Theos-Talk Archives (September 1994 Message tl00038)

Hello, Kent,  welcome to the list on my behalf.

You wrote:

> There are lots of points aki makes about the absurdity of sports
> that I agree with, particularly the way it often seems to take up
> half the news broadcasts.  However I think there is something in
> the absurdity of it that is persistent through the ages.
> Something about "homo ludens" I think that is the term? That
> playfulness has turned into big business or become distorted in
> some urban.ritualistic.little league <g> is just extreme
> behavior.

I agree, business is just the one big motive, why people commit
sport activities.  Athletes are doing commercial entertainment.
So they are like actors.  To be an actor is well and OK.  But the
plays they play are not so good.  About the sport-news, I agree
even more, I touched this point in my earlier post about
mass-media, I'm not sure if you were then at the list.  Also
Lewis, commented this thing in his post about sports.  The main
point in the sports-news, is the distortion of the concept of the
news.

> In my experience I test myself in many ways.  Sometimes
> consciously and often not.  I watch kids do this too.  As a
> spiritual being I've tested myself in many lifetimes and the
> process continues in the present one.  Is the end goal to be
> totally turned within and not to engage in "testing behavior" or
> is it something else? Perhaps to keep deepening my realization of
> the diverse wonders of the manifested as well as the unmanifested
> universes.

Here your testing is totally different of "testing"-aspect in
sports.  Since in sports the other people, meters, seconds, etc.
test you.  But I think in your case you are the one who does the
testing, so it is not the other peoples valuation of you, but
rather how you self think, you match your spiritual standards?
Peace, aki.