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Gerald Schmidt

+E -> Active Living: Sports, Cities & Sustainability

City Nature

Vestiges, 'immigrants', and especially parks - constructed green areas.

Whether geometric and controlled, or rather wild and romantic, city life tends to arouse the need for nature; and the existence of urban nature is opportunity and reason for physical activity.

Metropolitan Nature

It's green. It's plants and animals. Yet, much of it was put there by people.

So, is it nature?

The peculiar character of urban nature informs our understanding in interesting ways. We are nature too. So, what we do is natural as well. Everything being sort-of-natural, that's not the right guide, whether for life or for sustainability.

Sports as Spectacle

Since Roman times, city arenas have served as places where people will be entertained by sports competitions.
Environmentally, they are dubious enterprises; conventional environmental management should be used to make for "green(er)" games.
For raising environmental awareness, the attention that sports spectacles and stars garner is used.

Sports as Activity

Physical activity -not as spectator- is one of the most important aspects of sports, as a matter of course: It's good for fitness and health, and it connects person and environment/world (see Sports and Sustainability).

Sports Market

An issue considering the impact of sports: Will they not only (possibly) support some environmental awareness, but will their relation with green lifestyles also influence the market, "green" it?
And, not to forget the side of demand: Do sports practitioners always need the latest and greatest gadget and go through tons of equipment, or will we learn that not all is needed?

Sports as Lifestyle

City inhabitants are usually at the forefront of new 'cultural' developments.
One case in point: LOHAS - lifestyles of health and sustainability.
In people belonging to this -what?: market segment? social group?- concern over the environment, the planet's sustainability, and their personal health is connected.

What Sports?

In an environment designed to reduce the need to move, physical activity is all the more important.
It needn't be a marathon; walking to get around is a good start, too.

A Sense of Connection

People commonly take up sports over concern for their personal health and fitness.
The same people may be environmentally aware as well. The group subscribing to LOHAS, lifestyles of health and sustainability, for example.
Or, it's easier to develop a sense for your being a part of the world when "environmental health" comes into play: the connection between pollution in your environment and your own health.

Training & Nature

Green areas, even and especially in cities, are preferred places for outdoor sports activities. Thus, they reinforce some understanding of our emotional bond with nature.
Nature is also the setting for peculiar sports activities, e.g. adventure races. Without the challenge of wilderness, even such sports which are more oriented on human power than regards for nature would be the poorer.
The other way round, training profits from nature. Taking place in green areas, the benefit of moving is enhanced by the benefit provided by sojourns in nature.

Arousal

Life can be demanding, but usually is so by being rote routine.

Sports are a way of feeling alive, doing what one likes, how one likes it, finding a little adventure in going out and moving, exploring one's environs.

Environmental Impact

Sports -done with an eye towards nature, e.g., zero-impact backpacking, running in your environs- are a great part of an active lifestyle.
As such, it is pleasurable, advantageous to the person, and also causing less of an environmental footprint than many other activities.

Moreover, their other (environmental) positive sides may further support a switch towards sustainability...

Relaxation

The rhythmic motion of running, getting away by hiking, finding flow by forgetting about oneself and just moving, blowing off steam by exerting oneself... sports activities are among the best ways of forgetting about the pressures of daily life for a while.

Environmental Competence

Knowledge of nature is valued rather little.
Knowledge of one's environs is quite uncommon.
The connection of both in knowing intimately where you live, finding your way around, understanding what the weather will probably be like by looking out the door rather than at TV... tends to be undervalued.
All the same, it's still a good thing to develop, and outdoor sports are a great way to do so.

Environmental Awareness

Moving in sports, with open eyes, you see what state your environs are like, how they change with both the seasons and human influence.

Thus being in the world, you may also realize how the environment - in the air you breathe, the water and food you take in - is a part of you, and you are a part of the world.

Creativity

It's not a legend that the best ideas commonly occur while taking a walk.
Rather, the exercise improves blood flow to the brain, the exertion clears the mind of the clutter of thoughts, moving through the world helps you see things anew...

Awareness

Being in the here and now by forgetting that one is. It sounds strange, but is how flow comes about.

It occurs when you do something that you have become good at, know exactly what you are doing (to the point of not needing to remember it actively anymore), and now perform at the top of your possibility.

This does not need to be in sports, but is easier achieved in sports than in other activities.

Mental Development

Body and mind aren't as separate as we tend to think.
By moving, we discover the world (not only as children).

Awareness of the body even helps with such abstract things as numbers: Mathematics is easier when you "move naturally" through the steps of a calculation: Two steps forward, one step back... not just how we often proceed, but how children more easily learn "two minus one."

Fitness:

Sports exercise...

increases stamina
increases strength
improves muscle tone
improves agility
develops better sense of balance

Bodily Development

Children need to move in order for the body to develop correctly rather than develop obesity.

For adults to help counter the effects of aging, sports are necessary, too.

Not least, the improved strength and sense of balance that comes with sports - even if taken up or begun again in old age - helps to prevent accidents and keep independence.

Competence

It is fun, and even a basic human need, to be good at things - competent.
Ideally, you are good at what you do for a living.

Alas, motion is such a basic human capability, and sports such a great part of life, that you should strive to get really good at it.
Even simple activities such as running and hiking offer possibilites for gaining competence: learning new skills, more efficient motion, "Leace No Trace"-backpacking technique,...

Health:

Sports exercise...

balances calory intake/expenditure
helps prevent diabetes
improves balance of cholesterols
stabilizes skeletal structure
improves the immune system's function