Sportsmanship: Lessons from my morning jogs

I just started or rather resumed my joy and hobby of taking morning jogs and walks, which have proved to be quite rewarding. With the country being on lockdown, gyms being closed, companies encouraging remote working, together with the effects of the recent lootings in large parts of the country. I found that my morning walks have extensively contributed to a sense of control and certainly plucked me out of my own darkness and rut of uncertainty, as well as releasing me from feeling an overwhelming sense of empathy fatigue and anxiety surrounding the plight we are in.

Walking in the afternoons has also introduced a curiosity and obsession relating to athletes and those who religiously take to the streets and run so eloquently and with such discipline in the early and late hours of the day. Now...I weigh quite a bit (understatement) and walks tend to be quite strenuous and exhausting, plucking up the courage to walk from my complex to the mall has been an uphill battle but totally worth it, and has proven to be a leap of faith on my part.

However, during these runs I found a lot of runners and athletes waving, greeting, cheering, and motivating me each time they came across me (most times struggling to breathe for dear life while walking uphill). This certainly inspires me to take leaps and push harder, and this certainly drives me to commit to my personal weight loss challenge.

In contemplating this warmth and positivity I experienced from other runners in the neighborhood, a word called "Sportsmanship" crossed my mind. A brief description of this word emphasis "proper consideration for fairness, ethics, respect, and a sense of fellowship with ones competitors". Athletes, runners, swimmers and the likes, all have this in common and display a profound ethos and discipline which is easily felt through the energy which they exude in my daily jogs.

To further unpack sportsmanship, I found the following foundations that are all encompassing in this term and which I truly admire. I not only wish to apply these foundations of sportsmanship in my daily jogs but at work as well as personal life and they are as follows:

1. Being supportive
2. Maintaining a positive attitude
3. Being respectful
4. Practicing self-control and discipline
5. Being willing to learn.

There's a lot I could share on this topic, but I wish for you to take from it is that, we are all human and affected differently during these trying times, but through the term sportsmanship, I wish we could support, see each other, wave, smile and give that little nudge when one of us stumbles in life. A little kindness never goes unnoticed.

Ms Bongiwe Ngwane (Industrial Psychologist)