It doesn’t matter what it is. If it is important to us, we want to be the best/white knight/Queen bee/prima donna/favorite student/teacher’s pet. It only takes two to compete. Big brother vs. baby sister. The dog vs. the cat. At school, the lowliest of the students dreams of beating the odds to become the first in class. And when this actually happens the world (the class) is turned upside down, shocked and miserable that someone is “better” than them.
It’s all because we care. We care about the things that we considered as our image. When our identity is threatened we become angry and confrontational, or cold and unresponsive. Maybe it is better not to have an identity. Then there is nothing to compare with.
But we thrive on praise, like babies crying for attention. It is the wanting that makes us strike out.
