Guide Youth to Emulate Rather Than Compare

As a young man, I strived to emulate Brigham Young University athletes like basketball star Krešimir Ćosić and Elder S. Gifford Nielsen, who went on to become an NFL quarterback and later served as a General Authority Seventy.

I know many young men today have posters of their favorite athletes in their bedrooms. When you strive to emulate a gifted athlete, you study their technique, style and characteristics. That can be motivating.

However, when you compare yourself to those athletes, you can feel inferior and inadequate, which can affect how you esteem yourself.

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Comparison invites envy and coveting and can only bring frustration, pride and discouragement. When we measure our worst against someone else’s best, we either tear down and belittle another or ourselves. Either option does not mask or diminish our own insecurities.

This is especially dangerous in a world of social media that gives us endless opportunities to invite comparison. In the “For the Strength of Youth: A Guide for Making Choices,” we read, “Don’t compare your life to what other people seem to be experiencing. Remember that your worth comes from being a child of heavenly parents, not from social media” (p. 18).

President Theodore Roosevelt once said, “Comparison is the thief of joy.”

In the scriptures we read, “That which doth not edify is not of God, and is darkness. ... That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light” (Doctrine and Covenants 50:23-24).

As youth leaders notice young people negatively comparing themselves to others, let’s invite them to instead find someone they can emulate. Mention the good qualities in their parents, older siblings, For the Strength of Youth counselors or other youth in their ward or stake.

The greatest example we can all emulate is our Savior, Jesus Christ. Speak of His life, His characteristics and virtues and the way He treated those who were scorned and rejected.

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Just as a young man might have a poster of a favorite athlete on his bedroom wall, a youth should also have a picture of the Savior in his room and the scriptures next to his bed.

Encourage the youth to discover and develop their own spiritual gifts. One is to know that “Jesus is the Christ; the son of God and He was crucified for the sins of the world” (Doctrine and Covenants 46:13). Another is the gift of “knowledge, that all may be taught to be wise and to have knowledge” (Doctrine and Covenants 46:18). Finding and utilizing gifts is emulating instead of comparing.

Sister Patricia Holland said, “My greatest misery comes when I feel I must fit what others are doing or what I think others expect of me. I am most happy when I am comfortable being me and trying to do what my Father in Heaven and I expect me to be” (“Portraits of Eve: God’s Promises of Personal Identity,” in LDS Women’s Treasury: Insights and Inspirations for Today’s Woman (1997), pp. 97–98).

Her husband, President Jeffrey R. Holland, Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, testified, “[God] loves each of us — insecurities, anxieties, self-image and all. He doesn’t measure our talents or our looks; He doesn’t measure our professions or our possessions. He cheers on every runner, calling out that the race is against sin, not against each other” (“The Other Prodigal,” April 2002).

In April 2025 general conference, our Prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, taught us to increase our confidence with charity and virtue. Emulation rather than competition is how we can increase both.

“Let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly; then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God; and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven” (Doctrine and Covenants 121:45).