Competition arises whenever at least two parties strive for a goal that can’t be shared an essential part of our world, where only the strongest can and will survive. Competition is the basis of any job interviews, sports, college admission, etc. On one hand, competition literally determines who will be brought into this world, by the strongest sperm cell reaching the ovum. Which brings me to the point that some may argue that competition is always unhealthy, the nature of competition forms positive relationships and promotes innovation.
However, the influence of competition is not always positive. Because we are competing at the expense of the other person or other people involved which affects your values and where you stand morally. Basically meaning our success depends on their failure. First, In order to compete a person must always have a rival. Secondly, competition sometimes destroys the enjoyment of the activity. If you are only concentrating on the idea of being first then you are never going to be able to enjoy what you are doing in that moment because you are too worried about the outcome. An example of competition becoming so overpowering to the point where it affects your morals was when Tonya Harding ruined her chance at the sport of ice skating when she was implicated in the attack on fellow skater Nancy Kerrigan at the 1994 Winter Olympics trials. Another side you can look at to where competition is bad is by examining the effects in has on friendships or any type of relationship. For instance, it can negatively impact your friendship because these types of friendships doesn’t make one feel supported or appreciated. Friendly competition is always a good thing since it can push both parties to reach their full potential. The problem comes in when you are trying to outdo the other, in doing this it can result in an increase in jealousy and outdoing the friend becomes more important that the friend achieving his or her goals overall.
In addition to competition being negative it also has major plus sides that leads to the development of people and businesses and the growth of our economy. Without competition everyone will be the same, which is boring. Competition drives people to be better and with it there is constantly a bigger and better goal to reach because there is always someone out there better than you. It is the main driving force in business and economics, which makes enterprises work hard, struggling for better profits. It is the stimulus for many students to study and get more chances to win a university scholarship and sportsmen to train hard, as it is the competition which makes the sporting events so enjoyable both for the participants and the viewers. On a bigger scale it can develop a nation because with competition it will push us to keep up with developing countries and when they are advancing in technologies we will too, resulting in us being prepared for the worst. To go into further detail about the claim I just mentioned an example of that would be back in the 1900s when WWI was still occuring in order to stand up against Germany, Great Britain, etc the United States needed to have the correct type and amount of armour. So by other nations developing their weapons it resulted in United States doing so as well because we are competing with them. According to “WWI Technologies an the Weapons of War” it states, “Perhaps the most significant technological advance during World War I was the improvement of the machine gun, a weapon originally developed by an American, Hiram Maximum. The Germans recognized its military potential and had large numbers ready to use in 1914. They also developed air-cooled machine guns for airplanes and improved those used on the ground, making them lighter and easier to move. The weapon’s full potential was demonstrated on the Somme battlefield in July 1916 when German machine guns killed or wounded almost 60,000 British soldiers in only one day.” Which proves my position on how wanting to compete with other nations ultimately benefited us in the war and our weapon advancements.
Lastly, competition can lead to promoting a positive healthy relationship. We will start to focus too much on our competitor instead of the business we were doing in the first place. It can lead to a healthy relationship because you will both have a respect for each other, and will challenge each other in ways that you wouldn’t normally do with other people. With a friend you might want to “out-do” one another as a form of friendly competition. It is not about winning it's about wanting the best outcome for one another. According to nbc news, “If you're noticing these harmful competitive patterns in your own friendships, the first step toward making the shift to a healthier way of competing is to acknowledge it.” followed by, “This awareness also keeps the competitiveness from getting out of control and helps someone keep the larger goals of maintaining closeness in the relationship at heart.' This explains a way to manage a friendship if you feel yourself starting to get jealous of the other person
In conclusion, competition can be a good and bad thing depending on how you use it. You can either be on the side of people that takes competition farther than it needs to go and it ends up doing more harm than good or it can be a great thing that leads to the united states developing in many different aspects such as our technological advancements. Moreover, it depends on the type of person you are and how far will you go to “win” or “be better” than the person you are competing with.