Competing for life

In the poem “Rites of Passage” these young men are sizing each other up at the birthday part. As they each come into the situation they look around and see what their competition is. They aren’t necessarily competing for anything, just life in general. We all do this, more than we think. As we enter new situations we look around at what we are faced with and who we are going up against. We don’t necessarily mean to do this, but many times it ends up hurting us more than helping us. I know that I have personally “sized” someone up in the beginning and that general impression turned out to be totally wrong. We need to be careful of when we are doing this and how much we are allowing it to hold us back from letting us get to know that individual.