Why is it important to be involved in sports?

Why do so many people take sports so seriously and why do so many people get involved in them? Well, for one thing, they are for the most part, fun to play. They are enjoyable for the participants. But more than that, they are good for you. Not just physically, but mentally also. They help build strong bodies and strong minds. There is something about competing and working together, especially in team sports that is good for a developing brain. It is good for developing bodies as well. Sports teach how to win, which is important in everyday life. It teaches hard work and how to be respectful and humble. It also teaches the valuable lesson of how to lose. There is a way to lose that is both rewarding and good. I’m not saying that losing is fun and that everybody should lose all the time. But learning how to lose with grace and dignity is a lesson that everyone has to learn. That is why I do not agree with the way youth leagues have gotten so against keeping score for the younger players. Sure, they are learning how to play and to develop their skills, but scoring and winning, as well as losing is part of that process. If the child never knows the feeling of losing in a game until two or three years into the process, then it will come as a shock to them when it finally happens. Losing also helps build a work ethic and teaches them that hard work and dedication is a must to accomplish great things in any sort of endeavor. Not just sports, but this is a lesson that can be applied to school work as well as regular life situations. What if they didn’t give grades to students and everybody was treated the same no matter how they did in school? It would not teach the child that hard work is what it takes to be good at anything. It would take away any motivation or sense of accomplishment.

In addition to help building character and personal skills, it goes without saying that sports are great for physical wellbeing as well. It is even more important in today’s society where technology and leisure seem to have taken over American society. We have a generation of couch potatoes that abhor physical activity and do no more exercise as what energy it takes to turn on a computer monitor and get a Yoo-Hoo out of the refrigerator every hour or so to keep the sugar levels high enough to function properly. It sounds cynical, I know, but that is where we are heading and physical activity in the form of organized team and individual sports can help. Parents need to encourage, not necessarily push, but encourage their kids to try at least. Not all of them will be good at everything, but every kid can find something that their good at or love enough not to care how bad they are.