I have always love owls because it so rare to see one in the city where I live. The only ones we have can only be found in the zoo and they are usually in too dark of a place to capture without using fast lenses.

For some reason, I felt that this seemed like a fitting image for this post. Love how the two on the right snuggle together while the one on the left seemed to be in its own world. Personally it seems to symbolize between competitiveness and cooperation. It truly makes me happy to be able to capture this during a recent trip to Australia. Such simple things and yet so amazingly wonderful.

Supposedly one day your organs decide to compete with one another to see which part will reign supreme so that it can prove its importance, what will happen? The mind fights with the heart trying to prove that it is more intelligent and that it is the one in control, the heart stops beating to prove its worth to the mind; your whole body system will run into chaos and because of this disharmony, life cannot function. It is already in our nature to be harmonious and if we are created this way, it make sense that to live a joyful life, harmony is needed. Harmony can only be achieved through cooperation. Why is it then in the current situation, it seems like there is more competition than cooperation in our world? Much of it is attributed to the way we are educated. We were brought up in a competitive environment where schools teaches us to compete unconsciously at a very young age when our minds are still very open to suggestions. Education is nice but the scores on the results is not an accurate measurement of whether someone understands the subject or not, it becomes just a tool for competition. Nothing builds ego faster than rewarding the top scorers. Sports are also built into the school system for fostering the competitive spirit, teams may be formed for cooperation but ultimately it is about winning the other team. There can only be one winner so what happens to the majority of losers that makes up the rest of the population? Depression, low self-esteem, jealousy and low compassion for others are some of the results and we wonder why people in the city has gone so cold towards one another.

One of the main outcome of competition is a lack mentality. Nothing destroys the joy of our lives faster than a lack mentality. The reason we have to compete is because of the idea that something is limited. There are not enough resources to go around, not enough jobs, not enough money, etc. Everything revolves around competing for a limited piece of pie. Another argument that I heard quite often is that competition actually helps one to improve their craft, without it people will become complacent. I would actually beg to differ, you see you can only become complacent by giving up working on yourself. The only way to improve your craft is to be uniquely you, it cannot be found through copying and comparison. Competing is but looking at what others do and you try to be better than them in the hopes that you would be more successful but you realized that wherever you look, there is always someone better. This would only result in you giving up eventually because it is impossible to win. Winning today will only set you up to lose tomorrow.

The only way to truly win is to be yourself. It is about cooperating with the person that you are. When you realize how significant you are with the unique gift that only you can give, you start cooperating not only with yourself but with others and eventually with the universe itself. You will realize that by letting go of that competitiveness, everything around you is actually aiding you to flower your gift. People stop becoming a threat and instead everyone becomes an ally. When you are not competing, you are finally creating. When we allow, nature itself is in abundance. Fishes miraculously breed in the ocean, trees starts to wondrously bear fruits, the earth creates all the resources that we need. Lack only appears when the competitive spirit in us starts to hoard faster than nature can produce, all because of greed and the fear of losing.

When people start  to realize this, the world would be a drastically different place. Money is not the root of all evil, competition is the cause. If people would only cooperate, there is actually enough resources and food for all of humanity. It is always a beautiful sight to see people working together for a common cause—to create together while discovering the greatest potential that one has to offer.

You want joy and a different perspective in life? Choose wisely between competition or cooperation.