Sibling rivalry

Apparently sibling rivalry isn't just one of those dubious cliches, it's real. There are plenty of siblings who really do compete frantically with each other and can't bear it when their brother or sister seems to be doing much better than them.

A quarter of people polled on the subject admitted to sibling rivalry. They confessed to competing over just about everything - their careers, their homes, their cars, their holidays, their education, their cooking skills and, naturally, who their parents like best.

Well, I'm relieved to say my sister and I have never been prone to sibling rivalry. Our relationship has always been amicable, reasonable and non-competitive. We've both lived our lives as we wanted and we haven't spent a second comparing our different "score cards". We've never been jealous of the other's achievements, or gloating at their failures.

We were never bothered about who our parents liked best. Clearly my father, and possibly my mother, preferred my sister, but so what? It didn't stop me getting on with my life.

What motivates siblings to compete with each other anyway? Why are they desperate to be top dog and always one step ahead of the other? I really don't know, but I suppose if parents are the competitive type, that can get passed on to their children. Luckily our parents weren't in the least competitive.

But if your relationship with your sibling is the longest relationship you'll ever have, then constantly competing with each other will spoil your life in a big way.

And there's no easy fix, because siblings are bound to each other for life. You can't divorce them, you can't simply dump them. Somehow you have to find a modus operandi.

Just try to stop quibbling with your sibling.

Why compete?

I've never liked competing. I've always thought it was a vastly over-rated concept. I much prefer to set my own standards and try to reach them. Competing so often becomes a mindless desire to "win" and to defeat other people, frequently in the name of some dubious goal like making a fat profit or being famous or exciting envy.

And does competition drive up standards, as it's generally said to do? Look at all those jobs where competition is rife and tell me how high the standards are. Politicians? Estate agents? Journalists? Car salesmen? It's more like a race to the bottom, with principles thrown out the window in favour of being top dog and trouncing your rivals.

All too often the frantic desire to win leads to widespread cheating and fiddling - drug-taking by sportspeople, plastic surgery by models, gazumping by estate agents. Publicly it's condemned, but in private the attitude is, anything goes in order to reach the top.

I've always thought that the people who achieve the most, be it happiness, job satisfaction, a purpose in life or creative innovation, tend to be motivated not by competition but by personal standards they've set for themselves and tried to live up to or exceed. Rather than endlessly looking over their shoulder at what other people are doing, they're ploughing their own furrow and following their own impulses.

They may be aware of what others are doing, they be influenced and inspired by them, but they're not competing with them, they're simply using them as grist to the mill, as a shot in the arm.

The people who impress me most are not Oscar winners and gold medallists so much as the determined individuals who make a name for themselves solely by pursuing their own high-minded goals and meeting them. Camila Batmanghelidgh, say, or Paris Lees or Shami Chakrabarti. I take my hat off to them.