Competition.

Mt. Angus Sandstone Nib Wall.

Torquay, Victoria

Competition. ‘A situation in which people or organisations compete with each other for something that not everyone can have’.
It’s a stiff word.
Singular.
There are many aspects of life where competition is necessary. I think it’s a vital part of our development as people, personally and societally. It teaches the importance of losing the thing, not the lesson. It builds resilience if you don’t succeed, confidence if you do.
In business (and here I want to make a note to disassociate the act of building to the operations of business’, I think that although they’re peas from the same plant, they’re of different pods) there is indeed stiff competition. For however many people are contacted to quote a job, only one person, company, co-op, collective ad-infinitum wins the tender. The rest lose.
I think that there’s a lesson in there that can sometimes get lost in the ‘business’ of the whole thing.
The word competition takes Latin roots in ‘competitio’, which translates to rivalry.
In stonemasonry, and building, as I’ve written about previously on this blog, things just can’t be built singularly. The mason can’t lay a wall without the quarrymen. The carpenter without the faller, the baker without the miller. The person without the earth.
We are very lucky to have many skilled people across the multitude of trades that make up the fabric of society, bringing meaning and purpose to literally billions of lives around the world. What need do we have for rivalry? Appreciate the work of your competitors, let it feed your creativity, not your insecurities.
Connection, not competition.