Sports and endorphin

You take a deep breath and dunk your head in the water, you emerge after two seconds, take another breath and repeat the cycle. You do this for half a lap, one lap, and finally, 15 laps. You keep counting. All this while, how many thoughts have gone through your head? In my case, many.

There are many ideas, or some could argue, almost all ideas, which were born outside of a formal setting where the idea is seemingly more appropriate to be generated. Offices, no. That is perhaps not the most conducive of places to breed ideas. Unless, if your office is Google's complex. Bathroom, yes, kitchen, yes, outdoor playing golf, definitely. You see, in our modern daily life, we are conditioned to do multiple things at the same time. We watch TV while we eat, and at the same time, read magazines. We typed our emails and remembered something that our boss wanted us to do. The kind of life that an average office worker lead is loaded with many tasks, which required a multi-tasker to do, as is often pointed out to be a strong point during job interviews. We don't have the time to sit and think when faced with multitude of tasks around us. That decreases our ability to focus or to just sit. When the body is still, the mind is active. When you do an activity that requires your body to have a constant motion, or be still, that is when the mind wanders. The mind not only wanders, the mind imagines, the mind travels to places, the mind is communicating with another being, the mind visualizes, the mind shapes and shakes things.

Whenever I am exercising, especially sports that require repetitive actions such as pounding the legs on the street or treadmill, with noticeably fewer visual stimuli, or swimming, repeatedly swinging our arms and legs; I always never failed to have thoughts and ideas passing through my mind. It's a lot like laying on the bed before sleeping. The mind is active, the mind doesn't want to calm down. I had to take control, and started to read about meditation. I even tried meditating, but I have yet to arrive at the place where I know for real what meditation is. Give up too soon?

Does sports make your life better? I would say yes, do more sports, be active. It engages not only your body, but your mind. In cases where you require other people to play certain sports, it benefits you in the form of social contacts. These things are beneficial to our health. Endorphins are released, we get companionship and support. It enhances your stamina and ability to focus and some studies even reported, to think. You know how they say people experience runner's high where they feel a sense of euphoria engulfing their bodies, feeling the air and the body is one and the same? That will probably be my goal. If I have the mental power to torture my body for that long, that is.