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Today I was thinking about my attitude when I was growing up and how certain bad attitudes have dwelled within me since childhood. It all began with a quick ping pong game...

I was rallying with a buddy as a celebratory activity after (what seems to be) a good midterm when he suddenly exclaimed, "Hey man! Let's play a game!" I replied that I didn't really like playing games because I hated competition and preferred to enjoy hobbies as benign amusements; not as skills. After a lot of insistence, I reluctantly consented.

So as we rallied for the first serve, I thought about why I hated competition so much. I somehow thought about how I also hated verbal arguments because I always assumed someone would insist a wrongful point of view with conviction. And so I made the connection that the reason I didn't like competing was because I didn't like the idea that people lost.

Speaking of which, I lost the service rally. He made his opening serve and I resumed my pensiveness.

I considered what I do during arguments. If I'm not too riled up, I would think about what point I'm trying to make in the argument, then think about my opponent's responses, and then maybe see if there are any miscommunications, mistakes or connections between our respective opinions. A lot of the time, the argument would end with a resolution that generally made each party more informed. Either way, there would be no definitive loser.

So I asked myself, is losing in a competitive manner so absolute? Can a game of ping pong, or any competition, have an outcome that is beyond winning and losing?

I won the first set, which made me implode with satisfaction. I sat down to rest and watch some of my other friends play their own game. As my victory high simmered down, I thought about how pleased I was with my win, and then about how much I hated the thought of losing. After running through several memories where I won and I lost at some sort of game, I decided that I clearly hated losing more than I liked winning.

This is interesting, because when I was younger, I hated losing to the point that I would avoid participating in any form of competition. I would hate playing tennis when my opponent took the offensive and my morale would wither if my brother got an extra "hadouken" on me in Street Fighter. I realized that I never got good at anything because I was so averse to any possibility of failure.

It was my turn again. I had to rematch my rival of one game with hopes that I would be the decisive victor in our little contest. I quickly took a significant lead and maintained it until match point. He needed to score five points in a row just to enter a deuce, and then he had to win by two. I didn't intend to give him the opportunity.

But intentions don't necessarily mean results. He slowly took each point after a prolonged, conservative rally of attrition. Time slackened even more as I dwelled on every miss I made, every net I hit. My stamina diminished every turn as we grew closer to the dreaded tiebreaker, which occurred seemingly inevitably after I made my fifth consecutive error.

I started to think again during the deuce, which is probably the worst thing to do when you're trapped in a crucial moment. Why was I so nervously fragile while I held a lead? How did I allow the chasm between us to dwindle into nothing? I continued to question myself during our short tiebreaker, which he won after a smash.

I lost.

But I recalled all the thoughts I had during the game. I decided that losing this game was exactly what I needed. I'm probably too old to be good at nothing, and I need to shake under some pressure before I can get better at what I do. It'll probably help me with those sensitive "clutch" moments, too.

So I guess I learned a lot from losing, which makes it somewhat bearable and less absolute. Oh and I probably got nominally better at ping pong, too. In any case, mark my words:

I will have the final smash.

(in ping pong and in Smash [Melee])

Have a nice day,
-Matthew