NURTURING SPORTS EXCELLENCE AND CULTURAL CONTINUITY FOR STUDENT

RESILIENCE AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

To the faculty and staff of MPSPC Paracelis, who joined forces to help in the
preparation in order to make this event happen, to our visitors who gladly joined for
this Sports fest, and especially to our dear students who are excited about this event
and who help in the preparation and the reason why this Sports fest is going to
happen. A blessed morning to each and every one.
It is a pleasure to speak to you today. Before anything else, I want you to know
that I am not the person whom they call an “athlete”, I am just an ordinary student
during my time who played volleyball and basketball as my sports. But as a player, I
do understand the words winner or loser. And that word seems to have a deeper
meaning if you are a player. A winner is someone who got the first place or who
became the champion while a loser is someone who lost the game and or what they
called losers of the game. I have a question for you, do you think if you became the
winner of the game, you are already the best or if you are the loser of the game, do you
think, you cannot do better?

By understanding that success and failure isn't measured by wins and losses,
but by achieving personal excellence, we give ourselves the best opportunity to
succeed in sport and in life. One should learn from his/her mistakes and should be
honest enough to accept one's mistakes or demerits. You can only achieve excellence if
you are true to yourself and can inspire others if you are only able to accept the truth
and change yourself accordingly.

As you play the game throughout this week in celebration of this Sports fest,
remind yourself that the spirit of sportsmanship is the most needed while you are in
the field. The true spirit of a winner is not just about the position you will have in the
game but about how you will play the game.

A Founder and executive director of the non-profit TrueCompetition.org and

author of True Competition: A Guide to Pursuing Excellence in Sport and Society once
said “Developing your own excellence should be the goal of sport”. Shields who is the
founder of Pursuing Excellence discovered that NBA stars LeBron James and Kevin
Durant were spending time in the offseason training together.

To you our dear students, I know that you have your individual differences
such as the culture or historical traditions you are carrying. We have Ga’dang,
Balangao, Majukayong, Kalinga, and many more who are joining this event. No matter
what you are, who you are, or where you came from, you must not forget that you
have that self-confidence or self-esteem because you are who you are. What I mean is
that your cultural identity has a relationship with how resilient you are to overcome
the situations you are in. Being resilient as a player means so much because that
would help you win the game in a way that makes you mentally stronger as an
individual. For example, in running, to the students who are walking daily in coming
here to school and then even going home, you are more resilient than those who have
their motorcycle or service back and forth. Why? Because you have already exercised
your body before joining the running especially we don’t have time to prepare.
Resilient players have an organized mindset. Playing the game with a positive mind
and believing that he/she can do it with sportsmanship.

Sport in National Development really means a lot for us to have UNITY.

Regardless of the cultural differences of each and everyone, when it comes to sports,
there is no exemption on who will play the game as long as the player knows what to
do. Internationally, according to Bhattacharyya (2019) sport can also build and define
the character of a nation, it helps not only to develop a responsible society but also
develops responsible and good leaders, especially the leaders of the future. So, with
our number in this school, we hope that all the activities to be done during this Sports
fest will strengthen the camaraderie as long as we are together in this institution.

I have something that I want you to put in your mind while aiming to become
the champion of the game, “To win the game is to win the heart of your opponent”.
Win or lose, friendship continues. That is the spirit of true winners. God bless
everyone.