Releasing Competition
/Competition is part of being human. The primitive parts of our brain feel like “survival of the fittest” is true, but the evolved parts of our brains know this doesn’t always prove out.
Most of us feel competition everywhere we look - at school, in society, within families, at work, and among peers. The psychology of competition is a growing field of study because competing feels like a necessity, but it is actually a choice we make.
We choose to turn our lives into competitive races to have/get/be/own the thing that makes us feel like a winner.
For most of us with our basic needs met, we don’t have to compete for resources. But that primitive part of our brain still feels like our lives depend on winning. We continue to feel threatened if we lose a board game, money, friends, partners, professional titles, jobs, freedoms - the impact of these things varies, but the threat of losing is similar in each example.
It is healthy to check in with our competitive nature from time to time and ask ourselves:
“Am I creating competition where there is none?”
What if there is enough to go around and I don’t have to compete?
Could I stop comparing myself to others?
What story have I created about a “winner” and a “loser”?
Could I stop being afraid to lose?
Could I release my need to win/know the correct answer/be part of the cool group/play on a certain team/get the recognition?
What meaning do I assign to winning/knowing/belonging/getting?
Could I be good with myself no matter the outcome?
What am I trying to prove and to whom?
What comes to mind for you as you consider these questions?
Competition seeps into our cells from many directions: the stuff we have, the job we do as parents, the way we look, the quality of our creations, the work we do, the contributions we make. Competition occurs within and among families, friend groups, co-workers, clubs, religions, institutions, neighborhoods, the list goes on and on.
Explore your own life: what does it mean about me if I am on that team, in that role, drive that car, get that score, have that title, get invited, wear that brand, belong to that club, make that amount, go to that school, own that thing.
We compete because it means something about us if we win and it means something else if we lose.
If you can investigate the meaning that you give to the win and loss, then you can understand why you feel like it is a competition.
We all care about achieving different things - some of us want public victories, some of us what stuff that goes with success, some of us want someone to know we are capable of winning, some of us want people to notice us. But, if we didn’t have a story attached to what those things mean about us, then we could be free from the exhausting race to nowhere.
In our turbulent world, less competition and more compassion would be good.
We are all trying to figure out what it means to be human, let’s work together on it instead of turning it into a competition.
Explore why you compete, release it a notch or two, and….
Just be.