Linking Bhagavad Gita Principle with Sports

Translation: One who prudently practices or devotes oneself to the work without attachmentrni.e. ‘Karmayoga’, can get rid of both good and bad reactions in this life itself. Therefore, strive rnfor Yoga i.e. excellence at work.rnLet’s try to link this learning with the following story of a football team and its coach, rnand try to understand how it helped them. rnThis story is about America’s National Football League’s (NFL) Football team – ‘Green rnBay Packers’ and its coach. ‘Green Bay Packers’ managed to win only a single match out of rntotal 12 matches, and was at the last position in the NFL team rankings. In addition, team had rnthe losing record for last 10 consecutive years. Thus, team was going through a very bad rnphase, franchise was seeing the alternative of stirring away from the city and the players were rndemotivated. During this difficult phase, in 1959, franchise offered the Head coach positionrnto Vince Lombardi for this team. At that time Lombardi was associated with one of the top rnteams, ‘New York Giants’ as an assistant coach, however, he accepted this challenging task of rncoaching & transforming the losing team. But why he would have opted to become the head rncoach of such a low ranked team? Why he didn’t continue his association with higher ranked rnteam ‘New York Giants’? To get these answers, let us briefly discuss about Vince Lombardi rnand his coaching career by that time. rnDuring his college days at Fordham University, Lombardi was among the “Seven Blocks rnof Granite” – a popular name given for the university team's robust offensive line. After rncompleting his college, Lombardi started his coaching career at St. Cecilia Catholic School in rnEnglewood, New Jersey, followed by coaching the team of Fordham University, and then the rnMilitary Academy located at West Point. During all these coaching assignments his teams did rnvery well and therefore he was looking for a head coach position at NFL level. However, as rnmentioned in the book “When Pride Still Mattered : A Life Of Vince Lombardi” by David rnMaraniss, Lombardi was refused for the head coaching jobs, and one of the interviewers told rnhim “you’d better look around and find something else. Because I’m convinced no one is rngoing to hire an Italian head coach.” He faced such discrimination of being an Italian-American rnfor most of his life, and at the same time he saw his comparatively less qualified peers getting rnthe jobs and assignments he deserved. Later, in 1954 he received offer for the position of the rnassistant coach for NFL’s “New York Giants” team. The team performed well during his tenure rnof five years, including a league title in 1956, but still he was not able to get the head coach rnposition.rnThus, head coach position offered by the ‘Green Bay Packers’ franchise was something rnhe was aspiring from years now and also an opportunity to prove & demonstrate his coaching rncapabilities, which he cannot deny. But on the other hand, he was also aware that if he failed rnin this assignment, he would not get another opportunity. rnLombardi came in to the ‘Green Bay Packers’ team with unmatched passion and in the rnvery first meeting he clarified his mission: "Gentlemen we are going to relentlessly chase perfection. Knowing full well we will not rncatch it because nothing is perfect. But we are going to relentlessly chase it. Because In the rnprocess we will catch excellence. I'm not even remotely interested in being just good."rnThis speech demonstrates Lombardi’s pursuit of perfection, since he didn’t care about rnteam’s past performance record or inexperience, but he was focusing on helping his players rnto become the best they could possibly be. This resulted in igniting a different level of energyrn& confidence in the players, as shared by Bart Starr, his team’sstarting quarterback "I couldn't rneven sit in my chair I was so excited!". This followed with the tough practice routine for the rnplayers which was harder, longer and with more intensity than any other team of that timesrnin the professional football.rnLombardi’s Coaching Principles: • Focus first on the Fundamentals:rnFor each year at the beginning of the training camp Lombardi, with football in his hand, rnused to begin by telling the team “Gentlemen, this is a football”. He also used to review rnbasic techniques of blocking and tackling, even though some of his players were best rnin the game. Repeating the fundamentals may seems to be boring or less important, rnbut Lombardi knew that, the will to win was not enough, and to perform at their best, rnhis players needed to know & believe that they have prepared as thoroughly as rnpossible to win. • Emphasizing the Efforts:rnLombardi is often remembered for his three powerful quotes related to efforts: “Success only precedes work in the dictionary” “The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender.” “It’s not whether you get knocked down, its whether you get back up.”rnThus, he always worked on developing the belief of practicing and training hard to rnconsistently deliver the best performance during the game. • Leveraging the Love:rnLombardi knew the importance of team and teamwork for improving the overall rnperformance, and therefore he trained players to play for each other instead of rnfocusing on the individual glory. As shared by one of the players, “Coach didn’t want rnus picking on each other. Instead he wanted us thinking, ‘What can I do to make it rneasier for my teammate to help us win the game?’” The question was not, “How can I rnlook better?” but “What can I contribute to make the team shine?”rnResults & Achievements: rnIn the 1st year of his coaching, ‘Green Bay Packers’ team won 7 matches out of the rntotal 12, and all other teams were shocked with this kind of radical improvement in the last rnranked team of the previous season. Lombardi was awarded with ‘Coach of the Year’ honours, rnfor this transformation. Moving ahead, in the 2nd year ‘Green Bay Packers’ amazed everyone rnby reaching the finals! In the next 7 years, ‘Green Bay Packers’ team won NFL championshiprn5 times, something no other team has done in NFL history. These 5 titles included three rncontinuous titles, from 1965 to 1967. In the year 1967, Lombardi’s beloved alma mater, rnFordham University, awarded him its highest honour, the ‘Insignis Medal’, for being “a great rnteacher.” Later in 1969, Lombardi left ‘Green Bay Packers’ and became the head coach of the rnnew franchise ‘Washington Redskins’, which also registered its first win in the 14 years.rnUnfortunately, Lombardi couldn’t continue further as he was diagnosed with an aggressive rnform of colon cancer, and died in few months. rnAs a tribute to this legendary coach, the NFL's Super Bowl trophy was named in his rnhonour and in 1971 the late coach was also inducted into the ‘Pro Football Hall of Fame’. rnInference:rnVince Lombardi was truly a football genius. However, it was not his genius that made rnhim a football legend, but it was his willpower, persistence, honesty & dedication towards his rnwork, without getting affected by the good or bad results. i.e. ‘Karmayoga’. Since he remained rnconstant and consistent in his coaching efforts during the challenging period of his coaching rncareer and even during the best period of his career, when his underdog team won NFL rnchampionship year after year for 5 times. Thus, this practice helped Lombardi in not only rnachieving the success, but also prolonging it for several years. rnMoreover, Lombardi also proved that, those who not able to reach their dreams are rnnot always the ones who fail, generally they are the ones who either do not push further and rnsettle for "good", or those who begin to compromise their principles and make decisions rnbased on what others are doing, or those who are unwilling to make the hard sacrifices rnnecessary to achieve excellence. And further the root cause of such failure is getting attachedrnwith the short-term results of the efforts, which further affects subsequent efforts.rnThus, as per ‘Karmayoga’, for the prolonged success it is essential that one completely rndevote oneself in the work, without getting affected with the short-term results