A Celebration of The Girl Effect

Today's piece is in celebration of The Girl Effect. I am joining people around the world who want to improve the live of girls, in the Girl Effect Blogging Campaign which kicks off today! First I wanted to share this video, I think you'll agree it's pretty powerful.
 
There are so many ways we can help improve the lives of girls. Sometimes it's hard to know how to help. For me, I'm a strong believe in the power of sport to bring positive change to lives.

Sport and life are inextricably linked. If you're an athlete ["ath•lete": if you have a body you
are an athlete (Nike)] sport evolves from simply a way to burn energy to a foundation for life, a philosophy for living. How? My list is endless and no doubt every athlete can build their own long list. So in celebration of The Girl Effect, today's blog is about sport and how it can help stop poverty (bold claim? comment below and let me know what you think).


More often than not, sport builds a solid network of buddies (which lots of times become BFFs!), it's an avenue to learn life skills like teamwork, work ethic, perseverance. It teaches us how to be good winners, and graceful losers. It builds self-confidence and shows us what it means to be passionate about something, to believe in something. We learn how to interact with others and experience the hard work people share when working towards a common goal. The lessons we learn in sport can be applied to on and off the field. Instead of just a way to keep girls from being bored, sport can be an uplifting source of life education, arming them with skills to achieve a better life.


This is where I believe the true value in sport lies - in how it threads itself into the rest of your life. In the words of former Olympian Bruce Kidd, "it's got to be sport plus. Sport plus education, sport plus health, sport plus peace-building." Kidd is a rockstar and a role model of mine in how he epitomizes those words (his name and work is etched into the Sport-For-Development movement). The concept of Sport Plus can bring meaning on many different levels.


"Sport Plus" for me meant taking my passion for sport to the next level - discovering how I could contribute to creating sporting opportunities for others, for the next generation. And my next adventures in life were determined by this passion. After retiring from taekwondo/soccer I launched into a career in sports. Its been the common thread in all my professional experiences from brand, collegiate, Olympic, humanitarian and governmental sport organizations. It was in one of these roles that I was fortunate to experience the work of Right To Play and see how they are using sport as a tool to teach life skills. 


It further inspired my commitment to being an advocate for the power of sport to bring positive change to lives. I want you to be one too. Whether its through sport or some other way, I'm interested to hear how you are. Feel free to comment below or tweet me @wandarful10

Also, it's not too late to join The Girl Effect Blogging Campaign - check out this page to get more info!

Please share this post if you liked it, loved it, found it inspiring, or funny (that's unlikely, I'm not that funny) or your eyes were zapped open by amazement - thanks!