Of course, team sports provide a sense of physical wellbeing as well as mental wellbeing through socialisation opportunities, a scheduled routine and a motivational climate. This team environment and physical challenge brings out the best in us. All too often I realise that I would never hesitate to do something for a team-member, both on and off the field, this bond helps me be more than I would be as an individual. Perhaps, re-jigging our outlook to view the people around us as our very own sports team could be beneficial to our daily lives. To extend this metaphor, it’s interesting to think how much of our approach to life would change if we translated lessons learnt on the pitch into our work, our learning, our relationships and our own self care. The indices of wellbeing in team sports can certainly be applied into our daily lives, let’s explore some ways we can reframe our approach to everyday situations with the eyes of an athlete.
Looking After Yourself
The main person who is capable of looking after us is ourselves. With this in mind, it is interesting to consider the ways that sport encourages autonomy over your own fitness, ability and progression. After all, ‘athletes are self-determining individuals.’ Often, a unified coaching plan is created where the athletes voice is very much heard in relation to their own personal development alongside their superior’s. Therefore, the athlete plays a very significant role their very own progression. How actively are we formally monitoring our progress and striving for continuous improvement in other aspects of our lives? Team sport athletes don’t leave change to chance.
Emotional Wellbeing
Crucially, ‘emotional wellbeing is positively associated with extent of participation in sport and vigorous recreational activity among adolescents.’ As such, there is a clear correlation between performance and emotionality (in sport, and therefore life too). ‘Need satisfaction constructs may be more relevant to understanding the presence of positive wellbeing than for understanding the absence of negative wellbeing.’ Clearly, life’s emotional weight can subsequently impact performance, it could be something outside of sport effecting they're play. This means the emotional world is just as much of a priority for top sporting teams, investing millions each month to keep players mentally sharp. How much are we investing in ourselves?
Responsibility
Although you lean on your team-mates, your team-mates also lean on you. Studies have shown that in many walks of life, having responsibility can have a positive impact on people. This benefit can be manifested ‘by reinforcing effort, personal progress, and the view that everyone has an important role on the team.’ If we take responsibility for treating those who rely on us well on the field, let’s take a fresh look at our less inspiring daily responsibilities and concentrate on the positive impact they have on those around us. Furthermore, we should also take responsibility for ourselves and view the health of our body and mind as primary to fulfilling our commitments to others.
Reaching Your Potential by Challenging Yourself
I’d also like to emphasise the importance of rigorous physical activity to understand the extent of what your body is capable of doing. In sport, ‘emphasis placed on task mastery, effort exertion and improvement distinguished a task-involving climate.’ Therefore, the sporting realm is a place where we can focus on pushing ourselves to the limit and learn our bounds of physical activity as an individual. Reaching your own ever-expanding goals in the world of sport creates a bodily environment where stretching yourself is encouraged and welcomed. Think of the benefit this mindset and feeling of embodiment could have on your relationships, family and work life too.
The Team-Mates
The bond between team-mates can transfer to your friends, your siblings and your colleagues. For me, the key point of unison is how team-mates strive together for a common goal, whether that be winning a final or fighting against relegation. Here, sharing the credit and thinking about others rather than yourself is how your relationship with your team-mates can really develop our empathy and inspire positive relationships in life outside of sport.
The Coaches
The respect and discipline enforced by coaches also relates to other figures of authority like your parents and grandparents or work managers and mentors for example. Crucially, it can be very important to welcome an environment that offers constructive criticism. A ‘task-involving motivational climate’ does not need to be negative or ego-boosting. Rather, an ability to welcome feedback from someone you respect not only means that you are more likely to put the suggestions into practice, but also go above and beyond to achieve their targets. This is a great skill to translate into many different environments in life, it’s important to think about how can we use this mindset to more frequently seek feedback in our own lives and respond productively when we receive it.
References
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1469029205000622
Meet your writer: This post is written by Isobel Jackson, a keen soccer player and recent graduate in History from the University of Manchester in England. Having studied abroad at the University of Sydney during her undergraduate degree, Isobel has enjoyed combining these different, international approaches to her learning. This flexibility is all the more relevant to her interests in discovering new ideas about the positive empowerment of the human condition. After enjoying her time here in Australia so much, you can also find Isobel’s work on the ManchesterOnTheRoad Travel Blog.