How Winning and Losing Can Be Synergized -- The Big Picture
Updated: Oct 9
The truth of my genius is that I can see beauty in almost anything. -- Mr. Nathan Lasher
For every reasonable human being, winning and losing are, by default, complete opposites. That's because a person who constantly loses can never be deemed a winner, and someone who constantly wins, cannot really be deemed a loser. Likewise, it would be nonsensical for the loser to be winning by default, and still remain a loser, and vice versa.
However, we may fail to look at this logical example from an additional dimension. If we only look at things from a single dimension, we would also lose a significant portion of our understanding of the topic at hand.
In the case of this example, our viewpoint may remain shallow or one-dimensional. Resorting to such simplification is a bad idea because the bigger picture needs to be considered in order to understand reality.
Therefore, if we add the second dimension of time ('B') and not only the state of being ('A'), we would soon realize that the picture is more complicated.
In this case, winning and losing could be seen as a process or an evolution, rather than a static state of existence. It would only make sense to do so as philosophers, given that reality is not static but dynamic. We can also learn from this that it is extremely important not to give in to confirmation bias.
Because if we gave in to this bias, we would judge reality by a trait it does not regularly have (being static). In general, attributing confidence to doubtless claims would therefore be a mistake. Make sure you are open-minded enough to explore the possibilities that exist beyond your personal impressions.
Anyways, not only winning and losing can exist in a sequence, but they can also cooperate, or lead to one another. Let me give you a more concrete example: When Nazi Germany lost in WWII, some Germans won as well. After the fall of Hitler, that regime had a second dictator. In other words, thanks to Hitler's death, someone actually got to be in charge of his empire, even if briefly. A more obvious example in this context is the forced workers at labor camps, who won their freedom thanks to the defeat of their forced employers by the end of the war.
In other words, if Nazi Germany had not lost World War II, people would not have won anything related to the war. Therefore, loss is beneficial not only to opponents, as seen in the example of the second and last dictator of the Nazi regime. War, for that matter, leads to advancement in technology, leading to new discoveries and developments.
Ironically, even if the cause you work for, willingly or otherwise, loses, you might still earn something in return. As long as you learn something, you always win something! Furthermore, you may learn without your awareness, and especially when you sleep.
Arguably, there is no win without investment. Investment is essentially the loss of resources for a particular cause. Please note that not every loss is a complete loss. A complete loss has no return; any other "impure" loss, has. If it had not, it was "pure", as in "complete".
Thus, any loss that is not "pure"/"complete" can be used in synergy for a greater win. And even if you win, or achieve something, very swiftly and easily, you still invested some time into it. Therefore, there is no such thing as a win that is pure of any loss.
There is no cost that is not a loss, by the way. That's why people may claim that...
In war, whichever side may call itself the victor, there are no winners, but all are losers -- Neville Chamberlain
Looking at the bigger picture means giving the participants/agents of a situation the bias-reduced importance they deserve. The importance they deserve is in relation to your attempt to understand reality.
You cannot look at the general picture without attributing value, because the different components of that picture have different values, relative to your own found purposes. If a rocket from a hostile nation is headed your way, and you just dropped your ice cream on the sidewalk, surely your own safety is far more important than going back to the vendor and buying a new ice cream. A pragmatic view can come from a general understanding, however it is one which is, then, focused on a priority. Should you prioritize the ice cream, you may lose your life, and not just your money. Should you look for shelter or simply lie on the ground, you will have to be still, safe but not refreshed.
This analogy teaches us that we should value our own safety over comfort because survival deserves to be above temporary pleasures. When you die, you can't win any further. You can only win as an overarching influence, as in the case of my late grandmother.
Should we fail to give things the importance they deserve, in the general picture of a subject or situation, we may easily become more irrational. Hence why we must evaluate the things we gain and the things we lose within many actions we perform, if we want to be reasonable and wise.
Overestimating a loss may lead to negative surprise. Overestimating a win may lead to disappointment over your own lack of proportion.
And it is in our interest to win, AKA, to succeed within the intentions of our actions. Should we decrease our losses, we will become more successful and more "winners".
This can be applied to any field of activity, from academic to romantic. If you want a partner to stay by your side, logic would only dictate that you must sacrifice some of your resources for them in order to demonstrate your love and loyalty to them, which is the exchange of your losses. Should you not compromise yourself, not give gifts, not treat them somewhere nice, you will be losing them instead of your own resources.
Life is often about making the right sacrifices for the right gains.
How can we function wisely without having our priorities in check? Should you neglect a partner because you don't want to sacrifice for them? This is exactly where the different values of wins and losses exist within the general picture.
My advice is: Strive to prioritize the things and beings which are most valuable to you, but after looking both ways, not before. That way, you may reduce regrettable mistakes by taking on more important tasks, first. More important to you of course. You first handle your priorities, and then you can have the time to pay attention to others' priorities as well. This ambition for mutuality is the basis for reducing timing bias in relationships
I can tell you by experience that it's preferable when you have deadlines. I personally haven't broken a deadline for years. Although it did contribute to my fatigue at the time, I did anything important on time, preferring not killing time off. When importance is clearly present in any situation, I saw little reason to undermine it.
Even if you don't have a definite deadline for something, the deadline to your life can happen at any time. Any life that isn't immortal is one that is a matter of time until there's grief.
That is why I couldn't care less about the fact that I did so many things successfully in my younger years. I already have a will and am writing and philosophizing on a regular basis, solving my own problems in a large physical isolation I deem ethical. It is more important to take care of the more important things first, because there might be a time where you would not be able to do them. So seize the moment and at least try making sure you will win more than lose.
Waste too much of your time stalling and idling like an utter klumnik, and you will lose time and opportunities for winning in the name of your ambitions. The win of a vacation might not be worth the loss of time spent being productive. Maybe for rejuvenation, which is a loss of time synergized for winning. Not necessarily anything else, if you care enough to be productive.
All I can say is that I know the many sacrifices I made in this line of work. As a child I actually used to be social! Yet with time I turned into the asocial man I am today. Philosophy can be very emotionless. My sociality decreased when I began repressing myself significantly, to the point of losing much of my capacity to feel like a normal person does.
Yet, the reduction of emotion allowed me to understand much about how emotions work. In my weird experimentations I found myself being able to reduce my emotions using my thoughts.
Thanks to this ability, gained after years of asceticism, I learned that even in an ascetic life you can gain things that otherwise would not have been possible to attain... Namely, self-ruthlessness and the ability to live either way.
And for me, life is just "business". Life for me is a task. Workday after workday. For I live to win. I only intend to lose at death, when I will be discharged. It's all because I see much reason to think about the far greater picture.
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