I can't lose

I simply cannot lose. In any situation. Incomprehensible. The mental cartwheels I’ll flip to come out ahead would impress Le Circ de Soleil. I’m on a lifetime winning streak. You don’t have to ask me if I’m awesome, I’ll be sure to let you know actively or passively, soon enough.

George Carlin once observed that anyone who drove slower than you was an idiot, and anyone who drove faster was an asshole.

Don’t get me wrong: That I can’t lose doesn’t mean I always win. I just can’t lose. Some examples of not losing: I have stated, confidently and with pride and in all seriousness, that I play to just below the level of my competition. Name the sport: golf, billiards, basketball, skiing, cycling; if, in my twisted mind, I’ve shown the competition that I’m more skilled than they are, then I’ve won. I don’t need to score more points, be faster, get down the hill faster, nunnavit. I did something they can’t so I’m better. That 7 iron on 16? You could never do that.

I’m in sales. The technical part of sales. The part that actually knows what the products do and understands what the customer needs, not that wine-and-dine, asking-for-the-business, always-texting job. Boom. There it is. I’m better than a stinking sales rep. If we don’t win the deal (I’ve never worked for the number one vendor in any market in which I’ve competed, never been part of a team that blew through the competition into dominance), I at least won the customer’s heart. Or the sales rep’s. They’re often my primary customer anyway. That we lost is not my fault.

Which begs the question “why can’t I lose?” and its logical successor, “what happens if you lose?”

Why? When did this competitive compulsion come into being? Let’s look backward. Obviously, in my career, with a family and financial obligations, I cannot afford to lose. I took a three week vacation in September this year, and it was the longest I’d ever gone not officially working since I was probably seventeen. My official professional career has had stops of three years, six years, seven years, fifteen years. The shark swims forward and I succeed, because I cannot lose.

Why can’t I lose? Teenage years. Ugh, it’s all competition and survival of the fittest and law of the jungle, even back in the (comparatively) quaint times of the 1980s. One-upsmanship and belittling of others was the law of the land and the weapon in your hand. Safety off, locked, loaded. Eyes scanning. Hey, Lincoln, you sure as hell can raise yourself up by putting someone else down. Add in sophomoric schoolboy cleverness for bonus points.

Why can’t I lose? Ah-ha! It was the neighborhood in New Hampshire. Those kids were a new level of mean and spiteful to an innocent who moved in from away. I recall joining in a back yard wiffle-ball game the street over and coming home in tears because of the way these kids (my age and younger!) teased and insulted and even swore at each other. Kill or be killed.

There was a kid, George, whose family moved in from New Jersey, and boy did he have problems. I think that I can’t lose? This kid would deny reality itself:

“George, you’re out.” “No I’m not.” “George, the three of us made the ball bounce through your square and you didn’t save it. You’re out.” “No.” This would then devolve into tantrums and the end of the game. George was, beyond any power of instant replay, absolutely out. And here again, I was better than George because I didn’t throw a tantrum when l lost. George did have real problems and a messed up family. My hat is off to him, because I think he was both justified and found a path through.

So it was New Hampshire.

Except…

Before we moved there (now we’re talking age 3-9), there was competition and expectation. My brother and me, our cousins Donna and Debbie. Two sets of peers the same age. Who was faster, who was smarter, who grew more? Not a problem, we were two boys and my uncle had two girls. Ten points and victory, house Gryffindor. Oh, there were fun, joyous times. Donna got in trouble by having me sing Yankee Doodle but starting each word off with the letter ‘f’. Try it. I didn’t know what that word meant, but a “Donna!” was heard from the kitchen.

Block party, Plumwood Road, Dayton Ohio. 1976. I’m pretty darn sure it was 1976 because I had these awesome new stars and stripes sneakers. Coolest things ever, and I can’t believe I got them. (I never got a bomb-pop. You want to talk about jealousy) Anyway, with my new sneakers, I could clearly beat my friend/nemesis (Wait! That was a frenemy forty-six years ago! I have no friends, only rivals.) Christopher Robbin Knowlton in a sprint. Except I didn’t. Was I a good sport? Hell no. I recall throwing a fit and crying and going home. Although I could be confusing it with the bicycle decorating competition that same or a different year, where I had applied streamers and clothes pins and cards and stickers to my bike and I was a shoo-in to win. Except I didn’t. Was I a good sport? Hell no. I know for sure that I threw a fit and cried and knocked my bike over and walked home. I do recall adults laughing (nervously?) to defuse the situation of the poorly behaved child. I do believe that mom came along quickly to comfort.

So it wasn’t the pressure of career, it wasn’t the survival of high school, it wasn’t the (objectively spoiled, mean, rotten) shits in Amherst, no. It was there from the beginning. Why can’t I lose? It is the air that I breathe, the water that passes though my gills.

I cannot lose. Everyone better than me is an asshole, everyone I’m better than (which is the other 99.44% of the population) is an idiot. What’s that make me? Awesome or the exact inverse?

Imagine having me for a father, someone who has never lost and holds the losers in contempt …in a very gracious, sporting, noble way, of course, because I am a wonderful, humble, considerate man.

If I’m your father, everything is a competition. Whatever you bring to me will be judged because, as we’ve covered, it is the air I breathe. I mean no harm, …but I cause it. I’m not like the other dads out there who actively demand better, who yell at their kids, who might even beat them physically.

See what I did there? I’m not like those other parents. Gawsh, I’m awesome.

Akshually, I’m worse. I’m inadvertently perpetuating that survival-via-victory, that trial and judgement, judgement, judgement in and of all things, in a perverse psychological game of eking out results by not being tyrannical about it. I’m proud of your successes, and offer to help where you fail. What’s wrong with that? We must succeed because the alternative is… is... umm. My kids are better than yours, pal, so suck it. That’s what’s wrong with it.

Imagine having to be my chess piece in my grandmaster’s game against all comers, “One hand tied behind my back and only using half my brain”, “Feints within feints within feints, young Feyd.” Yes, my pride has even suggested to me that I’m a Mentat, seeing all angles and understanding everything. Fear is the mind-killer indeed.

If you’re my knight or bishop or rook, (to be clear about this metaphor: my kids are my chess pieces in the game I will never lose against anyone and everyone else, and they can choose which piece they will be. I’ve set the board and trained the troops, and they play the game for me), you’re going to bring your best and beat me as soon and as soundly as you can. My eldest beat me at golf when he was ten or eleven and it hasn’t been close since. If you’re my king or pawn, you’re never going to engage in anything remotely resembling competition. Hide behind the defenses. Let someone else engage. Castle in desperation, and flee. Let yourself be taken off the board, because then, at least, your part in the game is over. Choosing the path of the pawn is extremely difficult when even the simple task of beating eggs is a competition. It’s easier to not engage than make an omelet the wrong way. You can only move one cautious step at a time, looking around to see if it’s safe before pulling your finger off your piece. Will you tell me of your failures? Will you admit to yourself they are failures? Yes: and be the idiot loser I’ve slain and bragged about your whole life. No: and continue the climb to the top. Regardless, don’t you be you. There is a judgement.

Compete. I compel you to compete. From my father’s father’s father back to the dawn of time, down to you and your children and grandchildren. Compete. I curse and compel you to compete.

And so, why can’t I lose?

I… just can’t. Resolved. To lose is to give in is to give up, and to give up is to lose. Infinite loop, back to the beginning. Here’s the debug output: If I can’t lose, then you can’t lose. Good luck, kid. No pressure.

So let’s <BREAK> to the next question and debug. What happens if I lose?

Well, what happens if mom gets to “three”?

What happens if the monkey reaches for the banana that once, generations of monkeys ago, was electrified, but by which no monkey in living memory has ever been shocked. Gosh, how powerful a concept “in living memory” is. Because they’re the only ones who could possibly warn you that this is all a ruse, that what they tell you is not the way things were. Better get rid of or silence those living with memories. But that’s a rabbit hunt for another day.

Seth Godin once had to corral a bunch of rowdy, excited students he was chaperoning in an international airport. A simple “points will be deducted!” (there were no points) and the sheep calmed and complied. What a dirty, awful trick. I’ve tried it with adults. It works.

What happens if I lose?

Nobody knows. I’ll be in trouble. Darkness. Fear. Anger. Shame. Embarrassment.

What happens if I lose, give in, admit failure, seek to fix mistakes, address the un-addressable that cannot be spoken of or I’ll die of mortification, because I’m not at fault and not to blame and it’s not what I intended?

Doesn’t matter. The consequences are there, real, and expanding the bubble to bursting.

What happens if I lose?

Will I be loved?

Will I be forgiven?

Well, yes.

It’s worth the pain and worth the risk to get that love, to get that forgiveness. For then I would be loved for who I am: a human, broken limbs, warts and all, in need of love, and not loved merely for what I have accomplished.

And the loop would be broken, the program crashed, the system shut down, and I could attempt to write some new code on a new operating system.

<HARD REBOOT>

C:\format *.* /f /r