Rivalries have nothing to do with achievement but much to do with depriving others and even the destruction of others. With competition, on the other hand, there’s a goal that is not predicated on the destruction of competitors. Often, in a competition, there is a benefit. For example, a competition to invent the best cure for cancer.

Not so with rivalry. There are no winners here.

We call it sibling rivalry, not sibling competition, for good reason. No one benefits from sibling rivalry, at least not ultimately. Let’s take my sister, Kristen, for example: she inherited everything from our mother. I was disinherited. It might seem as though there is a “benefit” from this rivalry, at least for her. But in order to take what is rightfully mine or “ours”, she had to destroy me, my family, and our family. Does anyone really benefit from that? Is this something that puts a smile on G-d’s face?

My mother not only allowed this to happen, she encouraged it. She didn’t know any better. She was morally retarded, morally corrupt. My mother met my father in their early twenties. They married and had my sister, Kristen, in 1969. I came along in 1970. My mother, shortly following my birth, but possibly even prior to my birth, started an affair with the man who lived across the street from us. He was 15 years older than my mom and was married with two teenage kids.

My sister, Kristen, was just over 1 year old and I was a newborn when my mother began an affair with the married man who lived across the street. So far, does this sound like a “family oriented” or “morally aware” woman?

My sister, who was an only child for over 1 year, now has a newborn sister AND the married neighbor to compete with for my mother’s scarce, and even questionable, love and attention. As we know from history, scarcity increases the perceived value of a resource. This is especially true if you’re born with a propensity for selfishness, at best, and narcissism, at worst. So my sister did not see me as the innocent, sweet, harmless baby that I was. She saw me as someone, or something, who is going to take something already scarce and that she wanted all to herself.

This was not a competition to my sister, this was a knock-down-drag-out rivalry. A rivalry I was completely blind to for 51 years. Blind only because I was not born first.