> 1. Some things are in our control and others not. Things in our control are opinion, pursuit, desire, aversion, and, in a word, whatever are our own actions. Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions.
http://classics.mit.edu/Epictetus/epicench.html
Does it matter where our desires and hope come from at the very beginning ? We have thousands of divergent influences pushing us everyday. The ones we choose to go with come from within, they come from you, probably ingrained and influenced by your environment, but the only thing that matters is that you take them as yours.
Regarding "Is winning the point? What if someone doesn't care about winning? ", winning here has a wider meaning than the small 'winning a game' meaning, it means succeed at what you set yourself to.
You're of course free not to set goals to your own life, but doing so has long been found to be one of the best way to find happiness and meaning (it's the conclusion for Candid of Voltaire for example, but there's much more). If you're interested in the matter, I can recommend "Man's search for meaning" from Viktor Frankl