Is competition a zero-sum game?
I say no.
Sure, there’s plenty of rhetoric out there about vanquishing our rivals. On how There Can Be Only One or If You Ain’t First, You’re Last.
We’ve taken that to heart more than ever these days. From the ballfields to Capitol Hill, from the job market to social media feeds, partisanship is as vicious as ever.
Competition has brought out the worst in us. It’s poured lighter fluid on the vitriol of groupthink. It’s caused us to dehumanize anyone who’s not on our team. It’s eviscerated any empathy we might otherwise have for those who lie in the path of our selfish desires.
In the relentless quest to win, it appears we have all lost.
Yet, it doesn’t have to be this way.
We can still compete without causing each other carnage. Without drawing lines in the sand and causing further chasms in our society.
We just need to shift our focus.
I’m a highly competitive person.
I grew up playing baseball and watching Luke Skywalker lock light sabers with Darth Vader. The win at all costs mantra was strong within me.
Then, things changed.
I was 13 when the Twin Towers came down, and the skies above New York and Washington filled with fire and smoke. It was a horrifying, unfathomable event. Amidst my grief, there was confusion. How could the free world I knew have suffered such a brutal loss, out of the clear blue sky?
Of course, I wanted to punish those who took thousands of innocent lives. I supported the U.S. military’s operations in Afghanistan, and still do today. Petty as it was, I smiled when Seal Team 6 took out Bin Laden a decade later.
But my view of competition had changed. Going after the terrorists didn’t constitute winning. We had already lost something we could never get back.
As I moved into high school, I was lost. Disillusioned with the Zero-Sum game of competition and the horrors I’d seen come from it, I held myself back. I did my best to blend in at the expense of standing out.
By the time I was 16, my mother was fed up with my act. You’re lazy, she told me.
Those two words lit a fire under me.
The competitiveness that was long-dormant in my soul roared back to life. And I sprung into action.
I improved my grades enough to get multiple acceptance letters from colleges across the South. But upon choosing which school to attend, I didn’t let up.
I continued to strive for greatness through college, and the two careers that followed. Good enough wasn’t sufficient for me. I could always do better.
In fact, I was obligated to do better.
You see, I came to realize that by bringing out the best in myself, I could provide more to those around me. That I could help make the world a better place.
I came to realize the best kind of competition isn’t a Zero-Sum game.
When we shift our competitive focus inward, we change the game.
Think about it.
By demanding the best of ourselves, we play the role of both coach and critic.
We achieve what we might not have thought was possible before. We push our boundaries. We grow. We iterate.
Better yet, by turning the fires of competition inward, we can connect with others. We can respect our rivals, embrace our differences and focus on helping each other through a common drive for better.
Everyone wins in this scenario. In fact, the only casualty of self-competition is complacency.
So, let’s stop the blood feuds, the name calling, the nastiness. Let’s shift our competitive focus to a more productive place.
Let’s embrace the competitor within.