sports

Even our recreation was scheduled. There was no time to look for birds or wander into the nearby woods. We were put into teams and sent into violent pursuit of a helpless ball.

Physical exercise promotes positive self-image, high-productivity and energetic wellbeing.

You must make time daily to care for your mental, physical, spiritual and emotional health.

Always have a 'Plan C

Almost all accidents and injuries happen when an individual is not being present and not paying attention to what they are doing.

If you feel anxiety or depression, you are not in the present. You are either anxiously projecting the future or depressed and stuck in the past. The only thing you have any control over is the present moment; simple breathing exercises can make us calm and present instantly.

You have to love what you do, to give your best.

I needed to do my current job well, keep preparing, and wait on God__ timing. I needed to trust His leadership rather than try to force an outcome I wanted.

On athleticism, God knows no favor. It seems rather he is in the business of teaching winners how to lose and losers how to win.

Make time daily to nurture your physical, mental and emotional health.

Be youthful.

You don't need to play every ball but every ball needs your judgement.

...I've spent the last fifteen years of my life railing against the game of soccer, an exercise that has been lauded as "the sport of the future" since 1977. Thankfully, that future dystopia has never come.

After joyfully working each morning, I would leave off around midday to challenge myself to a footrace. Speeding along the sunny paths of the Jardin du Luxembourg, ideas would breed like aphids in my head__or creative invention is easy and sublime when air cycles quickly through the lungs and the body is busy at noble tasks.

When everyone believes they are the life coaches, who are the players?

My limits know me well enough to stay out of my way.

Physical activity promotes high productivity.

Steve [sports psychiatrist] had already taught me to try and stop worrying so much about pleasing everyone. We knew that this was one of my most draining flaws and he again used three groups to clarify my thinking. There would always be some people, Steve said, who would care about me and love me. In contrast there would also be a select group of people who would never warm to me - no matter what I did. And in the middle came the overwhelming mass who were largely indifferent to any of my failures or triumphs. I needed to understand that most people didn't really care what I did or said. All my anguish about how they might perceive me was redundant. Steve helped me realize that I spent too much time trying to please those oblivious people in the middle or, more problematically, the small group who would never change their critical opinion of me. I should concentrate on the people who really did show concern for me.