Not Winning but Not Losing Either ?
Not Winning and yet not Losing either....has this happened to you as well? Okay, I'll get more specific. So last month I was called to Hyderabad to present in the final round of a teaching innovation award organised by MHRD. It had all the makings of a typical competition (with 15 finalists presenting to a team of judges) :-). Today I got to know that I have not got the award. When my son heard this he immediately said, 'so you lost'. Without even thinking further I blurted out 'No'. In my head I did not feel anything similar to 'having lost'. Then he smiled and rephrased his question, 'okay so you did not win?'. To this I said 'Yes'. Then he aptly summarised - 'That means you lost'!. I protested. I was clear I had not 'won' the award but I was also clear that I had lost nothing. For me 'not winning' (at least in this case) was definitely not the same as losing.
I thought more about our little exchange during my evening walk and I wondered how wonderful it would be if all 'competitions' (if at all it makes sense to hold them) could be framed this way so that there are 'winners' but no 'losers'. What if one person 'winning' or being selected for an award does not have to automatically make all the other contestants feel like 'losers'.
In fact even technically I think it was more accurate to acknowledge that I had not won the award and also acknowledge that in truth I had 'lost' nothing. In fact I had gained a free trip to Hyderabad and met some awesome people there.
Have you ever felt this way? Think of the last time you might have assumed you 'lost' in some competition or race? Did you really lose something? Is that more accurate, or did you just happen not to win. Is there not a huge space where we can exist whole and complete as we are, participating and aiming to get an award but never actually 'losing' anything if we don't get that award?
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Metaphor Artiste.
7 年Thanks for your exceptional tedtalk video on Attention . Will watch it again and again
Strategic Alliances & Business Collaborations I Start-up mentor I Ex-Tata Sons, Tata Limited, London
7 年Well written Ramya. While I have always myself believed that one never loses, in turn you get a learning, (well, that't the best way to also console oneself, right?) yet somewhere one can feel disheartened, especially in this lopsided "corporate world" :) and here I am not just referring to a contest or a competition but to a much larger context. When and opportunity to further your learning, is questioned, where you have already been contributing?
Strategic Energy Advisory and Transactions, Decarbonisation and Net Zero
7 年A very nice read and composed well!! Maam....Er... Well, Are you sure you are in the right profession? Should you be in writing fulltime? Ever considered the optin?