ny115+Winning+Is+Everything+Essay

=Is Winning Really Worst Than Losing?=

== You're going to the Olympics! Your soccer team won the State Championships! Your basketball team won last night's game! Abe Lincoln won freedom for slaves! Even though these are on different levels of competition and skill they all have one thing in common; winning. The glory of feeling proud for yourself and others. That soaring feeling that leaves you light and airy. But what is most important, playing your best and having fun or winning? In my opinion, I believe that winning isn't everything. ==

== If you thought winning was everything, what happens when you lose? Winning is one of those things that can blind you, and when you lose, you will most likely crumble and break down. This means that you will stop working and stop trying at what you were trying to accomplish. So maybe having winning as a goal is not a bad thing, but it doesn't need to be your main goal. Anne Frank was a Holocaust victim who wanted the Polish to win, but her main goal was for her and her family to survive. What comes first, your country or you family? In life-and-death situations, winning shouldn't be your main goal; just surviving. This girl on my swim team who both her and her parents had only one sight in their minds; winning. When she lost to a girl in a race by three tenths of a second, she wouldn't talk to anyone for two days. Winning should be closer to the back of your mind, not the front. ==

== One benefit of losing is that it reveals your mistakes, even the smallest ones. It's a chain reaction; you lose, you figure out and fix the mistakes, you race with improvements, and you win. Even though many people who win have really good coaches and always improve, some people get overconfident and deny they have mistakes when they really do. A boy on my brother's soccer team had that overconfident personality. He refused to improve, so he got kicked off the team. He might have been good, but he didn't have the right point of view. George Washington lost all the small battles and fixed things little by little; when the big battles came, he won. Who new there were benefits of losing? ==

== A really bad thing about winning all the time is that you don't know your limits. Since I've seen this happen to the people around me, I know for a fact that if you push yourself too hard mentally or physically, you will burn out and fade. Most professional athletes know how to stay healthy during the training season, but some push themselves to hard or take performance-enhancing drugs to do better and get really sick. I once read a story in a magazine on how Lance Armstrong, a famous cyclist, was stripped of his Tour de France titles because he took performance drugs. Another experience I had is that a girl who was sick still practiced, and when she raced, she almost collapsed and didn't improve any of her times. Sometimes your body needs to rest. Your health and you taking care of yourself is more important than winning ==

== Even though some people are able to keep winning as their main goal and still be humble when they lose and stay healthy, most need to be able to see again. Businessmen can be blinding by money, but athletes are blinded by winning. Completely different situations, yet strangely the same. Should winning really take over your previous life? For the sake of athletes worldwide, I believe that winning isn't everything. ==