Literary Contest

Victory

Humans through the flow of time compete, they wage wars and fight for a just cause in order to prove their superiority. One can change the name of it, whether it’s a fight, war or competition it’s all the same. All of these things are just different ways of people trying to be superior in some aspects, whether is a physical superiority or an intellectual kind. It is a natural phenomenon that is born as we are children, one can try to draw a nice Crayola picture of mommy and daddy, but when the child sees how the other child is doing the same exact thing there is a certain sense of unease if not anger. The child wants to be better than the other one due to him looking to the side, had he not done so, there would be no need for him to work harder, but there would also be no need for him to see how far he can go. In general, the need of competition is born out of observing another being, there is a dominant psychological trait in the human being that makes them want to dominate and submit others to their will, hence proving superiority. Of course a child won’t have it to that extent, but if left to time everything grows exponentially. This being said, in the past month our teacher Professor Pittman  made us participate in a literary contest, in which the author of this essay participated in the poetry category. Now what could have possibly made me actually participate?

                First, the psychological implications, well in the beginning I told you about the child and what not. Well that’s the case with me as well, I wanted to prove that I was the best at what I do, to receive a prize for my efforts. It’s a certain sense of satisfaction one feels when they reach a goal, in my case it’s winning. I feel there is a general desire I want to appease, a certain longing is felt if I don’t fulfill it. To explain it further lets create an example: Imagine you are a boxer fighting for a world title. You trained your whole life for this moment, you beat your body dry in order to reach this goal you set out to do. Your opponent wants this just as much as you, the person trained and worked hard just as you to reach this moment. The bell rings and the fight breaks out, you both seize each other up trading blows and it slowly becomes a slug-fest. By the sixth round both of you are exhausted, his last left hook took a chunk out of your ribs and your last jab took a swing at his eye. By now both of you are at the critical point in fatigue, in an effort to finish the match you both entrust the last of the energy left into one fist and swing. At the last second the lights go out, you feel a sudden impact beside your ear followed by another on the back of the head. All of the s sudden the body feels too heavy and you can almost hear the blurred sound of a man saying some words. When you finally get up it is over, your opponent won the match and the world tittle you worked for so hard, there is anger, and there is frustration as well as fury. It doesn't matter to you that you tried the hard and gave it your all, he won the match and world attention, as for you, you won nothing and came back empty handed. There is no satisfaction in defeat, this situation is the general event that happens in the everyday life of people as well as the natural psychological reaction of a person. When I participated, I had only one intention: Win.

               

                In conclusion, after all the effort I made I was ‘knocked out’ (reference of the second paragraph) my poem didn’t even received a mentioning. In a way I knew it wouldn’t, criticizing the government isn’t really a beautiful or raw emotional thing about myself, it only portrayed a frustrating I have with the system that seems to forget who made them happen. At first it hit me hard, the want I had for winning was high and it took me a while to absorb the blow. In the end I realized that the only person that needed to like my work was me that no amounts of prize could ever replace the love I have for my own poetry and this was the result of a psychological impulse.

link to examples of speeches: http://www.speechanddebate.org/competitionevents

 this song suits the mood