You may not think of yourself as an athlete. Or, perhaps, you still rest on the laurels of high school championships and college accolades. Either way, you no longer compete with a band of teammates for the honor and glory of a school or club. The few professional athletes of this world are seen as the ones that “made it” and get to live their dreams.
I challenge you to reconsider – are you in the gym a few days a week? Do you have a group of guys you get-together to throw a football with? Are you taking a few minutes out of your busy day to move your body and break a sweat?
Sure, you may not be on the world stage, but you are an athlete. It may take a change of perspective on your part to recognize this. It may take changing up your workout regimen. Dr. George Sheehan, in Running & Being, makes the point that our athletic pursuits should offer us a form of “play.”
“Play” in Sheehan’s terms, is not the same thing as simply being idle, but rather a form of effort that allows you to feel the joy of your body moving as it as made to move. For Sheehan, play is an intensely spiritual experience where you learn your limits and learn to be closer to your heavenly father. In a similar fashion, when my son plays with me – when he is laughing while we wrestle on the floor – he is learning the boundaries of his world and growing in his relationship with his father. It is that child-like joy of play that Sheehan is seeking when he runs.
It is when we truly take joy in the play of movement that we are truly athletes. When we compete against ourselves to do better, when we push our boundaries, it is then that we are growing our bodies in the way God made us.
So, I challenge you to consider – are you an athlete? Do you still remember how it feels to play?
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