Football is only a game
I know many guys (and girls) who will call for my head upon seeing the title of this article but can you kindly read it first? Thank you. Ben Scott is an amateur footballer who plays for Stocksbridge Park, a Non-league football team in England. He is also a trained Nurse. Over the weekend of 24/25 August, 2013 something remarkable happened involving him; ironically, though it happened in the arena of his endeavor, it was actually an off the field incident rather than a distinguishing footballing performance that ended up putting him in the news.
Having been sent off during a match for a bad tackle on an opponent, Mr Scott was a very unhappy man. As he sulked off in understandable frustration his thoughts were full of the negative implications on his career, the strain on his team mates who would struggle without one man and the annoying boos of the crowd. The weight of the whole wide world was on his shoulders. On his way to the dressing room however, a young lady ran past him and said “a gentleman has died!” The next thing you know, our man’s Hippocratic instincts kicked in and he swung into action. A short while later, Mr. Scott had in collaboration with other medical personnel at the scene, revived the said late gentleman. When he was interviewed later on he said something which stayed with me and led to other thoughts which I am now sharing with you. Responding to reporters’ questioning, Mr. Scott said "It does put things into perspective - you do realize that football is only a game."
While I’m happy for the family of this football watching gentleman who gained him back, I must confess that it was the lesson(s) of Mr. Scott’s experience that caught and held my attention. I think that statement right there is just deeply profound, especially the second half of it “you do realize that football is only a game”. It may not be football in your case but the principle all too often holds true. Think of the many times you created storms in tea cups and upon reflection in retrospect wished you could have taken it all back. This lesson is very important for couples especially but everyone else too I’m sure: be responsible with your allocation of emotion. It is inevitable that even your loved ones will annoy you and that you will find things irritating a-times but it is your responsibility to put things in perspective so that you don’t flare up and have a major incident over something that is really not getting hot under the collar about. If you shout or get worked up over everything with your kids for example, they will soon get used to you ranting and will attach no weight to it even when the occasion properly so demands because the impression would have been formed that “daddy/mummy is always screaming”.
Just to be sure, I’m not saying you must never get angry or upset because that is not even realistic. Rather I’m saying prioritize your emotions. I saw a BlackBerry display picture with the words “ignoring some things is the pathway to inner peace” and I agree to the extent that some things are simply not worth expending energy over. Identify such things and file them under “IGNORE” so that you reserve your anger, disgust and irritation for things or events that actually deserve them. I will work on an app for Android and iPhone that sieves stuff and rates them for you, matching them with the amount of emotion you should expend on them, to make it easier for you but until then we have to depend on you to apply your good sense in this direction. Step one would be for you to be able to realize it when the issue at hand is ‘only a game’.
Having been sent off during a match for a bad tackle on an opponent, Mr Scott was a very unhappy man. As he sulked off in understandable frustration his thoughts were full of the negative implications on his career, the strain on his team mates who would struggle without one man and the annoying boos of the crowd. The weight of the whole wide world was on his shoulders. On his way to the dressing room however, a young lady ran past him and said “a gentleman has died!” The next thing you know, our man’s Hippocratic instincts kicked in and he swung into action. A short while later, Mr. Scott had in collaboration with other medical personnel at the scene, revived the said late gentleman. When he was interviewed later on he said something which stayed with me and led to other thoughts which I am now sharing with you. Responding to reporters’ questioning, Mr. Scott said "It does put things into perspective - you do realize that football is only a game."
While I’m happy for the family of this football watching gentleman who gained him back, I must confess that it was the lesson(s) of Mr. Scott’s experience that caught and held my attention. I think that statement right there is just deeply profound, especially the second half of it “you do realize that football is only a game”. It may not be football in your case but the principle all too often holds true. Think of the many times you created storms in tea cups and upon reflection in retrospect wished you could have taken it all back. This lesson is very important for couples especially but everyone else too I’m sure: be responsible with your allocation of emotion. It is inevitable that even your loved ones will annoy you and that you will find things irritating a-times but it is your responsibility to put things in perspective so that you don’t flare up and have a major incident over something that is really not getting hot under the collar about. If you shout or get worked up over everything with your kids for example, they will soon get used to you ranting and will attach no weight to it even when the occasion properly so demands because the impression would have been formed that “daddy/mummy is always screaming”.
Just to be sure, I’m not saying you must never get angry or upset because that is not even realistic. Rather I’m saying prioritize your emotions. I saw a BlackBerry display picture with the words “ignoring some things is the pathway to inner peace” and I agree to the extent that some things are simply not worth expending energy over. Identify such things and file them under “IGNORE” so that you reserve your anger, disgust and irritation for things or events that actually deserve them. I will work on an app for Android and iPhone that sieves stuff and rates them for you, matching them with the amount of emotion you should expend on them, to make it easier for you but until then we have to depend on you to apply your good sense in this direction. Step one would be for you to be able to realize it when the issue at hand is ‘only a game’.
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