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Naturally, that anxiety-inducing career-centric social network has been sent back into hibernation mode. Actually, I very nearly went nuclear, obliterating the whole damn thing (again), but pre-hibernating it forced a 24-hour reprieve. Maybe I’ll come back to that.

Let’s just remember some facts. Or at least some suppositions. LinkedIn is most likely the root cause of your depression. I’m addressing myself here. I’m not suggesting you have depression. But you will have if you spend any amount of time on there.

For it provides a turn-by-turn exposition of everywhere you went wrong in your “career”. It reveals to you the trajectory of all your peers, the great variety of roles they’ve enjoyed, their qualifications, experience, and status. Honestly, ignorance was bliss.

It’s on a par only with that other great misstep of mine: connecting with my old school’s alumni association. Imagine the esteem-boosting impact discovering all your old classmates are brain surgeons, barristers and particle physicists, while you’re just a glorified office dogsbody.

Somebody said, “Comparison is the thief of joy.” How very true. I must stop comparing myself to my siblings, relatives, friends, colleagues and — of course — total strangers. Let me just put my head down and focus on what I need to do, and forget every misstep along the way.

In short, slay that thief of joy.