Grades. Sports. Games. Performance. Nerdy math things. The list trundles on and on, the various ways in which students are pitted against each other. Competition is admittedly a pretty neat concept- through it, students can theoretically push themselves to new heights and in directions, students can find the drive to work harder and truly excel. If one is not too careful, though, competition ceases to be a tool for furthering excellence, and instead transforms into a monstrous beast that consumes the lives and minds of those it has engulfed, until they are reduced to piteous blobs with lead-stained hands, non-functionals who can only think in comparisons- that is, themselves vs. anything else, really. Conversely, a dearth of competition theoretically will lead to a complacent society that will inevitably be engulfed by the sun in around 5 billion years, if they don’t manage to starve themselves to death beforehand.
Both the excess and deficiency of Competition are undesirable, and pretentiously I say that Aristotle’s “Golden Mean” should be sought; to a certain extent, this is what the administration of my High School actually does. Complacency is ironed out through the continuation of the grading system. Likewise, unnecessary competition is not foisted upon us through the decision to not rank students, a choice I wholeheartedly support. Unfortunately, many students have yet to get the memo, and are still dawdling in the land of overt-competition, a fantastically self-centered world of trivialities and concerns.
A year ago, if anyone had asked me, a rambling Junior, about my feelings towards pressure and competition in my class, I would have given said roving report a befuddled look to fully indicate the depth of my ignorance concerning the attitudes of my peers. I, being one of those types that preferred solitary time spent outside, was not knowledgeable of any sort of inordinate competitiveness going on. As for my own attitude, I had personally exhausted my supply of academic competition in 8th grade, where my time and intellect were riddled away in an insanely stupid competition, a “perfectionist who has no life” contest whose end goal was to beat my equally competitive intellectual friend for the highest gpa slot; I don’t even want to think of the hours I lost while striving for straight A+’s.
Ashamed and rather burnt out, when high school commenced I dropped this attitude and instead kept my interests in my peers’ grades and achievements to a minimum (not that I didn’t laud their efforts and awards, I just didn’t care as much). In fact, any competitiveness that I once had in my body seemed to have been ground out by the intense, academic competition that was the defining factor of my 8th grade year. When I transferred to a new high school during sophomore year, I had no desire to beat my newly acquired classmates at anything. One afternoon, though, my little world of competitive ignorance was cracked by a stunningly stupid and frightening contest that is becoming more and more commonplace: a competition over who is more tired .
Don’t believe me? Pick a random time, and announce to those around you that you are very, very tired. Almost instantly, some bleary-eyed teenager will fall for the trap and proudly announce that they only obtained two hours of sleep because of so-and-so projects that they so “foolishly” put off. Immediately, another peer will enter the fray, trumping this with only one hour of sleep, only to be further one-upped by another person, who also got one hour of sleep and who had a pet die in the morning, or something equally woeful (I slight not pets, I love mine dearly).
Somehow, students are beginning to wear their sleep-deprivation and the “misery” incurred by hard work as a medal, a medal garnered in the war they are fighting with the school. This is ridiculous, for who truly competes for negative awards? “Hey, I just won the worst-mile-time-award! Cool! Well, I just go the most-f’s-in-a-class award, etc.” Facetiousness aside, what truly frightens me is that students become so introverted and wrapped up in their individual worlds that they loose sight of the bigger picture, the crucial perspective. Sure, the amount of sleep you got is important to yourself and your friends, who may or may not care for your disposition, but no one gives a damn if you stayed up all night playing video games or writing a paper. Some people stay up all night because they have to, insomniacs, soldiers at war, the unfortunate souls in torture facilities, overworked parents trying to sustain their families…
Keep an open mind, keep the perspective- we students should be extremely thankful, both for our school and for the resources available to us from the ever-growing technological industries. Cast off the medal of unhealthy competitions and enjoy life for its own sake, not for trivial victories in trivial matters that do nothing but damage the mind and polarize the class. And please, in the process, try to get more sleep!
