 Contests & Activities: September 05, 2012 Issue [#5244] |
  Contests & Activities
This week: Happy Losing! Edited by: spidey  
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Welcome to the Contests & Activities Newsletter. I'm spidey , and I'm your Editor this week!
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Happy Losing!
You may or may not know that I'm a runner. I started 3 years ago, so I'm fairly new. Last year I ran my first 10k race on a fairly easy course. Very little hills, mostly along a highway, with other novice runners. Near the end I passed a couple of college-age guys. That felt pretty great!
Almost two weeks ago, I ran a much more competitive 10k race. Want to know how I finished?
Dead last.
In my defense, the race was made up mostly of high school cross-country athletes, the majority of which ran the 5k distance. There were only maybe 40 runners doing the 10k (6.2 miles for those who are metrically-challenged), and in my age group there were only 3 runners! I could have gotten a medal, but they only gave them to the top 2 finishers. 
I could be upset about being in last place, about having the volunteers have to wait for me to cross the finish line to close everything down, about the EMS guy on the four-wheeler following me to the end (he only asked me once if I was okay), but I'm not. I'm proud of myself for trying and for finishing. It's not all about winning when it comes to running.
The same can be said about writing.
We enter contests with the hope of winning, but there are only a handful of winners, so the majority of the time, we lose. The important thing, though, is that we don't give up! We keep on trying! 
Winning isn't everything! Sure it's fun to win and get recognition and gift points, but the true reward is the growth and improvement we can get from practice.
Even though I felt some disappointment in how I finished in that race, I also feel really good about my effort. About one mile in, I knew I'd finish last. I could see no one else in sight and knew I'd have very little chance of catching up. Even though I felt like giving up a few times, I didn't, and I'm a stronger, better runner because of it! I think we can all agree that Writing.Com makes us stronger, better writers, regardless of winning or losing a contest. The important thing is to keep trying!
Always keep on writing!
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My last newsletter, ("Contests & Activities Newsletter (August 8, 2012)" ), discussed what to do once you've lost a contest.
Dawn Embers  Great topic on what to do if losing. I have heard so many judges struggle when someone reacts to losing, questioning their decision. At the end of the day, even the contests are all personal opinion and losing doesn't mean a person's story is bad, just that in that moment it didn't strike the judge in the right way. But that's okay. As long as we are writing, that is what matters. ~ Dawn Embers
That's so true!
Questions to think about:
What have you learned from losing in your personal life and on WDC? |
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