To Deny Competition is to Deny Life
I can remember in fourth grade having an Easter egg hunt at school and having the teacher tell us that we could pick up only three eggs, and then we were to stop. Truth be told, that rule was probably in place for people like me who were so incredibly slow that the other kids would have gotten all the eggs before I even got there, but that didn't matter. I can still remember how stupid I thought it was and how it took the whole point out of the experience. Or how about when we had an art "competition" and half the class got first place ribbons and everyone else got second place ribbons. I had even less art skills than speed at that time and it still annoyed me. What was the prize worth if it was easily attained? Why were they trying to fool me in order to make me feel good about myself? Why were they afraid of real competition?
I have been a fierce competitor all my life. I believe I owe most of the credit to having two older brothers who are somewhat close in age. I remember shooting baskets and knowing full well that the only way I was going to shoot the ball was if I managed to get the ball away from my much taller and bigger brothers. If I wanted to play with them at all, I had to learn some way of bridging that natural gap, and it instilled in me a competitive spirit that has been carried with me, further developed, and found to be essential throughout many aspects of my life.
Humans are naturally competitive beings. If we weren't, we wouldn't still be around on this planet. One of the greatest and healthiest forms of competition is found in sports. The fact that sports are still thriving also points to our need for competition, for they are an outlet for our ...
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... of life. If people can't see this, then it is easy to understand how they can't see the true beauty of competition.
Competition is an essential part of growing up. It mirrors life almost to perfection while allowing it to be a game. To deny competition is to deny that life will present us with struggles. It is to pretend that this world will not offer obstacles to be overcome. To fear the pain of failure for either yourself or anyone else is to misunderstand the importance of challenges to create purpose. It is to misunderstand the balance of life. A hollow victory is no victory at all. So I say give me competition. I'll strive to do and be my best and I'll take my chances and if I fall short then so be it, for that's reality. Allow me to hold in balance the chance of failure and the hope of success, for it is in these moments that I can dare to be alive.
Two best friends are torn apart. A man meticulously plots revenge on the person who got the job he was dying for. A nation is full of rage and fear because another country beat them in the race to walk on the moon. Sadly, all of these situations were caused by one thing, competition. In Alfie Kohn’s essay, “Competition Is Destructive”, he describes competition as having a “toxic effect on our relationships”(11). Although competition has many positive effects in this world, when talking specifically about relationships, whether it be between best friends, two strangers, or even entire nations, it fuels negative feelings and attitudes that transform people into monsters.
The character of Jay Gatsby was a wealthy business man, who the author developed as arrogant and tasteless. Gatsby's love interest, Daisy Buchanan, was a subdued socialite who was married to the dim witted Tom Buchanan. She is the perfect example of how women of her level of society were supposed to act in her day. The circumstances surrounding Gatsby and Daisy's relationship kept them eternally apart. For Daisy to have been with Gatsby would have been forbidden, due to the fact that she was married. That very concept of their love being forbidden, also made it all the more intense, for the idea of having a prohibited love, like William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, made it all the more desirable. Gatsby was remembering back five years to when Daisy was not married and they were together:
Nothing is more important, to most people, than friendships and family, thus, by breaking those bonds, it draws an emotional response from the readers. Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan had a relationship before he went off to fight in the war. When he returned home, he finds her with Tom Buchanan, which seems to make him jealous since he still has feelings for Daisy. He wanted Daisy “to go to Tom and say: ‘I never loved you” (Fitzgerald 118) Gatsby eventually tells Tom that his “wife doesn’t love [him]” and that she only loves Gatsby (Fitzgerald 121). But the unpleasant truth is that Daisy never loved anyone, but she loved something: money. Daisy “wanted her life shaped and the decision made by some force of of money, of unquestionable practicality” (Fitzgerald 161). The Roaring Twenties were a time where economic growth swept the nation and Daisy was looking to capitalize on that opportunity. Her greed for material goods put her in a bind between two wealthy men, yet they are still foolish enough to believe that she loved them. Jay Gatsby is a man who has no relationships other than one with Nick Caraway, so he is trying to use his wealth to lure in a greedy individual to have love mend his
There are people who are not as motivated, they are often referred to as the underachievers. However, once they have someone to compete with, they are more likely to become motivated to improve and excel. This is where competition serves as a healthy motivator. There is a friend who was exhausted of being constantly compared to his overachieving older brother. This caused him to start studying and working harder in order to become just as good as his brother. The situation showed how he did not need to bring down his older brother in order to be just as successful. Competition serves its purpose, when one finds themselves competing with themselves instead of their competitor. When one is competing with themselves, they are allowing themselves to grow and improve to become a better person. They do not have to compete with someone else, nor degrade others success in order to make their achievements seem exceptional.
Hinkle, J., Cheever, K., & , (2012). Textbook of medical-surgical nursing. (13 ed., pp. 586-588). Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer Health
When involved in sports, you have to be competitive. You need to win more than anybody else. However, athletes are taking winning to the extreme.
...petitive sports can cause lasting harm and have no benefits for these children (Statsky 627), then examples of how childhood competition negatively affected individuals years after the fact would go a long way to proving her accusation. As Statsky's thesis rests on the assumption that adult imposition of competition and organization in children's sports makes the games neither satisfactory nor beneficial to the children, then lack of benefit must be shown along with lack of satisfaction. The existence of unsatisfied child athletes in organized sports is no indication that children are somehow unsuited to competition and team sports.
Societies that esteem social conformity view defiance as a by-product of insolence rather than an act of courage. Isolation of individuals that do not abide by the set restrictions is another common characteristic of systems that encourage mob mentalities. As a result, in order to be accepted by peers, individuals often have to function based on societal expectations. Some consider pursuing their own opinions and ideas against the social norms. This often garners backlash and hostilities from other members of society, ranging from physical and verbal abuse to denial of individual’s competence and sanity to complete alienation from society. Although some people are able to champion their freedom of expression and right to opinions over the need
.In addition young athletes have become more aggressive. Kids that participate in competitive sports are becoming more and more aggressive and competitive the sports have become themselves. Mitchell reveals "traits like bullying and the need to dominate their oppo...
Since the moment you had your first play date every single boy that has ever been born has always wanted to win or be the best out of what you are doing. This is the competitive instinct that is within everybody but especially in boys and men. Even when you’re a baby when another baby is around and that baby starts to get more attention than you your first reaction is to cry and demand attention. As we get older into our teens our competitive instinct blossoms more than any other emotion we have. In sports you always want to be the best, that’s why you play the game. You lift weights and do speed drills so that you get faster and jump higher just to help you become better than your opponent, the thing that drives you through your training is you competitive instinct. Even after we are done playing sports we make up our own games just so we can still be competitive with our friends and other people, prime example is fantasy sports. We treat it as if it were life changing for our team that we picked was able to beat or lose to your friends teams.
There is a misconception that competition is bad, if a child can experience the thrill of winning and the disappointment of losing, they will be well equipped for the reality of life. Competition provides stimulation to achieve a goal; to have determination, to overcome challenges, to understand that hard work and commitment leads to a greater chance of success. Life is full of situations where there are winners and losers; getting a job; a sports game; not getting into a desired college. People need to learn how to cope with disappointment and then to look forward to the next opportunity to try again. Competition also teaches us to dig deep and find abilities we never knew we had. The pressure to win or succeed can often inspire more imaginative thinking and inspire us to develop additional
I found that much of my free time is spent socializing with friends and competing in numerous sports and hobbies. I found that much of my daily life revolves around competition, from playing collegian level soccer to video games with friends. Competition has always interested me from a very young age when I first begin playing soccer. However, I found there is a distinction between healthy competition and unhealthy competition within my own interests. Healthy competition was doing my best in order to advance and develop a skill or process. Conversely, Unhealthy competition was a sole focus on winning and a trap I have fallen into many times. In the work world today healthy competition can be a monumental tool used to engage and motivate employees. In class we have talked about a company called Nucor that has used competition within shifts to advance technology through innovation and increasing production. I believe my interest in competition and my competitive drive when instrumented in the right environment could be a huge motivator in the future
“Survival of the fittest” is a notion that I firmly advocate. Competition brings out the best in people, and I am a very competitive person. Competitiveness whether with one's self, or with others arouses the desire to succeed. My mother has taught me that competing with yourself is even better than competing with others because you struggle to become the best person you can be, without settling for exceeding the limitations of others.
Ever since I have been little I have been a very competitive person. I think this stems from me being involved in sports from a young age, and also having a father that was very competitive. I think the best example that illustrates my competition is my volunteering at the Boys and Girls Club. Every Thursday I volunteer at the Boys and Girls Club in Minneapolis, and am able to play sports and other games with the kids there. I have the hardest time letting the kids who are from ages six to twelve beat me in anything. I think I am good at using competition to my advantage, but at times in can get in my way because I become
The main goals behind Sport Education are to help students become knowledgeable about different sports and activities to the point where they can participate in these outside of the classroom to stay active. Also it teaches execution and strategies and encourages competitiveness. It is important for kids to be competitive because they will have to be in life and it will teach the importance of winning and losing the right way. “Sports offer kids a great chance to work cooperatively toward a common goal. And working coope...