To Win In Life You Don’t Always Have To Compete

To win in life you do not always have to cross goals, climb podiums or obtain gold medals. As much as they sometimes make us believe, to be happy it is not necessary to compete, measure ourselves with others or put ourselves to the test in a thousand challenges. Authentic well-being is achieved by working with oneself, having us as the only reference, being able to achieve what we really need.

Now, if there is something that they instill in us almost unconsciously from children, it is the need to compete. Whoever finishes homework earlier can go out to the playground, whoever gets the best grades is the first in class, the most outgoing, friendly and attractive have more social success at school. Somehow, there is always the need to “be more than the other” to obtain rewards.

On the one hand, there is our capacity for effort and desire to obtain certain objectives. Working for what we want and giving the best of ourselves in any circumstance is appropriate and recommended. However, the problem comes when there are those who always have the need to compete with others, to make an effort to have more than what the other has and to be the eternal advantage.

These are situations that are seen frequently and that sometimes subject us to indefinable wear and tear. Let’s learn more about this topic.

Winning in life is to conquer a happiness to our measure

There are many people who understand their day to day as a constant form of competition. You have to have the best job, the best car, the most spectacular Christmas tree, celebrate the most original birthday party so that our son is the most popular in school … It is as if the defining feature of life in society were precisely that. , compete, place yourself in a position of advantage over the rest of the world.

However, there is something evident in all this. Whoever understands his life through this filter will constantly experience only one sensation: being frustrated, never being able to feel satisfied. At the end of the day, there will always be someone who is ahead in something, who is better on his own merits. The need to compete, to be better than others is the most useless of sufferings.

Winning in life should consist of conquering a type of happiness in which oneself is the only reference. Surpassing ourselves, setting goals, and testing ourselves to achieve them is the most satisfying of life tests. However, we have spent many decades applying what ecologists define as the principle of competitive exclusion, that is, challenging each other so that only the most advantaged are above the rest.

But this is changing. In this increasingly interconnected and globalized world, new social dynamics and, above all, urgent needs are emerging. Now more than ever it is a priority to structure a more cooperative and less competitive life to solve the many challenges that lie ahead.

Why are there people who prefer to compete to collaborate?

We have spent a lot of time applying a competitive approach in much of our social settings. We do it because it was (and is) the only way to get a job, to get a place, to get attention or respect among a certain group … Now, beyond the fact that it is sometimes necessary to compete, there are those who do For nature. The reason?

• It is often due to low self-esteem. For them, winning in life is being able to feel superior to the rest and thus obtain food for the ego and reinforcements for their insecurities. On the other hand, if they have to get involved in collaborative tasks for this type of people it does not suppose any benefit and, therefore, they avoid it.

• At other times, what we find is a personality focused on envy, on the almost obsessive need to have what he has in the other, to yearn for what the one from beyond has achieved.

Last but not least, we cannot forget that a part of highly competitive people with a clearly aggressive profile hide behind the shadow of the most pathological and harmful narcissism. They are those men and women who yearn to earn merit at all costs without hesitating to “crush” the opponent.

To win in life, cooperate and put yourself as a reference

If you want to win in life, challenge yourself. Do not yearn for what the other has, do not want to overwhelm others to achieve a position of power and relevance. Because in the long run, something will always happen that pushes you to desire more, to continue experiencing deficiencies to fill, envy to satisfy. Understanding life from continuous competition is synonymous with suffering.

On the other hand, if you compete with yourself, things change. If you put yourself as a reference and place goals and challenges to achieve on your horizon, you will feel more motivated and the reward will taste better. Little by little, you will build a happiness tailored to you, at your own pace and adjusted to your characteristics.

Likewise, it is important to take into account one detail: it is time to create scenarios in which a collaborative intelligence runs, one in which we are all part, combining ideas, action, reciprocities and organization. It is time to stop competing to create alliances and be able to move forward together towards a future with solutions for present needs.