Alfie Kohn wrote, “When my success depends on other people’s failure, the prospects for a real human community are considerably diminished. . .” in his essay titled “Why competition”. People will always fail, people will always achieve, and people will always compete. It is the way everyone prospers throughout life, some live on the notion that they will eventually play in a game where they will be provided with satisfaction from winning, but the losers might face the consequences of their own and others scrutiny. I agree that Kohn has a good point but I would disagree. Winning a losing have been around since the beginning of time and will never leave our presence. Dinosaurs fought for meals, cavemen fought for mates, and we do the same …show more content…
If our population as a whole did not have the mind capability to develop a sense of those things, no one would fight over who wants the last scoop of ice cream or a certain girl from school. But that can never happen because we were put on this earth with those capabilities for a reason, to compete. It is the satisfaction of Tim scoring a goal, and over celebrating, in the last minute of a soccer game to win, or the devastation of Doug getting being scored on. Which may lead to many things like Khon’s quote “the prospects for a real human community are considerably diminished”, after Doug was scored on, he could go home and start texting Tim, calling him obscene names but the Tim brushes it off until Doug shows up to his school with friends taunting him until they fight, which they do and Tim has to be rushed to the hospital because Doug had a switch blade and severely injured Tim to the point he had to stay in the hospital for 4 months and almost died. Now Tim has terrible seizures that will never go away. Tim is my cousin, Tim as well as I will remember that day and his recovery for our whole lives. Doug never apologized for what happened that dreadful day. But throughout his recover and after, Tim learned to be patient because his recovery was so slow, never over celebrate in the
In Theodore Isaac Rubin’s essay, “Competition and Happiness”, he summits about how in today’s society its always the battle eat or be eaten. Therefore our parents always tried to get us involved at an early age to help with our self-development, well being, and health. Since our culture has made us believe that competition brings out the best of us. Yet, it simultaneously brings out a stressful, isolating, and paranoid ambiance at a very young age. I agree with Rubin’s notion since the use of our time and energy is determined by competition and limits our happiness because it weakens our sense of identity.
In the moment neither of these feelings are amazing but in “Competition Makes a Comeback”, Caitlin Snaring shares that this was actually results in an outcome that is well worth it: “‘Losing made me want to win even more… got me fired up’ to win the 2007 contest.” (Kronholz 18). Because Caitlin felt upset after being eliminated at a 2006 geography bee, she realized that she didn’t want to feel like this again, and the only way for that to happen is to push even harder to reach goals. Without failure against others people assume they are the best or they are just a natural winner so they don’t need to try. This mindset automatically sets society up for failure, because with everyone just sitting back waiting for a trophy to be handed to them for anything and everything nothing would get done, and there is no way for everyone in a society to all win one way. Just imagine a computer engineer thinking they can release a computer that is only a small percent finished just because people loved their last
Every day in our lives, we desire to be perfect to please others. No matter how hard we try, if we do not achieve the concept of being perfect, then we will feel like failure. For example, every year at the Olympics, a newly crowned Olympic champion receiving a gold medal persuades young athletes to worry about winning a medal in every competition they compete. If they do not win a medal in a certain competition, then all their hopes are vanished for the next competition. This action shows how if we do not strive to emulate other people’s achievements, then we will not stand out from the rest of our population.
Margaret Mead once said that "For many Americans, the concept of success is a source of confusion. As a people, we Americans greatly prize success. We are taught to celebrate and admire the one who gets the highest grades, the one voted most attractive or most likely to succeed. But while we often rejoice in the success of people far removed from ourselves-people who work in another profession, live in another community, or are endowed with a talent that we do not especially want for ourselves-we tend to regard the success of people close at hand, within our own small group, as a threat." Personally i believe that this is not true for many reasons. It makes the world run smoother although I wont be talking about that personally it really does.
In The Meaning of Lives by Susan Wolf, she states, “They [people] want to be important, to have an impact on the world, to make a mark that will last forever. When they realize that they cannot achieve this, they are very disappointed. The only advice one can give to such people is: Get Over It”(846). Which is a statement I do not agree with. Many people are determined on making a difference in this world, whether it is small or large. Although, of course, every journey isn’t easy and it consists of many bumps along the way, which, in one of those bumps, could easily bring one down to think one cannot achieve our goal. That we cannot make a difference in this world. But no one should simply say to them “get over it” and make them think this.
Theodore Roosevelt used an analogy involving an arena to express how it feels to be judged when you are trying your hardest. The man in the arena is trying his best, yet there are people on the sidelines spectating his life and judging his every move. They do not understand what it is like to be in the arena and haven’t had the courage to try, yet they feel as if they have the right to criticize the man in the arena based on his techniques and successes. Roosevelt warns not to listen to judgmental people and to continue to strive. The man in the arena fails repeatedly, but he has the resiliency to try again. He knows that as long as he endures, he will end up with either victorious or knowing that he at least had the courage to try. Failure,
Margaret Mead said in her quote that people recognize other people’s success from afar, but when people succeed who are close to the people who are recognizing the people’s success from afar, don’t typically recognize those close around them, and could see those people as threats. For example, during sports competitions, such as swimming. I may look at a swimmer like Ryan Lochte and recognize his success and have tremendous respect for him. On the other hand, if there was another swimmer that I swam against, and that particular swimmer won a race, I may not recognize that he won that race, I may view him as a threat. If I do view him as a threat, I may not like him and could possibly develop hatred towards him just because he beat me. Some may be shocked at how often this happens in sports. It seems that whenever someone that you don’t particularly know makes an accomplishment, more people tend to celebrate that accomplishment. Meanwhile, if someone locally makes an accomplishment some people may be reluctant to congratulate. Perhaps, people are more likely to celebrate someone else’s accomplishment from afar because that person may know that they will never see that person in their life, which is a very real possibility. Those who succeed locally, some may not recognize, based on the fact that oneself hasn’t accomplished that particular goal, which could cause
Most people distress from mistakes and failures as it is associated with losers. Students, workers, companies, and even leaders will keep on straining towards a dead end because of the fear of losing. Think like a freak, however, encourages failure, only when the opportunity cost of lapses the dashed cost. Chapter nine reminds economists that failure can be an impermanent holdup and motivates them to learn from their failures and use them as guidelines in tackling life
If we did not fail or lose how could we learn to value or appreciate success/winning? What would we work towards, strive for or struggle with if we won all the time? What would motivate or drive us to do better or want better for ourselves if there was no concept of competition? If we are only recognized for attendance or participation because there is nothing beyond what’s actually handed to us, then all of society would come to a screeching halt. It goes beyond childhood, we are shaping the society for the future
That exact statement makes me or any reader feel that failure doesn’t always have to be perceived to be negative. Failure can improve personal growth. We are always scared out the outcome failure will bring, but that is the silver lining for our personal growth. If we concentrate more on the effort we put into a certain task, we can grow by the steps we take along the way. Anyone can succeed, no matter their
People have said that to succeed, you must first fail. I didn’t really understand this until failure became so present in my life. In the beginning, my team was losing game after game, and getting knocked out of tournament after tournament. It was hard to keep playing on a team that was struggling so much. “Hang in there guys. We’re
Success without adversity is impossible. Everyone in life has their ups and downs and nothing in this world is perfect. At some point in life, hardships begin to occur and that’s when the real test begins. Some people rise up and try their absolute best to take a stand against the challenge. Then there are others that would crawl back into their shells, crying for mercy. There should be no excuse for giving up or not putting in the effort. People are only successful in winning the battle of adversity when they are mentally tough. The intense game of adversity can be referred to football.
People come together to create unspoken social morality laws. They compete against each other in everything simply because everyone has their own individual conscious and subconscious. People work to live and vice versa, but how significant is that when in the end all they will leave is a half written legacy for no one but their loved ones to read as time passes it deteriorates from the minds of everyone and decays until nothing's left. I think human behavior is interesting, regarding the fact that they do things for the rest of their lives only to be forced to give it all up because death is patiently waiting at their front door as they take one step closer to opening the door. I never really see the point in doing something if the person can not do that something for as long as they like whilst improving.
...nk of as accomplishments that shaped who we are. Measuring ourselves against our personal achievents and the adversity we face is one of the many ways that we can examine our lives and potential. Adversity plays such a big role in our lives that it's almost invisible. We don't realize that practically everyday we face it and set it up to determine who we are going to be. Sometimes people are given a really crappy deck of cards and don’t know how to handle them. When were in a difficult situation, or faced with adversity we have two choices. Battle through it and become an even greater individual because of it or succumb to the situation and give up. It it all depends on how much determination a person has to fight through the adversity and in turn, become a better person.
...ere is no competition, our minds would remain idle. Competition also helps us to get back on our feet. There can be no failure without competition and not all failure is bad. Learning from failure and overcoming it also helps us with future hurdles in life. Although we might be setback by many obstacles on the way to achieving what we want, we should not brood over such minor matters. Instead, we should find out where we wrong and change for the better. We should not be stubborn and try to do things our way but search for alternative methods that will help us to obtain success. Competition may also do good for our character and personality. An over-confident person may keep doing things his or her way in hope of getting what they want. However, after experiencing many disappointing failures, this proud and narrow-minded person may be humbled in the process of attempting to reach his or her goal.