Winning isn't everything, and it is certainly NOT the only thing.

WINNING:
- Coming in first place in a competition, whether it be athletic or scholastic or poker.
- Earning a trophy, medal, or badge proclaiming victory.
- Succeeding in life, including completing goals such as earning a college degree and landing the ideal job.
- Meeting your soulmate, because there are literally billions of fish in the sea.
- Gambling successfully, like picking the right lottery numbers, or getting lucky at the nickel slots.

Those are some of many definitions of winning, and everyone likes to win.  Even me.  If you work hard at something, train your butt off, and seriously persevere, you deserve some recognition.  This is not like giving to charity- that should be a personal sense of satisfaction not to be bragged about.  I am talking about winning first place in a spelling bee or sporting event.  You deserve a trophy and some recognition of your skills.  The old and traditional first, second, and third place trophies or medals are a good system, so why are some people messing it up?

More and more kids are being brought up to expect an award for just showing up. Simply participating.  Should these kids get trophies?  I don't think so.  If they are working, striving, and dedicating their time to improving their skills and then they WIN a competition?  Yes.  Not every person deserves to be rewarded.  If you don't put in the time and you don't reach the top, you need to learn to work harder or find something to do that you are better at.  Rewarding everyone may be the "nice" thing to do, but it will make people lazy.  How many works of art or new inventions won't be created because people have become too complacent?

How do we teach our children to continuously strive for greatness?  Give them challenges.  Don't let them "win" everything until the word means nothing.  Make winning something to be celebrated because of all the work put into achieving it.  They must learn that everything in life must be earned, and not given to them on a silver platter.  Life is difficult, tricky, confusing, and a long road.  I personally learned this in the worst possible way, and I hope to prepare my boys for adult life better than I was prepared.  You really, really don't realize how good you had it until you leave the nest.

And then there is
LOSING:
- Finishing dead last in a competition.
- Dropping out of high school.
- Never setting or meeting life goals.
- The inability to sustain a lasting relationship.
- Losing money on gambling and not knowing when to quit.
- Breaking the law greater than a misdemeanor.

Nobody likes losing, but some people get stuck in a rut and get used to it.  Recidivism.  Yes, there are losers in life, just like there are winners.  It's a cycle, and all we can do as parents is to watch out for it and prepare for it.

The Personal Bit:
Due to my extreme shyness and zero athletic ability, I was always picked last to be on a team in PE in grade school.  Graceful, I was not.  Embarrassed, I certainly was.  In this particular area, I learned I was never going to be very skilled.  I was, however, able to develop coping mechanisms to get me through the torture of PE, and I was never given an award for my athletic abilities.  See?  An award for something I was NOT GOOD AT would have only confused me as a young kid.  I would have been happy to receive it, but eventually I'd wonder what I did to deserve it.

On the other hand, I made extremely good grades in school, and I read at least one book every day from first grade until I got my first job at age 16.  I became very skilled at playing the bass clarinet and piano, and won awards for the former- that is, until I gave it up.  I won a full academic scholarship for my first year of college.  I made the highest grade in my French class every year from 8th grade to 12th and got medals for that.  I got one of the highest ACT scores in my class.  There were many more academic honors, but I can't remember them all.

I hope that I can encourage my kids to find something they are good at.  I do not want to pressure them in any direction, but I will also instill that they must finish what they start.  They can experiment in sports, academics, or whatever else they want, as long as it is within reason financially.  I truly want them to each develop a certain skill to its fullest extent, whatever it may be.