A walk around any park will bring you face to face with people doing exercises in early mornings. Nowadays the young and the old are caring more about their heath and are spending more time in gyms after work. Doing exercises benefits them in many ways.

The most obvious is the physical benefit. Sports make us fitter, quicker and stronger. Physical training is helpful to our health. Scientific studies have shown that regular exercise is a powerful tool against illness and aging. Indeed, many diseases are the results of lack of physical exercise.

The benefits do not end there. Sport is a character builder. While doing sports, we may feel exhausted, but it trains our willpower. To win a game we have to be determined. To go beyond others or ourselves, we have to push our limits and overcome all difficulties. We come to know that there is always room for improvement. Then, failures are also common in sport. We learn to adapt to new conditions, to judge our weaknesses and to gather strength from our defeats. The fast-moving nature of most sports also helps us to become quick-minded.

By joining in team sports, we learn to work with others. In sport fields, one person’s goal takes second place to a team goal. Every team member is working towards a common goal. To achieve it, cooperation is a must. Members must work as a team and achieve what they want most even if that means someone has to give up his or her interests for the team. For example, a cyclist may take the leading position for half of the game and then drop out so as to ensure the victory of their team.

Like art, sport is a good way to train ourselves psychologically as well as physically. So, why not do sports and experience the great effects of sport?

4 . My husband and I both grew up playing sports. So we weren’t surprised when our little daughter, Kennedi showed early athletic promise. She could easily outrun other kids, while playing with them on the playground.

By the time Kennedi started primary school, we signed her up for track training. Slowly but surely, track training took over our lives. We gave up taking vacations so our girl wouldn’t miss any practices. I even stopped Kennedi from swimming with her friends, for I thought she would waste the energy needed for competition. We didn’t ask Kennedi if that was what she wanted. Of course she did! she kept winning, and every kid liked to win.

When Kennedi was 13 years old, at a national sports event, she suddenly fell down and ended up lying on the track, screaming in pain. A doctor said, “She worked out too hard that the thick tissue in her knee was torn. she might not run as fast as before.” The doctor kept talking, but I bad a bard time following the words. My feelings were mixed. Was I too strict with my daughter? Was I partly to blame for her injury? Then I realized that my kid needed a mom more than a coach.

To our great relief, after a year-long’s strict medical examination, Kennedi almost recovered. She even joined the volleyball team at her high school. And we were gradually back to a busy family schedule. But not everything is the same. We seldom miss vacations anymore, even if that means missing practice. And I’m learning to believe that if my daughter decides not to run track in college, that only means life has something even more wonderful in store.