During the 2nd lockdown, my physical activity had stopped almost completely for more than a month. So, I decided to take action on the same by playing one of my favourite sports, badminton. Due to lockdown, all the courts and academies were closed but which became my excuse to not exercise, but I soon realized that wasn’t a right approach to a balanced lifestyle and instead of delaying it more and more, I decided to starting playing badminton with a few of my friends, in my building itself to start getting more physically fit.

LO 1: Identify their own strengths and develop areas for personal growth.
Playing badminton surely helped to analyse my strengths and weaknesses. Since I had taken training before, I knew all the rules and most of the strokes well. However, playing badminton requires a lot of stamina and agility, which I had lost sitting at home and not exercising regularly.
Therefore, I first needed to work on my stamina and agility to actually be able to make use of my skills while playing.

​​LO2 : Demonstrate that challenges have been undertaken, developing new skills in the process.

I used to take badminton and swimming coaching a year before the first lockdown but with IB DP managing the deadlines and playing 2 sports became hectic. Consequently, I left taking badminton coaching and only stuck to swimming. But later due to lockdown my swimming stopped as well. Not only did my physical exercise stop all at once but I also started feeling lazy and did not feel like doing it. So when I took the decision to start playing badminton again, I faced many challenges due to my lack of stamina. During the start, I used to get breathless quickly, had body pain after playing or lack of energy after playing. Soon after playing regularly, I started to develop my stamina back and my body got used to playing again.

LO4 : Show commitment to and perseverance in CAS experiences.

I started this CAS experience in the start of May, while then I had little motivation to play badminton. Addition to that, the body pains after playing made it hard to commit to the activity. However, meeting friends and playing badminton after a long time felt good, which kept me going. It was definitely triesome at the start but as we kept playing more, I could play for a longer time without getting tired and it kept getting more and more fun.

Conclusion:
Through this activity, I feel I have certainly improved my stamina and feel more healthy by having a more balanced lifestyle. Even though the activity had its own ups and downs, I feel better, refreshed and more active after starting physical exercise again.

Evidence: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AxsZ66s6aspCrHuUEiGT1P5xDeecP_V7pRGXrHUo4iA/edit?usp=sharing