Raise your hand if you are guilty of making your own life more complicated than it needs to be. I have come face to face this week with the fact that how I define winning and losing is severely complicating my life. This week I want to spend some time unpacking where my stinkin’ thinkin’ came from. I challenge you, as you read, to think of your own life. How can challenging outdated personal definitions improve how you live?

My induction to the winner’s circle came in fourth grade. Mother picked me up from baton practice one afternoon and said we needed to stop by the grocery store on the way home. I was wildly annoyed. I was bone tired and nine years old. I prepared myself for the usual eternal slog through the store. Pure dread set in. When we walked into the store, instead of turning right and grabbing a cart, we went straight to the little store office just inside the door. Mother said who we were, and an excited man came out and congratulated me. He awarded me with a small yellow blow dryer. I entered the Sally Sunflower Grocery Store coloring contest in the weeks prior, and I was their winner.

The little yellow blow dryer instantly became my most prized possession. It was an odd choice of an award for a 9-year-old, but I went with it. I was the winner, and to the winner went a small yellow blow dryer. The picture I colored also hung on the wall at the grocery store for a week or so afterward. I achieved Sally Sunflower fame. Fame felt nice.

Four years later, when I started competing in gymnastics, I began craving victory. Much like coloring, success in gymnastics is determined by skill, artistry, and perfection. I worked hard. I won the Class IV Mississippi State Gymnastics Championship at the end of my second year of competition. That victory ignited a drive from somewhere deep within me. The more blue ribbons I got, the more obsessed I became with wanting to be the winner. I learned to associate winning with standing at the top of the podium, everyone else beneath me.

I competed for Sundancers Gymnastics. Our team competed well. We had many individual winners and often found ourselves at the top of the podium in team competition as well. The one team that beat us regularly was Susie’s Elites. Susie had a team of tiny phenoms. They were cute and very good at gymnastics. The best we could hope for was second place against them. We fought hard but never beat them.

Second place team finishes against Susie’s Elites were where I learned about losing. All these years later, I realize it never mattered there were teams who finished behind us. There were teams who got no awards at all. I never once considered them. All I could see was the distance from where I stood to the top of the podium. I considered second place as the first loser. What a bratty attitude!

The competition monster inside me re-awakened, a little more than 7 years ago when I started doing CrossFit. I was immediately good at some things because of my gymnastics background. Other things conquered me. I stuck with it, though, because it was a good decision to be engaging in regular physical activity. Also, the environment felt familiar.

My CrossFit journey has been rough. I am old. My joints are compromised from all the gymnastics when I was younger. For the longest time, I kept going back to the gym because there was a distant glimmer of the opportunity to compete if and when I became successful at the sport. That distant glimmer faded a little more with every setback due to my worn-out body. After three ankle surgeries, possible future shoulder surgery, and recurring neck and low back pain, the glimmer has been extinguished. Now, I am simply addicted. I will keep going, but I am having to re-define winning and losing.

A workout this week went very sideways, for me, mentally. I had a plan before I started. My drive to compete kicked in at a wildly inopportune moment, and I let my mind wander away from the plan. I spent the remainder of the workout fighting for an irrational and physically impossible outcome. I did not finish last, but I declared myself the solid loser. I left upset. I was unkind to myself all the way home.

What outdated definitions are you holding onto? If you are struggling to come up with anything, consider the expectations or personal rules you have for yourself. What are things in your life that feel non-negotiable but, when you put some thought into them, you question how they achieved non-negotiable status? How are those rules impacting the mess and mire of your life that happens between sleeps?

For me, I have a rule to never finish last, i.e. don’t lose. My narrow, outdated definition for losing has kept me from all the positive benefits of good decisions I make that don’t ultimately look like my expectations would dictate. After the sideways workout this week, I used a lifeline and reached out via text to the coach. She was able to point out some facts, and help me name some of my own, that point to how I AM already winning in my journey. She helped me re-frame winning and losing.

Sometimes, I may feel like I am losing. The truth is every day that I choose to make healthy choices, like getting to the gym, is a win. I may finish dead last. I may even need to scale the workout so much that it doesn’t resemble what is written on the board. ANYTHING I do at the gym is winning. Choosing to just sit around, or binge TV with an entire bag of chips is what losing actually looks like in my life.

Here are my definition re-writes:

Winning – Finishing first ahead of everyone else  Tenaciously pursuing good habits and giving myself grace by accepting that the practice may look messy and imperfect

Losing – Not being the best in the room at whatever activity I choose to engage in  Choosing to not be personally challenged in any way, leading to an unfulfilling and irresponsible lifestyle

What about you? Have you come up with anything? As we rapidly approach the time of year where many consider what can be done differently to make life better, let’s consider what drives our expectations for ourselves. What definitions can we re-write to get better outcomes next year?