Post: #1

I'm starting to think this is taking a toll on me. I'm a REALLY competitive person. If I meet you, yes, I'm sizing you up. Reality though, is that I can always find someone better than me in some way. I think this is driving me to go crazy. I use to think this was a good thing and it was just additional motivation, but I'm god honestly beginning to think the is pathological, leading to anxiety and depression. Anyone else the same way?

Post: #2

It sounds like you are trying prove or validate yourself, and therein lies the insecurity.

Don't get me wrong, I think the competitive spirit is very important, but you should only apply it where appropriate, not necessarily in every situation.

You have to build self confidence so that you don't need to keep demonstrating your value to yourself. If you truly believe you are confident, then you don't need to prove it all the time everywhere.

Post: #3

To paraphrase Sun Tzu - Choose your battles wisely!

Post: #4

(05-14-2014 12:36 AM)soup Wrote:  It sounds like you are trying prove or validate yourself, and therein lies the insecurity.

Don't get me wrong, I think the competitive spirit is very important, but you should only apply it where appropriate, not necessarily in every situation.

You have to build self confidence so that you don't need to keep demonstrating your value to yourself. If you truly believe you are confident, then you don't need to prove it all the time everywhere.

Thanks for this response. It's good, but my problem lies in the fact that the hard thing for my confidence is that I can always find a way that someone is better than me. Examples: I'm better looking but he could kick my ass. I could kick his ass but he's better looking. I don't know if it's a negativitey thing or not, but it's affecting me alot as of late.

Post: #5

Focus on competing with yourself.

And you should only be hanging with people way ahead of you in success etc.

This will push you to do better and become a better man.

Competition is good, but remember at the end of the day you're really just competing with yourself. Become the best version of yourself.

Post: #6

Marlon Brando, alpha king, once said that "there's always going to be a bigger guy in the next bar". He was referring to getting into bar fights. He was a tough mother fucker and could kick people's asses, but he also knew that were guys out there that were bigger than him and could kick his ass.

Part of being a mature man is being aware of the reality of the situation.

I'm pretty sure that you will never be the most handsome guy in the world. Neither will anyone else on this forum.

Same goes for being the best fighter or having the best physique. There will likely be someone out there that is better than you. Does that mean you cant get shit done in a big way? Absolutely not. Accept it and move on.

You need to learn to control your energy and focus on things that are going to actually help you improve and get you want in life. Don't waste it competing with guys over frivolous stuff.

Figure out what you want. Like McQueen said, go find the guys in that field that are better than you and learn/compete with them.

Don't get distracted or cock blocked by your need to compete. I've actually AMOGd guys by taking advantage if there competitive nature.

In one instance I started a fight with a guy and told him I'd meet him down the block to fight. He took off to go meet me for the fight, and I walked off in the other direction with the girl he was talking talking to.

Don't be that guy.

Post: #7

Sounds like my ex. I always found her hyper competitive even when she didnt have to be and she suffers from depression, anxiety, personality disorder had an eating disorder, drug addiction, attempted suicide when she was younger.
She was always surrounded by hyper competitive people shiting all over eachother. Private school, her brother, her work and the problem is she's very sensitive.

Post: #8

(05-14-2014 12:29 AM)nek Wrote:  I'm starting to think this is taking a toll on me. I'm a REALLY competitive person. If I meet you, yes, I'm sizing you up. Reality though, is that I can always find someone better than me in some way. I think this is driving me to go crazy. I use to think this was a good thing and it was just additional motivation, but I'm god honestly beginning to think the is pathological, leading to anxiety and depression. Anyone else the same way?

Sound like me.

You need an outlet to focus your energy. That backed up energy will get you into trouble or worse.

Have you considered some physical activity like sports or some gym? Heck you'd probably get a good canidate for sport fighting.

Also once you focus that physical energy, you'll have restless mental energy left over for study. Remember that only you on the inside can relax the demon inside. Just focus it and you'll find yourself amassing a large amount of resources and respect.

Post: #9

You need to put yourself into a stressful environment.
Somewhere where you'll be at the end of your wits just trying to survive. And where you cannot quit and walk away.

Inner game issue.

When you have to push yourself to the limit to merely survive and where the choice to quit is taken away from you.... That is where you'll be humbled and discover true courage, true ingenuity, true fear... And true self confidence.

Right nw you have a set mental image and youre approaching every problem with a similar competitive approach. Where you succeed, it reinforces the value of your approach and where you don't succeed with this you backward rationalize it as you being unnecessarily hypercompetitive and get depressed. And now you've started wondering whether there's something wrong with you, there probably isn't but your brain will hand pick incidents from your memory to convince yourself of it.
In reality I suspect that this hyper competitiveness is really a reaction seeking to overcompensate your low self esteem issues.

Throw yourself in the fire, go DO things you're terrified of.

At the end of the day, there will always be someone who will be bigger and better than you.
But when you actually do shit, when you actually have been through scenarios where you thought and knew you were fucked and yet somehow survived, when you defeat those irrational fears, those demons in your head that are holding you back from jumping of a cliff or talking to women or attempting to get into Stanford, and you say fuck it to those fears and go burn your heart out doing those things anyway just to prove a fuckin point to your diseased brain, that's when you'll realize they were all exaggerated.

And eventually, no matter how many tall sharp handsome men with silver tongues and monstrous phalluses you encounter, you will not be threatened by them.

Post: #10

It's nice getting older. Guys get less competitive and then...holy cow, they turn into these great friends. I like guys over 50, they just don't care any more and will drink beer and trade war stories.

Post: #11

(05-14-2014 12:04 PM)frenchie Wrote:  

(05-14-2014 12:29 AM)nek Wrote:  I'm starting to think this is taking a toll on me. I'm a REALLY competitive person. If I meet you, yes, I'm sizing you up. Reality though, is that I can always find someone better than me in some way. I think this is driving me to go crazy. I use to think this was a good thing and it was just additional motivation, but I'm god honestly beginning to think the is pathological, leading to anxiety and depression. Anyone else the same way?

Sound like me.

You need an outlet to focus your energy. That backed up energy will get you into trouble or worse.

Have you considered some physical activity like sports or some gym? Heck you'd probably get a good canidate for sport fighting.

Also once you focus that physical energy, you'll have restless mental energy left over for study. Remember that only you on the inside can relax the demon inside. Just focus it and you'll find yourself amassing a large amount of resources and respect.

Haha it's funny you mention this, I've been training in MMA for a few years now. It's made me more confident and less confident at the same time. While I can handle myself better than before, I'm much more acutely aware of the dangers of violence and how easily a simple fight can result in some major injuries. Plus you learn that, in this day in age with lots of people knowing martial arts, you can't judge a book by its cover so I find myself always wondering what someone is capable of.

Related, and I don't know if it's a confidence thing, but once I do something I was nervous about or intimidated by, or something I feel would be an accomplishment, I don't feel more confident, I just feel like I overestimated the hurdle.

Post: #12

I'm hyper competitive in things that I care about. I will lose my shit if I feel things should be going differently. For example, I was fishing last week with someone who just started learning how to fish. She was pulling out a bunch of crappies and bluegills and I was happy for her, I was going for larger game. When she pulled in a 3 lb. largemouth bass and I didn't get a bite, I though about launching all of my shit into the water.

Soup is 100% correct when he says it's an ego thing. After the trip I was stewing pretty bad. Once the initial wave of anger subsided, I started to think about what I was doing wrong that I didn't get a bite. Funny how a fish can put you in your place.

Post: #13

Does your hyper competitiveness help you with your career, money, etc?

Post: #14

(05-20-2014 09:02 PM)Brodiaga Wrote:  Does your hyper competitiveness help you with your career, money, etc?

No, oddly enough it doesn't at the current moment (I need work I'm more passionate about). And it gets me injured in training as I'm always overworking and pushing myself (always sparring with guys bigger than me or at least faster/better than me in some way). The worst thing is, I'm not taking losses very well. I'm very self-critical as a result.

Post: #15

Nobody is perfect, but everyone has at least a few things he/she is good at. The more the merrier, but you have to accept that you can't be a star in everything.

So take a good long look at yourself, be critical and honest, realize what your strengths and your weaknesses are. Then try to minimize your weaknesses while maximizing your strengths.

For me, my strengths are my sense of humor (I often make chicks laugh), my way with words (I'm better at smooth talking than smooth writing though, text game and online game are definitely a weakness for me), and above all my artistic skills (I'm a very good digital artist and I'm proud of it).

I can say with certainty that most of you are never ever gonna be as good at digital art as me, unless you would spend twice as much time as me practicing and refining your art skills, and even then you'll have some years of catching up to do before you'll reach my level of skill.

But that's okay, I'm sure some (maybe most) of you guys spend way more time in the gym than me, meaning that you're probably way more buff or athletic than I am. I'll never be as muscular or athletic as someone who spends 3 hours a day in the gym. And I'm okay with that. I realize that me not being able to spend as much time in the gym is one of my "weaknesses".

You're never gonna be the best at everything. So choose two or three things that you want to be the best at and then make it happen. For me those three things are my art skills, my social skills and running.

So, what are your three things gonna be?

Post: #16

I consider myself a very competitive person. However I see it as really good opportunity for self-improvement. If you become "competitive" with more successful people you will ultimately become successful yourself.

Personally for me my competitiveness apparently started when I was a few months old my mom said around 7 months I was trying to walk to copy my older sister who was already running. It continued into my childhood trying to be better at math, science, English, and history than the other homeschooled kids in my church.

Now to this day i'm still competitve with older businessmen trying to get to their level of success. and the men in the gym who are in their 30s, 40s, 50s, pumping hundreds of pounds and me in my late teens only pumping 25 pounds. I take this as challenge to improve myself, not beat them.

All in all your competitiveness should be used as an asset not trying to beat people but to try make yourself better if not at their level to for your own improvement not with the "i'm better than you attitude". If you keep that in focus you'll be on your way to success in life.

In fact I believe being naturally competitive is an advantage we have to more easily "fuck average".

So try changing your mentality to a "I want to be just as good as you" attitude instead of "Your not as good as me" or "I'm better than you" attitude.

Post: #17

(05-20-2014 09:37 PM)Anthony A. King Wrote:  I consider myself a very competitive person. However I see it as really good opportunity for self-improvement. If you become "competitive" with more successful people you will ultimately become successful yourself.

See, I think you hit on something here. I try to look at it in this light but now I'm looking around my social group (higher achievers) and then I need to push myself even more. I'm now comparing myself to even higher calibers of people than before. I think what I need to do is step back and look how far i've come, not just how far I need to go.