If You Love Competition, You Never Lose 563.3
Suppose you're an Olympic athlete and you hear that the only person who has a chance to beat you is ill and may have to withdraw. Are you overjoyed at your good luck or disappointed that you won't be able to compete against the very best?
You ought to be disappointed. Olympian John Naber, winner of four gold medals in swimming, says a true sportsman wants to compete against his best competitor on his best day. Although that makes winning more difficult and less likely, it also makes the event more exciting and a victory more meaningful. Being declared a winner is not real victory; being the best is.
In any sport, what's more fun: to play against someone you easily dominate or against someone who forces you to be your best and makes every point an exciting challenge? The aim of sports is to have fun trying to win and to love the game enough that you can enjoy yourself whether you win or not.
Athletic competition is not a form of war. The people you compete against are also the people you play with. They aren't enemies. The word "competition" comes from the Latin root competere, which means "to strive together, not against each other."
Be thankful for quality competitors who push you to your limit. You'll find sports more healthy and enjoyable when you respect and like your opponents rather than hate them. When you compete against someone as good or better than you, you may not always win, but you never lose.
This is Michael Josephson reminding you that character counts.
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Comments
Thank you for the knowledge that this column gives. Combined with your post on The Pressure to Win in Sports and Business, it becomes very clear that we as a nation need to look at how we define and practice competition.
We accept the term "unhealthy" competition to describe unethical actions that lead to unsustainable and harmful consequences. The reality is that this isn’t competition at all. We have a viral pathology running through our society.
As in many aspects of human development, language reflects the consciousness of a society. In many cases language is improved to evolve humanity. In other cases we have devolution of humanity. In our current use and practice of “competition,” we appear to have a pathological condition that needs to be healed. I will ask what people mean when they use the word competition and begin a conversation to have people think about the words we use and the rationalizing acceptance of various sick practices that result.
Posted by: Michael Powell | April 25, 2008 9:34 AM
I'm on a softball team that always wins. We usually play the same teams over and over again. After a while I stopped bragging about our wins to the guys at work. Now, when I play, I am thinking about my personal achievements: batting and fielding. Now, the competition is within myself. And it's fun!
Posted by: Kat McComb | April 25, 2008 10:11 AM