5 Profound Reasons We’re Crazy About the Olympics

4) Competitive

In the midst of all the feel-good stuff at the Olympics, it is also competitive. And we love competition. We love it because it affords the opportunity to measure oneself.

For us mere mortals, measuring our performance is sometimes hard to do. Am I a good friend? A good father? A good husband? A good worker? There really is no metric. We obsess, mostly quietly and internally, with wondering how we stack up.

At the Olympics, the best performers are measured and rewarded. Our efforts will likely never be acknowledged in the same way, but our souls view it as a metaphor for doing life well.

5) But Not Toooo Competitive

There are plenty of things to scratch that competitive itch. Not all of it is healthy. We sometimes make idols out of our metaphors. It is easy for us to get lost in the competitions around us, to attach our identities to how well our sports teams do.

The Olympic sports are too unfamiliar, too short-lived for us to tarry down this path. Of course, where there is a will, there is a way. But most of us like the thrill of the competition without the high-stakes investment. If our team loses the Super Bowl, we can sink into a depression. If our team loses the luge final, we’re much more likely to take it in stride.

So, as the Olympics are underway and you find yourself somewhere on the spectrum of interest, ask yourself why. Why does this appeal to me? Why am I feeling inspired or moved or enthralled? Like every single thing in this world, the Olympics are a hint at what we might be, what we might do. What we are created for.