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When Comparison Knocks Your Confidence

Episode 110 • 9th April 2026 • Good Enough Counsellors • Josephine Hughes

Josephine: 00:00:01

Have you ever looked at what someone else is charging and felt that little drop in your stomach, that thought of, maybe I'm too expensive, maybe I should be charging less. I had a moment like that recently and it really made me stop and think.

So today I want to talk about comparison and how it can quietly lead us to undervalue ourselves. Welcome to Good Enough Counsellors, the podcast for growing a private practice without the pressure to be perfect.

I'm Josephine Hughes, counsellor and creator of Therapy Growth Group, helping you get the clients you want and create the practice of your dreams. I wonder if you've ever had this experience. You're scrolling through social media and you see something that someone else is doing.

It seems pretty similar to you and looks a whole lot better.

You get that terrible sinking feeling, a heart sink moment, and your brain goes to all sorts of places like, oh, they're so much better than me and this means that my stuff isn't going to be good enough. People aren't going to want to work with me and this is going to be the end of my practice. I wonder if any of you can identify with that feeling.

It's certainly something that I've been through that I'm going to talk about with you today. You can end up just feeling that you're not good enough. So you start off with comparison and that makes you doubt yourself.

And then it can have another effect as well. It can mean that you hold yourself back back because you don't think you're good enough and you don't feel as though you've got the right to share.

So that's what we're going to be talking about today. And I'm going to be really honest with you.

I'm coming from a place of having just done it myself and I'd really love to share with you how I went through this process and how I overcame it. And I hope that this will help you if you ever find yourself in those moments of comparison.

And I hope you'll come away from listening to this podcast and feel encouraged and that you are actually good enough. That's the aim of what I'm doing today.

So, yes, I was scrolling through social media and I found someone who is offering what looked like a very similar service to me. So what I do is I help therapists, principally counsellors in the uk, with their marketing. So I help them to get more clients.

And I saw someone who had a very slick looking website and they were offering what looked like a very similar service to mine. But at A considerably lower price. And that really made me wobble.

And what I'd really like to do is share how I overcame that wobble and was able to come back to a place of being grounded again. But, boy, that. That was a hard moment, I can tell you, and I had to work on it quite hard and process it. So I really did end up doubting myself.

I thought that no one would want to buy my services because they were more expensive.

I looked at how beautifully written and how techy the sort of technical excellence of this particular website looked and thought to myself, oh, I can't produce anything like that because I'm not techy enough.

You know, it really made me question myself and, of course, catastrophize and think that that was it, I was going to lose all my members and they would all go to someone else and I would be left without a business. But although I'm sort of talking about my membership, I'm sure that this does happen to some of you as well.

When you're looking for clients and you can look around at other therapists and think, oh, you know, they're charging maybe less than me and they look really experienced, and why would anybod want to come to me?

And when we start doubting ourselves like that, I think it can mean that we really begin to hide away because we just lose our confidence in ourselves.

But what I'd like to share is, number one, we've got to be really careful when we fall into the comparison trap, because quite often what we're doing is we're not actually comparing like with like, as the saying goes, we're comparing apples with bananas. They just often are completely different offers. I think it's really important to remember that.

And when I sort of began to think about that, I realized that actually I wasn't being fair to myself. What I was doing was I was undervaluing, actually what I offer.

And in thinking that, you know, everybody else would go to the cheaper person, I was forgetting that actually the reason I do charge what I charge is because I'm going to sort of polish my halo a little bit here, is because I really believe that it's worth it, you know, what I offer is an amazing offer.

And actually, to be honest, I think I could charge a lot more for it for what people get, because I'm not just really offering, you know, a membership where you come along and have a Q and A once a month. I'm offering sort of ask me anything sessions, for example. They're on several times a week.

You know, I give people a lot of access to me and access to me does cost a little bit more because it takes more of my time, so I have to charge more. But also that really deepens the service that I give to people because I'm available to them a lot.

So I sort of realized that what I'm offering is actually very different to what the other person was offering. It's at a different level of support, it's at a different depth. And really, you know, we're trying to do something slightly different.

What I'm trying to do is really get to know my members so that I can really support them in their individual circumstances and with the best one in the world, if you're only doing, say, a call a month, that isn't very easy to do. And what I really actually love about my membership is that I get to know people and they get to know me and we can really sort of work together.

So sometimes just because something looks similar on the surface, it doesn't mean it's the same. So you might be thinking to yourself, yeah, but I'm just offering counselling.

And the next counsellor who's offering something that looks better than me or is cheaper than me, they're offering counseling as well.

But I think if you say that to yourself, what you're doing is you're actually underestimating who you are as a person, who you are as a therapist, and what makes you unique as a therapist. And each of us is unique as a therapist. And it's.

I can't emphasize enough, and it's one of the things I do again in therapy growth group, is really try and help people to see what makes them a really suitable therapist for certain types of people. And when you're feeling confident like that, it means that you can go out and talk about it more.

And that's why I love to do it, because I can help people write their profiles. It gives them confidence when they're writing their blogs and doing their social media.

When I looked at what I do in therapy growth group and looked at what the other person was offering, I realised that I was comparing apples with bananas. And that actually wasn't being fair on me.

Now, the next thing that really helped me, and I hope it will help you too, is remembering that it's not a zero sum game. And when we think in terms of it being a zero sum game, effectively, what we're saying is there's not enough to go round.

But I'd like to reframe that and say it's about believing that there is enough to go round and that we suit different people.

So you may see a colleague who's doing a really lovely directory entry and you might look at that and think, oh, that's amazing, everybody's going to go to that person. But the fact is, is that that person won't be right for everyone.

And if you allow yourself to think that, you'll probably give up and you probably won't bother and you'll probably, you know, not publish your directory entry, for example. So it's really helpful to remember that there's lots of different people out there and they need different things.

And that certainly helped me when I was looking at this other person who was doing marketing because they're doing their offer in a particular way, it's cheaper than me. That might suit some people with limited resources.

It may be that they're quite happy with something that is self led, that just consists of resources that you can follow. Whereas with me obviously I'm much more involved in what people are doing and some people want that from me.

They want the support, they want the structure of what I'm doing, they want the calls and they want the community that I've created and the way in which I facilitate discussions and peer supervision, all the different things that I offer. Some people want that. And it's okay.

It's okay that there are some people who don't want that because there's enough people who do want what I offer and there's enough people who can afford it. That means that my business will be okay.

So it's about remembering that I might not be the right fit for everyone, but I am exactly the right fit for some people. So what I'd really love to encourage you to think about is there is space for you.

A lot of what I read online when I'm looking through the counselling groups on Facebook is people saying the market is saturated with counsellors.

And yes, there are a lot of counsellors out there, but that means you taking responsibility for what you're doing and making sure that people know what it is about you that might make you suitable for them.

And that was one of the things that I realized when I was thinking about my situation, that actually, you know, I can go away and compare myself with other people, but what does that actually do for me? It makes me feel down, it makes me want to hide and isn't good for me and in fact it's actually not being very kind to me.

And the kinder thing for me to do is to acknowledge how far I've come to acknowledge what I have that I've got to offer people and to actually make sure that people know about it. So it's not about my response being I should go away and hide because, you know, nobody loves me. It's the old words of the song. Everyone hates me.

I might as well go and eat worms. It's actually, no, you know, people need to know more about what I do and how I do it so that they can make a choice.

And, yeah, I'm not going to be right for everyone, but I need to be visible so that I'm actually helping them make that choice.

And I think often we can worry about pushing ourselves forward because we think that we're trying too hard to sell something, but it's not about selling ourselves themselves.

It's actually just about being open with people so that they can make a choice, so that they can think to themselves, yeah, I think this might be the right person for me.

So in your world as a therapist, where this comparison might show up, it might show up in your pricing, in that you look at what other people are pricing their services at and think that you can't possibly charge what you really would like to charge, or you think you're not worth charging any more than them, or even you think you shouldn't charge as much as them because they seem so much better than you. But we shouldn't base our charging decisions on what other people are charging.

It's actually thinking about, you know, how many hours do I want to do? What sort of income am I looking to earn from this? And then, you know, really marketing yourself to the people who can afford that sort of price.

Another way it can show up is when you're thinking about your niche and thinking to yourself, oh, so and so's doing this, I should be doing that, or, you know, what I'm doing isn't as good as what they're doing. And that makes you shrink back and maybe think, oh, I shouldn't be doing it this way.

But again, it's about recognizing who you are as a person person, and that actually you might have some real skills there that makes you perfect for whatever niche it is that you want to work with. I really do think it's about acknowledging your strengths.

And again, this is something that I do work on with my members of therapy growth group to help them realize, you know, where they have strengths that will stand out to people and will make people want to choose them because they'll seem like the Right. Therapist for them.

So, you know, it's a really common pattern to think things like, oh, they're charging less than me, so therefore I should lower my fee, or they're more experienced than me, so I've got no right to speak up in this situation. So, yeah, it might come up.

If, for example, you're someone on social media, you might feel shy about giving your opinion because you think there's other people who are much more experience than you. But often what you can bring is your lived experience.

And you can bring your experience of the clients that you've worked with, obviously without mentioning the clients, because that would be unethical.

But, you know, you can use your knowledge that you've gained over time to inform your opinions and to share those on social media because you've got every right to be able to share what you know is true.

And just because someone else maybe has more experience than you doesn't mean that you've not got something to say and that you can't offer your perspective on it. So if you've been listening to this and thinking, yeah, I maybe know what to do, but I don't know how to do it.

Or even you might know the how, but you need more support with it. It's possible that Therapy growth group might be the place for you.

Because I help therapists who are looking to grow their practice, who are looking to get more clients who need support, not just an instruction manual. You know, as my coach said to me, if you need an instruction manual, you can just go to AI and AI will do it for you.

But actually, what I do is I bring the human touch. I'm not AI, even though it does want to write my podcast for me, I'm doing this off my own bat.

I hasten to add, what I do is I help you interpret, I help you to apply it to your particular situation.

That's what I spend a lot of my time doing, is spending time with members and supporting them as they're doing things like thinking about how to write their profile, you know, if they've got questions or concerns, if they need encouragement. That's what I do. In Therapy growth group, it's not just a standard, you know, 10 or 20 pounds a month membership.

It's actually what we would call in the coaching world a mastermind. Because I'm on calls and I'm spending time with people and we're problem solving.

So if that's something that you're interested in, you're very welcome to join us inside Therapy Growth Group. I'll pop the link in the show notes. It's very easy just to go onto my website josephinehughes.com and quickly find therapy Growth group.

There's a link to it right at the top of the of the homepage and I'd love to see you in there as I just draw this episode to a close.

I'd really like you to ask yourself, or even to write this down and bring it out when you next find yourself in a moment of comparison with another counsellor. Just, just take a moment and ask yourself, am I being fair to myself here? Am I underestimating myself and am I putting myself down?

And what's a kinder way to be to yourself? It might be to really acknowledge how far you've actually come.

So I'd really like to reiterate one of my core messages, which is that you're not behind and you're not lacking in any way. You just might be underestimating yourself. Thanks so much for listening and I hope this has helped. Thanks for listening.

Do come and join my Facebook community. Good enough counsellors.

And for more information about how I can help you develop your private practice, please Visit my website JosephineHughes.com if you found this episode helpful, I'd love it if you could share it with a fellow therapist or leave a review on your podcast app. And in closing, I'd love to remind you that every single step you make gets you closer to your dream. I really believe you can do it.

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110. When Comparison Knocks Your Confidence