As a parent, you already know that team sports can provide a number of important benefits for your son or daughter. You may remember the fun you had as a young person, running down the soccer field, rounding the bases or scoring the winning touchdown. You may have fond memories of your teammates and the camaraderie you shared, and you want to pass those good feelings on to your own children.
You also know that playing team sports is a great way to encourage healthy exercise, and that every minute spent on the field is one less minute spent staring at a computer screen or smartphone. What you may not know is that playing a team sport offers a number of other benefits for young people. No matter what sport they ultimately choose, those new players can derive a host of benefits, including the three underappreciated ones listed below.
The Value Delayed Gratification
No matter what the sport, new players rarely emerge from obscurity to win the game. On the field, winning requires hard work, dedication and the ability to sacrifice now for a good result later.
Those lessons obviously transfer to life off the field as well. The ability to work hard and delay gratification will serve young people well on and off the field - helping them save money, avoid overspending and accomplish a variety of other monetary and non-monetary goals.
The Triumph of Teamwork
From the soccer field to the baseball diamond to the football stadium, no member of the team can triumph on their own. Winning requires the hard work and cooperation of the entire team working together, a lesson that is even more important in everyday life.
Being a member of a sports team serves as an early introduction to the value of teamwork and cooperation. Those early life lessons, learned on the football field, the soccer field and the baseball diamond, will be even more valuable later on. When those former young players take their place in the workforce, they will understand how teamwork, cooperation and hard work combine to create real results and real profits.
The Power of Self-Confidence
It can be hard for new players to take the field, especially when their skills are not fully developed. Working through that fear and intimidation and finding the self-confidence to play is an important lesson from team sports. This lesson will serve those young people well throughout their lives.
Learning to appreciate and harness the power of self-confidence is a valuable life lesson that participating in team sports teaches quite well. Players do not have to have the best skills, but they do need confidence in their own abilities to take the field and play their best.
It does not matter if your child is a star athlete or just an average player. The benefits of team sports are just too great to ignore. Team sports provide valuable lessons for young people from all walks of life, and not all of those lessons take place on the field. Long after their playing days are over, your son or daughter will still be enjoying the self-confidence, teamwork and cooperation they learned all those years ago.
