Say hello to our new worker, Bre2k9! Be good with her or else I know some ways to torture you to death >.> ~Manager-san
.
“There is no meaning to victory, if you win alone.” Kuroko Tetsuya
What is victory? The dictionary definition is “a success or triumph over an enemy in battle or war.” When most people look at it, that is the core meaning, is it not? Victory is when you come out on top of the other person. At least, that is what others view as a victory who simply watch in most cases. To put it in the sad truth, in times, yes, simply being the winner in something does mean victory. However, there are little things where being victorious in lost, and losing in victory.
Seeing as this is based around basketball, I shall use the manga as an example. For the Generation of Miracles, they continually won. They made continual progress and never lost a single match. The longer they progressed and grew stronger, though, the less the sport was a team effort. It became all about victory, and the best player to achieve that in the games was themselves for each respective player. Yet the game appeared to be losing meaning. Winning the game became everything, but their love for what they were doing just gradually disappeared. The sport became just for them, and their teammates were simply other people to compete against. It grew to the point by the time they entered high school, the love for basketball had been buried in their own dark corners. In their lonesome victory, they lost what mattered most – a love for the game they played.
Then there is the opposite, which is Seirin. Even with the great players on their team like Kagami, Kuroko, Hyuuga, Izuki, Kiyoshi, and others of course, they suffered their share of victory and defeat. In both their victories and defeats, though, they put their entire heart into what they were doing. Their love for the sport was in each game, as well as their bond with their teammates. Even Kagami, who didn’t pass the ball very often, if at all, relied on Kuroko and the others. Because of this, when they came out in victory, they knew they had put everything they could into that match along with the people they care for. It wasn’t only one person’s victory, but the entire team’s win. Once we start to truly care for someone, we want that for them, and because both we and the ones we care for are victorious, it makes it become something so much more meaningful and fullfilling. Though, if they put their entire heart into the game, and then were defeated, wouldn’t it break them? This is where victory comes with a loss. Rather than crumbling and backing down, they stood back up. The few times a teammate did break, the others were right there to help them stand up again. They didn’t give in – they learned from what they had experienced and grew determined to grow stronger. It set a new goal before the team, and together they did everything they could to race toward it. I’m in Karate, and my sensei has said nothing is ever a loss if you learn from it, and they did this with each loss. Because they had everyone with them, Seirin never shattered, but stayed together and grew to great heights.
However, this isn’t only true in sports. With life in general you can see this as true. There is victory as well as you go through life. Some get through life worrying about getting themselves to the top. I’m sure you’ve all also seen at least one movie that depicts that one business person who let go of everything just to stand above the rest. If not, well, there are movies with men or women like that. They gain their victory, but it by themselves. Anyone who has ever gotten to this point soon realize something – victory without others is lonely. It sounds like it would be obvious, but people truly don’t realize it. Their need for victory in life can consume them with greed. Then others don’t matter. Anything to move forward will be done. If that means hurting someone, we can be blinded to it. Sometimes in reaching victory alone, we become blind. We also don’t have those around us to catch us. If we achieve victory alone, we also fall alone. You’ve heard the saying the bigger they are, the harder they fall? Just imagine getting to the top and falling just to realize there is nobody below to stop our descent.
If we allow people to be there, though, there’s no fear of spiraling like that. They are there to shoulder the burdens. They are there to push us forward. Victory once again becomes something more when it’s shared with others. For example, how many people on this site read books? Hah – stupid question, right? Have you ever noticed how pretty much every author, or at least in books you’d buy at the store and not on here, has an acknowledgement page? Or how they say thank you to someone in the beginning? That book is their victory, but it is not their own. People helped them get there. That book is their victory because it is getting it out to others. The victory is shared, and if you think of it that way, it is because it is shared it becomes their victory. Maybe that’s just a selfless way of looking at things, but it’s the ones who can’t see that that will end up in their lonesome victory. Victory in life becomes victory when it is shared with others.
