Fingers on buzzers, please! Let us find out who can answer the following questions correctly. How many subject categories are there in the game ‘Trivial Pursuit’? When was ‘Trivial Pursuit’ invented? How many editions of ‘Trivial Pursuit’ have been developed? Who invented the game ‘Trivial Pursuit’? What other game were they playing when they invented ‘Trivial Pursuit’? What were they drinking when they invented ‘Trivial Pursuit’?
The fact is, ‘Trivial Pursuit’ is exactly what it says – trivial. The questions in the game (like the ones above) are trivial, inconsequential, insignificant, meaningless. If you are not convinced, try some of these questions from ‘Trivial Pursuit’: How many times has Cristiano Ronaldo won the World Player of the Year award? The marriage between which two famous people was described as ‘Egghead meats hourglass’? What did Canada declare illegal in 1992, saying they were degrading to women?
Yet we do not need to look too far to see that the ‘Trivial Pursuit’ game (and its off-shoot, the Pub Quiz) can become very competitive. Players from opposing teams delight when people get the answers wrong; they try to put them off answering the correct question; they challenge unclear answers; they complain when opponents get an ‘easy’ question; they blame defeat on the roll of the dice; they thump the table when they get an answer incorrect. In fact, competitive ones among us may well be screaming to have the answers to the above questions; we want to know if we got them right, so we can raise our arms aloft and punch the air – come on! But, wait, there is actually no competition! There are no prizes; no-one else needs to know if we got them right; nothing is dependent on us getting them right; the information is not essential. In seeking to be proved right, we are simply becoming com-petty-tive! We are drawing out the petty in com-petty-tiveness.
Not long ago Liverpool Football Club was faced with a difficult situation, they being a victim of their own success. They had to complete two full competitive fixtures within twenty-four hours of each other, in different competitions and on different continents – the FIFA Club World Cup and the Carabao Cup. They could not use the same players for both matches, obviously, so they picked two entirely different squads, the one being comprised primarily of their youth players, with the sum total of sixteen first-team appearances before that match and an average age of nineteen. In other words, they chose to treat one competition less seriously than the other. The players in each team were competitive but perhaps the club was not so in one of them.
In fairness to Liverpool, most soccer clubs do the same, ranking the different competitions in which they play – they do not always play their strongest team in every match but use some competitive matches as opportunities to ‘blood’ younger players, to prepare them for when they are really needed in the ‘big’ competitions. They are more competitive in some areas than others, no doubt depending on the rewards available for success in that area. That is understandable. Some competitions carry greater significance and importance than others.
So here is the crucial point: there is definitely a place for competition but not everything must be competitive. It is important to be competitive but only in important areas of life. Just as tennis players do not have to win every point to win their match, so we do not have to win everything; we do not have to win arguments; we do not have to be at the front of the queue; we do not have to bet on everything from a friendly game of golf to an inter-school match. Much of that is petty.
Sadly however we are often in danger of making everything in life a competition, from board games to Board plans, much of which is only petty. Yes, we need to help our children be competitive but part of that lesson is to learn when and how they should be competitive. It will help us greatly in being competitive to have perspective. Some things, many things, in life are not to be competitive. We do not always have to win. It is not crucial that we win everything. We do not have to win arguments, but we can still disagree – after all, not all will agree with this writer on any or all of these points – as it is not a competition. There is no winner and no need of a winner! We need to stop pursuing trivial and petty points; we need to stop making everything competitive.
