A blurry picture of sheep grazing in the moors of Isle of Skye on a sunny afternoon in Scottish Highlands, photo by The Smiling Hypocrite
ARE YOU A WINNER OR A LOSER?
The topic of today’s edition is “Are you a Winner or a Loser?” In my humble opinion, it is a worthless question. Then why am I writing about it? It is so that I can call it out.
Questions like these indicate two main biases:
A. There are only two options:
If someone tells you, that you have only two choices, especially in this dynamically complex structure called life, they’re wrong. Dead Wrong. In most life circumstances, there are more than two choices you have. And most of those choices are a combination of various sub-choices and need not be opposites. The society is constantly bombarded by such biases. You are either creative OR good at math. You can either follow your passion OR do a boring 9-to-5. You are either a leader OR a follower. These are very wrong classification. For, people can be all of these at the same time. If anything, such questions are made by those who want to justify their actions. They will always start their arguments saying something like “One can be rich or poor, I choose rich” or something like “There are winners and losers, I like to win.” Such narrow-minded thoughts are tools used by narrow-minded people to prove themselves right, or in worse cases, prove others “wrong”. It is never about one or the other. If anything, “win” or “loss” is an outcome at a point in time, from a particular perspective.
B. Such questions try to describe you as a person rather than actions:
You must have read it a million times “Winners don’t make excuses”. This is where the society goes wrong. It personifies qualities and events to such an extent that a person is almost dehumanised and reduced to the outcome of their actions. Did you pass or fail? Did you get promoted or not? Did you get fired? Did your 10th business fail? Tchk Tchk Tchk!!!!! Such a shame! You FAILED. You LOST. I understand the underlying message of the proverbs, but sadly this society has forgotten it. The society has forgotten that there are no winners or losers. There could be those who can have more wins than loses (again, depends upon your perspective), but those are outcomes we are talking about, not people.
THE ALPACA DOCTRINE – WINNER OR LOSER
The fuzzy warm Alpaca says “There are no winners or losers” or to an extent even no “wins” or “losses”. Every task is a means to an end. Either you achieve the end or you don’t. It is painful to not achieve what you set out to. Especially, if you dreamt of it, yearned for it all your life, and put in all your life’s energy into it. But that does not necessitate that this utterly complex world should behave in the way you want it to. Those who “win” grossly over-estimate their effort and cunning, sometimes more than “losers” over-estimate their “bad-luck”. What comes out of one’s action is grossly out of one’s control. Does that mean we just stop and let the beautiful world do its thing? NO. It just means that the outcome of your actions don’t define YOU. Your actions define you, not their results. Not even “WINS”.
Let life be what it is: A roller coaster of emotions, and experiences! There is no checklist somewhere to say “Ohh you did not achieve X, Y, and Z. You were a loser in your life”. Have dreams, reach out for them, and if you don’t, that’s fine. They were your dreams, not YOU. You are a much larger entity. Explore, laugh, cry, slog, sweat, bleed, eat, dance, fall, rise, fall again, smile, read, talk, shout, drink, connect, sleep, rest, enjoy, regret, be miserable, be ecstatic, or maybe both in the same day, LIVE. But in all those experience, don’t get into useless name calling such as “Winners” or “Losers”. Be kind, be a human, labels are for products.
PEACE!
- the smiling hypocrite
