Is a competitive spirit wrong?

Regality said:

I feel that I am very competitive. I like to be the best at the games that I play with friends. I feel that maybe this is unhealthy because it makes me compare myself to others, which may hamstring my ability to be truly humble. What do you guys think? Is there a form of competition that is wrong? Is competition okay under certain circumstances?

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Play with humility. If you have to be "all that" when you make a good play, you should reconsider your attitude. If you can make a great play and simply walk (or run, depending on the game) away from it without saying anything to call attention to yourself, you're fine. If not, you have a problem.

Being competitive is good when its done in a good way. Most men are competitive by nature too.
Its when you start getting angry, obsessive, rude, obnoxious, negatively-aggressive, mean, crude, unfair etc that competitive spirit becomes wrong.

Playing to win
or
Playing to have fun

are not the same.

Competitive also leads to pride.

Just enjoy the game, and enjoy the others winning.

If you play to win - you only have 'fun' if you do.
If you play to have fun - then you always win!

-eric

The Exchanged Life

It's wrong if you use it wrongly. The bible is full of competitive personalities who did good things, or bad things, or both.

I am pretty humble so I never liekd getting competitive because I feel no amtter how hard we try, we tend to get full of ourselves and we don't notice it. I have seen people who are competitive such as in the Olympics who will win but give God the glory, so in the end they are humble about it!

Marcus Allen, who went into the Hall of Fame as a Kansas City Chief, repudiating his time with the Raiders, was the epitome of competitiveness tempered with humility. Allen would make the most exhilarating of runs from 20, 25 yards out, breaking tackles, spinning, hanging a tempting leg out for a linebacker to grab only to snatch it away just as the defensive player reached for it, juking and hopping around tacklers and ending up in the end zone, whereby he would simply look for the nearest official, hand him the football, and jog to the sidelines. No one was more competitive, to my knowledge, than Marcus, but no one was more humble, either.

He used to tell the young Chiefs' running backs and wide receivers, "When you get in the end zone, act like you've been there before." The only time I saw him refuse to hand over the football was when he broke the all-time career touchdown record (I've gotta rub this in, guys, sorry: It was against Denver). He floated over the defensive line with a tremendous leap from three yards out and came down fully a yard and half inside the end zone. As he came to his knees, the umpire was standing there holding out his hands for the ball. If you've ever seen the film clip, it is classic Marcus. You can see him clearly mouth the words, "Sir, if you don't mind, I'm keeping this one."

If you can play any game with the attitude that Marcus Allen played football, you have nothing to worry about from your competitive spirit.

Regality said:

Perhaps I should restate what is truly bothering me. I don't think that competition is inherently wrong. It is the fact that in any sport game or likewise, you have to compare yourself to your opponent. You are trying to be better than them at that sport/game. I have the issue of always comparing myself to others and feeling inferior because of that. I became aware that humility is not a lack of self esteem (which was what I thought earlier), but an understanding that your worth is in God's love for you through Jesus Christ alone, not in what others think of you or how good you are relative to others. Since comparing yourself to others is then not helpful towards a truly humble spirit, I worried that my competitive spirit may be, in fact, hindering my humility. Not that I am not giving God praise for my successes, it's that my success is determined by feeling that I have outplayed my opponent. That is my fear.

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If you find your value tied to winning/losing, then your fear is valid.

BTW, it's cool that you are bringing your faith to bear on the real stuff of your life. It's in such minutia of life that God's spirit works to transform your image to more resemble his.

Regality said:

Perhaps I should restate what is truly bothering me. I don't think that competition is inherently wrong. It is the fact that in any sport game or likewise, you have to compare yourself to your opponent. You are trying to be better than them at that sport/game. I have the issue of always comparing myself to others and feeling inferior because of that. I became aware that humility is not a lack of self esteem (which was what I thought earlier), but an understanding that your worth is in God's love for you through Jesus Christ alone, not in what others think of you or how good you are relative to others. Since comparing yourself to others is then not helpful towards a truly humble spirit, I worried that my competitive spirit may be, in fact, hindering my humility. Not that I am not giving God praise for my successes, it's that my success is determined by feeling that I have outplayed my opponent. That is my fear.

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That was the point of my story regarding Marcus Allen. He happens to be a Christian, which I'm sure is what motivated him to act as he did on the field. He never developed a "schtick" like "Tebow-ing" or other ostentatious showy routine. Regardless of how successful he was, he kept things in perspective. It wasn't about celebrating himself, it was about celebrating the team's success. He never drew attention to himself, blowing his own horn, doing dances in the end zone or jumping up and down and high fiving and butt-bumping everyone in sight. He did his job, he surrendered the ball to an official and he got off the field. That is humility. That is proper competitive spirit.

I asked you to compare yourself to him, or someone of similar stature with a similar attitude. I said: "If you can play any game with the attitude that Marcus Allen played football, you have nothing to worry about from your competitive spirit. " I stand by that. Allen was not a prideful player. He did his job, and celebrated team success, not his own. That is what we are to do with our competitive spirit.

Regality said:

I feel that I am very competitive. I like to be the best at the games that I play with friends. I feel that maybe this is unhealthy because it makes me compare myself to others, which may hamstring my ability to be truly humble. What do you guys think? Is there a form of competition that is wrong? Is competition okay under certain circumstances?

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Come on, you can write a better post than that...

There is nothing wrong with a bit of competition, the problem comes when winning becomes more important than how you play. When you dedicate your life to "winning", or even when you put winning before good sportsmanship, you make an idol of your own ability (vanity and pride) and of acquisition (a form of avarice).

Regality said:

But I will try to be humble in victory and defeat.

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That's the key, brother. And giving glory to God. Amen.

I like to be the best at the games that I play with friends.

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Here's a place to start: ask yourself if you believe you really are better than your friends. Many people will find they do believe that. So it's not just competition that eeks out, but insult of others' abilities.

It's fun to play against competitive people, and when they joke about prowess it's fine -- but if they start saying things like "I can't believe I lost" or "how did that happen?" it shows the other people that you really were that arrogant and self-centered.

In the body of Christ, we build each other up like stones creating a structure. It is good to have friends that challenge each other and hone skills -- in the end, you all get a castle! But if you continually throw stones at your opponents, no castle for you.

Iron sharpens iron. Rust and acid eat away at iron and disintegrate it. Let competition happen in a balanced way.
Pride cometh before a fall.