Game - playfulness - creativity

То win the game is great.

To play the game is greater.

To love the game is greatest.

Although play or game already existed long before¹ a human appeared (playfulness of animals) and his culture developed², it is, nevertheless, its basic element. In every phase of the development of a human being, at least³ at the level of his perception⁴, the following basic conditions have been required: beyond any doubt, they represent the idea of our enjoying the surrounding world in "children's", easygoing manner. If an individual isn't able to enjoy a game, we can suspect him in having definite problems, and he isn't usually liked by other people. That could even be a way of individual's resistance⁵ to the world he lives in. Freedom, relaxation and absence of fear expressed in their own way in the human's inner world, even if not existing in reality (e.g., a child's game during war) seem to be something untouchable, a part of a human's inner world which is not possible to be taken away.

Only a human, feeling the inner freedom, is capable of playing. Relaxation in play enables him to live in an imaginative world, and to extend areas and the timelessness of his existence. The physical and spiritual efforts experienced during a play represent an experience of freedom and its possible extensions and limits. Those values put sports creativity beyond time and space. It is the same with fear. Indeed, there is a high risk in some sports, e.g., climbing, even on the verge of life and death. Still, as many greatest alpine climbers say: "It is not a question of conquering the fear of death, but rather a question of broadening human's recognition frontiers and his potentials." It does not mean to challenge death, it is more a confirmation of inner powers. Play, being an element of creativity, may be accompanied by fear only as fiction which disappears in the moments of creative efforts.

Playing, playfulness and creativity in sport are elements defending a hu­man's self-realization. It is worth stressing that such an understanding of sport does not mean only utility values like health, working efficiency, evaluative retardation process, prevention of patho-sociological phenomena among the young from delinquency to drug abuse, and many others made possible by sport.

Notes

1. long before - задолго до

2. develop - развивать, развиваться

3. at least - по крайней мере

4. perception - восприятие, понимание

5. resistance - сопротивляемость (организма)

Дата добавления: 2015-08-17