The Hatred of Losing
“A champion hates to lose even more than she loves to win.” is a quote from Chris Evert an 18 time Grand Slam Champion in tennis. It is often believed by athletes that the desire to win or how badly they want to win will determine the outcome. However, once athletes reach a certain competitive level everyone wants to win as much as they do. Therefore, what separates high performance athletes from champions is the hatred of losing. Whenever I compete, I have always had this hatred of losing, as if it was the end of the world and life just sucked. I am currently attending Stetson University on a mens tennis scholarship. Prior to making the commitment to study at Stetson, I was speaking with the University of Pennsylvania(UPenn)
A change from a self-determined engagement in a sport to a much lesser degree of self-determination is a common theme among athletes’ burning out. In other words, as the true passion and love for the game fades away, the perceived costs of sustained engagement begin to outweigh the rewards afforded by the sport. After time passes, the inability to handle the negative appraisals can lead to such harmful outcomes as physical and emotional exhaustion, reduced accomplishment, devaluation, and then complete dropout of the sport (Holmberg and Sheridan,
In the moment neither of these feelings are amazing but in “Competition Makes a Comeback”, Caitlin Snaring shares that this was actually results in an outcome that is well worth it: “‘Losing made me want to win even more… got me fired up’ to win the 2007 contest.” (Kronholz 18). Because Caitlin felt upset after being eliminated at a 2006 geography bee, she realized that she didn’t want to feel like this again, and the only way for that to happen is to push even harder to reach goals. Without failure against others people assume they are the best or they are just a natural winner so they don’t need to try. This mindset automatically sets society up for failure, because with everyone just sitting back waiting for a trophy to be handed to them for anything and everything nothing would get done, and there is no way for everyone in a society to all win one way. Just imagine a computer engineer thinking they can release a computer that is only a small percent finished just because people loved their last
Dr. Steven Aicinena from thesportsjournal.org, in the article “When Pride Goes Wrong”, says that athletes will go far enough to have pride as to hurt other players unknown of the consequences. For example, in the article Dr. Steven says, “Athletes experience mental anguish, embarrassment, shame and may come to hate sport as a consequence of strong humiliation. More sinister is the prospect of the athlete feeling poorly about him or herself as a human being” (thesportjournal.org). This quote shows that there is a horrible consequence for those that do not have a balanced life. This quote also reveals that pride does not bring a blessed life, but instead a life full of grief and worry. This quote proves that people cannot be ill-willed to others because they want to feel mighty and proud or else they are going to be the one that will be humiliated instead. One will receive consequences if they are not balanced in their life or show
“It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game” is a quote by Grantland Rice which suggests that winning is not important as long as one tries their best. In the movies “Chariots of Fire” and “Next Goal Wins”, the notion and meaning of sport is explored in both similar and dissimilar ways. Although “Chariots of Fire” and “Next Goal Wins” both follow the journey of sport and competition, the characters in the respective films show contradicting views on the idea that winning or losing sport is unimportant in light of the best effort.
It has been long debated whether genetics or the environment in which one is raised impacts human psychological development the most. In Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro shows that nurture cannot overcome one’s hereditary inclinations. Ishiguro exploits a world where human nature powerfully contradicts nurturing. He shows us that people, no matter how they were created or how they were raised, desire to be loved and accepted and need to know where they came from and what their future possibilities are.
However, what this argument does not take into account is that athletes have an abundance of pressure put on them that most non-athletes don’t ever experience. Hence, the saying, “go hard or go home”. A recent study emphasizes this fact as McClatchy notes, ”The researchers monitored mood levels of 465 collegiate athletes over three years and found 6.3 percent of the athletes met the criteria for clinically significant depression and 24 percent were considered ‘clinically relevant’ “ (2016). Studies like these prove that athletes are not blind to the idea of depression, but rather experience this disorder themselves. Anxiety has a huge role in depression. As sportsperson, there is constant effort to become an awe-inspiring player. As the stakes of the game raise, so does the anxiety. Some want a scholarship, some want to show off what they offer to a team that got a scholarship, and some are professionals. Regardless of whether it's grade school sport or a professional sport, failing at personal goals one set is down right depressing. Kearns and Hwang state that, ”While it’s not clear whether the source of challenges to a student-athlete's mental well-being is the same as those non-athletes, collegiate athletes are known to encounter unique stressor that the general population doesn’t have to deal with, such as the demands, relationships with coaches and missed scheduled classes” (2014). Pressure is something everyone experiences. However, athletes experience some of the same pressure that of non-athletes and then some. Being on a sports team is demanding to time and the idea of being “superior”. In athletics, coaches are everything. For example, If a coach likes how a person attributes as a team player, then that person will get a chance to shine. However, if the coach is not very fond of one, then the chances of opportunities are not very
Athletes are often viewed specially because of their intense determination. They often beat themselves up in order to overcome what they think they can do. Breaking this threshold nearly always requires the overcoming of adversity. In sports psychology, when an athlete “not only makes it through [his] adversity, but acquires additional protective factors in the process”, he has undergone what is known as “resilient reintegration” (Galli, Nick, and Robin S. Vealey 318). This is especially the case when “an athlete returns with a greater appreciation of sport or a stronger work ethic than before” (319). According to exercise and sport scientist Galli’s study, athletes who overcame adversity were ninety percent more capable to cope with future adversities and perform “well in both sport and in life” (320). It is no surprise that people who have overcome adversities in their past are better suited to overcome them again. What is a surprise is how far this truly goes. In fact, this study shows that athletes who have returned from an
In “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor and “The Wolf’s Postscript to ‘Little Red Riding Hood’” by Agha Shahid Ali, they both utilize characters that show distinct forms of justification. While the grandmother's justifications in O’ Connor’s narrative are based on manipulation, the Big Bad Wolf in Ali’s poem uses justification in a way to clear his name despite already facing the consequences of his actions. Even with their differences, both characters rationalize their actions on the basis that they are good people, who do things for good. Within both pieces of written work, they utilize characters that reflect on their own virtue and rightfulness of their actions regardless of the feelings of the victims. Within O’ Connor’s “A
The topic of hunting has always been filled with controversy, excitement and trepidation for the environment. Both sides have varies ideas as to what is wrong and right. I realize that many people do not understand why people have to hunt or why people do hunt. One of the questions that kept coming to mind is why so many people are against hunting when their ancestors hunted and without hunting many of them would not be alive today. This question is relevant because many people are becoming to be worried that animals are in pain when being hunted and that it is unfair for people to hunt selfless animals with modern weaponry, and with many people going against the right to own guns.
Sports are an important aspect of society. They help people to strive to reach certain goals and join people together, but they also can divide people and turn a fun game into the main purpose of someone’s life. Taking sports games too seriously can be harmful to both the athlete and the spectator. The attitude of always winning at any cost in sports has managed to distract us from other important parts of our lives, such as health and education. This importance of the value of sports can heavily influence the way that we see ourselves as both the spectator and the athlete by creating a positive self image and distilling confidence and discipline within the player, or by embedding self doubt and inversion.
Confucius once said, "he who does not do well is less guilty than he who pushes too hard." People found that competitive sports are often physically straining and it is detrimental to proper emotional development. This blows away the misconception that competitive sports create a healthy and engaging atmosphere for kids. This and an overly strong obsession with winning create a toxic mix for the child’s wellbeing. People have begun to realize the world of competitive may be doing more harm than good for their children. Parents have also begun to notice that competitive sports often injure their children severely and also make the child feel left out, which in turn is detrimental to the child 's emotional health. Therefore, competitive sports
Athletes must have self-confidence. It’s all about the positive mindset. Having the thought of not doing well is an automatic lose for the athlete. This happened to me one time, actually many times, but here is one incident that occurred in my life. I was getting ready for my race which was the 100-yard freestyle. I told myself I wasn’t going to do well because I had not trained for it the best I could. Yeah, I did exactly what I thought, I completely bombed that race. I gained almost two seconds. Without the confidence I needed, I allowed my mind to control my body. Marcus Garvey once said, “With confidence, you have won before you
To start off let me give you a idea on how I let it go out of hand in the first place. From a young age I did not like the idea of losing. For example when I was in kindergarten we had a jog-a-thon and I self competed with myself on how many laps I could run. When Entering Jr. high I could see that there's two types of kids in PE class. The kids who are competitive and the kids who decide who won’t take part in class. And I knew I was a kid who is competitive and always wanted to be on the winning team.
Nowadays the competitions go well beyond teaching fundamental skills. Once the athletes have learned the basic skills of the game, they must then learn how to manage their emotions prior to and during a competition in preparation for it. Before any of that can happen, the athletes must enjoy the sport that want to play it.
Success goes hand in hand with failure. “You win some, you lose some” is a famous quote which epitomises one of the main core’s of life as these two components are apart of every human being’s daily life. In the same way, they are a part of every sporting event. In life everyone strives for success, yet not always do we attain success instantly, often it requires many failures before success can be achieved. Humphrey asserts that sport ‘brings out the worst in people’, and yes, it is within failure where the worst is brought out of people as many people hate the feeling of failure. However, no matter what one fails at, they will always express their bad side, for example: when one fails at their job, when one fails their license and so on. Sports is the best opportunity for people to learn the benefits and necessity of failure, thus allowing their outlook on failure to be change which in turn corrects the behaviour that comes with failure. Sports also allows one to feel the sense of accomplishment that emanates with success. It therefore teaches the sportsmen how to cope better wit...