Losing is much better than not playing

(2-minute read time)

A while back I had the pleasure of game night at a friend’s house.  We played Clue. You remember: “It was Colonel Mustard, with the candlestick in the library!” I hadn’t played that game in years, it was so much fun.  

What you may not know about me is I L-O-V-E board games, card games, word games all of it.  What I don’t love is losing. In fact, I remember as a kid more than one Monopoly board was tossed in the aggravation of losing.

I got to thinking about it and I wondered why do we hate losing?  Is it really that we hate losing or is it that we just really enjoy winning?

Either way, most of us who like game nights still partake even though there’s always the risk of losing.  Perhaps it’s because the stakes are low. It’s just game night so there is no long-lasting consequence for falling short.  We would rather have the experience and risk losing than not have the experience at all.

But how about when the stakes are higher?  For example, our careers.

Should I go for that promotion?  Pursue that degree? Start that business?  Ask for the raise? Move into that new field?  

At each decision point, our brains will do a risk/reward analysis and usually, the outcome is to take as low of a risk as possible.  Even if it means not playing at all.

Here’s the problem with that.   While it feels safe to stay with the status quo, this perceived “safety” is not going to keep you from being uncomfortable.  Yes, there will be discomfort in going for it but there’s also discomfort in staying the same.

If you are going to be uncomfortable either way I challenge you to do a deeper risk/reward analysis.  What’s the worst that can happen?

Here are the two worst case scenarios:

1. You go for it and fail:  This is not the end of the world.  In fact, failure only feels bad if we make it mean something bad.  We can always make failure mean anything we want. I like to just see it as information.  Information that will help me get closer on my next attempt. Viewing it this way makes losing much better than not playing at all.     
2. You don’t go for it at all, you bench yourself from the game of your career:  This one, to me, is the real tragedy.  Think of the opportunity cost. What possibilities are you giving up by NOT going for it?  Think of some of the historical greats we know and love like Dr. King – what if he didn’t go all in because the risk was so high?  Or what about tech giant duos like Steve Jobs & Steve Wozniak or Larry Page & Sergey Brin, what if they didn’t huddle up in the garages working on Apple & Google like they did because the risk was too high?  

It’s your career.  You’re likely going to spend a lot of time doing it.  Let’s do it intentionally. I can definitely help, just click here to schedule a free, 30-minute discovery session.