In today’s world, the participation trophy area, people are finding it harder and harder to overcome failure. Harder and harder to handle losing. The entitlement and me first motto of many is a hard thing to witness.
For me growing up, you had to tryout to make a team, guess what, not everyone made it. If you didn’t make it, you had two options quit or try to work harder to make it the next year. With watching and coaching sports today many want to point fingers if they make a mistake. Not many want to take responsibility for failing or making a mistake. However, they want and crave attention. Kids today strike out, cry and the throw things. They don’t understand that the pitcher did his job. Now you have to learn from it, make an adjustment and get him next time. Too many will fail the first time up and are done for the rest of the game.
One of the worst cases of not handling losing is the recent shooting in Florida. Two great young men lost their lives because someone couldn’t handle losing.
I like others don’t like losing either. My overall record as a coach and player is below 500, does that make me a loser, some may say yes. Those loses have made me better. They pushed me to fix my mistakes, learn from my failures and strive to be better than I was. When you play a game there are usually 2 options, well in some cases there’s a third, you win, you lose or you tie. A great quote from White Men Can’t Jump, sometimes when you win you really lose or tie and sometimes when you lose you really win or tie.
Enjoy the battle, learn from your defeat and don’t be over confident in the win. Above all, respect your opinion and yourself.
TCB