Almost every competition in life is pointless. But the keyword here is “almost.” April Shprintz talks about the one and only kind of competition that matters and how it can unlock a better you.
—
Listen to the podcast here
The ONLY Kind Of Competition That Works
A lot of people have been talking to me about competition lately. A lot of people have been talking about, “I have to win this, so so-and-so doesn’t win. Business is war, and we’ve got to do all of these things. Competition is so fierce.” I’m sorry, but except for one kind, I have always thought that most competition is bullshit. I don’t mean competitions like you want to do a race or you’re competing in a sport. That’s fine, but the idea of competition in life is complete and utter bullshit.
Coopertition: Competition In Corporate
I can remember in my corporate days the people who would say things like, “Business is war. We’ve got to always be closing. You’re a salesperson. Every deal someone else wins is a deal you lost.” I just couldn’t feel like that is further from the truth. When I was in the corporate world and doing sales, I even coined a term called coopertition. These people are not my competition. We’re going to cooperate to find out what’s best for these prospects and the potential clients. If what they have is better than what I have, I’m going to send my client to them.
I had people tell me I was crazy, and that was too fluffy and touchy-feely. By the way, I made hundreds of thousands of dollars more than the people who said that coopertition was dumb. I want you to think about all the places in your life where you might be competing with others, jealous, or worried that there’s not enough. Understand that the world and the universe are set up so there’s enough for everyone.
If you have to do some competition, compete with the version of yourself from yesterday. Share on XThe only person we should ever be competing with is ourselves. When you think about it, let’s say you’re going to build your business and you want to build a super successful one, and then you see that someone else has already done what you’re thinking of doing. Do you get mad, jealous, or defeated? No. Think about it as the universe sending you a wink and saying, “This is possible. You’ve got this. They did it, so can you.”
Think about actors who win an Oscar. If somebody wins an Oscar, does someone else think, “I’m never going to get one now, they just won one,” or does the fact that someone else wins one mean that the one that you won five years ago doesn’t matter? No. Why? It’s because this is a world of inclusiveness, not of exclusion. It’s not mutually exclusive, where if somebody wins, you lose. Anyone who feels this way or thinks that is true is setting themselves up for disappointment, beating up on themselves, and feeling like shit most of the time when they could instead be inspired by other people’s success.
The One Time When Competition Is Amazing
There is one time when I think competition is amazing. This is separate from sports and games and what have you. I’m just talking about in life. The one time that I am always going to compete every single day is competing with the me I was yesterday. How can I be a better version of her? These things don’t have to be big. Maybe I can drink one more glass of water. Maybe I can do one more kind thing. Maybe I just get more sleep or have more fun, or do something that I want for a little bit longer. If I’m going to be in competition, it’s going to be to up my game with myself, because anything else is working against what we want in life. It’s working against the happiness, the success, the being around other awesome people.
Think about it. If you’re constantly competing with the people you’re around, you are not going to have those awesome people around you forever because it’s not going to feel good. When you think about it, being in a supportive environment where everyone knows that our wins are our wins, whether it’s you or me, we won, is the best environment to not just succeed in the short-term, but to grow on that success, get it to be more and more every single time, build on each other, and be better and better. If you have to do some kind of competition, compete with yourself yesterday. I promise that that kind of competition will make sure you win big. Here’s to your success.
