The Value of Sports
The chief object of ports is, of course, bodily exercise. “A sound mind in a sound body" is a well-known saying. The heath of the body is essential for success in life. An unhealthy man is always sad, gloomy ad therefore loses confidence in him. To keep healthy, one must take an active interst in sports. Thus sports serve an essential purpose in life because they ensure good health and build a fine physique. If one is bodily fit, one feels capable of hard endeavor and life without endeavor is useless. The great advantage of sports is that they combine exercise with trill, excitement and sensations. In order that we should readily take exercise it should be made interesting and, as everybody knows, practically all kinds of games devised by man possess a certain degree of interest.
The Value of Sports benefits not only the body but also the mind. Almost every game requires a certain degree of skill to play. Skill is a mental quality. Physical vigor alone is not enough in games like golf, cricket and tennis.
Sports develop and encourage the spirit of healthy competition. The, competitive instinct is natural in man and demands outlets. Sports have wide scope for the competitive instinct. Matches and tournaments and contests are held to put to test the skill, toughness, stamina and endurance of values of participants. Medals and awards are an incentive to players to achieve excellence and a high standard of performance in their respective fields. The healthy spirit of rivalry and competition constantly leads to improvement in the performance and previous records are constantly excelled or surpassed.
There are several other considerations which entail sports to an important place in life. It is usually by taking part in sports that we cultivate what is called the spirit of showmanship. This spirit of sportsmanship is an excellent quality in a man and consists of fair play, sense of discipline, capacity for team work and cooperation and confidence in oneself that enabled one to accept a defeat cheerfully. A sportsman playing on the field is not expected outplays foul. He must cooperate and finally, if his team suffers a defeat he must not lose self-confidence but must shake hands with his adversaries cheerfully. When a sportsman has acquired these qualities on the playground, he will naturally exhibit them in the wider sphere of life. If he has truly imbibed the lessons taught to him by sports, he will be very honest and fair in his dealings with other people. He will never see his enemies below belt. He will always obey his superiors. He will never feel heartbroken on account of the disappointments. If he shows these qualities in his general conduct, he has learnt how live truly. His life is successful and he will be admired everywhere.
Sports are an excellent means of spending one’s leisure. All work and no play make jack adult boy. Sports are much interesting pastime. Most of the games are quite inexpensive too.