How Sports Changed My Life

Sports have always been an important part of my life. I remember the glory years of Adam Małysz in his purple Milka jumpsuit on TVP, my own leaps off tables and telemark landings with the help of my dad.

I remember the summer of 2006. Chasing the ball with friends on a rough field. I remember simulating World Cup matches alone, shouting out the names I had memorized from a paper compendium of tournament. My Zidane-like shaved head and the unforgettable final with that famous headbutt to Marco Materazzi’s chest.

I also recall my first attempts at strength training in high school. They didn’t last long, nor were they effective. Back then, I was in the passive spectator phase. I was a huge fan of pro wrestling, writing about it for online publications. I also wrote about football/soccer (mainly Manchester United), and it was through writing about sports that I earned my first money online.

That’s when the timeline of how I divided my time between passively watching sports and engaging in physical activity started to shift. At the start of college, I discovered running. A few months later, sitting for long hours studying and working at the computer led me to yoga (specifically DDP YOGA, the version developed by former pro wrestler DDP), which brought relief to my back.

The pandemic gave me more free time. I began to focus even more on training, investing in TRX bands and a bike. That’s when a new era in my life began.

The Fitness Buff Era

During the pandemic and post-pandemic years, I cycled hundreds of kilometers. The first time I got back on a bike after years, I felt the air fill my lungs, and a sense of freedom fill my head. I missed that feeling.

In 2022, with my permanent move to Warsaw, TRX bands and outdoor exercises were replaced by the gym. I also tried tennis, squash, and group fitness classes, while still cycling whenever my distance was under 15 kilometers.

This era of fitness suits me well. Physically, I feel great—much better than I did five or even ten years ago. I can see the effects of years of exercise on my body. But more importantly, I see the psychological effects. Movement is the best remedy for fatigue, for feeling stuck, for a bad day. For me, sports are medicine.

Corruption

This essay isn’t just an excuse to brag about my workout routine (okay, maybe a little, you caught me). Sports seem like a simple form of entertainment, providing us moments of joy, positive emotions, and sometimes heartbreak. But is it really just a game? From ancient times to the present day, it fascinates human societies and is much more than mass entertainment.

Its commercial success is undeniable—David Goldblatt, in his book The Ball is Round, points out that European football alone generates revenue comparable to the global music industry. That’s just one example proving that sports, particularly football, are no longer just pastimes for athletes and spectators.

I was inspired by an article by Josh McLoughlin on sports, published on Engelsberg Ideas, which explores philosophical and sociological reflections on sports and their commercialization.

Take football and Formula 1 as examples—two disciplines that attract millions of fans worldwide. They seem to share a lot. In both sports, emotions run high during every event: from triumphs to dramatic defeats to those tense moments when the stakes are high, and the outcome is undecided. The biggest football clubs have fans all over the world, with billions following their matches. Formula 1, though perhaps less popular, also sparks emotions, especially among motorsports fans. Races in Monaco, Silverstone, or Monza are spectacles that attract attention even from those who don’t usually follow motorsports.

Both of these sports also have their dark sides. Commercialization has turned football and F1 into money-making machines, but this comes with consequences. The increasing sums spent on player transfers, sponsors using every inch of stadiums, jerseys, and cars for advertising—this all turns sports into a product and chips away at their authenticity.

In football, this phenomenon is especially evident in leagues like Saudi Arabia’s Pro League or the World Cup in Qatar. These are examples of “sportswashing,” where sports are used to improve a country’s image. Increasingly, sports are used as tools by political regimes investing billions into major sporting events to boost their global image.

Formula 1 isn’t free from criticism either. The race calendar increasingly includes countries with questionable human rights records, raising ethical concerns about holding mass events there. For many, financial gains outweigh moral issues.

Sports leagues are massive enterprises generating huge profits, but they also become battlegrounds for image and influence. The emotions and passion that drive fans are still there, but we can’t ignore the other side of the coin—commercialization, political manipulation of sports, and the increasing burden on athletes (e.g., football players with extra matches in the Nations League and Champions League) to maximize shareholder profits.

Here, I’ve focused only on sports themselves, leaving out other problematic industries surrounding them, such as gambling or the media, which squeeze every last drop of attention from sports and athletes.

The Philosophy of Sports

Plato and Aristotle wouldn’t agree with this negative view of sports. For these ancient thinkers, sports were an integral part of education and the pursuit of virtue. Plato, in his Republic, notes that physical education supports aretē—virtue, excellence—not only for individuals but for the whole city, or society in modern terms. Aristotle expands on this in his Nicomachean Ethics, suggesting that virtues like courage and self-discipline are shaped through competition. Morality is gained, not inherited.

Centuries later, Thomas Aquinas took up this thread, emphasizing moderate physical activity as a way to balance work and play. According to him, sports were “a break that refreshes” and a way to maintain a virtuous life.

Moving to modern times, Jean-Jacques Rousseau argued that sports are crucial for the moral development of citizens. In his Considerations on the Government of Poland, he wrote that physical education instills virtues like equality and brotherhood, embodying the ideals of the French Revolution.

Similarly, Victorian reformers like Thomas Arnold, headmaster of Rugby School, saw sports as an educational tool. Physical activity was one of the pillars of “muscular Christianity,” a religious movement in mid-19th century England, which believed in patriotism, discipline, sacrifice, masculinity, and the moral and physical beauty of athleticism. I don’t want to glorify muscular Christianity, but it’s a good example of how sport was perceived in the past.

What Is Sport?

I began the previous part of the essay with the claim that Plato and Aristotle wouldn’t agree with a negative view of sports. That was a conscious simplification. In Plato and Aristotle’s time, sports weren’t the massive business they are now, making thousands of people millionaires and billionaires.

I draw a thick line between the sports we watch on TV, which are industries, and the kind of sports that should interest us—everyday activities we do for ourselves, alone or with others. This is the closest version to the physical education Plato spoke of. Whether it’s a mix of walking the dog, jogging, and yoga, or spending hours each week at the gym or training for triathlons, do what brings you joy. And if you haven’t yet found what you enjoy, try new things. You’ll definitely find an activity you like. For me, almost every form of physical activity (except running) is bearable, so a mix of 3-4 activities each week works best. Your experience may be completely different.

This will also be an opportunity to get to know yourself and others. My sports journey has taught me to control my breathing, be more aware of it, and most importantly, disconnect my breath from the experiences I’m part of—a skill that comes in handy in many aspects of life.

The principle I recommend following comes from one of Scott Galloway’s podcasts. Galloway, a professor of marketing and media personality known for his podcast The Prof G Show and bestselling books analyzing the impact of technology and business on society, sums it up well:

“The ratio of time you spend sweating to watching others sweat is a forward-looking indicator of your success. Show me a guy who watches ESPN every night, spends all day Sunday watching football, and doesn’t work out, and I’ll show you a future of anger and failed relationships. Show me someone who sweats every day and spends as much time playing sports as watching them on TV, and I’ll show you someone who is good at life.”

The quote is a simplification of reality, but I recommend following the core idea of this principle. There’s nothing wrong with watching the best in the world at what they do, but try to sweat more yourself than watch others sweat on TV. Only then is sport a cure, not a money-tainted business needing a pill to fix its issues.

---

This post was originally published in Polish on my Substack. You can read it in Polish HERE.