While competition can be a fun method of inner motivation and an excellent bonding opportunity, it can also often provoke unhealthy self-comparison, hostility, fear, and low self-esteem. And when our competitive success determines our access to emotional, financial, or even physical resources, we can be driven to act against our values or even seek to harm others. Finding a way to keep ourselves centered, whole, and in balance under intense competitive pressure can be a struggle, but if we can find our way through, we can use competitive situations to challenge ourselves to reach new heights—and depths.
Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. . . . It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest. Once the element of competition is gone, pride is gone.
