The skills and expertise can be enhanced effectively through competition. It was the national level competition organized by the rich traders of Florence which inspired the artists to go beyond their limits to create awesome designs, and work of art, which when completed awed even the creator.
Mihály Csíkszentmihályi in his book Flow says that the consciousness gets more complex each time a person encounters competition, and breaks her limits and becomes better. By "complex" he means that a person become unique, and more skillful, with each such competition. There is another much more profound aspect of this complexity, which involves development of "integration" inside ones consciousness, in which the person does no more compete against other individuals, but competition becomes an end to itself, in order to become better. The person feels that she is part of the whole, and it is not that she is a separate ego, fighting against others. Well, I will not go in depth of this aspect, as the main subject of this article is something else.
Well, getting back to the importance of competition, scrutiny and criticism, it has been found by various psychologists is that it is only through a constant challenge to do more and better, that creates an original creativity which is of very high value.
Extending this aspect of sociology, to the common friendship, one lands into an important realization. Most of the times we are attracted to people who think like us, have similar value system and interests. We say that our thoughts match. We feel comfortable in company of such friends. Even if you look deeply into a romantic relationship, it is also based on this aspect of endorsement. The lover feels important and happy by the realization that the loved on likes her, and understands her. She is very important to the loved one's life.
But then, this pleasure of kinship, harms the creativity of a person. It does not aid the consciousness of the person to grow "complex". This is because one is always surrounded by agreement, and praise. There is no one who can stand against the person, or rather bring up something that challenges the person to go beyond his current abilities.
Like for example, a mother is always filled with praise for her son. No matter how ordinary is the son, she always has this blind, narrow minded superiority feeling for her son. Such blind approvals tend to reduce the creativity and potentiality of an individual.
Much of the greatness of Raphael was due to the criticism he used to get from Michaelangelo, and the competition from other great artists of the Renaissance era. If Raphael might have been surrounded only by his fans, he might never had gone beyond his limits.
Mihály Csíkszentmihályi says - "The idea of friends - when a friendship is primarily a way validating ones own sense of self, it will give pleasure, but it will not be enjoyable, as it does not make our consciousness complex". Even familial bonds should be directed towards making the consciousness more complex"
The company of peers, like every other activity, can be experienced at various levels of complexity - at the lowest level - it is pleasurable way to ward off chaos and feel happy, temporarily; at the highest it provides a strong sense of enjoyment and growth.
Unfortunately most of kinship in our society is based on the lowest level of complexity - where it is all about agreement and making the other feel accepted, and cared. By design, due to our animal instincts we herd with other animals who belong to the same species of our intellect. We never want to shun that aura of comfort zone, as being with our own species fuels our ego, and the pride of being right.
Humans have to realize that the only way they can keep growing is challenging themselves every day with something bigger and nobler, not by being in the bliss of the pleasure of kinship.
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Copy Right © All rights reserved - Samrat Kar
Copy Right © All rights reserved - Samrat Kar
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