In Response to Competition
April 25th 2008 05:47
Category: No Category
In response to one of the question raised by a fellow friend in my university class, about competition, here what i said:
I think our way and concept of competing can be regarded very brutal, violent, and primitive-way of life. As individuals, when we compete in our society, we tend consciously/ subsconsciously wishing to tackle all the others out and everyone too equally desire to tackle all the others down, and keep the single top seat for himself/herself. Whoever will win, it would just be certain that the seat would just be reserved for one. Would there be enough seat for everyone? And through such competition, we raise focus on our individuality, therefore making our society more and more individualistic, socially-isolated and antipathic towards others(especially others that may threat our 'competition')
Whereas in native society, they are not crazy enough to lose their sense of community/social ties just for the sake of individual being the best. They have it where everyone may win. See how they can laugh together and enjoy playing basketballs together in their bushy forests without having to separate themselves into opposing teams, nobody there had to be broken hearted if lose while the winner joys on top of others' misery. Nobody would need to keep or suppress unpleasant thoughts/feelings such as vengeance, envy, not-happy-with, jealousy, hatred, and so on towards the winner. I think they have done great thing for their society being humble enough not focusing and giving all their life just for the sake of trampling on top of one another and then get tramped by somebody else bigger/stronger or whatever it is.
Okay, some people may say that competition is good cos it encourage the society to be better by having the individuals racing against one another. But think again, how fair and unequal it is. It's not like everyone in this globe is given the same opportunity to start from the same start-line. Many people in this world are handicapped, mute, deaf, learning disabled, have broken family, raised in destructive alcoholic/drugs environment, and so on.
So even if one does support competition, how can we justify it as fair 'race' when the competitors doesn't start from the same start-line? Some people are lucky enough to be born in adequate family, but some are just too poor to buy books or to train sports. Would you say that competition is a fair game if you are one of those unlucky ones?
Consider again, from that unfairness of starting line, can we consider ourselves the real winner even if we do win? Maybe we are not supposed to be the winner cos there exist a better one/better ones out there just that that person now is deprived of proverty that he/she would never have the chance to challenge our championship.
Saying in short, above the sky, there is sky. Can we consider ourselves the winner just because the ones better/stronger/smarter than us is currently out of our sight? Is it not that 'winning' is just an illusion???
Now see our world and our children. So manyyy children and children that have grown adults that see themselves as worthless, grow and live with low-esteem and confidence, get broken-hearted and discouraged, and some even get dragged down to the black worlds as means of escape. This is part of our society focusing on competition that the parents and the school-teachers make the children see that they worth is only determined by their performance in the rat-race in whatever field it is. But would there ever be enough seat for everyone there?
Perhaps out of every 1000 chidren in this world, since there are only 10 seat for championship(let's say), so only 10 of those that comes from lucky-enough background/training/facilitat ion/environment would benefit from competition. But what about the other 990 children who put as much effort as they actually do?????
So i'd rather say in the whole, competition pull societies back rather than push societies forward towards progress.
The best way to compete i think is to compete with oneself. We shouldn't compare ourselves to others since it's not fair anyway as i hv mentioned. Everyone starts from different start-line, everyone have their own fate lines, live out different process of life, have their own purposes and different goals than ours, then how should we justify ourselves worth of comparison with others?
When we compete with our ownselves, we focus on ourselves. We focus on what we can do to be better than the us the day before. We no longer would focus as much as to what we can do to bring down/pull down those others standing higher than us. When we live in society where every person tend for themselves and be their own master, the society would automatically progress further than ever before rather than the violent world we live in where people think more of how to stumble down one another. Therefore, compete with yourself, be the better of you than the you before, only then it's worth counting.
The real warrior competes with oneself.
---
Recited from the Buddhist Dhammapada:
If a person were to conquer in battle
a thousand times a thousand people,
if another conquers oneself,
that one is the greatest conqueror.
Conquering oneself is better than conquering other people
Okay, some people may say that competition is good cos it encourage the society to be better by having the individuals racing against one another. But think again, how fair and unequal it is. It's not like everyone in this globe is given the same opportunity to start from the same start-line. Many people in this world are handicapped, mute, deaf, learning disabled, have broken family, raised in destructive alcoholic/drugs environment, and so on.
Consider again, from that unfairness of starting line, can we consider ourselves the real winner even if we do win? Maybe we are not supposed to be the winner cos there exist a better one/better ones out there just that that person now is deprived of proverty that he/she would never have the chance to challenge our championship.
Saying in short, above the sky, there is sky. Can we consider ourselves the winner just because the ones better/stronger/smarter than us is currently out of our sight? Is it not that 'winning' is just an illusion???
Perhaps out of every 1000 chidren in this world, since there are only 10 seat for championship(let's say), so only 10 of those that comes from lucky-enough background/training/facilitat ion/environment would benefit from competition. But what about the other 990 children who put as much effort as they actually do?????
So i'd rather say in the whole, competition pull societies back rather than push societies forward towards progress.
The best way to compete i think is to compete with oneself. We shouldn't compare ourselves to others since it's not fair anyway as i hv mentioned. Everyone starts from different start-line, everyone have their own fate lines, live out different process of life, have their own purposes and different goals than ours, then how should we justify ourselves worth of comparison with others?
For the world, we hand in hand as one
The real warrior competes with oneself.
---
Recited from the Buddhist Dhammapada:
If a person were to conquer in battle
a thousand times a thousand people,
if another conquers oneself,
that one is the greatest conqueror.
Conquering oneself is better than conquering other people
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