Once upon a time long long ago in the Kingdom of Beliefs lived a smart and handsome Prince Nipun. He was very good in Archery. His aim was very close to perfect on most of the times but he would never settle for anything but a perfect Bull’s eye. He would always keep practicing.

He would always be very competitive & would put a lot of stress on winning each and every competition. This would mostly put him in a state of anxiety. He would internally always put a lot of pressure on himself and would feel that if he doesn’t win any particular competition. People would not like him and he would be a lesser individual. The anxiety generated due to his thought process would actually limit his performance & thus would add to his frustration level.

Once Angel Parivartan was visiting the town of Prince Nipun for an archery competition. Angel Parivartan was a close friend of Nipun’s uncle. When uncle and the angel were talking Nipun was playing around. The uncle was teasing Angel that why was he participating as he had never won a single competitions? Angel replied “why not ? Whoever said anything about winning or losing. I participate for the sheer joy of archery. See amongst so many participants only 3 are going to be winners. Does that mean that others are not good enough? Or they are any lesser humans?” Prince was completely engrossed in the conversation by then. Parivartan further added “don’t get me wrong, I will be trying i.e. I will be giving my 100 % & will see to it that I do better than my last performance. My real competition is always with myself. i.e. I wish to do better than my last performance but even if I don’t do better it doesn’t say anything about me, it simply means I need more practice. I am a human being with human limitations and fallibilities, and I merely have to put the effort to do what I can, the way I can.”

Listening to this Nipun could understand as to why he would feel so tensed up before the competitions , it was his insistence on winning & the way he correlated his self worth to losing or winning which precisely made him incapable of focusing. Once he understood that he was a mere human with limitations and fallibility he was set free and he started winning the competitions as now there was no pressure from within which gave him pure joy of archery.