There are times when I'm glad I was born without a competitive bone in my body. When other folks get obsessed with "winning," I just say, "sure, man, you can have it." It's an easy enough way to make someone happy. If I'm making enough money that I can eat and be left alone, I'm happy.
I remember reading a blog post long ago about a man who scraped and sacrificed to buy a house in a neighborhood inside a better school district. He got the smallest house available and he could barely make the mortgage payments. When he went to a cocktail party held by one of the neighbors, he talked about what a struggle it was - but it was worth it to have his kids in this particular school.
Everyone just stared at him until someone said, "You don't send your kids to public school, do you?
I don't think he talked to his neighbors much after that.