Is Competition Healthy?

We live in a society that kind of imitates a survival of the fittest ideology. You need to be better, and yes, more competitive in order to make it. But one always wonders – is there such a thing called good competition? And to what extent is competition healthy?

To start off, competition is a complicated word. First there is the idea of jealousy that gets mixed in. And to be honest, a lot of it does stem from jealousy, but that’s not it. We as humans love to compare, and our society gives competition a bad rap. For instance, I remember taking the Gallup Strengthsfinder test to find my top leadership traits, and ‘competition’ came out on top. I also remember presenting this to the team and the room went silent or gasped. “Wow had no idea she’s that aggressive” or “Wow is she really a good leader then?” came to their heads. Being the odd one out at that moment didn’t feel good, but when I look back I don’t see anything wrong with being competitive.

But how do we make competition a positive thing?

Like it or not, competition is key in bettering yourself or your craft/business. The key is moderation and perspective. Here are some ways it stays a positive thing:

1. Use yourself as the target of competition: Not someone else. It’s useless to compare yourself to where someone else is. But to use that energy and mentality to compare where you are versus where you want to be, that is a game changer.
2. Competition gets you motivated: It sets the urgency to ‘act now’ and not wait and be content with where you are. Because, let’s face it, the more content we are with how we are, the less willing we are to step up/grow.
3. Keep the ‘friendly’ in competition: Because it’s not a personal thing. Just like the games- you are competing within the duration, but maintain a friendly relation once it’s over. Competition helped me get to where I am when it comes to blogging as well. However, what made the difference is distinguishing between “Oh that’s so unfair where she is” and “Oh wow she’s doing great! Need to challenge myself to go above and beyond what she’s doing so I’ll challenge myself.”

To answer the question – Yes! Competition is healthy. Figure out the target, intensity and characteristics of the competition and that will make all the difference!

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