I was never happy with who I was. Even when I received a compliment, I wasn’t satisfied.

All it took was for someone to post a picture of themselves on Instagram, depicting their particularly rosy life. I’d feel a twinge of envy, which would eventually overflow into a landslide of self-doubt. I’ll never be as happy/pretty/smart as her, I’d think.

So I became determined to do whatever it took to be happy. But what would it take?

I always fell short of the expectations I placed on myself.

Get a million followers on social media? Show off a perfect body? Score a perfect GPA? Land an internship at an established firm? Yes, I thought, only then will I be content.

And I don’t think I was alone in believing that lie. Needless to say, I always fell short of the expectations I placed on myself.

I was really unhappy.

This changed one day on a bus in Spain, bound from Zaragoza to Madrid. The usual cloud of anxiety looming over my head was suddenly interrupted by a podcast playing on my headphones. Dr Ravi Zacharias quoted a phrase from an old but popular hymn; the words cut like a knife, slicing through the lies I’d been believing.

“I’d rather have Jesus than man’s applause.”

And then it hit me. I’d been doing everything with the motive of gaining approval from others – not the one whose approval truly matters. And deeply seeded in that twisted mindset was pride – wanting affirmation of my worth.

That gentle reminder to look to Jesus completely changed the way I viewed … everything.

I understood finally that we are all running different races. The finishing line is the same – we all end at the same place, before the judgment seat – but the race isn’t a competition with others.

Just be you.