By Engr. Carlos V. Cornejo
There are many ways that the natural human activity of sports could be a lesson to our lives. That’s why it’s highly recommended that everyone engages in some form of sports regularly, because not only is it a healthy activity, it also teaches us lessons that we could apply to our lives. The physical experience of playing gives you a better perspective and deeper appreciation of its life learnings than just watching others play.
Here are 5 life lessons that sports can give us:
Lesson 1: It Teaches You How to Accept Defeats
Win some, lose some. Especially if you are playing a sports tournament, the loss could be more painful than an ordinary friendly game because of what is at stake and because of playing in front of a crowd that would magnify a victory or a loss emotionally. Sports teaches you that you can’t win all the time and that you have to accept losses graciously. The same thing with life, if you apply for a job for example and get rejected (especially if a good number were hired except you), you’ll have to accept defeat humbly but at the same time never give up.
Lesson 2: It’s Winnable
What makes sports exciting is because you have a chance of winning. You don’t play a sport to be a victim or to be a punching bag so to speak by letting the opposing player or players win all the time. You play because it’s winnable. You have a chance of winning it and you feel good about yourself when you win because a certain sense of accomplishment. In life, God gifted us to live in order to have a share of His happiness, but that happiness has to be worked out by us. Happiness is something winnable by us if we play and give it our best shot. And the good news is victory is assured if we play by God’s rules (follow His commandments) and always get up and begin again if we suffer some losses and setbacks. And another good news is that God is always on our side helping us with His graces and encouraging us like a good Father does that even if we suffer defeats, he would not mind it because it’s part of our learnings to succeed in the ultimate goal in life: to be holy.
Lesson 3: It Gives You Novel Challenges
Another factor that adds up to the excitement are the different challenges you encounter in each game. In sports, there are no two games that are exactly the same. Each game has its own unique feature and its own unique challenges that make you adjust and bring out different skills from you in response to the different challenges. That’s why it’s never boring. It teaches us that in life you need to take on new challenges, get out of our comfort zone and not be afraid of challenges because it’s what makes life exciting. New challenges in life bring out skills in us that we thought we never had.
Lesson 4: It Gives You Goals
Playing a sport gives you an objective to work for and get it. The goal is not just to win the game but the values you acquire in the process of attaining it, such as how you react to the adjustments in defense the opponent gives you, how you apply the new skill you have acquired from hours of practice, how you encourage your teammates to not give up or how you sacrifice some personal goals to achieve the team’s overall goal, etc. There are so many aspects to the game that you will never run out of goals to work for and achieve. Life has many goals too because we have to play different roles in it such as being a father or mother, an office worker, a student, a Church member, a friend to our friends, or a leader perhaps of a certain organization, etc. and each life-role gives you a goal to work for and improve.
Lesson 5: It Gives You Instant Feedback
You don’t have to wait for days or weeks to find out how you are performing. It’s not a board exam where you have to wait at least a month (it used to be six months) to know the results. The scores in a sports game tells you whether you are winning or losing, or whether you are doing it the right way or not. The scores give you instant feedback that if you are losing or trailing badly in points, it signals you that you need to find out what aspect of the game you are not doing right, and correct it to get back into the competition. In life, we need to make adjustments when we suffer some losses but we also need feedback in areas we might not know we are losing. That’s why it’s good to get a mentor who can guide us and give us feedback in the different areas of life such as business, career, spiritual life, family life, etc. There could be blind corners in our life we could not see that only others could view and that’s why we need help. It’s also important to have that attitude of accepting correction and be willing to rectify because if we resent suggestion from others out of pride, we will not improve.
“The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph, but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered, but to have fought well.” (The Olympic Creed)
