My dad was a really intense competitor and that rubbed off on me. He was loud and vocal on the court, so I let him do all the talking. But I developed a kind of quiet intensity that I knew I had to have to improve and compete with grown men. It took every ounce of focus.
Anthropologists have promulgated the myth of the peaceful savage so effectively that when actual deaths by war are tabulated for prestate simple societies, one is astonished by how such a notion can continue to be taught to students.