|
|
|
Winning is Everything My brother and I play table tennis each day, and almost every day there is a quarrel over trivial things. Quarrels start on the smallest of topics and spread quickly to others. My brother often gets aggravated when he is losing the game, and lets the entire block know that he is angry, using the siren that is his mouth. Soon after the quarrel is over we ask ourselves everyday, why? Why did we fight? Why did I get so angry? And, everyday we start accusing each other for starting the quarrel, which results in another quarrel. While thinking what to write this weekend, I thought of our frequent quarrels, and I asked myself are games enjoyable to play only when you win? If the question "Do you believe winning is everything?" was asked to people in a survey, almost all would answer "No," but the truthful answer for many of those people might be "Yes." I myself agree to the question that games are fun only when they are won. We have all seen sports stars throw tantrums and behave inappropriately after they lost a game. Chicago Bulls superstar (god knows why?) Rodman is a perfect example of such behavior. Rodman once kicked a cameraman out of frustration when he landed on top of him. John McEnroe is another sports star who was famous worldwide for the way he played, debating with many referees over calls he thought were wrong. Many other sports stars cannot bear defeat. Such behavior is a clear indication suggesting that many people cannot have any type of fun playing at a sport they cannot win. One of the reasons I think that sports are only fun when won, is the constant human fear of embarrassment. If you ask a young child to play against someone who was twice his age, even that young child would be embarrassed if he lost. That embarrassment would last him for the rest of his life and it would not be surprising if he shies away from that particular sport later. Embarrassment has always frightened humans terribly, and any form of it will continue to frighten them, possibly, forever. In addition, if the child’s first encounter with the sport is a loss, he will try to avoid it as much as possible to prevent further losses, losses that he translates into embarrassments. If he won against someone who was twice his age, he would embrace the sport for years to come, as that one win would shape his thoughts about his skills in that sport. The joy of winning, the exhilarating feeling that runs through your body when you taste victory is a sensation that satisfies you more than anything else. The agony of defeat, the feeling of defeat is enough to make anybody depressed. These two statements alone are enough to give a clear idea of the difference between winning and losing, and why most of us cannot have fun playing a game we always lose. A game we always win is always more enjoyable to play. All of us look forward to playing sports that we are good at. Winning is everything to many of us and no matter how hard we try to deny it, it always shows in the way we react to losses. People have always loved the taste of victory and will continue to do so. Although the courteous thing to say has always been that winning is not everything, the true case might be the opposite. People have always preferred to win rather than to lose. Losing has always made people dislike whatever they lose at, and winning has made them fall for whatever they win at. The dislike for playing games you lose is something that we all know, but all the same, it is something all of us hate to admit. Date Posted : August 23, 1998. What do
you think? |