Jordan vs Blake--Is Winning Everything?

Jordan Sparks was my choice from very early in the season, so I was very pleased to see her crowned American Idol on last night's season finale.(http://www.americanidol.com/videos/view/?vid=776).

Jordan is young, talented and if top songwriters choose her (as they did Carrie Underwood http://www.carrieunderwoodofficial.com/) to record their next big hits, she'll have a long career.

Do you have to win it all to win? Are you a failure if you get into the top 2 like
Blake Lewis and stop short of the prize? Not on American Idol and not in the dating world either, because sometimes losing the top prize offers you more freedom so you can pursue exactly the life you want.

I'm sure Blake is encouraged by 2006 4th runner up Chris Daughtry's chart topping debut album with 2 number one hits and already selling 2 million copies (http://www.daughtryofficial.com/). Especially since clearly the chosen single for this year's winner would not have reached the charts if he was singing it—it wasn't his style. Same thing happened two years ago with Bo Bice http://bobice.com/—the song just wasn't appropriate for his voice—kinda uncool, but that is how life is sometimes.

So what does being runner up have to do with love? Are you a failure if you are runner up at love (you know the guy you thought was the end all be all chooses someone else. It doesn't have to mean that you failed at all. Let time be the revealer. I was "runner up" with at least 4 ex boyfriends and oh my, did that rip my heart out each time! BUT I moved on, kept faith there was someone out there for me, and thank God for unanswered prayers! All 4 of those guys ended up being far from the right one for me (10 to 20 years later all 4 of them have had real relationship drama. One of them finally got it together and at least seems to have a good 2nd marriage, the other 4 are rumored to be a mess. I have been happily married to my keeper for going on ten years.

I'm so thrilled I was merely runner up at least 4 times in my life! How about you?