Life's Grandest Contest



Do you like the title? What do you suppose can be the grandest contest? Think about it for a moment, then read on. A contest is, by definition, competition. So, I might be talking about The Superbowl, The World Series, The Academy Awards, an Olympics event, a World War, or the struggle between religions. People spend their youth training merely to have a chance to compete in such things. The contest of which I speak is something you, I, and anyone can do every day. Compete with yourself.

The game of golf comes to mind. If you play golf at the same course regularly, you have a chance to repeat your activity with little variation, except that you will remember what you did the last time or several times that you teed up at each hole on the course. You have a chance to improve your game. You are competing against yourself. Oh, you say, what good is that? The way that I win is to beat the other guy at the office. I win the boss's favor and I savor the defeat of my coworker. No. There is nothing great about that. You have achieved arrogance. Play a game with yourself and win. Then, you will achieve confidence.

If you want to define your contest in terms of making more money, this approach will work for you. Whatever it is that you do for your pay, do it better. Do it different to see if that was better. Find the best techniques, make better alliances, accrue finer resources, market yourself and your product more effectively, but tell no one that what you do is all a game in your mind. You play the grandest game. No matter how good you are, be better, every day, better than the day before. The art of this approach to your daily activity is that you taint your game if you make someone else lose. Someone else does not matter in this game. It is just you, and only you.

I am playing this game right now. You don't have to know about it. You are not part of it. It is my game. But, I will tell you, just because I like you. The title of my article is eye-catching. It is a tease to tempt you to read the article. I regularly assign titles to my articles that tease, but today, I am upping my game. I distracted you in the first paragraph. I write to you as if I am talking with you. Yet, I don't know you.

I have involved you in this article. This is high art for a writer. I have advanced my craft of writing. I threw bait in your direction. Very many people define winning as a personal victory over others. I told you that you missed the finest part of winning if that is all you do. I win my game today if you change your behavior. What will you do?

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