The Good Life Through Family Sports - 3 Ways to live through the generations
Introduction
Sports are food for the soul.
Playing them is more than just moving our bodies in familiar patterns. They are deep expressions of our values, principles, virtues, and aesthetic desires. If we watch them we want to experience this depth and if we play them we want to ensure we’re getting the most out of it.
The problem is modern society gives us lots of junk food options to feed our soul from sports.
What is the good life?
The ancient philosopher Aristotle gives us a blueprint on how to navigate the tricky world of meaning through modern sport.
For Aristotle the ‘Good Life’ is a life defined by happiness. He tells us to aim at happiness and purpose as the ends of our life; and by doing this we will achieve virtue and intellect. He coined the term Eudaimonia to respect that each individual will have a different sense of what happiness means to them.
For sports it means that each of us can find a way of moving our bodies that speak to our larger values and thus they become genuine expression of the best ways we can live.
How can we live it through sports?
But how can we accomplish this when modern sports don’t aim towards deep meaning but superficial consumption?
It’s a tricky problem because like all great human ideals and activities, sports are a paradox. Despite that we CAN harness the power of sport to live the ‘Good Life’ through them. It starts with living them through the generations as means to feed our soul.
Here are 3 ways to live the Good Life in sports today by aligning your participation to your elders, your peers, and your children.
1st Way To Live: Compete with your Parents
Loving movement starts with a family bond handed down from your parents.
They taught you how to play and encouraged you to try sports they loved. Maintain a strong relationship by continuing to play sports with them as a mutual challenge. My parents and I play golf together and we don’t compete against eachother but instead try and compete together against the course.
This past weekend we celebrated Mother’s and Father’s day by playing together at a prestigious course near my house; playing brings us closer together to enjoy the ‘Good Life.’
2nd Way To Live: Compete with your Brothers
Too many people enjoy sports with their friends by overconsuming, not enough get into the arena to sweat and struggle with them.
But getting off the sidelines together does more to create lasting bonds and incredible memories than just watching other people do the work. Last week I raced a 50k ultramarathon with some of my best friends and it was so much fun we’re planning on ways to do more races together already. The joy of completing an arduous task together gives us a chance to live out our values while sharing deep and meaningful experiences together.
By competing alongside your contemporaries you get to display how important movement is your creating your good life that it will project down in the generations just as your parents instilled that love in you.
3rd Way To Live: Foster love of movement with your children
Kids spend too much time indoors on screens and not enough time outside exploring the world with their bodies.
Just as our parents did for us we need to instill a love of motion and an expectation that it’s part of the good life into our kids. My daughter is 5 and she can ride a bike, roller skate, she’s already tried ice hockey, soccer, downhill skiing, and gymnastics. We go on long family hikes and I’ll take her trail running during the summer for her first time.
We don’t put her, and eventually our 2 year old son, into sports for our expectations, but rather to expose them to different ways of motion and to educate them that movement is an crucial ingredient of the good life.
Takeaways
Threading sport through the generations is a surefire way to live the good life through sports; here are some easy examples to implement in each area.
Compete with your parents: I wrote about this a while ago but consider organizing a family vacation around an activity that everyone shares. Some great ideas are cycling or hiking trips if you don’t have a go to activity like golf that everyone already plays. (The Meaning of a Family Golf Trip - Article)
Compete with your friends: Sign up for a rec league and meet people who share your passion for a sport. Encourage your friends to join you on physical challenges like races you think are too long and enjoy pushing towards the finish line together. (5 Lesson from running a 50k race - Article)
Foster love of motion with your kids: Experiment and be creative with your kids by exposing them to different sports and trying new ones together. Have you ever wanted to try a sport but you didn’t get the chance growing up? Now is a great time to learn alongside your child.
If you make a strong effort to engage in sports through the generations you will be living the good life through sports. I’ve given you some great starting points but if you’d like to talk deeper about living the good life through sports let’s hop on a call.