Fun Time: Inspirational Stories Make Us Hopeful, Less Stressed
During football season, I find myself paying far less attention to politics. My wife would say that during football season I pay far less attention to everything, including whether I am wearing pants. There’s a lot of truth in that. I often leave home without pants, even on those days when it’s too cold for shorts. Football consumes too much of my attention—and everything else takes a back seat. It’s a very narrow back seat, with politics being wedged between dire weather reports and “breaking news” on the Travis-Taylor romance. Perhaps that’s a good thing, because politics is considerably less uplifting than sports.
A sports team or individual athlete can unite people, bringing together fans of different races, religions, and political affiliations. If you have a favorite athlete, you probably don’t care which religion they follow or whether they voted for your political candidate or the numbskull. You just admire their talent and athletic feats. Sports is full of inspirational stories. Just the other day, I read about Minakshi Hooda, a 24-year-old from a village in Haryana, India, who won a gold medal at the 2025 World Boxing Championships in Liverpool. Hooda’s father is an auto-rickshaw driver and she’s the first member of her family to be involved in sports. Imagine the obstacles she faced, none bigger than convincing her parents that it was okay to let her hit other people.
Dad: “Who are you going to be hitting?”
Daughter: “Other girls, papa.”
Dad: “What if they call the police?”
Daughter: “They won’t, papa. No phones allowed in the ring.”
It’s worth noting that politics occasionally gives us inspirational stories too. How can you not be inspired by Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old state assemblyman who came out of nowhere to become Mayor of New York City? Before he started campaigning for mayor, Mamdani was given as much chance of winning as a Ford Pinto competing in a beauty contest against Freida Pinto.
Why are inspirational stories important? Because they give us hope. They show us what’s possible if we work hard and keep striving toward a goal.
If a blind woman can swim across the English Channel, as Melanie Barratt did, it gives me hope that one day, with many hours of practice, I can swim all the way across my local public pool. If a cancer survivor can climb to the top of Mount Everest, as Sean Swarner did, it gives me hope that one day, with many hours of training, I can climb to the top of my Honda minivan. If a 48-year-old man with two prosthetic legs can complete a marathon in under three hours, as Richard Whitehead did, it gives me hope that one day, with plenty of training, I can complete a marathon in under three weeks.
Inspirational stories don’t just give us hope— they also help reduce our stress. That’s what a new study published in the Psychology of Popular Media, a publication of the American Psychological Association, suggests. The study found that watching inspiring videos can be just as effective as meditation for creating hope and reducing stress.
“We were actually quite surprised at how similar the effects of the inspiring videos were to the group that meditated,” study author Robin Nabi of University of California Santa Barbara told NPR.
What the study shows is that it’s important to choose wisely how you spend your time. If you don’t feel like meditating, do the next best thing: watch lots of football.
No, watch inspiring videos. Read inspiring stories. Listen to inspiring podcasts. It’s hard work, but you can do it.
More of ChaiTime here:
http://www.khabar.com/magazine/chaitime/
Compiled and partly written by Indian humorist MELVIN DURAI, author of the novel Bala Takes the Plunge.
[Comments? Contributions? We would love to hear from you about Chai Time. If you have contributions, please email us at melvin@melvindurai.com. We welcome jokes, quotes, online clips, and more.]
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