Tennis in a Bucket of Crabs

"Ah," she wondered, "What shall I write about today?"

Serendipity, of course!

What a pleasure in this little piece I stumbled upon. I guess it would take a New Zealander to come up with the perfect analogy - "a bucket of crabs." But I was already interested in the subject. And Tomaz Mencinger has written about the same thing.

Chris Lewis:

Anyone familiar with the behaviour of a bunch of crabs trapped at the bottom of a bucket will know what happens when one of them tries to climb to the top; instead of attempting the climb themselves, those left at the bottom of the bucket will do all in their collective power to drag the climber back down. And although crab behaviour should not in any way be analogous to human behaviour, I can think of many instances where it is.

Take what is commonly called "The Tall Poppy Syndrome." This is where anyone who is brazen enough to strive for success — or, god forbid, to achieve it — immediately becomes a target for the "crab bucket mentalities" who, rather than strive for success themselves, derive enormous pleasure from attempting to cut the tall poppy back down.

This is a serious problem among young tennis players aspiring to greatness. Few actually do pursue it because of this negative peer pressure.

But the surprising thing is that I see the same crab-bucket behavior pressuring much older people even in social doubles play. Like it's against some unwritten rule to put the mediocrity of the crowd to shame by trying to learn the tricks of the game.

That's a no-no u know. That would make others look bad and thus force them to (sigh!) strain brain cell or two too.

This is just a continuation of what goes on among teenagers, as noted by Lewis:

You have done really well in your exams, but another one of your less successful peers accuses you of being a "try-hard" — the implication being that effort is bad & non-effort is good. Do you ignore him? Or, next time, do you take pains to show him that you do not try hard?

We know what the usual answer to that question is. But since you're the one who has to live it, common sense dictates that you should be the one in control of your life.

Read the rest of this insightful article.

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