A lot of us, myself included, are mainly driven by our compensatory strategies. We are driven by what we are trying to prove to the world and ourselves. This is how we start to form positive and negative beliefs about who we are. These become part of our story, which then continue to drive that definition of who we think we are. In my case, wunderkind, talent, golf pro, failure…

I was a super successful junior golfer, and my goal was to become the best player in the world. I’ve tried to think back and understand where that goal came from, and the truth is, I don’t know. I loved golf and knew I wanted to play this game professionally for the rest of my life, but I don’t know why I wanted to be the best. I could have said I want to be a really good professional, but I always said I want to be number one.

Now, you can imagine what happens when someone who wants to be the best sees someone else who is just as good or even better. You become extra motivated to get better, better than the other person. That is external motivation. My goal was an external goal; becoming number one meant I needed to be better than everybody else.

Today, I try to stop comparing myself to other people. My life, just like yours, doesn’t need to look like anyone else’s. There are many ways to do it and many paths to take. I really can’t think of a better way to disrespect yourself than by comparing yourself to others. It’s no surprise to me that wherever we find high levels of comparison and competition, we find sickness, stress, injury, burnout, and, a lot of times, corruption. Many of us suffer from the same disease; we don’t believe we are good enough as we are. Therefore, we are always trying to do better, which in our culture means acquiring and doing more. More of everything. This never seems to work; at least, that is my experience.

When we think about who we are, it becomes a list of roles that we have played. However, that is only part of our story and merely an expression of what we do. When we aren’t connected to ourselves, we want to constantly achieve and be somebody. Our culture is obsessed with what we do and is driven by results and achievement. Results and achievements are great but they should come from intrinsic and healthy motivation to achieve and become.

We live in “When.., then… “, do and achieve first, then you’ll be good enough, find happiness and be content. I have stopped feeding that old unconscious habit of “when, then ” and I feel like sometimes the best way to judge yourself and your progress is by how little you judge yourself and your progress. There is a way to be both, content and still ambitious.

Our world is a competitive place, and as a professional golfer, I love competing and am very accustomed to competition. However, I believe we all need to have a switch for competition; we need to know when and how to turn it on. I see a lot of people, including myself, who constantly have this switch on. It can be toxic for both the relationships you have with others and your relationship to yourself.

Part of the reason I love Yoga so much is that in the practice of yoga you’re not competing with anybody; not even yourself. In a world where tough competitors are praised and looked up to, there is a lot to be said about those who don’t feel the need to compete at all — not even with themselves.

I believe we can be both content and ambitious.