Just smile and say WHAT

 Just smile and say ‘WHAT’!

I was listening to this interview with Mick Jagger last evening —someone asked him how he compared himself and the ‘Rolling Stones to the Beatles’. Now most people would have taken the bait, right? Not Mick. He just said, “They do what they want to do, and we do what we want to do—and that’s it. I don’t compare. We enjoy our music, and I guess they enjoy theirs” End of story. True rocker style answer for sure!

Except, of course, it wasn’t. The interviewer, itching for a headline, pressed on: “But who do you think is better at doing what they want to do?” And Mick, in all his glorious rock-star fashion, just looked at him and said: “What?” That “what” said it all—bemused, uninterested, maybe even a trifle annoyed.

And honestly, I get it. I’ve had it up to here with this obsession the world has with comparing everything—everyone—all the time. Why must there always be a competition? Why is every action, every milestone, every breath measured against someone else’s?

And it starts early. Painfully early. I’ve seen young parents- lovely people—locked in a subtle war over whose toddler walked first, talked first, sat on the potty first, rode a bicycle sooner, or got into some prestigious toddler yoga class. I mean, really? We’re benchmarking babies now. “Oh, my son’s doing phonics at 18 months.” “My daughter recites the periodic table backwards.” Congratulations!

Then they start school and things get worse. “What reading level is your child on?” “Which after-school program is she attending?” “Have you enrolled them in chess, ballet, robotics, advanced coding, and mindfulness?” “Is she on the ‘gifted and talented’ list yet?” And if your child is just… you know… being a child? Exploring, laughing, drawing blue dinosaurs with three heads and two tails- Then you’re clearly not doing enough, and you’re an awful parent.

Parenting today is strange and very different to when I grew up.  Today everyone’s child is in football, piano, and advanced math—at seven. One mum sighs, “She’s bored in class… already doing fractions for fun at home.” Right. Meanwhile, we all nod politely and quietly freak out that our kid still likes crayons and empty boxes to bang on.

It’s exhausting. Not just for the kids—but for all of us.

And we carry this utter nonsense into adulthood, don’t we? We compare houses, jobs, holidays, waistlines, watches, and of course, whose child is performing better in school, football, speech class, or ideally all three—preferably simultaneously. We cloak it all in polite language— “just curious” or “just proud”—but we all know what’s going on.

Even in the working world, this disease of comparison continues. Companies don’t just focus on their mission anymore.” No one seems to ask: ‘what do we want to do?”

Somewhere along the way, we lost the plot. We forgot that it’s okay—more than okay, in fact—to just do your own thing and do it well - To not be in a race - To not stare sideways all the time, constantly checking where others are.

Think about this - Why is it so hard to enjoy what we do, how we do it, without needing to “beat” someone else at it all the time. Frankly, I find it utterly nauseating. And more than that, I find it sad. We’ve robbed ourselves of the joy of simply doing something for its own sake, whether that’s parenting, painting, playing a guitar, or building a business.

So maybe, just maybe, we should all take a leaf out of Mick Jagger’s book. Let them do what they want to do. You do what you want to do. And do the best you can.

And if someone insists on asking, “But who’s better at it?”—just smile and say:

What?