Olympic concept and how people understand it
I think we all know and like Olympic games. Since the last olympic games just ended few months ago I thought to write about it. I don’t think that I look to the games like other people.
All my life I’m in love with sports, sport changed my life and led me to a lot of adventures.
When I was young I was always into adventure and I love adventures till now.
But when I was young I couldn’t go to big adventures unless I would find a way to do it.
So I discovered cycling.
Cycling led me to escape my everyday life and everyday after school I would dive into the adventure with my friends. We cycled around the city and usually going near the train tracks to play…
Since I am competitive person I always had to be first from our group of friends. After awhile I started to cycling more and realised I need to be first not just around my friends.
I just have to be first…
Game started and my life changed. All I was thinking now, was cycling and how could I be better.
I even lost some friends because I was talking about cycling all the time. About one year later I went to sport school and started to train professionally. I will be pro cyclist for the rest of my life…
I trained hard and after another year there was only five people to compete in my age group. Eventually I became junior mountain bike champion of Lithuania.
It was downhill from that moment for me. I still loved cycling but in a different way. I started to search for meaning in cycling and constantly asked myself:
Why am I doing it?
I always want to win, but is this realy it?
After few months I quit sport and decided to cycle just for fun.
Next year I decided to try racing one more time. I wasn’t capable to be in the front any more and it was hard for me.
But olympic spirit and most important thing is not to win but to participate.
And from this misconception rises a lot of problems with today’s point of view about sport and participating. I think it even covers more than just a sport.
So what are the problems with Olimpics?
Olympic problem number 1.
Games come every four years and are one of the most anticipated sporting event in history.
Many people young and old gather in the stadiums or in front of TV to looking and cheer to the athletes that they don’t even know existed and lived.
People love sports and people love their country so
they usually tend to care for their country not for sports or athletes itself.
If you would look at people who were in sport they usually look at the games differently.
They cheer for the athletes they like no matter from what country they are. They cheer for sport that they like and they know.
Olympic games are the biggest sporting event and it’s about sport. Not about a country you live in.
People should cheer for the sport and people in that sport but not for your country.
As an example in the olympics I was cheering for Switzerland cyclist Fabian Cancellara ( it is his last year in sport and I thought that gold would be nice end for his amazing career)
Yes, of course if you support your country it’s okay but remember it is sports event and sport and athletes are the most that matter not the nationality or country that they are representing.
Olympic problem number 2.
This problem basicly comes from the first problem of Olympic games.
There is simply too much of nationalism.
Sometimes in the press we can find some articles that it seems that we are in the war. We always tend to put politics, religion and business on everything in our lives.
We put our political problems on the shoulders of the athletes and just push them into this war of Olympic games. Where we fight in a peaceful way fight with other countries and we try to win or just show them that we are here and we are ready to fight.
We use athletes for something we shouldn’t do. Remember it’s just a sport and it’s about it, not the…
But do we really want to go to this war?
Doesn’t the games are just a way to show a humanity what you can do?
The greatest athletes from all the corners of the world comes to one place to show what they can do. Why we put pressure or any other nonsense on them?
If an athlete can win an olympic medal don’t push him, he is already a winner and he definitely will try to do his best.
It’s his all life, in that one moment.
Don’t you think so?
You want a medal because it’s entertaining and cool. You will have what to talk about for the week with your co-workers…
But for atlet that start in olympics, that medal is all the life’s work, dreams in a few moments.
So please don’t fight wars in the olympic games, athletes are just a people no matter from where they are… and they are trying to do there best.
Olympic problem number 3.
I think we all at least once in our lives heard this.
It’s not a winning that’s the most important, it’s participating.
We so much like this “olympic spirit” that we put it on everything. We are teaching our kids that way. And even participate in a lot of event with this mindset.
But what a complete nonsense it is!
This Olympic spirit is only right in a Olimpics. Why?
Because athletes that are participating in the Olympic games are already winners. They devoted their lives to the sport. They get up everyday and work super hard to be there for that moment.
And all we see from this is just that it is important to participate.
NO, it isn’t
The most important thing is to train and try to do your best. If you are doing something, this simply not enough to just participate. You have to do your best. You have to try your hardest, work as much as you can and try to do your best.
Remember it’s not only about participating. You can participate and do nothing, but the right thing is to always try to do your best. Because only then you will really respect yourself.
END
I think a wrote a lot in this article what I wanted to say. I hope next time when you will see any sporting event you will forget everything that isn’t important and just enjoy a people that are trying to do there best.
It isn’t just about participating, it’s about doing your …
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Originally published at hellorokas.com
