11 April 2008
Sports
I have been actively doing sports all my life, mainly football (soccer, for American readers) in all its varieties (mini, indoor, outdoor, beach, street, … ) even though I equally like pretty much any other form of sports* (except for cycling maybe). There are a number of reasons why I enjoy sports and a lot of them I also carry forward in my personality outside the field, even though they seem to get emphasized a lot when I do sports.
One of the biggest factors is competition, the sheer enjoyment being better than your opponent is pure bliss. I love winning, in everything I do. Over time I learned to cope with losing, but it never feels good. Not even if you are totally outclassed by an opponent. It hurts, no matter what! I may try to hide it, rationalize it, look for reasons why there was no logical way I could win but deep down I will always feel bad.
Somewhat related to winning is personal challenges. Slowly pushing your limits, trying to get better all the time, overcoming obstacles, … it makes me feel happy. It also helps on my confidence level. Every time I overcome a challenge I prove myself that "I can do it" and that I can take on another challenge and there’s no reason to be afraid. And I’m not talking about world records or Olympic medals here. Doing good at sports and getting small personal victories helps me in taking on the world as a whole (slightly overstated, but you get the drift). In that light I also believe that people who never did any sports and horrible condition will benefit from doing it (next to the "health" factor).Getting personal victories, no matter how small they are, is nice.
"Mens sana in corpore sano" (a healthy mind in a healthy body). It is a saying ever so true. I have a job that requires very little physical activity and a lot of brainpower (well, a lot is relative I guess 
). Bottom line, when I get home I often feel mentally tired and empty. That mental tiredness also reflects on my body, the more intense I’ve been going during the day, the harder I find it to drag myself to the gym or football field. And still, everytime I’ve done sports I actually feel good. Yes, my muscles are tired and it aches every now and again, but strange as it may seem, I am actually full of energy. An hour of sports recharges my mind more than an entire evening as a couch potato.
The "health" factor. For some reason, when I frequently play sports, I tend to maintain a more healthy lifestyle. I tend to pay some attention to what I eat, drink more water during the day, will prefer walking to work over driving my car (sidenote: it’s a 20min. walk vs a 5min. car ride). I don’t have a clear reason as to why I do it and it’s not something I do on purpose. It goes a bit like this in my mind: I just did some sports, I feel good. Because I feel so good, I want to do the healthy thing and keep feeling good. Hey, I feel so great I want to do more sports. It’s hard to start and maintain that cycle, but it’s great when I can keep it up for some time.
Sports has learned me to maintain focus, fight, and not give up. When playing sports, I play to win (see point 1). Playing to win means I dedicate myself to the task at hand until the game is over. And (in football) it’s not over until the referee blows the final whistle. Even in the very last minute with 2 goals down, I will still fight every duel on the field as if it was 0-0 and all to play for (obviously it won’t be exactly like that because I will be tired from actually playing a full game). My mind won’t accept the fact that I lost until it’s completely certain (I believe in miracles at times like that).
Conclusion: sports is great, for many reasons. People actually notice a difference in me, also in my professional life, when I go and do some sports frequently.
*with sports I don’t mean playing pool or darts or drinking games in a bar. They are equally enjoyable, but for entirely different reasons.