JOY FOR OTHERS

There are moments in team sports
that hardly anyone speaks about out loud.

I know them.

You sit on the bench.
The game is on.
The others are on the field.
You clap.
You smile.

But inside, something tightens.
A quiet comparison.
A thought like:
Why not me?
Why am I just watching again today?

And sometimes beneath that
there is something else:
this feeling
of suddenly being worth less.

I don’t think that’s a coincidence.

We grow up in a world
where worth is often tied to performance.

At school, what counts is
who understands quickly,
who knows a lot,
who delivers well.

Not necessarily the one
who warms the classroom.
Not the one who connects.
Not the one who listens.

It’s not the child
who lovingly cares for the group
who gets rewarded —
but the one who can reproduce
as much as possible correctly.

And so we learn early:
I am more when I perform.
I am less when I am quiet.

Maybe it’s exactly this learning
that returns later in moments like these:

When someone else plays.
When someone else wins.
When I’m not needed.

Then it doesn’t just feel like a “pause.”
It feels like:
I don’t count.

And maybe that’s why joy for others feels so hard.
Not because we don’t wish them well —
but because our worth
is internally tied
to the place on the field.

But what if that isn’t true?
What if I am not less
just because I’m not visible right now?
What if my worth doesn’t depend
on whether I play —
but on the fact that I am here?

Maybe this is a form of strength
we hardly ever learn:

Not only being present
when we are in the spotlight —
but also when we sit at the edge
and still remain connected.

Not out of obligation.
But out of joy for others.

Sometimes I wonder
if coaches could teach this consciously.
Starting with children.

Not only technique.
Not only performance.

But this inner message:
You are part of it.
Even if you don’t play today.
You are not worth less.

That would be a powerful school for life.

Worth is not created
by minutes on the field.
Worth is created
by being human.

And joy for others certainly doesn’t end on the field.
Maybe that’s just the beginning.

Because this feeling —
that others are “up” and we are not —
meets us everywhere.

There are so many small everyday moments
where something tightens inside us.

When our child’s team loses
and we only see the pain —
what if, for a moment,
we could also feel the joy
of the other parents?

Not against our child.
But for life
that is celebrating right now.

Maybe we could take pressure off our children that way.
Maybe it would become lighter for them.
More play.
Less seriousness.

Feeling joy within our own circle
is already a high art.

But what if
we could feel it
even for complete strangers?

How much more peaceful
would it become inside us
if we allowed joy for others
in those moments too?

On the airplane.
When we get the worse seat.
And the child at the window
is looking out in wonder
for the very first time.

Hand on heart —
do we even look outside anymore?

Maybe we could simply
feel happy for them.

Or at a restaurant.
The table we always want
is already taken.

And instead of irritation…
we see a young couple
celebrating something.

And we let them have it.
We feel joy with them.

Or next door in the garden.
Children laughing. Loud. Wild.
And something in us
wants to feel annoyed.

What if we remembered:
That’s what life sounded like back then.

Maybe that’s the small shift:
Less lack.
More warmth.
More spaciousness within us.

Because no matter where —
and no matter for whom —
joy for others makes us light.

It removes pressure.
It removes comparison.
It softens that tight pull in the chest.

And sometimes it fills our body
with exactly the calm
we so often long for.

Not because the situation changed.
But because our perspective did.

Same situation.
New perspective.

LUMA – it begins in you.