Knowing the Essence of True Competition

Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off.

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

In today’s world order, the word “competition” has taken far reaching meanings and consequences.

When we are born, our parents compare our growth and behavior with other kids. As we grow-up and join a school, our teachers compare, teach and behave in perspectives of competition. Human perspective itself is formed out of wanting others to be like their own selves and then behaving accordingly. This may not be true of all but for majority, it is a definite case. Competition doesn’t end here. When we get a job, appraisals are done based on “competition” again (with the famous or infamous bell-curve technique). When we become parents, we again want our kids to compete. Most of us, also look at life as a competition with our neighbours or relatives accrued wealth, or it could be with that of a celebrity.

Why competition (with others) in the first place?

The innate need of competition in the bygone eras, was based on the fact that – ‘Only the fittest can survive’. During those times, to stay alive, this was one of the basic needs for all human beings (just like animals). Over time and now, the essence of competition has changed to acquiring as many resources as possible (greed). This (greed) is part of the human nature in order to acquire happiness (a false sense of). Unfortunately, this has gone to a level, where we… as human beings are fighting mental battles against each other to acquire the ultimate goal (vis-à-vis happiness).

Competition in general has been gravely misunderstood as a means to an end. A majority from our population are daily running and ruing about the “rat-race to so-called success”.

Humans in general cannot be compared, as we are all unique. Although, we do have certain qualities, which can be compared (such as physical abilities, duly compared in sports and music). There are certain mental abilities as well, which are comparable to a certain extent (such as performing calculations, visual perception etc.…). Once we move further on, the comparison becomes a grey area. Comparison itself creates more issues than resolving a problem.

So… What is the ‘true essence of competition’?

From our old scriptures sharing their wisdom, I have deduced and hence advise to follow this mantra - ‘compete with your own-self over time, and you can achieve excellence’. This does not mean, that we should always ignore the good in others and only focus on ourselves! This mantra means –

• Look at others and inspire ourselves to imbibe the good to achieve excellence.
• Keep learning for growth and follow your passion / interests.
• Understand our own positive traits and make them stronger.
• Learn and manage situations, that demand your attention for not-so-interesting stuff. 

When we compare with others, we are looking outwards. During this process, we look at the good as well as ‘bad’ values of the other person. Focusing on the ‘bad’ values of other, fuels our ego and creates hurdles in our overall growth and wisdom. At the same time, we also start ‘expecting’ others to be like ourselves (imbibe our good values) and behave accordingly. During this process, we create a sense of love/hate relationship with other people – based on our ‘formed perspective’ (of good and bad values).

Finally, we end up being unhappy at our bad values and the good values of others, which we don’t have.

Coming back… Every human being is unique. No human in this world is perfect in all senses and hence, having ‘that’ perfection is a myth. Running behind this ‘mythical’ perfection will always keep us unhappy (our ultimate goal is to be happy).

When we compare with our own selves (for our positivity) and imbibe the good from others to become better, we tend to grow multi-fold in our own positive personalities. This has a cumulative effect for us to achieve our goals.

How can we Use the ‘True Essence of Competition’ to Our Benefit?

The biggest change in our lives happen, when we do the following:

• Remove expectations from others – to behave in a particular way of our liking (remember – They are unique in their own way. We are only looking at their positives)
• Learn to accept one own self with all our positive traits / values. Every human being has the potential to achieve greatness. The most important mindset that should be developed is to – Accept ourselves as we are and have a firm belief in our own selves.
• Look at others for inspiration and positive values. We can look at others, learn and grow ourselves to attain wisdom.
• Look and accept challenges or issues to fast-track our learnings. Welcome these to leap forward in our own growth and attain happiness.

To conclude: Once, we shift our perspectives to the above given points, we will see life as a beautiful gift and put our best to not only be happy, but also help our other fellow human beings.

P.S. This topic is a huge ocean of wisdom. More to come in my future write-ups on this.

- Written by Anand Nanavati (SupraDigit Solutions)