Competition vs Creativity. Why you should be your biggest competition.

We all aspire to be the best in everything we do. Whether it is in our perspective careers, sports, activities, etc. But the aspect of that and competing against others is taken the wrong way. There is a term called Abundance vs scarcity. Abundance is the mindset of there been enough in the world for everyone while scarcity is the mindset of lack and feeling like there is only one to fight over. When it comes to competition there are different aspects. There are sports competitions, competitions to be the best at our jobs or to be the best in everything we do. But the way we view competition may be wrong at times and may be looked at in a sense of lack.

Creativity is the act of being one's own competition. Competition against who they were yesterday or just focusing on their growth instead of measuring themselves against others. I was in the gym one day doing my usual morning routine when a random guy came up to ask me to take a picture of him. I of course took it for him and he thanked me. While walking away he told me that he used to be over 300 pounds and seeing how he is now, he is completely happy with who he is and how far he has came physically. I couldn't help but smile inside because this to me was the person representation of a creative mindset. Someone with a creative mindset is focusing on their own growth and aiming at pushing the limits of how great they can be. They are never satisfied but they also are not hearing the noise or paying attention to others.

They are basically in their own world and doing what they can to be better than who they were yesterday. I always see people in the gym who may be skinnier in comparison to others who are constantly there around the same time I am and are just working hard to get to where they want to be physically. It takes a form of creativity to get to this point especially when there are lots of individuals walking around who look like they should be doing weight lifting competitions. Someone always in a competitive mindset is constantly measuring themselves against others and their lack of progress in comparison to others can lead them to feelings of stress, depression or lack. It should never be this way. You should always be your biggest competition and aim to be better than who you were yesterday. Always aim to be better for you not for the praise or recognition of others.

I read more about this from a website called Daily Stoic by Author Ryan Holiday. Here is a piece of the article and will link it down for anyone interested in checking it out. Feel free to comment your thoughts and any personal stories.

https://dailystoic.com/the-race-to-run-is-against-yourself/

“I think one thing that is a really important thing to strive for is being internally driven, being driven to compete with yourself, not with other people. If you compete with other people, you end up in this mimetic trap, and you sort of play this tournament, and if you win, you lose. But if you’re competing with yourself, and all you’re trying to do is — for the own self-satisfaction and for also the impact you have on the world and the duty you feel to do that — be the best possible version you can, there is no limit to how far that can drive someone to perform. And I think that is something you see — even though it looks like athletes are competing with each other — when you talk to a really great, absolute top-of-the-field athlete, it’s their own time they’re going against.”