Essais de Psychologie Sportive
1913 — Essais de Psychologie Sportive
Payot & Cie, p. 154–171
The Spontaneous Agent of Effort:
“The true débrouillard takes the opportunity as it presents itself, the effort as it presents itself; he does not measure them, does not weigh them before deciding to act. And here is one of the most precious parts of the moral heritage of sports that would be damaged if we were to start treating effort like medicine, with a dropper.”
Context:
Coubertin contrasts the débrouillard with overly mechanical or clinical approaches to training and effort.
The true débrouillard acts with adaptability, instinct, and presence of mind, without paralyzing calculation.
He warns that reducing sport to rigid dosage and regulation would destroy its essential spontaneity and moral force.
Warning Against Over-Scientific Routines:
“These qualities [dosage and regularity] are a little negative, a little old fashioned… their dominance will take away... the energy, spontaneity, and elasticity that should be manifested [in sport].”
Context:
Coubertin critiques the emerging trend of over rationalized, overly scheduled athletic training.
He positions the débrouillard as a corrective figure, embodying flexible judgment and dynamic energy rather than mechanical compliance.
The Psychological Value of Sport:
“Sport… is an incomparable psychological agent… to be used in the treatment of many psycho-neuroses… there is nothing like sport to revive and maintain [virile feeling].”
Context:
Coubertin presents sport as a psychological remedy for modern life’s passivity and neuroses.
The débrouillard mindset becomes a means of restoring self possession, courage, and mental elasticity through adaptable, unstructured effort.
Key Insight:
In this text, Coubertin presents the debrouillard as more than a figure of physical or civic training. He becomes a psychological model of practical adaptability and a counterforce to rigidity, anxiety, and the over intellectualization of modern life.
