Is Being Competitive Healthy?

[Lisa]

How Competitive are you in your related Martial Art or Sport? Is it important for you to be better then others or are you more competitive internally with just yourself. What is good and what is detrimental about the level of competitiveness you see in yourself?

 

[terryl965]

For me personnally it is more of competing with myself and I believe that is healthy. For my student and my own childern I too believe competition is a healthy part of growing up, we must all learn that we cannot win everytime amd yet there is no possible way for anyone to loose all the time. It is a kettle waiting to boil over for society.

 

[exile]

I am ferociously competitive in just about everything I do, but it usually gets to the point where I lose interest in other people's performance and focus solely on my own, and what's wrong with it, compared to the ideal I have in my head. As a result, I often wind up getting very competent at things I can no longer take much satisfaction from, or pleasure in, because my abilities/execution don't live up to the ideal picture I have. And if I were to make a massive improvement in whatever it is, in a very short time, for whatever reason, I would still be unsatisfied because my ideal of what is possible would scale up correspondingly.

So to answer your question, no, I do not regard my competitiveness as healthy. But I've been that way all my life, and it's way, way too late to change...

 

[Lisa]

I am ferociously competitive in just about everything I do, but it usually gets to the point where I lose interest in other people's performance and focus solely on my own, and what's wrong with it, compared to the ideal I have in my head. As a result, I often wind up getting very competent at things I can no longer take much satisfaction from, because it doesn't live up to the ideal picture I have. And if I were to make a massive improvement in it in a very short time, for whatever reason, I would still be unsatisfied because my ideal of what is possible would scale up correspondingly.

So to answer your question, no, I do not regard my competitiveness as healthy. But I've been that way all my life, and it's way, way too late to change...

Have you been giving lessons to my youngest daughter? You have just described her exactly.

Competitiveness is healthy, I do believe, if it is within realistic parameters and for self improvement. It becomes unhealthy when it is the be all and end all of everything you do.

 

[MBuzzy]

I think that there is a VERY fine line. There is a difference between healthy competiveness and unhealthy. When I compete for anything I am doing it for the betterment of myself and for the enjoyment of what I'm doing. But personally, when I get involved with an extremely competive sport, where winning is the only thing that matters to my team mates, the action loses its fun. Especially when they start attacking people for errors.

Of course, I've always been bad at sports....but I prefer to play for fun. Now the advantageous side of any competition is that it spurs you to do your best.

 

[exile]

Have you been giving lessons to my youngest daughter? You have just described her exactly.

Competitiveness is healthy, I do believe, if it is within realistic parameters and for self improvement. It becomes unhealthy when it is the be all and end all of everything you do.

My advice, Lisa, is to do whatever you can to get her to take a different view of her activities, though your options may be limited— I've begun to believe that some people are just wired to be like that. Maybe I'm trying to get myself off the hook by thinking of it like that, but the feedback I've gotten from people in my family makes me think that I was like this from day one, so nature rather than nurture might have a lot to do with it. But I also was brought up to believe that nothing but A+ was good enough, which didn't help. And with my own son, I'm trying very hard not to communicate that kind of expectation to him, because I really don't want him to wind up like me.

The part I've bolded in the quote from you is the heart of the matter. And the problem is that competitiveness becomes very addictive. When winning becomes the most imporant thing it's bad enough, but when nothing that isn't a personal best is any good, it's really bad, and when even your personal bests become sources of frustration because they're not better enough than your previous personal best... something really wrong is going on. I think for some people, normal competitiveness can become like that. And when ordinary extroverted, fun-loving competition starts turning inward, and becomes a kind of morbid preoccupation iwth one's inability produce stellar performances exclusively... you got trouble.

Now the advantageous side of any competition is that it spurs you to do your best.

But you have to be careful here, MB—doing your best is a great thing, something to aspire to, but becoming obsessed with doing your best, so that that becomes the focus rather than just plain doing the activity because you enjoy it, is a major trap.

 

[Lisa]

I believe you are right, exile. Some people are just wired that way. What we have done is given her various activities to be competitive in. Both where she depends on herself only and depends on a team. It seems to give her a broader perspective on what "winning" means. By depending on others she takes the pressure off herself, and on the flip side of that, depending only on herself allows her to feel a great sense of accomplishment.

 

[Empty Hands]

With myself. Which can even end up worse than being competitive with other people. Other people make mistakes and you will probably beat them a good chunk of the time. On the other hand, you will always make mistakes, and never live up to the perfection you are striving to obtain.

Last night I tested for purple, and passed. My sparring test was with a monster brown belt who was damn near perfect in his speed and technique. I was pissed at myself that I couldn't get shots in on him, even though I probably did pretty well by an observer's standard not to get completely slaughtered.

Such competition with myself does help me stay motivated though.

 

[exile]

What we have done is given her various activities to be competitive in. Both where she depends on herself only and depends on a team. It seems to give her a broader perspective on what "winning" means. By depending on others she takes the pressure off herself, and on the flip side of that, depending only on herself allows her to feel a great sense of accomplishment.

That is a very shrewd way to approach it, Lisa. In a team context, you can't really become totally focused on your own individual performance (and shortcomings) because so much depends on the interaction among your teammates, which you have little control over (and therefore can't be blamed for, even by yourself). I think the people who become neurotically preoccupied with their own level of accomplishment are very likely going to turn out, if you look at their histories, to have always been a bit solitary, preferring individual sports and activities over team sports and group activities by a huge margin. Keep her on teams as long as you can and you may be able to avoid the worst of that particular kind of exaggerated negative self-preoccupation...

With myself. Which can even end up worse than being competitive with other people. Other people make mistakes and you will probably beat them a good chunk of the time. On the other hand, you will always make mistakes, and never live up to the perfection you are striving to obtain.

Last night I tested for purple, and passed. My sparring test was with a monster brown belt who was damn near perfect in his speed and technique. I was pissed at myself that I couldn't get shots in on him, even though I probably did pretty well by an observer's standard not to get completely slaughtered.

Boy, does this sound familiar... I'm not really the misery-loves-company type, but, on the other hand, it's nice to know I'm not the only one out there like this!

 

[Xue Sheng]

I tend to be competitive with myself but I consider that healthy. I just like to do better than I did last time, that is all.

In sparring and in push hands I just plain enjoy it, I posted something on here awhile back where I spared with my Xingyi Sifu, I got in a couple of good shots but all in all I got beat…real bad…. But it was a blast. I do push hands with my taiji Sifu and I always end up falling down or getting locked, it just takes longer to get me there the next time. And I walk away form those absolutely overjoyed with what just happened and what I just learned.

You learn by loosing in this stuff. I hear this from Wing Chun people all the time, “invest in loss”; it is a great way to learn. Overly competitive, in my opinion, is not a good thing and can get in the way of learning.

So competitive, probably not so much but what is there is with myself.

 

[Carol]

In general, I think being competitive is very healthy. Not many competitive people sit around getting fat and lazy because they aren't motivated to do anything with themselves.

However, there is a difference between being competitive, and having an unhealthy focus. If I worked on my career day in and day out to the expense of my friends and relatives, my training, and othere personal interests, that would not be too healthy. Likewise if I focuse on my training at the expense of my job/education, and personal interests, that would not be too healthy.

There is also a difference between being competitive, and really bad behaviour. I think a lot of the ridiculous stuff that accompanies youth sporting events isn't borne of pure competition, it's source is from greedy parents that are lusting after the six-figure athletic scholarships that many colleges offer to students that otherwise wouldn't be eligible for such a prize.

Taking away competition can breed indolence...which...IMO has more health risks than competition.

 

[Kacey]

I think that, without some level of competition, you have no incentive to improve, and improvement is a good thing - but like so many other things, too much of a food thing can become a bad thing.

 

[stickarts]

In my view a good spirited competition is healthy and productive. Its how we progress and also the fact is that it is a competitive world that we live in. Developing a win-win situation with a positive healthy outlook helps us to achieve our highest levels. My fight teacher and I always had a competitive spirit in our training but we always entered training as friends and left as friends. As previously mentioned, its really about competing with ourselves to achieve our maximum potential and setting competitive goals can help us to acheive that. Having someone else to work with speeds along the process.