People Who Do Not Want To Win

I have come to the conclusion that many people do not want to win.

Oh, they say the do.  They say they want to reach their goals or be the boss or win the lottery.  They say they want to see something through to completion or make the change that changes everything.  But in point of fact, they do not really want to.

Why?  This puzzled me a bit.  After all, is not winning - however you define that - the goal?  Is not moving forward towards victory - be it an election or a simple thing like losing 10 pounds - the point of what we want to do?  If we do not, life simply becomes a series of tasks that we have to life through, a treadmill which we on which we are constantly moving but never moving forward.

I think I know why.

Many people do not want to win because they have not been taught how to win.

What is winning?  Winning is victory.  It is an outcome which you sought and achieved.  It is the 10 lbs lost.  It is the local election won.  It is the race  you finished, even if you were the last one.

But winning - just winning - does not stop there.  There is always the next step.

Sports teams understand this.  It is called the season.  There is are a series of games in it. The team plays each one.  How foolish would it seem if the team decided after their first win "We are done!  We have made it!" - and then proceeded to lose the rest of the games.  No one would call them winners.  We would call them losers.

Is there an ultimate win?  Of course.  It is called the championship.  Even then, with the trophy and the acclaim, there is still another season, another set of games to win.

We have become trained to accomplish tasks, to check things off our lists.  We have not been trained to win - and by win I mean not only achieve the victory, but realize that there is another win, another task, another goal to complete.

Winning is not static and passive.  It is active and ongoing.  Those that are winners understand this.  Those that do not will feebly achieve once or twice, sigh, and then declare that that they do not have the ability to win.

Be different.  Be a winner.