"Competition in biology, ecology, and sociology, is a contest between organisms, animals, individuals, groups, etc., for territory, a niche, or a location of resources, for resources and goods, for prestige, recognition, awards, mates, or group or social status, for leadership; it is the opposite of cooperation. It arises whenever at least two parties strive for a goal which cannot
be shared or which is desired individually but not in sharing and
cooperation."
Competition occurs naturally and if based on an ethical behavior, it is highly beneficial for improving one's skills, one's self esteem and ones chances in enhancing his/her (professional, social, academic,...) status. However, when competition discards ethics and crosses the line from enhancing self performance and self chances to destroying or degrading other people's performance, it definitely falls under the category of negative competition.
Let me explain why do we live in a negatively competing society. First, I will explain a social phenomena in our culture and relate this phenomena to negative competition.
We actually live in a society where one's good performance is mostly measured relative to the bad performance of others and not according to an absolute measure determined by a system. For example, if you ask your son/daughter, how did you do on your exam? He/She says, I got 50 but all the class did not do well. In this case, most of us will say, Ah OK but you should do better next time. What have you done here is that you are teaching your son/daughter that grades are relative and not absolute. Your answer offered useless flexibility where no delivery can be done on your behalf. If there are factors that justify such low performance, the system will offer flexibility and it should not be on a personal level. What I mean by that, the teacher will most probably be flexible and he/she will take that into consideration. Even though many factors could have been involved that would justify his/her low grade but still you have to send a message that the measure for his/her performance is absolute and not relative. (I am giving this example but I am not very happy about adopting the grades as a measure of good performance.)
How is this related to negative competition?
Since we are structured in a way that our good performance is relative, we get so busy destroying or undermining other people's achievements in order to show that our performance is better. Thus instead of investing the energy in the right way, we divert it. At least, if some do not undermine or destroy others' achievements, they hide their appreciation for it.
What should we do?
We should do our job by adopting an absolute measure without worrying about others. We should motivate others and tell them how good they are when they really are. Don't wait for a downturn to tell somebody about his/her great past achievements, just say the good words for their present achievements. Brains are structured to transform good words into energy.
Competition occurs naturally and if based on an ethical behavior, it is highly beneficial for improving one's skills, one's self esteem and ones chances in enhancing his/her (professional, social, academic,...) status. However, when competition discards ethics and crosses the line from enhancing self performance and self chances to destroying or degrading other people's performance, it definitely falls under the category of negative competition.
Let me explain why do we live in a negatively competing society. First, I will explain a social phenomena in our culture and relate this phenomena to negative competition.
We actually live in a society where one's good performance is mostly measured relative to the bad performance of others and not according to an absolute measure determined by a system. For example, if you ask your son/daughter, how did you do on your exam? He/She says, I got 50 but all the class did not do well. In this case, most of us will say, Ah OK but you should do better next time. What have you done here is that you are teaching your son/daughter that grades are relative and not absolute. Your answer offered useless flexibility where no delivery can be done on your behalf. If there are factors that justify such low performance, the system will offer flexibility and it should not be on a personal level. What I mean by that, the teacher will most probably be flexible and he/she will take that into consideration. Even though many factors could have been involved that would justify his/her low grade but still you have to send a message that the measure for his/her performance is absolute and not relative. (I am giving this example but I am not very happy about adopting the grades as a measure of good performance.)
How is this related to negative competition?
Since we are structured in a way that our good performance is relative, we get so busy destroying or undermining other people's achievements in order to show that our performance is better. Thus instead of investing the energy in the right way, we divert it. At least, if some do not undermine or destroy others' achievements, they hide their appreciation for it.
What should we do?
We should do our job by adopting an absolute measure without worrying about others. We should motivate others and tell them how good they are when they really are. Don't wait for a downturn to tell somebody about his/her great past achievements, just say the good words for their present achievements. Brains are structured to transform good words into energy.
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