"Winning means being unafraid to lose."

--Fran Tankerton, one-time great NFL quarterback

It's true that we cannot always win in life but we can always give our best. Being able to give our best means we are able to achieve performance success. Once we reach this level in our performance our chance of success will greatly increased. In fact, performance success or being able to give our best is one of the success factors in life be it in business, work, competitions, etc.

However, if you start worrying whether we will succeed or not, whether you will win or not, whether you will make it or not, then chances are your performance level will start to go down. Everything will not come easy anymore, and it will be an uphill battle from there.

I remember when I was in high school, I represented, as board one chess player, the Mandaue City Schools Division during the 1996 Regional Meet held in Bohol, Philippines. During the early part of the tournament I lost all my first three games. I was so disappointed with my performance because I knew I can do better. However, something happened because I won the remaining six games, straight. As a result I placed third in the individual ranking.

What happened? During the first three games I was so nervous and got intimidated with my opponents that my thoughts were mostly centered on losing. I even remember that I thought that there's no way I can win. I simply forgot to think about winning. But something strange happened when I decided I stop thinking about losing; I relaxed and started to enjoy the game. Automatically, I started focusing on finding ways to win, and my performance level increased a lot. I was so satisfied with my performance that I couldn't almost believe it.

Bottom line, no matter how prepared you are, once you started entertaining thoughts of losing, pictures of you losing and humiliated will start playing in your mind like a movie, and you will start to have self-doubt. Once this happened performance success will start to tip to the other direction which is performance failure.

PS: To read more powerful quote, quotes, quotations, and insightful reflections, click HERE. To learn more about performance success, how to succed in life, success principles, winning in life, creative, creativity, good ideas, becoming a winner, the "I can" attitude, success factor, success factors, and winning, click HERE.