Day 80 – Jim’s Trek - 20.0 Miles – Thinking About Winning

Good Day,

Day 80 and counting. 20.0 miles and still cycling. I am now just about 38% of my way to my destination of Interlake Avenue in Seattle, Washington. And my blood sugar registered 100 this morning.

I’m still on US 41 headed north. I can’t wait until my Trek on my Schwinn 150 takes a westerly turn. I’m a short distance south of Shelburn, and north of Sullivan, Indiana. I’m following, and need to be careful of, a number of transport trucks. I can just imagine the truck wind-wake. Got to stay on the road. Only 189 more miles to my next Interlake address goal.

The topic of winning is a focus of my thoughts these days. And this is not to be "it is not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game" type of discussion. I am thinking about the thought processes of why one may feel dejected and feel so bad when s/he loses, and ultimately does not win.  Is it fixated in the recesses of our brain that "if you win you will feel damn good"?  Why is there such a swing of internal and external emotions between winning and losing?

I'm not thinking about a favorite team or person at some event, to which you are only a couched observer, but I am trying to get my mind around the thought stream that losing can be felt and assimilated to some sort of rejection.  A rejection that relays the intrinsic message that you are just not good enough.  Good enough for what?

I'm not investigating or thinking about what we are taught.  I'm not going to the point, at this stage of my life, that it has to do with the way that each child is brought up.  I am trying to understand the feelings of elation in winning or the feelings of dejection from losing that I sometimes, and continuously feel and encounter after living this many years.

Am I a competitive person?  I think I am, and therefore should I not learn the elements of how to win and how to lose... even how to get second place?  I know that I can experience an extreme high when I succeed, when I win.  And then I feel despondent and morose when I do not.  Why?  I chose to "play the game"?  I could choose to not enter, decide not to compete, not go after the brass ring, but I don't.  Is there some way that I can prepare myself for the emotional upswings in either case, whether I win or lose?  I am definitely thinking about this for the next little while.

Waiting for the next installment of Continuum On Demand. I then decided to watch Game of Thrones – Episode 1 – Snow, blood, snow, blood, heads, introductions, plots and sub-plots introduced, Dire Wolves, snow, cold, new languages.

Be healthy and enjoy,

Jim