Afraid to Win

I'm not emotionally mature enough to be a good sports competitor. 

I avoid competition with others.  I don't fear competition.  But I avoid it because it dredges up so many ugly parts of my personality. 
 

I'm juuusstt beginning to understand the edges of me and cycling competition.  Just a peek under the covers at this point. 

How do I know this?  Because I don't take sports competition seriously.  I take it GRAVELY. 

Victory or death.  At least that is the silent message I've given myself all these years.  Crazy.  Absolutely crazy. 

I am in over my head.  I shut down all other parts of my life.  I'm all gas pedal.  No brakes.  Even less steering.  Just a big glob of dangerous intensity. 

Dangerous.  That isn't a macho compliment. 

I'm all `below the neck' and very little `above the neck.'  A sure fire guarantee for reckless failure. 

And I succeed sometimes only due to dumb luck.  Weather.  Bad luck on the part of others.  Suspension of the laws of physics.  (There have been times when tragedy escaped me.  And I still don't know how, let alone why).

Though I've never actually cheated in sports I am a hair's breadth from attacking my fellow sports competitors.  More than aggression.  Outright hostility.

Attacking.  Like ... pushing them, physical assault, making them stop for good.  It's right there in my mind, in front of me.  My whole body wants to stop the other competitor. 

Maybe I stop myself from competing for fear that I'll actually do something that I would regret, feel ashamed about.  Maybe not competing, not trying to win, is a kind of an unconscious restraint. 

If I fear doing destruction to others, and am unaware of the psychological dynamics underlying this fear ...

I became aware of this desperation only recently.  And I don't really know why this insight has bubbled to the surface at this time and place.  But it helps. 

It helps because this awareness allows me to more carefully and thoughtfully identify cycling competition goals.  And to train more thoughtfully. 

For example, here is what I'm thinking about now, in advance of the coming warmer months: 

 

• Participate in more short competitions.  That is, shorter distances. 
• Why?  Because being in the mix of competitions more frequently will allow me to get closer to the part of me that gets undone. 

I need more time. 

Action Defines Us.