Games and gambling

Losing

The first time I visited a casino I got bored, so I put my remaining chips on number 23. It came in. Unbelievable. I cashed out and never played roulette again. Not so for others. Winning on their first trip can be a hook towards addiction. They say money won is twice as sweet as money earned. That can be the allure with gambling. A little gambling is fun but some of us are in denial about the true cost. Lives are ruined. Families suffer. Put your hands up and admit it. Seek help if you want to live differently.

We need to learn to lose before we learn to win. Losing dents our pride. Some get quite visibly annoyed when they lose. The winner sees your frustration and takes pleasure from that. Hence, losing gracefully on the surface avoids handing someone the win and the gratification of seeing you squirm. We beat ourselves up when we lose. We fret about what we did wrong. What did we learn. How can we improve for next time. What did we do well. Think about what you did right. In many matches you will have done a lot more right than wrong. It is difficult to avoid berating yourself though as small mistakes can hand victory to your opponent. Whether it is a game or a business loss, we can laugh it off and move on.

Few succeed until they experience the pain of a significant loss. Losing small bets has no real impact. Those with money have made a lot, lost a lot along the way and care less about money than those without. Oh boy the money I have lost in business is frightening. Then when profits came torrenting in, the government stretched out a hand to take a portion. I filled a bucket for them, then a barrel, then what seemed like a reservoir. It was all handed over to them gladly. It was spent wisely, fully accountably, thanking me with investigations and compliance checks recurrently.