Even though I am the oldest of 3 siblings, this has never been good enough. I was still competitive: competing for attention, love, and the best of anything that anyone could ever offer me. My brother (who is only 4 months younger than me) always seemed to try to outdo me. He’d challenge me to race him to the end of the yard, try to beat me at a game, and show me his straight “A” report cards. He was annoying but I couldn’t help to fall for it. I mean “I am the oldest”, I thought to myself, “I should be better than him”.As I got older my need to compete only became stronger and for a long time, I was ashamed of it. Why did everything have to be a competition? I was motivated by the challenge and felt gratified by the feeling of victory. It wasn’t until I starting taking on leadership roles that I started to adapt. Now I had to depend on others to win. With a perfectionist mentality, this was a challenge until I realized how this was affecting my relationships with others. More than wanting to win, I wanted to connect with others and I could see how my laser focus on results was making others feel. I had a vision of the type of person (not just a leader) I wanted to be and was determined to do and be better. Over the years my competitiveness became personal and I began to redefine my definition of winning to align with my values: Creativity, Organization, Inspiration, and Resilience.I’m still a competitor but these days I’m only competing with myself to be a better version of myself than I was yesterday. In the end, I just want to do important work and make a significant contribution to the world with the talents and abilities God has given me.