one. So the the thing is, as you know, and we've talked about this many times, repressed jealousy or emotions per se, they don't go anywhere, they don't disappear. Energy, which is what emotions are, it's electricity. I mean, thoughts are electricity, but emotions are chemical reactions in your body, they don't go anywhere, they just don't vanish, they don't disappear. And obviously, unlike repressed jealousy can leak through passive aggression. I have had passive aggression moments with a friend last year, you know, so me on the receiving end here, of course. But again, so there's passive aggression that can leak through fake support. I think we have all experienced one way or the other fake support from other people, like saying, Oh yeah, I'm supporting, and then actually there was nothing coming. Gossip, obviously, guilty as charged. I gossiped and I still do it once in a while, and still like you know, catch myself. I'm like, okay, you know, I'm questioning myself, what's what's going on with myself when I'm gossiping? And then comparison spirals. I mean, I know from clients who've gone there so crazy, like spiral, they never get out of it in a way, and obviously minimizing other successful women. So there is shame around jealousy, but that creates more toxicity than jealousy itself. So the emotion itself itself is never really harmful when you process it, but the repression is, and there's also the difference between being a bitter person or being envious. So your emotions, your feelings are not your character, but behavior forms your character. So envy is to me emotional information, and bitterness is kind of what happens when envy hardens into your identity. So as a healthy person, I say, well, this activated me, this hurts, this triggers me, I feel behind. That success makes me feel uncomfortable. Like her success makes me feel uncomfortable without having to collapse into shame. And emotional maturity, on the other hand, is is you being able to say, I feel discomfort, I I regulate, I remain still kind, I self-reflect. And jealousy becomes dangerous when you deny it, you project it out to people, you weaponize it, or you turn, you turn this into self-hatred. So you can feel envy without becoming a malicious person. So, and the goal is also never emotional purity, as I think kind of where people feel this is the goal. The goal is to have emotional responsibility, to amp up your emotional intelligence and understand. And for me, emotional intelligence is the thing of knowing yourself so well, able to catch yourself when you're projecting, when you are, you know, getting triggered, and also understanding other people in a way, but first it starts with you. So this is the this is the whole thing.

Naming Emotions And Regulating The Nervous System

Martina 28:33

So, what really helped me was naming the emotions that I felt or got triggered when I was in that phase of not knowing where I'm going and getting triggered by other people's success or wins or achievements, and reducing the fusion with those emotions, not letting those emotions be in the driver's seat. Because self-awareness really decreases your emotional reactivity. And to be honest with you, curiosity is the healthiest way, and it's healthier than self-shaming. So I ask myself those questions like, for example, what exactly is this triggering in me? What am I grieving here? What am I afraid this means about me when I see someone's achievements? And there might be unmet desires, suppressed ambition, neglected dreams of yours, or maybe there's a part in you that feels super abandoned. That is what jealousy or envy often reveals when you sit with this. And so what I did was I separated people's success from my identity. So I grounded myself in listen, I can't always know where I'm going. It is important to sit with the uncertainty, with the not knowing, because that's where the growth is happening. Obviously, I'm I'm I'm expanding my nervous system bandwidth of holding the discomfort of all these triggering emotions, uncomfortable emotions, and knowing that my timeline is a different one. It will always be that someone is winning while I'm maybe losing, while I make a mistake or grappling with a mistake. So timing is always arbitrary, and I have to focus on my timeline and not make this also a comparison race of like, oh, this age, I should be further down the line because I see someone younger being there. Your timeline is yours, mine is mine, and we started from different prerequisites, we had different education, we had different dreams and possibilities, privileges, everything goes into this. And then there is growth is also non-linear. We grow differently. You know, some grow faster than others. That doesn't mean that they are better. It's just always we always think that other people per default are better. And that's also something that you have to catch. And I always catch in myself. I'm like, other people's achievement or timeline isn't automatically better. And the big learning for me was to learn to tolerate temporary uncertainty, even if it's for months and you don't know when it will end, without making this decide that your future is doomed. So someone else arriving somewhere first doesn't mean that you are disqualified. Not at all. Really slow down here, and this helped me so much. I was like, you know what? This time right now, where I'm not achieving, where I'm not grinding, where I'm not hustling, where I'm sitting after work and I'm reading a book, studying my languages. You know, this is a good time. Cherish this. It is, I'm healthy, everyone is healthy right now, and savor those moments. And I did. And this is why slowing down and really ground yourself into the present moment and say, hey, I have food, I have money, I have I live somewhere beautifully, or my my family is healthy, my my pets are healthy, like all those things, they count. This is this is precious. This is this is this is my magic in life. That this moment is just the best I've ever got, you know. So, and I think one of the strongest things a person can do is stay soft within themselves when feeling disappointed, when you're feeling someone else is not winning, and you know, you you are not, you think you're not winning. It's important not to become cruel, it's especially to yourself because I know that we are not cruel human beings to other people or animals, but don't become self-cruel and don't become hardened and not rude against people because life feels painful to you. It is so easy to take the pain we feel and put it on other people by making a nasty remark or cutting them off, ignoring them, all these things. And this is while this is very human, I strive not to become heared by someone else's win. When life throws me a curveball, I really try to be soft within myself and let myself know that is normal and there's always a path forward. Because someone else receiving love, success, maybe visibility, joy, healing, opportunities is not la is is not proof that life forgot about you. And I think this is part of becoming emotionally free. It's like kind of learning how to witness someone else's else bloom without deciding that your season will never come. Because it will. It absolutely will.

Staying Soft Until Your Season Arrives

Martina 34:33

And for me, something just happened four weeks ago. Something big, something completely unexpected. I will do follow-up episode four days because I don't want to overdo it with timing here, which kind of pulled me out of the void. And it's so fascinating because I didn't expect it. I never had that in my books. If you asked me half a year ago, I would have said no, never, I don't want to do this. And it completely shifted everything. Now I'm winning, now I'm succeeding, and now I'm looking back on the time of that void and feel like I did great, it was good, I cherished it, I had a lot of me time, a lot of time to slow things down, sit with myself, get to know myself better. This was so valuable. It's so valuable. Because to me, is who I who am who I am in times where I get jealous, triggered, envious while I'm sitting in a void and seeing other people winning is who I really am. When I'm winning, it's easy to be kind, compassionate, to be bubbly, to be happy, to be to give, to be generous. It's easy. But when it's not easy, when I have all those self-debilitating thoughts of like criticism or shame, feeling like I'm left behind, I'm not worthy. The way how I behave towards myself and others, in a genuine way, not fake way, is who I really am. I don't believe that how should I phrase it? I believe that who you are in hard times is how you really are. And there are two kinds of people. People who stick around it, still compassionate and kind to others, and people who get malicious, who get who take jealousy and envy and use this as a weapon to outcompete or to put pain on other people. And I always want to choose the first one that when I am maybe in pain, when I'm like unsure about me, my life, my future, I want to still stay rooted in kindness and compassion. Because the world will not turn a better place by me when I'm not winning, when I'm in in in between stages. The world will not become a better place if I'm acting out of fear, pain or jealousy. So learn that when you witness someone else's bloom, achieve when that your season is also about to come. Maybe on a different timeline. But that timeline is yours, yours only, and it's meant to be this way because there is so much learning in the challenge, in the pain, in the hard times. And if you can take those lessons, you will win big times when things go easy, when opportunities come your way. I hope you enjoyed this podcast today, this episode. It was a pleasure having you. I will definitely talk more about those things and also also authentically how I deal with all those things. The achievement or what I talked about it before, because I'm out of the void, I will follow up on another episode. But again, thanks for being here. And I wish you that you process all the emotions in a way that help you gaining information that make you a greater, better person because you already are. But the more we process, the more we learn about ourselves, and that's what for me emotional maturity is so important. So, again, thanks for being here and speak to you next week. Bye, my loves, have a great weekend.