Stop competing with your past self and any of its accomplishments. Add to it. Expand upon it. Even if the rate by which you’re making progress is far less than it ever were before.

Instead of competing with your past self, add to the progress that it made.

Instead of thinking hey, I was so productive at that period of my life, I can’t do that now or be as good or highly productive as I was back then, and so I should think that whatever that I accomplish these days is never going to be enough, think how can you increase the amount of achievement you’ve already made happen in the past. Add to it. Expand upon it. Quadruple it. Instead of competing with it as if you’re two separate people who get nothing from the success of the other person. Trying to achieve in a way that makes sure that you did not achieve at a lesser level or rate than you did in the past is always coming from a place of competing with your past self, as if you’re two separate people, who don’t benefit from or get anything out of the success or the accomplishments of the other person.

Why are you doing that?

And if you fall short, you think less of yourself, or you think you are not trying hard enough. You are not doing enough. You are not moving the needle forward enough. You’re of insufficient moral character. You’re declining. You’re becoming weaker or worse as time goes by. Your best days are only behind you, and you will never be as good as you ever were in the past, no matter what, even if you’re still young as ever.

You seem to have forgotten the fact that you didn’t accomplish all of this in one day. You seem to be forgetting that you did not start out having a vision of accomplishing all this in mind.

You started gradually, and it snowballed from there. You started small. And you had no idea you’d end up accomplishing any of what you did. And now your past success is crippling you, holding you back in place, because you can’t compete with it. You can’t do that again. You can’t do something as huge or amazing as whatever that you’ve accomplished or reached in the past again, no matter how hard you try.

You forgot how you did it, and so you thought that it is impossible to be replicated again now or in the future.

But what if you did not try to be as good as you were at any moment in the past. What if you looked at it and said: I’m glad I did all this. Let’s add more to it. Even if it’s not at the same level of productivity, creativity, or quality, it still means that the overall progress you’re making is increasing gradually, on a consistent basis. And that’s not nothing. That is all that matters.

Think of it as making more progress, as opposed to competing with the rate by which you were making progress in the past, because sometimes no matter what you do, you can’t seem to be able to beat that again, no matter what you do, or how hard you try, at least for the time being.