First, I think most people believe that losing is something that happens after the fight is over. In reality losing starts in the ring or the cage or whatever setting the competition is set in. I believe somewhere in the fight everything starts to seem a little surreal. Your body seeoms to be working on autopilot. It's doing everything you tell it to do but nothing seems to be effective. Meanwhile your opponent is living out some sort of Van Damme fantasy fight. If you're anything like me, you throw back everything but the kitchen sink but with no luck on this day. Your heart started sinking in the first round when you took the first hit or maybe the middle of the fight when the pace seemed to catch up with you or maybe right at the en d when you were throwing haymakers as a last resort. Somewhere in there you just know it's not your day. That's just the beginning because now you have to see all the people not just in the stands but your friends and fmily that came to support. I become very apologetic. I always feel like I let them down. I know that's not the case but I think it will always be that way.
You've made it through the gauntlet of family and friends etc. and now you start to feel doubt in yourself and what you do. That accompanied by the guilt of letting people including yourself down plus the increasingly painful bumps and bruises, cuts and other from the fight can make for a very powerful cocktail.
Losing is your defining moment in life in any form of competition or just in life itself. It is the choice, the choice to lay down and turn the other direction or stand up and embrace the loss as a part of your education. It is the ability to face fear or turn tail. It can also be as simple as the realization that this may just not be for you or it might just be the thing you had been waiting for your whole life. In any case, losing is one of the places you wish you hadn't been but one of the places that teaches you the most. You never forget losing. I know who I am, I know what I do after a loss. Who are you? What do you do?
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ReplyDeleteVery good insight into what losing feels like and can mean and I completely agree that as bad as losing can feel, it sometimes is necessary because, like you said, it teaches us the most about ourselves. Someone’s true character is not revealed in victory, but in defeat, and how we handle losing and the way we bounce back shows us how much of a fighter we really are. Losing is necessary sometimes to put things back in perspective and force us to be honest with ourselves. I would even take it a step further and say that a lot of times losing already starts before we even step in the ring. Sometimes we’ve been winning too much for too long and we’ve gotten cocky and think we can’t be beat or have gotten bored because we feel like there’s no competition out there and we lost our drive or hunger for the sport. Or maybe we want to prove to ourselves and the world that we can take someone on with a lot more experience to feel better about ourselves. Sometimes we’re just not physically all the way healthy and feel shaky but are too proud to back out at the last minute to not look like a punk. And of course there are times that losing just happens no matter how prepared we were, but I think the key to learning from a loss is being brutally honest with ourselves about what caused the loss and where and when it really started.
ReplyDeleteAs far as being apologetic, I believe that’s a normal reaction for someone who is appreciative of the people who fully supported us throughout our journey. In a way we want to give them the win to show our gratitude and if we lose, then we feel bad that we can’t do that, so we apologize. Just know what exactly we’re apologizing for. Is it because despite having given it our all we weren’t able to give the people we appreciate that joy and happiness that a win can bring, or is it because deep down we know we didn’t give it our all and that’s the reason we lost, in which case the feeling of letting family, friends, and trainers down is actually justified. If it’s the former, then apologize but don’t dwell on it and let it go. If it’s the latter then probably an apology to ourselves and self-forgiveness becomes a necessary part of the process. Also, we can’t forget that when we lose, the people who care feel just as bad for us as we do for them and the more we apologize the worse we can make them feel. Exactly as we may feel like we let them down, they may feel the same way and feel like they let us down and maybe weren’t supportive enough or didn’t train us enough, and it’s important to be aware of that and sensitive to that so we don’t turn a loss in to something even worse than it needs to be. I’ll leave it at that because like you indicated the spectrum of emotions is far beyond words, but I believe that the main thing about losing is to understand that it can be exactly what we need to grow as an athlete and a person as long as we let it.