others - logically enough - 'losers'. Aside from  the evident meanness of this categorisation,  

the underlying problem with it is the suggestion  that life might be a unitary, singular race,  

at the conclusion to which one could neatly  rank all the competitors from highest to lowest.

And yet the more confusing and complex truth is  that life is really made up of a number of races  

that unfold simultaneously over very different  terrain and with different sorts of cups and  

medals in view. There are races for money, fame  and prestige of course - and these attract many  

spectators and in some social circles, the bulk  of the coverage. But there are also races that  

measure other kinds of prowess worth venerating.  There is a race for who can remain calmest in the  

face of frustration. There is a race for who  can be kindest to children. There is a race  

measuring how gifted someone is at friendship.  There are races focused on how attentive someone  

is to the evening sky or how good they are  at deriving pleasure from autumn fruits.

Despite our enthusiasm for sorting out competitors  into neat ranks, a striking fact about the  

multi-race event of life is, quite simply,  that no one is ever able to end up a winner  

in every genre of competition available.  Furthermore, prowess in one kind of race  

seems to militate against one's chances of  success in others. Winning at being ruthlessly  

successful in business seems not - for example -  generally to go hand in hand with any real ability  

at the race to appreciate the sky or find  pleasure in figs. Those who are terrific  

at gaining fame tend to be hampered when it  comes to competing in the race that measures  

the ability to be patient around thoughtful  but underconfident three year old children.

We cannot - it seems - be winners at everything.  Those who appear to be carrying off all the prizes  

and are lauded in certain quarters as superhuman  athletes of life cannot, on closer examination,  

really be triumphing across the board in any  such way. They are bound to be making a deep mess  

of some of the less familiar or prestigious races  they are entered for; in certain corners of the  

stadium, they'll be falling over, tripping up,  complaining loudly about track conditions and,  

perhaps, sourly denigrating the whole event  as useless and not worth participating in.

If one cannot be a winner at everything, it  follows that one cannot be a loser at everything  

either. When we have failed in certain races  in the mille-athlon of life, we retain ample  

opportunities to train and develop our strength  to win in others. We may never again be able to  

compete in the race for fame, honour or money,  but it's still entirely open to us to compete in  

the race for kindness, friendship and forgiveness.  We may even win at the not insignificant race for  

enjoying one's own company or sleeping very  soundly and without anxiety for many hours.

There is no such thing as a winner  or a loser per se. There is only  

a person who has won in some areas and  messed up in others. And, to go deeper,  

someone whose talent at winning in  one sort of race means they must  

naturally and almost inevitably mess  up in alternatives - and vice versa.

We never starkly fail at life itself.  When we mess up in worldly areas and  

feel dejected and isolated, the universe  is just giving us an exceptional chance  

to begin the training which means we will one  day become star athletes in other less well-known  

but hugely important races - races around keeping  a sense of humour, showing gratitude, forgiving,  

appreciating, letting go - and making do.  These are the noble tracks on which those who  

have 'failed' can finally, properly  and redemptively learn to 'win.'