Recently I was helping out at my daughter’s sport class at school. The children, all aged around five, were learning/practising ball skills. They were in teams of six, learning to play one of those games for kids like tunnel ball, where they took turns throwing and catching to the head of the line then running around their group.
The children were loving this game, smiling, laughing, being careful to catch the ball, throwing the balls gently, taking care not to throw them too far/hard/high, looking at the person throwing the ball to them, waiting patiently for their turn in the line, running safely through the narrow gaps between each team… you get the drift, it was a pleasure to watch.
Sure, a few balls went spiralling out of control, but when that happened, the child who had dropped it just went straight after it, picked it up with no fuss and returned to their spot in the game.
And then it changed. The sport teacher told the children they were going to now have a race: they were going to play the same game, but this time, the first team to have everyone crouched down, having had a turn throwing and catching and running, would win.
The teacher called “Ready, set, go!” – and pretty much all hell broke loose.
Balls were dropped on the child in fronts’ head. That child would yell back abusively. The run-around-the-team part became a ball game of ‘let’s see how many other children we can crash into’ – many of the boys particularly ‘enjoyed’ this one. Other children on the run tripped over their feet, and bumped into the nearby brick wall. The balls that had been dropped took two or three goes to retrieve – when the children went to pick them up in the rush, they would accidentally kick the ball another few metres away. Some were even prone to further dropping the ball on their way back into the game after having retrieved it.
Then, when the first team had all crouched down and called “Finished!”, another round of shouting began as the children who had been bumped into by the winning team’s members retaliated, accusing them of cheating, hurting them, not running in the right direction, and interfering with their own team.
There were no smiles, no simple pleasure at having been able to catch a ball and throw it back to be caught again. The laughter had stopped, replaced with angry looks at one another.
Some of the children in the ‘losing’ teams didn’t even get to have their turn as they were at the end of the line and once the winning team finished, the game was over. These children looked sad or left out but said nothing; others yelled that it wasn’t fair they didn’t get to have a go.
I did notice there were a few children amongst the chaos who stayed still, able to put the same care into catching the ball, throwing and running during the race as they had during practice. At the end of the lesson, these kids simply skipped off with each other, held hands, and stood in the line quietly, waiting to return to their classroom. But the majority of the class looked angry, were still talking loudly about the race, and taking a long time to get into the line. The classroom teacher by this point began raising her voice at the stragglers to get in line, and looked thoroughly frustrated.
I then saw the next class of five year olds arrive at the sports ground. They assumed their positions in the game, standing in their teams of six, ball in hand, etc., ready to start the same thing all over again…
Healthy competition? I don’t think so. We’re told sport is ‘healthy competition’, but there was nothing healthy about the chaos I saw unfold once the race was called. When it became about winning and not the (activity) ball game itself, something very ugly and destructive came through.
Competition teaches us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are. Competition erases the knowingness of who we are, that we all have as small children, as we are pitted against one another and heralded for being able to do more / better than another. Is it not possible that we all have skills in different areas and that we can each bring our own particular skill/expression to the table for all to share in, learn from and build upon?
Education needs to focus on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves. With this freedom, and by eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society.
What would it be like then if competition (including sport) focussed on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they could choose for themselves how they wished to express themselves? Perhaps then, and with this freedom, there would not be the chaos and competition that occurs now when a simple ball game becomes a race.
Inspired by the work of Universal Medicine and Serge Benhayon.
By Suzanne Anderssen, Brisbane
Wow what a difference, I wonder if the teacher noticed the behavioral changes in the children?
Competition does not feel pleasant in the body, makes me feel anxious and stressed out and/or invites judgement into the moment. It separates and disconnects us from each other. Certainly not healthy.
I wonder if the teacher learned this lesson from the children.
There is no equality in competition and perhaps that is why even the winners feel the emptiness of what they have achieved once the initial euphoria is over and hence why they are always having to strive for the next win at great expense to their body and general wellbeing.
A great example of the effect of competition and the ripple effect that this has thereafter. The quality of connection, quality of relationships and how we feel within ourselves, all affected. Harmless fun? I think not,
One day we will wise up to what competition does to us as children but that won’t be for some time yet, but I for one welcome that day. It’s horrible to watch how young children change when you bring in competition.
I’ve watched kids completely change and become totally anxious and nervous when I’ve turned something into a race. If we care all about our kids welfare and content-ness it’s time we dropped the saying that “competition is healthy” and changed it to “competition is unhealthy”.
Anything that is not love is not good for our health and competing against one another is certainly part of that. I really can’t think of anything that could contribute to our health with wanting to be more or better than others.
Competition crushes the truth of brotherhood. It doesn’t allow us to feel that united we can move mountains and that winning or loosing is just the same as being right or wrong and that is not what love is all about. We are all here to learn to learn one thing – love and competition doesn’t add anything to this learning.
Competition erases who we truly are and makes it all about what we can do, ‘Competition teaches us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are.’
Competition isn’t healthy, it encourages us to go against another- to be better than another, and so create a separation, ‘Healthy competition? I don’t think so. We’re told sport is ‘healthy competition’, but there was nothing healthy about the chaos I saw unfold once the race was called. When it became about winning and not the (activity) ball game itself, something very ugly and destructive came through.’
We need to consider that it’s not actually a natural expression to be competitive, that instead our nature is one of harmony and cooperation. I remember being introduced to competitive sports as a young girl in my first years of primary school, being competitive felt like I had to first fight all of who I am in myself (it felt horrific) before then fighting other children to be the winner.
Yes, to win at all cost and as wars seemingly have followed this same way or is it that wars came first then we played games to practice for being warriors in battle, and now even though we seem to have a some what civilised competition we still fight hard to win on every level. Then the so called game, fighting or ruckus on every level makes it impossible to connected to our child-like-essences and once we start the competitive-ness that contributes to this type of rat-race the one we have made so called normal we become caught in a merry-go-round of life that pulls the wool over our eyes about living in connection with our essence.
This is an extraordinary example of what is being just encouraged but propagated everywhere all throughout our society. one day there will be no competition.
There is a great difference between the wonder of exploring the science of the quality of energy in how we move, interact and connect with ourselves and others and the joy and playfulness that can be celebrated in this activity, in contrast to how the imposition of competition, where there has to be a winner and a loser, annihilates our connection to the wonder of who we are and is in fact all -round abusive.
This really highlights that when we lose ourselves and live in anxiousness and competition with each other, this hurts us all and issues then perpetuate themselves. Because we are not connected to ourselves, things don’t flow, then we are not connected with others and this leads to issues and problems playing out between people and if they are in the same stuff it is exacerbated and it grows and continues.
” By eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society”
One day in the future sport and competition will be looked back on as crazy and harmful as we know; look back on the ability to punch children with the cane. Exercise and play yes – these are amazing forms of learning – competition on the other hand does nothing but foster anxiety and separation.
“When it became about winning and not the (activity) ball game itself, something very ugly and destructive came through.” wow what an insight in to the harm of competition and the losing of our natural joy and simplicity.
I would imagine competition is competition everywhere – same colour.
‘Education needs to focus on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves. ‘ This is the way that education would benefit not only the children that are going through it but the whole of society because they would be the adults of the future who would be expressing themselves in their own unique way and not feeling the need to compete with anyone else.
It is our true nature to work together, yet education often pitches us against one another and this knocks out this natural impulse. It makes sense why children go into anxiety when they start school, because their bodies are being asked to do something that is not natural for them.
Competition is a harm for both parties. Therefore it can not be true success or joy. When someones wins, someone looses and feels less of worth or succes – that can never ever be love. Neither does it support one or another. Competition is not healthy for us, no matter how good we make it look..
And here we are again another extraordinary sideshow… The Winter Olympics is on. And it is as if the spectacles must get together and bigger and brighter and brighter to keep people entertained and indeed distracted from the essence of what is going on. Competition and separation.
People love this as it provides an escape from life and a moment to ‘check out’ and not full all the pressures they are facing, this is why this gets so much airplay and what is really going on in the world doesn’t- supply and demand- truth and responsibility are not currently being called for.
Whilst reading the part of this blog about when the children were told to make their ball game into a competition I could feel my body getting into a bit of an anxiousness at just the thought of it. This is what we are imposing on our kids when we reinforce an importance on competition and outdoing another to feel better about yourself at the expense of the ‘loser’. But the real losers are all of us when we don’t honour each other for who we are, but focus instead on what we can do to prove ourselves to another. A complete waste of time and energy, and a way of life destined to end in separation to others.
It is so true, that competition is a virus that has spread throughout the world, tainting everything in its path. Whatever we can do to arrest the spread of this, whatever role models we can provide is absolutely essential right now.
Wow this really reflects the change when competition is introduced. It is as if we forget the harmonious relationships we have with people and we go into a survival mode. And yet this does not support anyone – it does not reflect people working together or supporting each other. And yet it is built into our education.
True, the focus becomes on the outcome and not on the quality of the interactions and our own quality. Its like in situations like this we leave ourselves and focus on the ‘end goal’. This also highlights why outcome based education does not work- as when you put a very specified end point it does not allow a process of learning and discovering but is simply regurgitating what another determines as important but is not necessarily the knowledge you need to grow.
Competition seeks to annihilate the joy of brotherhood through the illusion that winning is what gives us something to be proud of, yet merely identifying us so we receive some kind of sense of value. However, there is far more enjoyment when we share together in playfulness, and in appreciation of the natural fun we have when we are open to play with each other in togetherness.
I wonder what is the educational purpose of bringing competition to learning. I can’t find it, as it only takes children out of their beingness in order to being better than another. ‘Being better’ for arriving first?? This is really crazy and antieducational indeed, as education never can come from comparison, but from the confirmation, growing and expression of who each child genuinely is, and this is not possible looking outside, but by going within and expanding their inner wisdom from their uniqueness. No competition needed.
Yes, I see your point. If every child is appreciated for the unique quality that they bring, then there can be no competition because there would be no need for anyone to prove themselves as better than anyone else as each person would or potentially could feel valued just for being who they are and therefore just the simple act of turning up is enough.
A great blog, research and evidence right here with 5 year olds. Most 5 year olds are still very open to all around them. You couldn’t be bias with these results or fudge them. Proof is in the pudding that sport is not healthy. Since I myself have honoured being tender I too could not play sport as I instantly become aggressive. You cannot think or try not to be aggressive if your committing 100% to competition.
This is a really great observation of what happens in education when we start comparing and measuring kids against each other. It kills their natural openess and way of being with each other. Our true nature is to care for and support others and children are amazing at this but the way in which we educate them shuts this down and gets them to compete with each other.
I remember on a sports day in my junior high school some girls decided it would be more fun to hold their hands together while they ran rather than having who came first, second… the last etc. Nothing more was meant. They were just too giggly to take anything too serious. And I remember feeling rather exposed that I was so invested in running faster. I felt so uncool for being so serious.
Wow Fumiyo, what a great aha moment for you.
Maybe this is the way out of our competitive spirit – where one by one we fail to take competition serious, so leaving the most competitive on the shelf, until eventually they too decide it’s not necessary and we all giggle our way forward.
It is very interesting to see and feel the difference moving with ourselves and enjoying the moment compared to moving for a goal or a prize or a task. I know for myself my movements are like you described in the children, rushed, bumping into things, very unsettled and anxious. None of that occurs when I am focusing on how I am moving and how it makes me feel inside.
Yes agreed. My daughter shared with me how easy it is for her to run around the oval at school when it’s play time, but how difficult it becomes in her lungs and breathing when she is forced to do it as part of sport class, being yelled at to go faster, or as it is commonly known as ‘motivated’.
This is a great observation and I have read this article before. Someone should do a study on this and the relationship between a group of children’s natural play and then the difference if there is any when competition is introduced. As the article exposes the ingredients were the same and yet the results were extremely different. It’s great to read about this and would be even greater to see it studied. With a focus on children, health and exercise it would be great to see as I said a true study that included how the children feel at different levels. In fact I will contact someone and see if this is something that is possible.
I’ve been involved in children’s physical activity for a long time, it is actually hard to find many games listed that are not about competition, as the pull is always to make it competitive. I’m not sure why because when I observe the kids, particularly the young ones they are having much more fun just being active than they are trying to win, which normally just makes them anxious, uptight, and unpleasant to be in the company of.
This is a brilliant blog Suzanne that clearly illustrates how competition completely removes the joy from our quality of play and interactions. I also cannot but feel how reflective your playground experience with little adults plays out in our workplaces with big adults every day.
I’ve had lengthy discussion with colleagues about competition, and there is a strong desire to make games competitive, even for under 5’s. I wonder who that is really serving, because it certainly isn’t benefiting the children I have seen, who are not pushing for competition themselves. So why are we as adults imposing this. I guess it is because it is what we got taught, and this misguided notion that life is competitive so we better make everything like that.
it is drilled in to us when we are children that sports and competition go hand in hand and that it builds resilience if you can be a good sports person from this way of moving. I only ever remember a lot of name calling, pushing and shoving and aggression that often ensued when we played sport and found it really disconcerting and too aggressive for me usually opting to sit out or stay further in the background to avoid being targeted as a weakling. Competition just separates us and sets in motion a wave of recognition for what you have achieved and not for who you are. Seeing sport more as a movement from your whole bodies connection and how it feels to move feels so much more lovely and the tension and harshness found in competition has no where to run when we move from the flow of the body. If we move in this way imagine how we can inspire children to move too.
Over the years I’ve heard the term “healthy competition” many times. Working in corporate I hear about how this company or that works to be “number 1”. In my mind there is no such thing as healthy completion. It is inherently unhealthy as it has to have a winner and a loser, it has to have a focus on being better than another, it has to remove the true purpose of whatever the goal is, and instead focus on winning.
The consciousness of sport and what it means to ‘win’ is without a doubt harmful in more ways than one. Even in the choice to enter or say ‘yes’ to the competition instantly changes our bodies physiology in preparation to fight, as we have chosen to separate from another and deem them as the enemy. How can this be healthy, and what are we teaching our children? We normalise this behaviour and then are surprised at how there can be war in the world, when we advocate engaging this behaviour from a very young age. Winning is defeating another. Defeating another is to overpower another who is equal in essence. And this is what the consciousness of sport delivers us, through the illusion that it is an enjoyable and healthy activity to win or watch on as the battle to overpower another is fought.
Reading this reminded me of the days I used to compete – there was no time for fun. I could feel the tension on the netball court and from there on the fun was taken out from any sports I participated in. It was about winning, certificates, trophies and there were no such things as being a ‘good’ loser – we were seen as ’bad’ losers and our teacher would make it known to us so we would strive to do better – very destructive and continued for many years later. It took the fun out of sports and it is so visible in televised sports.
Life and play is truly beautiful, but both get ugly quite quickly when competition is introduced, this is taking us away from our true essence showing us that we need to perform to be okay or accepted.
It’s clear from your description Suzanne that one competition entered it was about 1 group being better than another, which means those who do not win are less than. It’s a vast difference from what you described initially as the children were simply playing together and enjoying the fun of this.
‘Balls were dropped on the child in fronts’ head. That child would yell back abusively. The run-around-the-team part became a ball game of ‘let’s see how many other children we can crash into’
It goes to show how severely our movement is interrupted and impacted by competitione – big or small – it’s something that is in fact completely foreign to us.
Healthy competition, I don’t think so either Suzanne. Thank you for exposing the harmful impact of competition on our children; in fact on us all. Sadly competition is rife in all levels and aspects of our society. Beautiful that you could identify another way of participating in sport into the school.
It was great what you were able to observe and share with us Suzanne, the difference was quite amazing, seeing the children having fun just playing the ball game and the marked difference in the children when competition came into play. Competition these days is in just about everything, with the need for recognition separating us into winners and losers.
What a great example of the consequences of competition being introduced to children at such an early age. Then if their connection to it continues this competitive feeling may stay with them as they grow, being brought into everything they do as an adult. I didn’t play a lot of sport as a child and young person, but when I beat someone, as in a game of tennis, I did not enjoy it one little bit and in fact I am sure that sometimes I let my opponent win as I didn’t want them to feel less than me. Children naturally know how to play together in harmony so why do most adults think that they know better and that competition is good for them; this is one accepted normal that needs demolishing – and fast!
This says it all Suzanne… and this is only a small snippet of what happens when we move in competition. Imagine a whole lifetime of trying to ‘win’, ‘be the best at something’, or ‘trump others’.
A clear example of how the energy of competition causes disruption and separation.
It is disturbing and sad to read how the children changed when asked to compete against each other – many teachers would have seen the same thing over and over, and yet it is still championed as a good thing.
It very much is like a switch is flicked when we turn anything into a competition. It’s like our brains immediately get ready to try extra hard, to focus, to win, to be the best for that moment of glory, that moment where we might get the chance to be the one who won that thing. It’s crazy when we think about how much it doesn’t actually change anything about who we are. And if anything it just gives us another opportunity to either feel down on ourselves because we did not win, or better about ourselves momentarily because we measured up to something. Not sustainable in my view.
Gosh, so much we take for granted. I’m actively being more conscious of observing our behaviours, and it’s really fascinating how quickly the energy in a room changes depending on who has brought what with them.
Suzanne this is a great example how competition brings in complication and disrupts what was a perfectly enjoyable game of ball, and how we as adults have a responsibility not to bring in the disruptive competitive behaviour either as a game or by reflection.
I recently attended a social event with some colleagues. Everyone was looking forward to it. Enjoyable practice laps around a track driving at your own speed. But soon the focus became rating people’s performance. After each round results were put up on the screen and each person also received marks and charts of their performance. It was quite shocking to see the interactions slowly change from friendly banter and people sharing their enjoyment and experience of the ride, to more rowdy interactions with people simply comparing their performance to others and many trying to justify their position on the scale. The individual distress was also palpable in most people as they tried to make sense of all the marks and figures on their individual papers. In a short period of time I saw how competition is not healthy in adults as well as in children.
I continue to see examples of how turning something into a competition sucks the joy or simple fun out of the activity.
it is always good to observe how insidious competition is… To observe the seeds of it planted so early in us, and then watch how this most unhealthy fruit comes to bare in our lives in our societies and in our cultures
I agree Suzanne competition is not healthy. It creates a drive outside of you that then is strived for. Winning places you better than another – a division, same with a loser. We are designed to work in harmony with each other not in competition.
I have witnessed similar scenarios and I agree when the competitive element is brought in it changes everything, and just as you show here, not for the better.
It’s crazy that we inspire our children to compete, and to me it could easily be called child abuse, but I guess we are far from that. Imagine if we got to the point where encouraging your child or anyone else to be competitive was considered abusive. That would be the day!
Hello Suzanne and I am reading your blog again today after coming back to it from other blogs written after being inspired by this one. I can see further why as what you are saying is the introduction of ‘winning’ into play creates chaos and hurts. We can see this clearly from your blog but dismiss it as young children’s play and override the same feelings as we grow up. Have we really grown up in this way or have we not grown at all. I see from this blog children are the grown ups in this way and we are the children, we have a lot to learn from how children play and they don’t need to follow us we need to follow them. I don’t see to many adults from opposing sides truly skip off together after a game like some of the children did in this blog, untouched by what has happened before. Sport, competition, it is truly healthy? I agree exercise is the key but this isn’t exercise this is something else entirely.
Great to highlight the difference in these two activities and the effect they had on the children, pretty horrible. Then the children take this energy with them to their next activity or class.
Hello Suzanne and nothing like a bit of ‘ready, set, go’ to bring chaos to things. I remember this growing up as well and how you went from just playing with others to wanting to beat them after these 3 words. It’s funny we talk about having programmes instilled in us and this appears to be one of them. As you saw and it made me laugh because I could see it as well, the children simply content playing and then enter the 3 words and everything breaks loose and the play is over. In this way there is no ‘healthy competition’ and this was a phrase often used when it came to sibling rivalry but as you have shown there truly is no such thing. We can create it over and over again but it doesn’t look or feel great nor does it support us all to be together. Not exactly ground breaking stuff you may say but I would disagree it will take a lot for us to even hear the words, competition isn’t healthy for us. In the future we will find the phrase ‘healthy competition’ will stand beside ‘the world is flat’. Meaning we once defended and criticised people for thinking anything other then the world was flat, until it was proved otherwise to now we think it’s absolutely ridiculous to say that. Competition may be next in line, I’ll bet you…..kidding.
I remember this from my own childhood, I always enjoyed the first part of the gym class as we would be practicing and playing. The second part where we had to do a match or race I would feel very uncomfortable and tensed. I can see now that this competition did not bring out the best in us; it brought through all kinds of behaviours that actually were not supportive of the whole. Anger, wanting to win, tension to do it right and not to let the team down. Instead of working together which is so much more natural to us as human beings. We can bring the extraordinary out in ourselves by working together not by competing.
“Education needs to focus on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves.” I love what you have said here Suzanne, great wisdom that unfortunately doesn’t seem to be part of school curriculums these days. My late father was a school principal and this is what he also knew to be true, and even though he was just one voice amongst many who didn’t hold this same principle, he did what he could to foster these qualities in the children he had the responsibility of overseeing each day, and I know from what these children later shared with me as adults, that they still remembered him for bringing this wisdom into their lives
“Healthy competition? I don’t think so. We’re told sport is ‘healthy competition’, but there was nothing healthy about the chaos I saw unfold once the race was called. ” Competition is evil – jealousy and comparison kick in. When society learns about cooperation rather than competition, humanity and the world will begin to change.
A powerful and undeniable example of how competition harms all who choose to fall under its pointless and separative spell.
Show a child who they are simply by not imposing on them the many ill seeded beliefs of who they ‘should’ be according to a society that has lost its way, and watch them flourish. This is true education.
This is a very accurate microcosmic picture of what is happening in our world at large. There is no such thing as ‘healthy competition’ as competition by its very nature pitches one person against another with the outcome that one person is made ‘more’ (the ‘winner’) at the expense of the one who is made ‘less’ (the ‘loser’). We have centuries upon centuries of bloodied history to show us that this way does produce harmony and where there is no harmony there is only harm, so therefore such ‘sport’ cannot be considered healthy as it breeds separatism, the true seed of evil and not the one-unified way of being we are when we are not imposed upon (as evidenced in this example by the children just enjoying the activity of the ball game WITH each other, not against each other). A true team player understands that they are no more and no less than their own team members and also those of the ‘opposing’ team. For in-truth there is no ‘us versus them’ lest we give such evil energy through our choice to ‘divide and conquer’ when in essence we only know how to stand as One.
I love that you took the time to observe this, I too have seen the same. When we bring competition in children do start to argue, become more anxious and try to bring each other down or complain- we need to educate them in a way that draws out their strengths and encourages others to appreciate these and for everyone to feel valued for who they are. Many champion competition and justify it by saying- that’s how life is, however competition in the workplace and elsewhere doesn’t work- it does the same as what you describe. It would be far more supportive and constructive if we learnt to work together.
A great observation on the poison of competition. And children go to school and are educated that this is ok!
Things like hand eye coordination, having fun, playing together are all essential life skills… but that edge of competition where we have to climb over our brother to win is such a damaging attitude. It prevails in business and in the world and rather than elevating a few, we are all less for it.
Competition is so rife in our world today and is often considered normal. The saying ‘there’s nothing like a little competition to get the game going’ can lead children on a merry go round of playing sport that leaves no room for a team focus. Visiting my local park for walks I often notice football games where the playful rough and tumble in the past where both players would laugh and enjoy each others company is now shown with forceful actions that leads each student feeling agitated and annoyed. Where is the responsibility in how we model game playing and the joy of a simple ball game with our peers?
‘ By eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society.’ I love this Suzanne, so simple and very true, the more we celebrate the amazing qualities each child brings perhaps one day competition will no longer have so much importance placed on it.
I used to pride myself on the fact that I had a competitive personality, I loved winning, or so I thought. I realise now, I just didn’t feel that great about myself and so the fleeting feeling of winning took the edge of my low self esteem. People that encouraged me to compete in school only prolonged my issues.
Our societies have ingrained in them a very strong competitive element, this is encouraged by many people I have worked with over the years who laud the importance of competition, how anyone not encouraging competition is ‘namby pamby’ and not with reality. Yet I keep coming back to the same point, life is far more successful through cooperation than it ever is through competition, and as someone who won a lot of competitions, and experienced how ultimately empty and pointless winning was, I believe I know what i’m talking about.
I love your simple observation of what takes place when completion is introduced. What I have clocked recently is that adults are the ones that feel they have to introduce ‘healthy competitions’; kids are very content just throwing a ball around but we think introducing points or races makes a game more fun, but clearly it does not.
Reading your article Suzanne it reflected to me how many of the children were affected by the change and the impact on who they were previously. Even the teacher was affected and continued to be affected by the changed state of a number of the children. There is nothing healthily about competition and this makes me question how being in competition can possibly mean that more is contributed to the world than the beautiful and fun loving presence of the children when they were just being themselves. What is the reflection from this of adults who go into competition or even countries? much the same I suggest except on a much greater level.
Brilliant article that really exposes the way we inculcate our children through competition into patterns of behaviour that discourage equality, collaboration and acceptance of the different skills and qualities each of us brings to the piece.
I love the reference to the children that were not perturbed by the competitiveness and skipped off hand in hand! It takes a level of self assurance and a knowing that ‘this is not what matters or who I am’ to allow the world to spin outside of us.
The whole concept of competition is barbaric really and you described the harm it can cause Suzanne. I remember those activities when we were no longer having fun and enjoying being with each other. Suddenly performance was all that mattered and the ‘fight/flight’ response would kick in. Absolutely horrible to feel in my small body and it can still reverberate today.
Healthy competition, I don’t think so either Suzanne.
Competition, which is endemic in our education system, is so soul destroying for all children; the winner and the losers. You have provided a beautiful example of this here in your blog. Children really do have so much fun when there is no hint of competition, simply an expression of a natural joy.
And now we are seeing a whole new level of corruption in the Olympic games, the so called zenith of competition, to the point where one must realise at some stage , what a fruitless and empty path this is.
It is such a joy to watch children play and interact with each other, the way that they know how to be – naturally so. Add ‘competition’ or ‘see who can be the best’ that beauty and natural way of being turns quite upside down. Funny that because adults seem to react just the same!
It really is extraordinary how ‘normal’ we think it is to compete, whereas, if we stayed totally tuned into our internal harmony barometer that gives us constant readouts and how the intrinsic balance harmony and connection with body mind and heart is going , we would know immediately what a fundamental anathema competition is to humanity.
What is shared here is HUGE. Yes monumental when you consider just how much of human life is dominated yes totally governed by competition. Competition in business, education, life in general, sport, even health and well being. We can think the subltest of thoughts that someone has done better than us just about anywhere and that alone is the very ill seed of this competitive drive we all have been brought up to accept as being the norm and the way to be
Thanks Josh. What you say too is powerful: “…We can think the subltest of thoughts that someone has done better than us just about anywhere…” is very true, very rife and very damaging. We go to war to confirm we are better than another and do not learn from our mistakes. As long as we have competition driving us as a human kind, we will continue our downward path.
This very practical example of a children’s game is such a classic reminder of how much of society operates in general daily life. While the effect of competition may seem more obvious in the arena of sport, we in fact see competition all around us in almost everything we do… from competing to be the best mother, student, employer, employee, to competing to be the most funny, witty, clever and everything in between, with some effects more obvious (stress, tension, anxiety, controlling etc.) and some less obvious (low self-worth, lack of confidence etc.). There is a lot to ponder on here about how we can in fact use ‘healthy’ and ‘competition’ in the same context at all….!
Suzanne, I can so relate to what you share here, ‘When it became about winning and not the (activity) ball game itself, something very ugly and destructive came through.’ I have witnessed this with watching children play football, when it becomes a competition it is ugly to watch, i witnessed children shouting at each other, saying ‘we don’t want him in our team he cant kick very well’; I witnessed children purposefully pushing one another; if someone got hurt no-one was concerned, it was about whether there would be a free kick – it is awful to see this lack of care for each other and i also observed that after the game the children then wanted to arm wrestle each other.
Thanks for your comment Rebecca. You observed that the kids wanted to arm wrestle after the game; this tells me that the competition doesn’t just occur on the field, rather it goes on to continue into daily life, making life about competing and winning and bettering your friends. It doesn’t stop once the game is over and that is devastating for the wellbeing of the human race and ever achieving true harmony between nations.
This is an awesome, very graphic example of how natural it is for us to share and play with physical activity and what happens when it becomes competitive. To be honest, I very much ‘went for it’ as a sportsman at school and would be the last to say it was harmful, yet all the injuries, the lasting wear and tear on my body for being active in a brutal win at all costs way, has all shown the truth. Equally as powerfully, now having cleared a lot of the harm from my body related to my investment in sport with the assistance of Serge Benhayon, I can connect with the harm I felt as a young man, literally sick to the stomach and contraction in my body, when competition was forced on us at school.
How beautiful to go back to just playing without the need of winners or losers.
What an amazing example of the influence of competition and how it sets one against another and then another, and the choas, disharmony and conflict that ensues.
I can feel the truth of what you are exposing here Suzanne and wow when you really feel what competition does to us, our family, societies and nations it is obvious how destructive and hideous it really is. When a child is encouraged to love and celebrate the child grows up with an inner harmony apposed to the inner conflict that completion brings.
We treat competition as somehow teaching children a necessary life skill as the presumption is that they are going to have to learn to be competitive to survive. How can this be helpful in changing the ‘life’s a jungle out there and you need to be tough to pull through’ mentality that commonly prevails? It doesn’t take much pondering to see how the natural joy and sensitivity of children stops being valued, nurtured and developed and how as adults, having lost touch with this natural side of themselves most live in hardness and self protection. It’s worth remembering that how we raise our children is our future world.
What shouts out to me about this example is how the competition erodes the quality from what is being done… a simple pleasure turns into something else altogether. That coupled with the fact competition by its nature turns us against each other and you have to wonder… there is a better way.
Well said Simon “competition erodes the quality from what is being done” when we choose to compete our natural harmonious qualities go out of the window and are instead replaced with a harmful energy which is poisonous not just for others involved but for ourselves. In the future it will be understood the harm competition enforces.
I have noticed from a young age how competition in sport affected me and although I was very attracted to playing sport (mostly due to the team aspect of it) I noticed how when practicing or warming up I really was a lot more skilful without the pressure of playing to win. Therefore I can say in hindsight that the activity became less friendly and playful, my body tensed up and co-ordination diminished so skill diminished. I can now relate this to both function and quality of life in general and how truly harming living competitively is.
My job involves being checked by a supervisor every 6 months to make sure I’m following all the correct procedures and I am assessed and scored, my results put on file for the rest of my life! There is a definite pressure in this, and after 15 years of being in the same job, with the same pressure of assessments, I can tell you it never goes away. While I have gotten better at ‘handling the pressure’, there is no doubt that I operate more fluidly, more solidly without the pressure of assessment, aka competition. And all my colleagues are the same, yet few are asking if there is a better way to work.
Thought provoking blog, particularly the suggested three pillars of education – equity, co-operation and freedom – underpinned by a recognition that each one of us brings a unique essence, of value to all. Applied in schools, this would completely throw out any necessity to feel a lack of self worth about not being sporty or good at Maths let’s say, because there’d be recognition that your essence lay in a different field and you’d be encouraged to develop it further.
Great comment Cathy, thank you. You say very simply and clearly how each of us knowing our essence negates the situation of a lack of self worth. Or another way to put it is each of us knowing who we are and what we bring to this planet because of our very existence means we never need to feel less than anyone else because we all have skills in different areas. Competition would truly no longer exist.
Its undeniable that we all have a particular quality, or essence. If we can simply bring that to what we are engaged with, not getting caught in comparison or competition with the next person, then we fulfil something deeply personal and deeply sacred – our role. And our role is always unique, no matter what it is.
If we could simply observe when the shift from innocence and connection to separation and manipulation happens, this we would possibly be honest enough to recognize what the endpoint of this is, and then to return to the start and to bring a whole different mode and method of education to our children, to redefine what it is to actually be an evolved human,
Suzanne your example illustrated beautifully the shamozzle and disrespect of competition and how winners are grinners and all the others in the race who partook from a competitive stance are not smiling at all. What a mess. But, your observation also illustrated the fact that we all have a choice on whether we engage in the competition or not.
We do have a choice Suse, for sure. Even though our education system in Australia is leaning this way, where competitiveness is desired, a teacher can choose not to have this way in his or her classroom, inviting the children to operate as a team in harmony to bring out the best in them all, instead of a few who happen to have a physical prowess.
It’s not hard to see how come we, as adults, are often so outcome driven and see ourselves as failures when we don’t ‘achieve’ to the level of our own or others expectations. We’ve been conditioned into it from birth and it takes an insidious hold over us. No wonder it is such a struggle to transform all the ideals and beliefs we hold that have competition, winning etc as their basis! But once we start to do so, the feeling of lightness, relief and space is amazing.
Children give such a clear reflection on the true nature of things without the reasoning and rationalising of adults. For me this blog beautifully illustrates what is truly happening in all competition except for the fact that as adults we have internalised all of this behaviour as part of being ‘sporting’ a ‘good competitor’ and being in ‘the spirit of the game’. I was heavily involved in competitive sport from childhood to early twenties and no matter how much you pretend it’s all smiles you can always feel the deep undertones of the sadness and misery which are far more prevalent than any supposed elation at winning. Even the victors are aware of the lengths they go to and the costs to themselves and of others for their so called achievements.
It is sad that as children we are incited into competing with another, can you image the world if this was not the case and instead we learnt about true brotherhood? The state of the world would now be completely different. Wars steam from this same competitive energy, lets stop giving fuel to this destructive way of being and get back to who we truly are.
Thank you Suzanne for sharing what your observed, these days, apart from all the sports we have ,The TV shows now, are all full of hyped up emotional competition. I never liked competition when young, probably being on the loosing team and feeling the effects of not being good enough, not worth while, being a looser, devastating to a child, yet being on the winning team gave only a moment of glory, that was soon lost when some one better came along. Winning and loosing, both are loosing games, loosing who we truly are and our own unique gifts that we come with to share with the world.
The only way for people to see that competing is not the way is for people to feel that they are enough, regardless of what they do. Then the need to perform for accolades, momentary triumph will fade into oblivion.
Reading your sharing again today Suzanne really highlights for me how from such a young age the emphasis is still about winning, being first, or the brightest of the bunch etc. How this is then carried through life in all manner of ways. Is it a wonder so many rebel within society as they are classed as those who are not ‘winners’ or high achievers. Yet within each and everyone there are such ‘amazing gifts’ that get suppressed because the impress to win or be the best belittle any trying to follow their natural pathway in life to expand what feels to support them in all their choices.
Within society competition is everywhere, in relationships, in schools, in academia, in sport, in work etc….everywhere “Competition teaches us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are,” And so life for many can become about the ‘doing’. I never liked competition, I used to think I opted out of it most of time and often came across as a ‘rebel without a case’ I am sure, I suppose in some ways I was competing but not in the recognised sense. I was saying ‘No’ to society and ‘doing’ nothing, but actually the nothing is a something, it is resistance. I have come to realise that I was also saying ‘no’ to life….knowing something is not true I have learnt does not entitle me to hide and not be purposeful in life. I am now part of humanity, I will not play the games of competition but I will participate in life.
As a child I didn’t enjoy competition at all. I felt it showed up my inadequate skills and lack of confidence especially in sporting activities and I learned to dislike sports of all kind. Surely something that separates those with skill in certain areas from the rest of the class can only bring discontent and disappointment to many. To go to school where everything is about competition surely cannot b a pleasant experience for many of us, as children ! It is time we seriously looked at this as a real problem, and started to make changes where everyone learns the basic skills of communication, love, acceptance , brotherhood and equality. Thank you for sharing your observations with us Suzanne.
Well said Suzanne, competition is, contrary to popular opinion, the scourge of community rather then the glue, inviting separation and comparison and loss of self worth, frustration, irritation, anger and more … hmmm surly there is another way ?
One would think competing is the glue that is holding people together, considering the masses who barrack for sporting teams these days, many thinking they are connecting with each other for they have something in common – that could even be that they hate each other’s favourite team, but that’s still something in common, right? Sometimes it seems to me that people are so starved of true relationships with other people that they will settle for very little.
As a society we seem to thrive on competition with its’ winners and losers and the implied battlefield. To play sport for sheer pleasure especially a team sport is not easy as the need to improve, to show what one can do slowly creeps in when others are involved. Like any other endeavour in life we can maintain our steadiness by reconnecting to ourselves, leaving behind any need for comparison and just feel the pleasure of the body in motion.
Not only do we thrive on it, but we pay to watch it, we gamble on it, we invest everything we have to win… I wonder if we would consider ourselves more advanced or evolved than the Roman Gladiators? 2000 years of opportunity and rather than learning and evolving from the depravation, we have simply crafted and perfected the technique.
I live right next to a playground. Normally, it’s just children playing amongst themselves, sometimes with adults, just having fun. However, once a year, for a period of one month, the place gets hijacked by a local kids’ dodge ball team ‘training’ for a tournament, and turns into a battle field. I hear a woman coach yelling and telling the kids off for not being fast/strong enough, and the kids reply as if they are in the army. And the mothers stand by with drinks and towels, keeping an watchful eye on their kids. They are the same kids who normally come and play and just have fun. But during that month, everything feels so serious and so tough. I don’t know if anyone is actually having fun.
A great blog that exposes the path of competition from an early age in fact has no winners, for we all lose out in competition due to the nature of the word it brings up separatism, frustration, anger and feelings of not being good enough.
Is this really what we want to teach our children, great article Suzanne.
I have seem some terrible side line parent reactions to their children playing sport and the impact on the children. Its like the parents are living their dreams through their children and totally takes the natural joy out of the game. It is all about winning and so there will always be losers which is the sad part as the loser s always feel less and the winner is celebrated. So damaging for all-why can we not see it??
I love coming back to read this blog because it’s such a great living example of the effect of competition, and it’s so obvious, it makes me wonder why we still continue to tout that competition is ‘healthy’!
Agreed Angela. When it’s here black and white what is happening when the game becomes a competition and it falls apart, how can that be any part of healthy?
What a great opportunity to see the harm that can be caused by competition, it is clear from the chaos that this is not an energy that should be encouraged and certainly not at school where it is not left on the field but is taken inside with the kids after. It is interesting however and a great reflection and reminder to us all that with competition, which sometimes is imposed upon you, there are those that can choose to remain unaffected and not lose themselves and happily skip away unscathed.
Suzanne your observations was so much on the mark. Watching children play with no competition is the most amazing experience. You can hear laughter, giggles and the absolute mateship as each one discovers the world they live in. When competition is at play the group harmony disappears and what we see is what is considered in society as the highest accolades sportsmanship – which is one for the ball and not for all.
nb, this is exactly what I too felt to say. There is so much natural harmony and fellowship when children simply play together however, when competition is introduced its ‘every man for himself.’ Unity, fun and camaraderie or separation, anger and resentment……hmm.
Wow what an observation Suzanne – I really have the sense of the destruction of competition and the need to be a winner when we are given these directives. How is this world going to be if we continue in this way?
The other factor here is that the teacher has been given a directive and buys into the need to fulfil this overriding what feels great for all. The microcosm presented shows us that the world is in a particularly poor place and that there are very few who can stay still and not let the rot of competition affect their lives. WE need as a society to look deeply at the truth of competition and sport for it does not truly serve.
What a clear and true picture you paint Suzanne of the destructive and demoralising nature of competition. As you so rightly say it squashes all connection that we have with our true nature of being harmonious with ourselves and others.
Great point Suzanne, the two words healthy and competition simply do not go together. One holds care, the other is concerned only with out doing another. With care and support for ourselves and for all others no need to be better than another arises.
Susanne thanks for the insight into the way we keep encouraging our children to compete against each other, causing comparison and jealousy and hurt . It’s time we looked at making changes in the way we teach children to live their lives, and see where we let them down, then set them up for so much disappointment and pain. We need to look at what we as adults are perpetuating in this world.
What an interesting observation of this seemingly harmless activity. It’s just incredible how prepared we are to accept that behaviour. We are not taught as educators to observe the change in energy, and to read the students for where they are at, what works and what does not. Why would we welcome such disharmony, and could this be where the need and drive to win begins? You lose a couple of school yard games, you get a chip on your shoulder about not experiencing a win, you then make it your goal in life to always win. It seems ridiculous, but also feels as though it’s what often unfolds. This is a conversation that really needs to be had.
What a very revealing situation and a beautiful observation Suzanne. The juxtaposition of both activities brings a striking revelation – how an instruction to ‘race’ turns cooperation into competition. A brilliant illustration and one I’d love to see filmed and used in educating teachers.
I enjoyed reading the part where you observed what happened when the competition was introduced and seeing the kids going into anxiety and making more mistakes and the joy being lost from what they were doing.
This is so different to what you describe earlier before the competition was introduced, seeing kids playing and having fun, working together and developing their confidence in their skills. This is so much more supportive for young kids then putting them into a situation where the stress was then heightened for them and the teacher and played out for longer than when the game was over.
It is often stated that competition brings out the best in people but in my experience it brings out the worst in people, children and adults alike. Competition drives separation between people whether that is another team of people, or as individuals. It is very sad to see children coerced out of their natural playfulness into competing for recognition as Suzanne has described. Some children continue in constant competition their whole lives striving for success at another’s expense.
I have observed what you observed here, Suzanne. When there are winners, there must be “losers” and in that we are making a group of children feel less. This is not right, especially as winners often always tend to be winners throughout the school years and there is always a group of children feeling less.
Thank you for sharing this observation Suzanne which profoundly and clearly highlights the destructive impact competitive sports have on the well-being of children and adults alike. And how separative this is not only on a personal level but with all and how consideration for another is absent, having some children miss out on having a turn, as enjoyment was no longer considered important. I agree that education of our children would be far better served if we focused on nurturing the unique precious and powerful qualities of who they are, that they are enough and so there is no need for competition and true enjoyment of playing together is honoured. ‘With this freedom, and by eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society.’ – well said.
Suzanne competition takes away the ‘me with you’ and relpaces it with ‘me against you’ that separation can never be a good thing.
Living with competition induces a kind of rat race that has no end. The ironic part is far from winning any prize we all loose out on enjoying the natural playful togetherness that as you show here Suzanne comes so naturally.
Indeed we all do miss out Joseph. How can ‘togetherness’ be felt if we are competing with and amongst each other all the time?
Very true Joseph – there is a real irony that rather than ‘winning’ we all end up as being losers as a result of competition.
So beautifully expressed Joseph; a rat race that has no end, how destructive for all of us.
Winning always involves one feeling elated for a short time and another losing and feeling less. My daughter is only 7 and at school she is already very aware of the game of competition and that you seem to only be worthy if you win. In my book everyone is a winner and we need to celebrate children for the qualities they carry within not what they can ‘do’. Thank you Suzanne for such an awesome blog.
This article exposes the fallacy behind the so-called benefits of competition in society, summed up here as ‘all hell breaks loose’. At the mere hint of competition we morph into something different from who we truly are, working in harmony with others goes out the window, we tense up, get fixated on outcomes rather than enjoying the process, become anxious and either win and feel good from the achievement and recognition, or lose and feel lesser, dejected and not good enough. So in both instances we risk losing that natural connection to ourselves, to that stillness that gives us our sense of self-worth in the first place and a deep acceptance of the value our own unique essence brings. And all in pursuit of trying to be the bod with the best ball skills for half an hour. It’s a madness inculcated from an early age.
I think many parents see competition as something our kids need to learn. I think it is seen as a quality needed to ‘survive’ in this world. Personally I don’t want my child, or any for that matter, to have to just ‘survive’. I think there are many qualities that are needed far above being competitive that will allow kids to be joyful, healthy, happy, solid, compassionate little beings that will bring out the best in each other, not tear each other down.
We used to see the extraordinary transformation that would happen to ordinarily nice parents at the junior school soccer matches… It was quite extraordinary to see, and there was definitely no joy, there was the jubilation of the winners, the depression of the losers, and the Jekyll & Hyde parents… And this bizarre combination was there match after match and was thought to be normal.
It is interesting Chris, to observe what people are accepting as part and parcel of life; what is normal and not to be questioned. We all need to be more curious and wonder why we ‘do life’ like this. We’re harsh on ourselves and one another so often, which I’m sure perpetuates the winning/losing scenarios’s normality these days.
looking back in my early childhood years at school it was always about the winning both as an individual and as a team game. If you did not fit in and did not like sport you were almost cast aside and left to your own vices – sit on a bench and read. The anticipation of excitement can be felt in the children as games/sport is introduced initially but, once in full flow and there becomes winners and looses that joy then turns to a big let down! and the sadness is there for all to see/feel.
Wow Suzanne what a clear illustration of the destructive nature of competition. “Competition erases the knowingness of who we are.” This is such a powerful statement and so simply put. Competition does make it all about what we do rather than who we are. Since love is who we are and not something we do, we then can spend the rest of our lives seeking something we already are, this is crazy and it all begins with innocent activities such as children’s games once the element of competition is introduced.
So true Tim – in that once we’ve been taught something that isn’t naturally inside of us, the search for it must take one further away from the real us. A treasure hunt doomed to fail. Competition is simply not an innocent game. It is not ‘all just good fun’ as we are led to believe.
Other waters that are fraught with sharks and objects of the deep that we don’t even know are there… This doesn’t make any sense – we are taught never to leave the ship but as you write Eduardo, if schools continue to educate kids to compete against all others, we are grooming the kids to do completely the opposite to their natural tendency or inclination of togetherness. Shame.
Competition is not part of our make up as beings. It is something we learn from adults. This is a great example of how adults ‘prepare’ kids for life. This preparation does not meet the kids though. It requires the kid to leave their own ship and to venture in other waters.
Competition is indeed something we learn, like culture, religion and nationality. None of these things are known innately as a young child, this tells me that opinion, emotion and bias, among other things, come into play, a person learning how to be a certain way in accordance with a belief of sorts, i.e. how to ‘be Jewish’, or how to ‘be Korean’. Take the person out of that religion or country, and a totally different way of life can be experienced. These things we learn aren’t always true and as the eons have shown us can and have been warred over. But take warmth, harmony, love, playfulness; these things are felt by everyone equally, no matter their relation, their culture. And so are the true parts of what it means to be a human being. If we could drop those aspects of human-ness that aren’t true for everyone, we would be living in compete and total harmony, competition a distant and painful memory.
Competition seems to highlight comparison and a winner and loser behavior. It is all about the end result and not the person how they are in the game. It does not feel nice at all.
My daughter’s teacher encourages the children to work together and offer support where they can. Recently the class was divided into four or five teams and told that whichever team scored the most points by the end of the day would win a prize. She told of how this changed the class immediately. They went from helping each other to guarding their work, from feeling a togetherness as a class to refusing to help those that weren’t on their team. She was shocked at how bringing in competition changed people and their behaviour towards each other.
Wow, what a clear example. Why would anyone want a world that operates like this, guarded, protected, sly?
This article is a powerful exposure of the harm that is imposed on children when they are taught to live by competition and comparison. All the fun and joy was squashed the moment they had to try and be better than someone else.
Such a simple yet hugely telling blog – surely there wouldn’t be many adults who can’t see the point here? Or is there? It’s the classic boxing-together all of the kids in a school to have to all come-up to a defined level. Some kids are robust and powerfully built, so their athleticism is going to give them advantages in sport. Others are well equipped to solve puzzels or mathematical equations. It’s unfair to make, for example, these two groups of kids compete in a sporting game or a maths quiz, and what about the really creative children who paint wonderfully and express more freely, they perhaps are awarded prizes for their art – but then that’s only 3 groups of kids, what about all the others? I get the point here and that is making small people compete isn’t healthy; it inflates untruthful association of reward for excellence in doing something, rather the truthful innate feeling of self appreciation or being appreciated for their inner beauty or other qualities. Give them boundaries, not yard sticks when they walk in the school yard. Thanks Suzanne.
Oliver I really like what you offer: “give boundaries … not yard sticks”. I still can feel what it was like as a child trying to fit in with the imposed “what should be normal” developmental skills for age groups. I’d go so far to say that this conditioning carries into adult life and this is where comparison and expectation comes in and plays out with-in ourselves and in our relationships. How amazing would it feel to not grow up under such imposed and completely unnecessary pressure? How much healthier would we all be?
Recently more measures have been introduced in the UK to identify how school are performing. It seems to me that it’s not just the children that are being given yardsticks, but the teachers and the heads…all based on exam results.
When are we going to start valuing caring for each other, gentleness. truth?
Thanks Oliver, a fantastic comment, adding to what the original blog presented. The crux of it is in society these days, rarely is a child celebrated for being amazing as they are; we make it about what they can do (same goes for adults). And herein lies the problem. I have no problem with people being excellent in something and celebrating that excellence, we all have skills in different areas. But to compete leads us to compare ourselves, apples with oranges, and the only outcome from that is feeling we lack something, leading to lack of self worth, the very thing the competition was thought to bring us in the first place. We have it all upside down.
“Education needs to focus on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves. With this freedom, and by eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society.”
Well said Suzanne. I remember as a child enjoying ball games, but like your experience, the moment it was a race, it became something out of control and horrible. I felt very pressured to get it right and do what was asked or else I would be letting the team down. I didn’t enjoy the experience, hence was not keen to play sport or go in races at school.
I played netball and swimming to a high level at school, including many competitions. But never did I enjoy it more than when we just tossing the netball around to each other, chitter chatting, laughing with the team, or after swimming training, when we were chatting with each other getting something to eat before school started, combatting how hungry we felt after training so hard on empty stomachs. All seems so pointless and silly in hindsight.
‘Competition teaches us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are’ ~ This line is very powerful and beautifully sums up the harm in ANY competition. The enormity of the difference between the way the children play without the competition factor and how they do with it cannot be ignored.
Suzanne despite watching countless children playing ball games I was unable to make your amazing observations due to being caught up in competition myself. I really appreciated what you have shared as I can now feel the absolute harm of encouraging competition in kids. This competition sets us up for a life of always trying to be the best and often feeling less if we are not when all we really need is to be ourselves.
It is very sad that as a society we even consider ‘healthy competition’ as a way to motivate children to participate in a way which really is not their natural way of interacting, but something we have trained them in our families and in the education system to prepare them for the workplace.
Great observation. Its clear that children are very naturally caring and able to cooperate with each other. I can remember playing this game when I was in primary school. Competition is so damaging and its easy to see this in the example that you’ve shared. Thanks for sharing.
What an eye opening account and insightful simple example of the abuse of competition Suzanne, and from such a young age too, wow. And then we go on to take this pattern of behaviour into workplaces where we are promoted from winning, beating, being the best … and, from the school example which I feel is reflective of how we tend to go about doing or achieving this – often through blaming others, cheating, insensitivity, stepping on people and hurting everyone, and ourselves in the process. How ugly. And how damaging we can allow ourselves to become by the carrot of reward and recognition. Great to spot this and also see that there are some who do choose to not take this on, and walk away in the joy that they are, and treasure that is too much to spoil. Beautiful.
Thank you for writing about this Suzanne. Yesterday I drove past a local school and was stopped at the traffic lights long enough to watch some young girls playing with a ball and doing netball skills.
It struck me how exercise and activity is seen as one of the best things for us… However, activity and sport are two very different things. I watched how these young girls strived to get the ball in the net, to impress the teacher and play against each other… This is not a lesson that prepares us for a loving life of teamwork, working together and building equality, but one of drive, push, undermining others, competition, comparison, and the list goes on. How many corporate environments run on this same principle – there may not be the running and physical aspects, but the game being played is exactly the same- through words, mind games, emails – competition and working in a way to be the ‘winner’ at the expense of others – even your own body.
I love what you share too Kylie. The thing is, what the corporate world really wants is to produce the most amazing product or service that benefits all. They are always seeking a better culture within the company, a better work-life balance, more ideas, more teamwork, but they keep going about it the wrong way. If only they (the corporate world, and people in general) could see that, as you say, “drive, push, undermining, competition, comparison” is NOT the way to achieve, but rather “a loving life of teamwork, working together and building equality, ” that are the principles to follow. It is this understanding that must be taught / expressed from day to day that will change the future of education and work.
What a great, but also disturbing observation, of the difference between the two events. I was witness to something similar at my grandchildren’s school recently. And this was just one example of what occurs daily in the education system, and then of course flows on out into life as the child growing into the adult considers it normal. I don’t see one ounce of normal in it. It is time to begin to grow a new normal where children learn to play together, to support each other, to know when they are close to harming themselves or others, and to have no expectations other than having fun. Now imagine these children taking this experience out into the world – what an amazing new normal that would be!
Yes, it must be hard for people who can see only pluses for competition to understand the other side’s view.
Suzanne I have recently said to my 13 yr old soccer mad son that I can no longer congratulate him when he wins a game. This may sound harsh but I watched him recently play an inter state game which he won but when I looked into the faces of the boys who had lost I felt no joy whatsoever at my son’s ‘triumph’, they were absolutely devastated. So I focus on the wonderful boy my son is rather than his soccer results.
The number of comments attesting to the fact that competition engenders separation and intense and harmful emotions is staggering and the examples are many. Maybe it is time we called the plug on this deception?
It’s high time Gabriele. Its a massive consciousness to break, that competition is separatist and keeps people pitched against one another, but so desperately important to do.
I could not agree more Gabrielle, lets call out the deception.
Thank you Suzanne for highlighting this consciousness
Thank you Suzanne. What you have described here is what I have observed in the classroom of my 5 year old daughter who has started school this year. At the beginning they all just came together at the table to do the activity and didn’t really even notice what the other people were doing. After one term of being at school this has changed and the conversation I hear now is ” mines better than yours”, “your just doing scribble”, mines bigger than yours” The competition is well set in and this is only prep. The system is certainly set up to go against equality, and acceptance.
I observed a very similar classroom scene too. Perhaps teachers think they’re motivating the kids by comparing them between one another, and trying to get the kids to strive higher, but it feels to me like the starting ground for competition being a very normal, as in common, not natural, or true or loving way of operating.
This is a great example of what happens between people when competition is brought into the equation. The way that you describe how the kids were just enjoying the physical activity and being with each other is so natural and easy. The chaos that competition brought with it feels awful and sets up comparison and jealousy with no appreciation for each part of the whole.
Many say that competition builds resilience and that this is a good thing to prepare our children for adult life…but really we should be questioning where that adult life leads to…last time I looked the majority are exhausted, depressed and not feeling great. So it’s not resilience to push through that we should be fostering, but instead true collaboration and appreciation…how would the world be if we fostered this?
You raise a great and very valid point Marika about resilience and what exactly is the purpose of it. If it fosters adults to push through their fatigue and encourage people to push through life regardless of the cost, then how can it be seen as a positive? Enjoying physical activity and sharing that enjoyment with other people seems to count for more to me.
This is indeed a very interesting point. Resilience is now fostered as the solution for many of life’s problems physically and mentally, but fails to consider what caused the ills in the first place.
Thank you Suzanne for your observations. I had not been aware of the difference of playing a simple ball game and then the consequences of that game becoming a competition (especially in children). Now, I am going to pay closer attention to ‘competitive’ sports and feel what is really going on.
Suzanne, I am re-reading this piece and it is profound. I agree that teachers need to read this too!
It is so true that when we are in competition with each other this causes us to forget actually how much we can all just simply get along. Competition is ugly, and fierce and has a deeply imbedded exclusivity to it which will always be against what we are all able to live within our communities.
Wow what a great observation Suzanne. I really could feel my own stomach contracting when you wrote about ‘now we make it a competition’. I can remember this very well from school and never liked the competition, I really enjoyed doing things together in equalness and this has never changed. It is like you said all about equity and equalness, being together and having fun!
I am wondering what it is in us that is looking for competition, the need to win, to be better than the others and why we are choosing for this. Because as you so beautifully describe Suzanne Anderssen, it does make us hard, we actually have no fun anymore and we loose our natural appreciation for the others completely when we allow competition into our lives.
This is the most beautiful vision, Suzanne, sport being focussed on equity, cooperation and freedom. Just reading this, feels like a healing for my body. I can still feel traces of sadness from childhood experiences, when I stopped expressing myself in sports class and instead tried to perform well.
Suzanne, this is such a great blog which provides a lovely reminder of how if we put a time frame on a situation the tension is felt and what plays out is far from joyful but where we take the time we need to get jobs done then there is a natural flow and harmony with what we are doing.
Reading this blog Suzanne, I wanted to be there with you watching the co-ordinated joyful children passing a ball. I felt their natural rhythm working together so easily. Why is it we insist on making life about competition when it does nothing to bring the harmony that in reality is what we all want.
Great observation Suzanne, and a great example of what is happening all the time with everyone in life. Making it about competing, whether it’s sport, work, school, relationships -in fact any aspect of life, once you add that pressure, all hell breaks loose…
As someone who used to play quite a lot of competitive sport, I totally agree about how the truth of it is that competition does not ‘build character’, unless creating division and comparison between so called ‘winners’ and’ losers’ can be described as building character. I used to enjoy my practice games and yet when it came to the weekends and the actual competitive game, I would get very nervous – often being physically sick. However I used to do very well and was often a game winner. But the damage done to my body from striving so hard to win and be a stand out player, is still there with me today, in my fifties! My experience is also watching people in the crowd at matches, the antics they get up to, the despair on their faces when their team loses and the fact that no sporting event ever changes the life of anyone, unless a serious injury has occurred and that is hardly the kind of change you would call positive!
‘I did notice there were a few children amongst the chaos who stayed still, able to put the same care into catching the ball, throwing and running during the race as they had during practice. At the end of the lesson, these kids simply skipped off with each other, held hands, and stood in the line quietly, waiting to return to their classroom.’ How beautiful that some children were able to still maintain their focus on what they were supposed to be doing and to not be affected by the ‘race’ that had been introduced and caused such chaos. What a lovely reflection for the other children and also the teacher if they were open to evaluating what had happened in the lesson as soon as a competitive element was introduced.
While I was reading this blog all I can think of is my 11 year old son who absolutely dislikes competitive sports. He has never been good at it and feels completely stressed out by it at school. So from what you have observed I can see why it is so harming for children to have to compete in this way. There is no harmony or joy in any of it. It will be a very long time before the education system and society accept or recognize this and begin to realise that it could be harmful to practice competitive sports.
I agree there is nothing healthy about competition. I used to think that sport was about playing – having fun together, not about striving to outdo each other by whatever way it takes to win the game. The competition in sport feels like little mini wars going on everywhere. It is so beautiful to hear children just enjoy being and playing together.
I love how much you bring to life the scene you describe Suzanne, I am much more aware now of the effects of competition on the performance of a child’s basic motor skills. So often their ability to perform a task that before they found easy goes to pot as they get caught in the anxiousness of trying to be better or perhaps not be worse than another. It really is remarkable to watch this unwanted transformation unfold and makes me wonder why this topic hasn’t been given more coverage and credence, particularly in light of the effect on behaviour as surely teachers would prefer not to have to deal with such a stressful scenario.
The full impact of completion for children and adults is quite harmful, on many levels, from the false sense of confidence, to the push it puts into someone’s body to complete it.
What I find interesting is that, WHY did the teacher feel the need to turn this beautiful, playful game, which the children were enjoying into a race? Why spoil something that was fun and obviously working for them, being their natural playful selves? Your story seems to be an analogy for life, we are merrily skipping along when ‘all of a sudden’ something changes and the competition and comparison take over and all hell breaks loose. Competition just leads to jealousy, comparison and resentment which is not our natural way to live. By nurturing our own innate gentleness and playfulness wouldn’t this allow children to hold onto their loveliness too, taking it with them into adulthood without the need for competition and comparison.
I think the majority think that kids need to learn to cope with pressures and competition as that is what they will encounter in adult life.
Thanks Suzanne for this beautiful insight , to truly observe what competition does to us is such a gem , this should be broadcast to every one , competition in any form is so not it.
Yes, I agree, most businesses could learn from the contents of this blog.
WOW what you have accurately observed and shared is so very true and the harm clearly exposed to anyone who wishes to see. This should be compulsory reading at every school and for every sports teacher, head and parent.
Yes, it should be Nicola, I do agree. I shared my observations with one of the head teachers as teachers are in the ideal position to be pivotal in changing the way sport and exercise is done at school. This will take time but as more and more teachers realise the truth behind competition, so things will gradually change.
I agree Nicola, just reading this blog made me want to shout STOP. Examples like this would be great to film, they would make an excellent documentary for parents and teachers alike.
A great idea Fiona, filming the change in demeaned of kids and adults alike as they move from teamwork to competitiveness. It would be an eye opener for so many who at this moment champion sport and competition as being a path to one’s ‘growth’.
The competition thing in schools and in life in general is deeply imbedded and won’t change overnight. It is certainly an ugly thing but even the writing of this blog and bringing attention to this fact will help bring about awareness and the change needed to the way we live our lives and educate our children.
I totally agree with you, Suzanne. With competitiveness, the seriousness, the rough & tough behaviour comes in, and there is no more One unified, just fragmentation, and the fun is lost.
Thank you Suzanne for your blog. It is so sad that children can be tainted at such a young age to pit themselves against one another. As you say ‘Competition erases the knowingness of who we are’ as we immediately become caught up in the doing-ness. Education would surely serve humanity if it ‘focussed on equality, cooperation and freedom for each and every child’. We could then grow up to become adults who truly served and made a positive contribution to our world that would become sustainable.
So true Suzanne that education should be built on equity, cooperation and freedom. In competition, everything decent flies out the window and your just left with a drive to win- that’s your goal and that’s what you see in front of you. There is no consideration or love left for the person you might be interacting with at the time. It sounded like a mad house what you have described.
Thank you Suzanne for exposing what competition creates. We see this on the world stage with riots and aggression at elite soccer and football games. And it all starts as young children in our schools. I wonder if the teacher noticed the change in the children, as you had, which then meant she now had to raise her voice and feel frustrated which then spills over into her interactions with the class for the rest of the day.
You make a great point Karen, the knock on effects for the teacher then becoming frustrated and that then becomes the momentum she takes into her next class with another 25 young children. Where does it end?
Suzanne, what you have revealed here is so true and every teacher needs to read this. The competition in sport gets worse as the children get older, for it becomes less and less about the child and how they feel and more about the kudos for the school, when the team wins and often kudos for the parents! I have often seen the pressure on boys for instance to score goals in football, but there is no joy in the experience for them, only pressure. There is only winners and losers -there is nothing loving in this!
Such a beautiful blog, exposing something so common on schools and in sports, It isn’t about the game anymore when it becomes competition. We get lost in the recognition we get when we won, and feel dissatisfied when we lose, it isn’t fun anymore.
Suzanne thank you so much for your revealing blog.” Competition teaches us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are.” My feeling is that some people in this world would not understand what you describe here because our education is so in line with being competitive that even the parents raise their kids in this energy in the meaning they are doing something good for their children. We are blind on this eye and therefore I love you blog because it exposed what the energy of being competitive is really doing. You expose the real harm behind it.
Great blog Suzanne. This brought back so many memories for me. I played a lot of team sports until my early 20’s and learned how to ‘play the game’ well so that I would not look frazzled, frustrated or furious. I and many others thought that I had a good attitude in sport regardless of whether I won or lost. All I ever really did was bury how I truly felt so that I could continue to feel like I belonged in some way and get some sort of recognition.
A great observation you made there, and so important that you wrote about it. There is indeed no ‘healthy’ in competition.
I can just picture how children must have changed as soon as the race was on (I used to teach at primary schools). As written here, there are some children who naturally do not get caught up in “competitions” thankfully. Current education really needs a fundamental change.
What really got my attention in this blog Suzanne was the way you described how the children were when the chaos erupted and about competition erasing that knowingness of who we are. If small children have a strong sense of who they are to ask them to race would be like expecting a fish to swim on land, if it tries it would struggle. As I read the part about the race it felt like the competition was asking the children to act in a very unnatural way – hence the chaos. And from experience I know while at work I give more focus to what I need to get done – such as a promotional change over or get a certain task done in a certain time – I lose all focus of me and sole focus is on the task. This leads to feeling anxious, craving foods, emotional disturbances and the list could go on. What has stood out the most in this blog is that to focus on what the doing can bring us we lose sight of what we can already bring without trying.
I love what you say here Leigh, that when the focus is on what the doing can bring us, e.g. rewards, recognition, accolades, promotions, friendships etc, we can easily lose sight of what we can actually bring without even trying. We can lose sight of why we were enjoying the activity in the first place.
Love this line Leigh: ‘…to focus on what the doing can bring us we lose sight of what we can already bring without trying.’ When we are our natural selves it is amazing what can unfold with such ease. Competition and anxiousness seem to go hand in hand and what often comes with that are mistakes and compromised performance.
Of course there are those that say they thrive on competition, but at what expense to their bodies? And why do we need to compete? In the past I used competition to seek recognition and identification…but stopped that as it’s a never ending pit of ‘never good enough’ and no space to stop and appreciate myself or others.
Great blog Suzanne, this so clearly shows that competition can bring up so much anxiety and separation between us all when in fact it is working together that is the greatest part of it and not the end result.
This is a great article depicting the fun in sharing a game of ball and the total change of energy in the theme of competition, which certainly takes away the fun and a loving connection among the group.
At 8 years old, after a punishing training, I won the Inter Schools long jump and obstacle race, with my photo and a write up in the local newspaper. This gained me much approval and recognition, which in turn meant I pushed my body even harder………
Another 60 years on, I found the teachings of Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine, “competition is not who we are” finally, body pushing is over, recognition no longer necessary.
That sounds really intense. I can imagine standing by observing the difference between the activities would have been quite alarming. We really do take competition for granted. Thank you for the observation!
This so reminds me of my childhood sporting days. There was indeed a driving force that made me abandon any love that I otherwise would have felt for that person/s or opponent, at that time. And often after the game or competition the hurt of defeating and being defeated lives on in some way. Thank you Suzanne for highlighting so clearly how this happens and how unhealthy this game of sport is – not only for the players involved, but all of us who have to live with the effects long after the game is over.
Great blog Suzanne. The picture that came to mind when you described how the chidren were initially playing, was one of children focused to do the activity well, but doing it in a joyous manner with laughter and watching out for others when running for the ball. When competition was introduced the energy changed immediately. The children were more agressive and angry with others if a mistake was made, and they would have continued on in this energy into the next lesson. It doesn’t strike me that there were any ‘winners’ from that experience.
Awesome Suzanne, thank you for your sharing on this. It certainly took me back to schoolyard days and I definitely remember this feeling of competition, and feeling let down, or as if no one saw how good I was if I didn’t win. I then learned to not participate in the things I wasn’t good at to avoid looking like a ‘failure’. In contrast to that, I definitely reveled in the things I was good at, and when I did win. How different could it have been had I just felt loved and supported no matter what I did, and my strengths encouraged to allow me to blossom into the awesome me. Competition is such a given in all of society currently, and this is a simple and very exposing example such as this, that shows the disarray it can cause. I do wonder what society would look like without it.
Damaging and function I agree and outcome at the expense of others. Personally I disliked competitive sports immensely it made me want to hide. Not a great way to start out at 5 – hating something and wanting to hide.
I can still remember as a child getting highly anxious during sports days, I was never a “winner”. This made me feel less and unworthy, I then started to try less and use bad behavior so I didn’t have to participate in sports. I too would love to see more equality, cooperation and freedom in schools.
I too got highly anxious during school sports days. I loved winning and would win most races but looking back the feeling of winning races was very short lived as the emptiness filled me inside. I felt very confused as a child and now I am understanding the reason for this. From my experience it is certainly not natural for any child to compete with one another and how we as adults think that competition is good for us is beyond my understanding. Our education system needs to be made more aware of the impact competition has on our children and therefore how it effects them later on in life.
What a great example how something like competition can turn our kids from being joyous to angry. There is so much competition embedded into our everyday living that its not hard to see why anxiety is so prolific in society. There is constant pressure to “do more” and “be better” than others in our work place. Such an un-healthy way to live.
Suzanne, after reading your blog, it took me back to remembering my school sport days and how I used to dread sport especially in secondary school where sport was compulsory and we had to play hockey. I wasn’t a very good team player as when the puk came near me I would move away as after having my ankles whacked by the stick instead of the puk a couple of times, I didn’t wish to be in the firing of anyone’s swing. For me it brought in a tension around that word competition that was definitely not enjoyable.
The competition thing starts way too young in school as at my daughters school they get these badges of honour for various things and they already have things like the elite learning group. Age five is this really necessary?
Fully agree Kevin, and not just at age 5 – is it necessary at all? Just look at adult competition and how some of them behave when they ‘lose’ ….
I agree Kevin and Karina. It amazes me the number of certificates the school where my children attend give out and this recognition the children get for what they do is becoming much worse. Not only does one child in every class get pupil of the day (a star), pupil of the month (certificate presented to them in the hall by the headteacher) they now have recently been introduced to a points scheme where the children build points or have points taken off during the week for their behaviour, work, helping another, tidying up etc… it is getting quite ridiculous! Wouldn’t it be awesome if the children had certificates for being the amazing, beautiful beings of light they truly are?
It is quite interesting that there even is a term like healthy competition, as how you have observed and described it so aptly, when competition comes into play things become not quite so harmonious anymore; and when we look at what it means to our bodies, we can easily feel an anxiousness and super alertness just by hearing the word competition, let alone going to enter a competition. So I do agree there is nothing healthy about competition.
Susanne your blog has left me thinking about how competition is ingrained from such a young age that we think that it is normal. What you have described here as happening when competition comes into play and how the children lose themselves ‘to get somewhere’ is deeply saddening, particularly when children innately know how to ‘just be’ and enjoy themselves. What a shame that it is commonly thought that competition is healthy. Really, this ideal needs to be re examined. The state of the children that you described at the end of the tunnel ball competition doesn’t sound healthy at all. A true state of health is only through ‘being’ – which is so natural for children. Why do we steer them away from this?
Susanne your writing on this subject really brought home how we have all been affected by competition, and we did know all along that it didn’t feel right. It has permeated every aspect of our lives, how we look at other women, how we criticise ourselves, how we feel anxious about our ability to do everything in a day…..how precious are those children and how amazing for those who get a teacher who teaches co-operation and equality.
I felt quite sad when reading your blog Susanne. For many years I was a Physical Education teacher who pushed and encouraged students to compete and strive, now to my shame and regret for the harm I caused.
I love what you have written; how education can be and needs to be;
“Education needs to focus on equity, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves. With this freedom, and by eliminating the need to compete, we would all benefit as each child naturally brings something different but equally amazing to society.”
What a clear example of the destructive influence competition actually has on us and our relationships. We all knew this as kids but we learn to comply and realise this is the way the game of life is played. I see the effect this competition has had on teenagers as they approach sports at school. The ones that have dedicated themselves to being good at sport as their way of getting recognition in life, say they love sport. Those who have felt crushed by competition and the ugliness that comes with it, give up and stop participating. As you saw in the group of 5 year olds there was no one who didn’t want to play and enjoy the game. It is the competition that separates and polarises us.
What a great story to reflect that ‘healthy competition’ can breed anything but that, especially in these children, in us all. Your statement “it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are,” this is so true and the competition, no matter what it is, really can foster this.
Competition has made so much of my life less enjoyable. It really is a blight on us all having activities that create winners and losers. I look forward to the day when we can look back at our history and say, ‘what were they thinking when they thought competing against one another was a good idea?’
What an important observation to witness. I too see this as a school teacher. Generally nice students can become so angry and aggressive when competition is involved. Every day in the classroom I have to remind students that art is not a competition and to not compare themselves to another’s ability. Sadly this competitive consciousness will take some time to heal as sport is such a huge force in society.
It is sad that education encourages children at such a young age to be constantly in competition with each other and to push their way through regardless of who may be shoved out of the way. The ‘winner’ then finds that next time everyone else is out to try and pull them off the podium. This article shows so clearly the joy of everyone working together and having fun without trying to ‘get’ anywhere. That is true education.
It is such a shame that much of life today is about competition, even for young kids at school who are simply playing a game. Suzanne it would be a very different and more loving world if we were able to interact with absolute freedom and individuality in competition sports, work or life in general.
Great observation Suzanne, I can picture the whole game, the way you described it is very clear. I can also relate really well, remembering back when I was at school and seeing the competition that would cause all friendships in my class to seemingly disappear while the game was on.
Thanks Suzanne for illustrating how destructive competition is especially on young children. When really there are no real winners
Great observation Suzanne and how sad that we live in a world that teaches children that they can only feel good about themselves if they win or are the best at something – there’s no love in competition.
Well summed up Shelley. We program children so strongly with competition in every aspect of school life that to be without it is a mystery to them. We have made competition so normal. The drive to have another chance of winning, or being recognised for something keeps them in that perpetual loop of motion. I offered my class an opportunity to not turn an organised activity into a competition recently, but to simply enjoy the activity for what it was and to have a breather from intensity that competition brings…. Interestingly they weren’t interested. Yet those that don’t get top spot are so disappointed (and often cry) and those that win get falsely inflated. Just what are we creating here?
You make some great observations about how early we condition our young to become competitive and angry at the world. What purpose does that ultimately serve in a young persons life, other than to program them to become alienated and mistrustful of people? What on earth are we doing? I have a whole new appreciation of this conditioning since reading your article Suzanne. Thanks.
So true Suzanne! The children suffer a lot of stress and anger when it becomes a competition. I love your take on it Jessica. I shall use something similar thank you.
What a great depiction of what ensues when we call on competition. In this frame of mind there are always a winner and many losers. The student body of Universal Medicine is showing us how to do away with comparisons by evaluating ourselves as complete in our own way,
Through out my schooling sport was a major factor for me, I was told that I had to play team sports so I would not be a loner, fit in and get along with the other kids, I remember when I first started playing these “team sports” if this is getting along with each other and being apart of something, theres something wrong. Competition is foul it totally takes away any fun and joy
I actually liked the sharp, metallic taste of competition and the way it numbs you. It was a welcome reprieve from feeling too much and noticing too much.
Yes, and isn’t competition such a waste of energy? Pouring all that effort into proving that you are the best at something? But why? How does that time and energy serve anyone, other than the ego of the winner? Is it not time that we consider that the energy of competition – in which we pit ourselves against our fellow men and women – might be far better spent by working together and with our peers, so as to create a better world? This seems very obvious, considering all of the problems humanity is currently facing in the world.
Lovely expressed Conor. Competition is such a waste of time and energy and who does it truly serve, no-one. Working together, communicating and sharing together, is so much more natural and fun for both adults and children.
What an incredible observation, seeing the switch flick in the kids as soon as the ball game became a competition. It was no longer about having fun and working together but about beating the opposition by any means possible.
Sadly this carries through into our adult life where there is always the champion and the loser, the one last to be picked and those who want nothing to do with team activities because of past experiences like the one described.
Is this what we really want for society everyone trying to out do each other at the expense of who they are and their fellow human beings? What if we could raise our children to value who they are and what each other brings and that to be successful we need to work together harmoniously with no one being left out or left behind. Now that would be something worth teaching in school…
What if we could raise our children to value who they are and what each other brings and that to be successful we need to work together harmoniously with no one being left out or left behind. Now that would be something worth teaching in school… Certainly would be Rachel, feels like you have started amending the cirriculum?
What an awesome observation and exposure to ‘healthy competition’ for it can never ever be that.
The competition thing really freaks me out. I remember how many fights it caused with my siblings growing up or even how my 5 year old daughter has a will to being first or best at a very young age. Where does this come from? Does it not feel better when we are equal? The being better,faster,richer etc is definitely from a different energy.
Thank you for sharing an amazing observation. It is incredible how competition plays out throughout the day in many areas not just sport. It seems it is always about being seen to be the best and to get everything done as quickly as possible, even when it comes to answering a question in class, with a child putting their arm up the fastest. In these moments the ‘trample’ on others and race can be felt. ‘Education needs to focus on equality, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves.’ Thank you Suzanne.
Thanks Julie. I like how you call it the ‘trample on others’, as this is what’s really happening and it doesn’t feel nice.
Competition does feel like, “trampling on others”. It leaves a feeling of hardness, anxiety and frustration. There is nothing lovely about that!
Exactly Rachel whenever I drop into a form of competition it feels really horrible. Certainly not lovely at all.
Thank you for sharing this insightful observation. Something that can teach us so much about education and competition.
I absolutely feel that education does not need to be a race – nor does sport. We’re teaching this to our children at such a young age, and then they take this mindset of ‘do and get rewarded’ into their everyday lives.
What you say here below – sums it up;
‘Education needs to focus on equality, cooperation and freedom for each and every child, so they can choose for themselves how they wish to express themselves.’
There is such a beauty in unique expression – and supporting this as opposed to conforming to a certain way.
A lot to learn from this experience!
Thanks for sharing this article on the damaging consequences of competition Suzanne. Competition does indeed teach ‘us to be all that we can ‘do’ – it’s never about who we are, and never about being all that we are. Competition erases the knowingness of who we are, that we all have as small children, as we are pitted against one another and heralded for being able to do more / better than another’. It is simply horrible.
Amazing Suzanne – I have seen this too in the pool with swimming: once it becomes a race/competition, the children’s stroke changes absolutely, often involving a lot more splashing and crazy kicking! So instead we do ‘competitions’ about who can do the most gentle arms, or focus on other qualities in their swimming, other than how fast they can go, which changes the dynamic enormously.
Beautiful Jessica, I love how your ‘competitions’ are about who can ‘do the most gentle arms, or focus on other qualities in their swimming’ and it’s not just about how fast they can go.
Yes Suzanne, we all have skills in different areas for us to bring our own essential qualities and expression enriching our daily lives and interactions. The change you speak of in education eliminating the need to compete would indeed change society for the better.
Thank you Suzanne for clearly showing us how competition destroys true community. It would be a true evolution in humanity if we choose to build competition on “equity, cooperation and freedom”, a competition to see who can establish these qualities to the highest standards. It would transform our understanding of group work and how to live and work in a way that benefits everyone, not just a select few who can push, force or rush more than another.
This is a great article how competition is damaging to everyone. What harm it causes from the first experience of competition in ones life. I remember when I was a child and I was slow at running and felt always left out, I then always had it in me I am loser I can’t run, I am not good at sports. What made it worse was when I would be picked on by other kids. This is something that stays with you. If there was no competition, how different would my experiences have been.
This is a great article in exposing how children enjoying a game and developing hand/eye coordination skills can be spoiled by making it a competition to create one winner and lots of losers. I remember that attending sports day at our children’s junior school was a day of endurance for many as so many parents were desperate for their children to make them feel good by winning a race and the children who felt they had let their parents down when they didn’t win.
Such a great example of how there is no ‘healthy’ competition. I have been at my 5 year old daughters sports day and I felt fear, anger and strong emotions from some parents and children. It was not playful, collaborative or inclusive. It created drama, exhaustion and disappointment. That was the lesson for the day. I feel competition does not support society, any issue that troubles the world on a larger scale has an element of competition, that is at its root.
I have always been naturally good at sports, but the competition never felt ok, I always wanted to not keep score. It is great to understand now that “healthy” competition is not ok.
I really like this, a superb observation to illustrate the harm that competition brings.
I also feel there is a tremendous pressure put on teachers these days to create competition. There are a lot of parents who demand that there is a competitive element to events such as sports day, normally because they have a child who excels in this area. Also, every aspect of school has become more results driven and so our orientation has gone towards judging our children on everything they do. We can all remember being judged on things we did growing up, I can’t see a positive benefit for society of making childhoods so demanding.
Thank you Suzanne for this great article and observation about competition. It is so true how much it affected me as a kid always wanting to be part of it, looking for approvals and recognition and the hurt when the team I was in did not win!
Exactly Alex although I must say I mostly ended up on the loosing team as all the kids that did not like sport or where not so good at sport often ended up on the same team. When I look back I recall I did envy the “popular” kids who were good at sport. It shows me how, as you have shared, the value children can feel about themselves is based on how good they are at something like sport and with the schools championing it, anyone that does not fit into the ideal sporting person often feels like a lesser person – an outcast. Far from bringing people together, sport which always incites competition, is far more damaging to children than perhaps we have wanted to see.
Great comment on competition. I have also witnessed similar things at my daughters school and have experienced it myself when I was an elite athlete in the past. I can remember loving running but literally being physically sick before most races because of the pressure to perform and compete. I agree competition and therefore most sport in their current forms are not the healthy things we all assume them to be but in fact are severely damaging our society.
I love the way you described the children enjoying themselves initially, which is natural for them and obviously unnatural when it comes to competing against each other. I am sure, teachers realise that it changes the children’s behaviour when they are asked to compete against each other; especially as they see it over and over with every new school year. Maybe as parents, we could start the conversation with Teachers and schools and support with discussing another way for children’s sports days?
I’ve recently been observing a group of teenagers and how they play naturally together with a ball in a park. When made up of boys and girls, I have noticed that very often they are playing a haphazard game together of just keeping the ball in the air. Anyone can join in or not, and there is lots of fun and plenty of encouragement, and they applaud if someone does a particularly skillful move to keep the ball off the ground – and no critical or judgmental reaction when the ball is dropped. It is a team game in the right sense, they all have the same goal and work together in their different ways to achieve that. So, yes, more conversations with teachers and schools, pointing out how hard and aggressive children become in competitive sport, but how true team work can work, and allow the children to develop their own physical skills naturally.
I recently played some sports games with 10 -15 year olds and they were really competitive and a few would get really angry, but they would think nothing of it, like it was normal or okay for them to behave like that. I felt they probably got that behaviour from watching football games where the players have been aggressive with each other but still get put on pedastalls by fans. It made me see even more what an influence these players have on children and that they are not good role models.
For a long time I have known I am not competitive as I didn’t like how it made me feel. I have always enjoyed being active and learning a new skill because it was fun to feel the movement in my body and also fun to play with others just like you describe the tunnel ball activity with the 5 year olds. No pressure, just fun and playful. I have quit sporting activities because of the competitive elements as you describe that made it feel awful and definitely not fun. For some it’s fun to win but for me is was the interaction, the relationship with me, my body, the ball or bat and the relationship with others if they were involved too that was fun. Once competition came in then the pressure to win also brought in abuse whether it be from other team members, your competitor or simply the abuse of overriding the body when it was screaming it had had enough or didn’t like you moving in such a forceful way.
So yes, it’s lovely to feel an acknowledgement and appreciation for myself being able to get this about competition at a young age but what I didn’t realise is I have lived a life “racing”, always wanting to get there first, walking ahead of the group, going faster than I naturally feel to, always feeling I need to hurry up, feeling the mental pressure to go faster. I have certainly addressed a lot of this raciness in my body and can operate with a lot more stillness in my body but I never related competition and the “race” as being connected. I definitely have been driven to win the race … What race?
My youngest son will happily kick a football against a wall on his own for hours, or dribble it around the lawn, or sit on it. But then….put two jerseys down as goal posts and introduce his brother…..all hell breaks loose!!
And this is ‘healthy’ Otto?!!? It has a name and they call it sibling rivalry which then makes it okay. This doesn’t sit well with me. It’s a great training ground for life, and it helps toughen up the kids but what does it really do on a deeper more permanent level? Life can throw us a curve ball but what if we had our brother to help us out and support us when this happens, so we can work together and actually catch the curve ball, not have to drop it or fend for ourselves.
[…] This blog originated as a comment inspired by the blog: From Ball Game to Race: a Not-So-Healthy Competition […]
Great topic Competition is ugly. I can remember in my first days at school we had a mini Olympics it was called, with cardboard gold, silver and bronze with winners and losers. So from day one it had begun. The thing was competition wasn’t a choice, you were made to do it and then it was straight into playing rugby which I played for about twenty years. Looking back if I had my time over I would never play rugby, I did some nasty things on the rugby field all in the name of competition and it is so hard on the body. It would be interesting to also hear how Teachers feel about competition with sports at school and what they observe goes on between children. This observation of yours needs to be taken out there into schools and made known on a wider scale. Thanks Suzanne for bringing this up.
Thanks for your comment Kevin. When we stop and really look at what it means to compete, pit yourself against another to find the ‘better’ or ‘stronger’ player, what we find is really ugly and not what we would choose for ourselves. The problem is most people don’t stop and look at competition, we just follow what we’re told to do, by people who themselves have been told that it’s okay when they were young.
I have shown this to the principal of my daughter’s school, something we could all do, to show our teachers that there is harm to the current way, and that just a little bit of awareness can go a long way to putting a stop to how we play sport.
For teachers, it is part of the curriculum to teach sports, which implies competition as part of the activity. Yes it would be interesting to hear what Teachers observe goes on between children when they go into this competition, and if they feel to teach it in another way. As a society we are not yet aware on how sport can affect us but more articles like this will hopefully help to bring this awareness in us and see sport for what it is and the damage it can cause effectively.
Wonderful comments from everyone. For me, I have felt sport is there to be enjoyed, get fit and get healthy. It is not about winning but the enjoyment of being with your friends and colleagues. Over the years of playing sport, and even today when I play golf, I observe a number of people who beat themselves up, if things are not going their way.
This takes me back to School days, I was always the one that would drop the ball or trip over! I’ve never stopped to think how I changed in those moments to want to win, and why that was so important – yet the more I wanted to win the more something would go wrong! Interestingly thats the same way I then grew up and went into work – pushing through when there is some “win” at the end of it – disregarding everything in the process. I would never have said I was competitive – just that I like things to go my way – but in reality I had a huge investment in that success, that win which is ultimately and clearly being competitive. So from opting out of Sport at school I took that same thing into other fields i.e. work. Thanks for writing on this.
The one thing I got when I read “pitted against one another” is that it reminded me of arena fighters. The alive one wins. Sure it’s a bit of an extreme example, but where’s the difference really? The objective is the same. The win is short lived – as you have to go back into another ‘match’ at a neutral position and fight for dominance again (with the risk of losing) and when you lose, you feel annihilated.
It’d be great to see sport introduced (not only in schools) for fun and exercise, rather than introducing all those emotions of failure and the short-term elation of a win.
Thanks for sharing!
Spot on Stephen. Competition will not prepare us for the real world. Competition will ‘ARM’ us for the real world, put us into a permanent fight response. make us need to wear protection for what’s install for us.
Absolutely Suzanne, we come armed to the teeth, I have heard so many times that we have to prepare our children for the competitive “dog eat dog” world. I know how false that is as in all my work experience my ability to work cooperatively and as part of a team has always been of greater value than a competitive streak. The individuality I have developed from being competitive growing up is something I would say has held me back and made me struggle as a team player, as the recognition I grew up seeking does not transfer easily to group work, where sharing and communicating is both efficient and effective.
My experience of competitive sports is how joyless it was whether winning or losing, any pleasure gained for me was from the camaraderie and being in a group sharing experience and making friendships. This for me is where the true value of sport or exercise is, not as a way to compete and prove yourself better than another. The notion that competition is needed to prepare ourselves for the real world feels empty and hollow to me, if we experience the joy of play and being cooperative as a child, surely that prepares us more fully for the world than any competition can.
So true Stephen. I remember liking sport and outdoor activities as a child, one because we were outside and not stuck in the classroom but mostly as you say it was about the friendships and fun we had by just being with each other. Skipping, playing ball or rounders it was an opportunity to express our natural playfulness. When competition was introduced, as Suzanne so wonderfully expressed, the magic and joy is taken away replaced by disappointment and a deep feeling of emptiness. How horrible – no fun at all!
I agree Stephen, every year for over 20 years whilst working as a bus driver I played in a snooker tournament with over 500 others from different bus companies all over England and it wasn’t so much the competition that I enjoyed but the chance to meet up with friends I hadn’t seen for a year.
It is very commonplace for people to have the notion that competition is needed to prepare kids for what adult life has in stall for them. To me this proves that competition is already known that it toughens kids up. Competition is a conscious choice to push aside sensitivity and strengthen the i-can-do-anything / I can handle it attitude at the expense of tenderness, togetherness, companionship, unity and harmony.
Chicken or the egg: perhaps education needs to be in first teaching adults the value of sensitivity in adulthood so it is fostered in our kids? Then maybe the adults will be better equipped to support the natural tenderness that comes from our kids and competition just won’t get a look in.
I have seen the same thing is school. When we have sport lessons, I really don’t enjoy it because I’m very aware that my hand eye coordination isn’t fantastic to say the least, and so the competitions can become embarrassing, like when I go to kick a ball and miss, or aim for the goal and end up passing to the other team, oops! Because of this sense of having to do well, almost perform, it takes away from the enjoyment of exercise and having fun or working as a team. The lessons I have enjoyed most are the ones where the activities are fun and team building without it being all about winning. I felt the way you observed what was going on was amazing and you really clearly expressed it in your article, thank you.
Thank you Rebecca. You quite clearly point out that it is a Performance. We are being judged on our efforts, not once do we just applaud the simple fun that we are having, or simply feel good for the health benefits of blood running through our body with the exercise.
This is so clear and true Suzanne, I have felt all that terrible tension and hardness creep in when I was participating in sport as a child, and then observing my children. Their primary school once ran a sports day based on teamwork, but the parents objected and it returned to the old races format. Perhaps it is the parents who need to be educated as children know innately what is joyful and fun and harmonious.
What a tragedy the parents objected to a day of harmonious togetherness. Already it’s not enough for so many to simply enjoy the beauty of friendship and team bonding, but that the need for ownership or recognition overrides all other emotions. The parents do indeed need re-educating, all it would take is one school principal to stand steady in their decision to play it another way. I say put the link to this article in the school newsletter!
Thank you Suzanne for this article about sport and for exposing how destructive and unnatural competition is. It is so much more harmonious when we all work together rather than compete against each other, competition is about individuality and being better than each other, it seems crazy that sport and winning and competition is encouraged in schools.
This is a great blog Suzanne and as Meg says, shows how damaging competition really is. As someone who has played many different sports competitively whenever I or my team lost I would never show it outwardly but I would be fed up, deflated and sometimes angry. Ultimately competition is self-defeating because winning can never be sustained and you are always going to be left with the pain of losing and the feelings of dejection.
I agree Tim, that ‘winning feeling’ is only ever temporary. Any feeling based on smashing another has got to be questioned.
Tim reading your comment about the fact that winning can’t be sustained in sport made me wonder if the time that sports people spend in the preparation and lead up to winning is similar to that of a gambler in the lead up to their potential win, anticipating that glorious high. The lead up is part of the building towards a win, it’s all tied in to the prospect of winning and therefore ties those who are involved in the sport/gambling into the whole process. It’s almost like people don’t realise that most of the time they are not winning but waiting to possibly win.
This is a great exposé and example if how damaging competition is to both children and adults. We need to teach our young children that it is who they are that matters, not what they do or win or achieve!
Life would be about friendship and teamwork if we were to concentrate on who our kids are, not what our kids are doing. Meg, you’re spot on – making it about achieving is a mistake.
Suzanne, this is such a clearly written example of what plays out every day for many. I love Adam’s response, who goes further into the depths of what it feels like to be involved. I’m pretty sure we have all seen examples of unhealthy competition go on, and no doubt felt it for ourselves too. Classic, thank you.
Loved your article, Suzanne. I was struck by how this sentence, ‘Is it not possible that we all have skills in different areas and that we can each bring our own particular skill/expression to the table for all to share in, learn from and build upon?’ has a role to play in the world of work as well as in schools. Work is but a playground for the continuation of the beliefs we have cemented as children.
How right you are Cathy. Every single human being is a piece of the giant puzzle and without each individual’s special skills and expressions, the puzzle never gets to be completed.
I recently got to see how it is not just amongst children that competition changes behaviour. My dog and I go to a local fun dog agility class. At our last class of term there was a very low key competition in our class. I lined up with Benji my dog as usual. It didn’t occur to me not to – we were doing the same thing as last week, just this time someone had called it a competition. I saw that some people were surprised. I later realised that this was because Benji hadn’t exactly been good at agility, and had generally in class dashed off across the field half way through his turn. So, once it was a competition, people assumed that he and I wouldn’t take part. During the evening I saw one lady get quite upset because her dog ran off and had a pee during his go, and so his time was slower than it would have been, and then there was man who appeared totally crushed by the fact that his lovely dog seemed to see through the whole thing, and chose not to go over the obstacles this week. Other people became quite intense, or over focused and some were upset with their dogs/themselves. It was as though in some cases past experiences, maybe from school were being relived. In some cases it was the pride at success that could be seen, and with others it was the resignation or frustration at things not going so well. And this was a fun dog agility class.
I love what you’ve shared here Catherine. It seems like as soon as any activity becomes competitive, people, and dogs, lose themselves, and any understanding of why they played in that activity in the first place. I feel that for many people, if we simply took competition off the agenda, they would be relieved and perhaps even overjoyed. Being recognised as a winner wouldn’t be needed, but I also think that very quickly, the sheer enjoyment of the activity would far outweigh any recognition received.
I love the example above of the dog who seemed to see through the whole charade but simply not partaking! If only people did the same…
… yes, that would be great: what if there was a competition and nobody entered? Now that is newsworthy indeed.
Elizabeth I agree that competition has crept into every facet of society, it certainly seems to have taken over the television. Every other program is a competition. Who can out cook, out entertain, out model, out sing, out dance, stay in the house the longest, endure pain and I even saw an advertisement on the side of a bus for a children’s spelling bee competition coming to the telly ! All of this is on top of the hours and hours of sport that is already on the telly !
This is great, Suzanne. An amazing lesson for adults with and without kids. What struck me reading this was that the ideal of ‘healthy competition’ is more about teaching children what it feels like to lose, not strive to win. And any strive to win is simply to stave off the horrible feelings of loss.
As Adam Warburton said in an earlier comment, his first memory of competition was losing a race and feeling the loneliness while the winner was congratulated. And he went on to be a fierce competitor. Possibly based in part on this initial experience?
Naren that is so true what you have clearly pointed out. I can absolutely agree with this – when I was a younger girl I used to win trophey’s for long distant running but the loss of not winning and receiving all that acceptance and recognition, was devasting and I felt worthless.
No amount of winning will ever offset the devastation of losing, if that is the values we choose to live by. I have seen firsthand the panic in children when a game has been switched from fun learning to competition, it is definitely “not so healthy”.
And the more we take notice of how we go about our activities Fiona, the better able we are to see how it’s not really working and the more likely we are to ask is there a better way. Thanks for your feedback.
Yes we accept competition as just a way of life – it is engendered in schools from the getgo – yet we are by our true nature collaborative rather than competitive – how amazing it would be if that was engendered instead of competition?
Mankind could and would probably build another few great pyramids, Eunice!
I absolutely loved this Suzanne. The chaos of the ball game when it became a race was VERY revealing. It is very harming to compete and I luuurrrvvvee what you share about our uniqueness as it is soooo true.
I just watched a Commonwealth Games athlete interviewed after losing when he was hot favourite to win. He was desolate and filled with emptiness as everything was invested in winning. Do we really want children or anyone for that matter to live that way or would it be of more value for us to allow children to just be who they are, instead of asking them to perform.
Thanks for your comment Stephen. We are taught to be gracious losers, and humble winners; somehow we think that makes sense on the surface, in the words only. But the very fact that we can realise that it hurts to lose, smashes open that door on competition and the true nature and effect of it.
How many athletes (and it must be in the millions) feel crap when they’ve tried their best but still they don’t seem to measure up in another’s eyes? And of course it’s not just athletes…
I agree Stephen, when you see the desolation of the one loosing why would you want to compete in sport. Sport should be fun and enjoyed by everyone, and not based on winning or loosing. Children are not natural competitors it is only through the influence of adults who encourage the win loose ethos that children learn to compete.
The weight of all those expectations must have been crushing for this athlete. It feels awful enough just reading about it, leave alone watching or actually experiencing it, but in one way or another, we all have.
Aaahh the competition card … as you clearly state NOT SO HEALTHY… from generation to generation it keeps being fed. Which leads to more and more relationships being distorted by its un-truthful ways. Awesome observation and clearly shared. Thank you.
Great article that exposes so clearly what happens when competition is introduced to a fun activity. So unnecessary and also what is lost through competition, not just the ‘knowingness of who we are’ but also the unity of working together in harmony.
Helen I really love what you have written about the fact that competition rules out working together in harmony. Working together in harmony is such an incredibly transformative tool and supports our evolution and so doing anything that takes us in the opposite direction takes us naturally away from evolution and into stagnation.
A wry smile came to my lips Suzanne as I read your account of how naturally children work together to move the ball along the line, run to fetch if it goes astray and have FUN. Why the smile, well I was wondering whether many ‘team building’ exercises for high power personnel don’t promise a similar outcome. So are these expensive courses in essence not offering to deliver exactly what we had as 5 year olds? Hmm, so what does that say about our ‘education’ and the life skills we have learned? My favourite team activity these days is re-arranging furniture and room layouts at a Universal Medicine event. It all just seems to ‘happen’, someone just appears at the other end to help lift a massage table or place a chair up onto a stack, no words needed, no self appointed monitors vying to produce the best solution, all I experience is the flow. So thank you to Serge Benhayon for all that you have awakened in us that facilitates this beautiful harmony.
So true Kathie.
I love how you relate this scenario with the team building exercises in the corporate world. I don’t see there is a difference either. Team building in the corporate world seems to still be about power and group dynamics in the team. In my experience, there is often an underlying feeling of domination, team members jostling for position within the team, wondering who’s watching.
So true, with competition come division and inequality, better than and worse than. What an awful mess! And worse still, as a society we keep championing and perpetuating it.
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Thank you Ariana. It would be nice if the word competition was removed from our vocabulary altogether! We just don’t need it.
An interesting read. While I agree with aspect of the article while there are other aspect that I don’t. In the right environment competition for kids can be a good thing. Kids get to feel disappointment on a low level and learn to deal with these emotions. If we shelter kids from failure they are less likely to be able to deal with disappointment as adults. Sport can help provide this learning in a supportive environment with good sportsmanship.
I appreciate your comment Rob, although I’m not sure that kids need to feel disappointed or learn to deal with losing and failure when playing sport. I would like to see sport used for exercise, sharing, fun, not in the way we use it today, i.e. to compete against each other, seeing who is better at it than another – and praising and rewarding them for it. Confidence may be gained from being good at sport, but at what cost to themselves in the long run when they maybe lose their skills, are beaten by someone better again, or at the expense of the other kids that are bettered and therefore fail in another’s eyes. This way of playing sport is far more devastating to kids.
There are always going to be varying levels of people’s sporting prowess (as there is academically, artistically, musically etc.), but I would love to see that the strengths in some, while appreciated, are not heralded as making that person better/more important than another. We all have our own strengths in different areas. In this way, kids/adults do not get their sense of worth from comparing themselves with each other, but rather get to support the development of one another throughout life. This would be the true supportive environment.
Wow I want to be part of that world Suzanne. Just to support each other feels so refreshing rather than the tussle of competition. We all deserve to be supported with our strengths and weaknesses rather than trying to keep up with or be as ‘good’ as another.
This should be presented for all of the world to learn from. I played competitive sport for 25 years, from the age of 9. I became very good and very competitive. But my most lingering memory is when I was six, and participated in my first running race. I came last, and I can remember watching how the winner was swamped by his parents, how the crowd cheered the winner, how everyone went over to congratulate him, how he was given a ribbon. Meanwhile I felt sad and isolated.
Sure, we say that competition encourages self esteem, but self esteem based on what, and self esteem for whom. 10 kids in a race, one develops confidence, the other 9 develop a lack of confidence, and the confidence that the winner develops is forever based on what he does, not who he is inside. No wonder then when that kid finally loses a race, or does not end up achieving olympic gold, he is crushed, not knowing who is is without such achievement. As for the other 9 kids, either they end up spending their life striving to be the best, driven as I was, or they give up on sport and exercise. Either way, neither path leads to true self esteem, which can only be found by knowing and accepting self – as you are – and that is all you need to be.
Thank you Suzanne for this enlightening example that brought back so many memories for me.
Thank you for your reply Adam. We see many ex-athletes suffering after a life of competition as they have nothing to measure themselves against anymore. You’re so right in saying true self esteem can only be found by knowing yourself and accepting that as all that is needed.
This is so accurately and acutely expressed Alan. I was right there with you with every word re-living my childhood experiences, seeing how much competition has been the foundation of how I live my life – even subtly. It has created so much friction in relationships. The freedom of just accepting ourselves as we are is astronomical.
You are so right that there seems to be two common paths tread by the majority of people that aren’t “the best” and don’t win, we either end up striving to be the best or we give up on exercise with a horrible memory of what it means. Neither seem very healthy. What Suzanne described about the children that were unaffected and remained quiet and content within themselves, that seems like a great way to raise children in respect of exercise and sport. It seems far healthier to not be invested in sport but instead just enjoy exercise for the health benefits and connection to our bodies that it brings. For most people I have seen have a smile on their face when exercise is about simple movement, and surely smiles on faces is better than angry faces!
It is very interesting Adam and Suzanne that there seems a further reaction to this losing theme. Many primary schools hand out ribbons or certificates just for participating so everyone gets some form of recognition or opportunity to build self-esteem. I think children know exactly what is going on and are still being taught that we are recognised for what we do not who we are.
I see this everyday in the school system from as early as prep. they are given stickers to put on their sticker chart for being ‘good’ or ribbons for coming 1st in the running race, and I see so many of these children vying for one of those positions to be praised.
Adam that’s so well written. There is so much potential depth to a childs confidence and that depth certainly doesn’t come from winning anything it comes from truly knowing who they are.
Great observations Suzanne to highlight the effects of competition on children. And as we move on through life, those debilitating effects become magnified throughout society unless we have the wisdom to drop the need to compete. After all, without competition, would there be any more wars?
And doesn’t this emphasis on competition then fuel the need for recognition and then more recognition for what we ‘do’ rather than who we ‘be’?
Absolutely Alison, competition requires comparison and can provide the momentary high of being better than someone else and recognition or the disappointment and feeling of not good enough or less than another, fuelling more effort to succeed, overriding the bodies own natural limits.
This is wonderful to read. Your blog beautifully presents the reality of competition and how destructive it is for society and the people living in it.
Thank you deeply for writing this piece.
Thank you Nicole. I couldn’t not write it, it’s too important an issue to observe. 🙂
Great observation and so well described, Suzanne. It nearly seems a given these days that everything, and I mean everything, gets turned into a competition of some kind in the belief that it will make things more interesting and engaging. How come we hold on to this belief when reality and astute observation tell us otherwise?
You’re right Gabriele, pretty much everything gets turned into a competition. From a young age children are encouraged by their parents to race their siblings to put their shoes on, eat breakfast, get dressed etc, usually in the need to hurry and go somewhere. Seemingly innocuous but I wonder, does it affect the children in the long run as they have been trained to be faster, better than another and rewarded for it?
It certainly affected me because I learnt to revel in the recognition and the praise that I would get when I outdid my classmates; another thing that happened was that I became a very fast and proficient reader quite early, but there was certainly no joy in it, just me showing off and feeling better than others.
I recognize that one: almost everything is done either in completion or in comparing to each other: my drawing is much nicer than yours. Brrrr, when I think back of it, it still gives me shivers. This always having to do better, be more than another is only looking outside and forgets the beauty we have inside. It can keep us going for outcomes for the rest of our lives.
Maybe we don’t hold onto it because the transition period is short – the mayhem and all-around pain and hurt when competition is first introduced may not last – a bit like your first coffee or cigarette. Once you get used to the hurtful effects of competition you simply adjust and get on with this much less enjoyable form and after a while you can get addicted to the adrenaline rush.
Yours is an interesting idea Christoph, one that rings true for me. The ability for humans to override what has been first felt is astounding and the more I recognise that fact and see it with my own eyes, the more I see the damage too, that that ‘over-riding’ behaviour leads to.
That’s what I love about young children they react spontaneously and you get to see just what they are feeling without hiding anything. There is none of this adjustment – of playing a role or trying to hide their feelings and I agree Christophe, from shutting down like this is easy to become addicted to the nervous excitation that things like competition induce.
Yes, it’s true Gabriele. In fact, competition dis-engages us from others and makes it about self. Even ‘team’ competition is all about self. This is so clear in your example Suzanne. The natural connection between the children was already present when they were just having fun; but immediately dissipated as soon as competition became the focus.
Agreed Kylie, and anything that makes it about self at the exclusion of others (ie for recognition, lack of self-worth, control etc) means there is already separation from how all of our actions and behaviors affect the all. This is in stark contrast to having our actions come from a ‘connection’ to self ( ie who we truly are or being ourselves) which comes without need or attachment, and therefore is naturally connected to the all.