Relating To Your Competition or How To Avoid Being Your Own Worst Enemy
September 28, 2010 by duffgibson
In previous posts I have written about the great sportsmen I was so lucky to have competed against in my skeleton career. Because they were champions in their own right, they knew the value of facing a great competitor in drawing out great performances in themselves (2. Emulating Gregor Staehli). I was very grateful to have had competitors that wanted me to be at my best because they had the attitude described by the phrase, “may the best man win”. It created a very enjoyable competitive environment that not only brought out the best in me but allowed me to be happy and supportive of the performances of my competitors.
In creating this blog I have had the chance to interview a great number of very successful athletes including several Olympic Champions and I always make a point of asking them how they view their competition. In other words, do they see their opponents as friend or foe and invariably the answer is friend. I accept the possibility that there may be certain sports that are more combative in nature in which a healthy dislike of the competition may serve as a motivator in the heat of the competition but this is simply not the case when athletes compete independently. I would even go so far as to say that most of the top athletes in combative sports are able to get themselves into an optimal competitive state without having to trick themselves into believing they ‘hate’ their opponent.
Your success in sport is dependent almost entirely upon you and often has little to do with your opponent. It’s a valuable skill to be able to distinguish between what is and what is not under your control as it allows you to focus on what directly affects your chances of success. Even if you are of the mindset that athletes can be intimidated, such a tactic will work at times with certain opponents but if your goal to be the best, you’d better rely on something more consistent and tangible, like your own performance. Athletes are better served to develop friendships with their opponents. It creates a far more enjoyable environment that is every bit as competitive.
The following is an excerpt from the book Flow by Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi. It speaks very well to the value of those relationships and the importance of taking the time to make them positive and enjoyable.
“Unfair bosses and rude customers make us unhappy on the job. At home an uncaring spouse, an ungrateful child, and interfering in-laws are the prime sources of the blues. How is it possible to reconcile the fact that people cause both the best and the worst times?
“This apparent contradiction is actually not that difficult to resolve. Like anything else that really matters, relationships make us extremely happy when they go well, and very depressed when they don’t work out. People are the most flexible, the most changeable aspect of the environment we have to deal with. The same person can make the morning wonderful and the evening miserable. Because we depend so much on the affection and approval of others, we are extremely vulnerable to how we are treated by them.
“Therefore a person who learns to get along with others is going to make a tremendous change for the better in the quality of life as a whole. This fact is well known to those who write and those who read books with titles such as How to Win Friends and Influence People. Business executives yearn to communicate better so that they can be more effective managers, and debutantes read books on etiquette to be accepted and admired by the “in” crowd. Much of this concern reflects an extrinsically motivated desire to manipulate others. But people are not important only because they can help make our goals come true; when they are treated as valuable in their own right, people are the most fulfilling source of happiness.”
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Self - Awareness
As I tweeted the other day (@sportatitsbest), I’ve only just started Andre Agassi’s autobiography Open, and I’ve already found a reference to what I believe is an extremely key skill that all athletes need to develop if they want to reach the top. Of course I’m talking about today’s topic, self-awareness. Here’s the quote:
“Butterflies are funny. Some days they make you run to the toilet… Other days they make you laugh, and long for the fight… Figuring out your butterflies, deciphering what they say about the status of your mind and body, is the first step to making them work for you.”
Hope you enjoy the post.
These days, most national teams in Canada operate under the Integrated Support Team (or IST) model. Right from the Own The Podium website,
“IST’s are the Sport Sciences, Sports Medicine and other team management professionals that support coaches and athletes/teams. ISTs typically include a physiologist, sport psychologist, biomechanist/performance technologist, nutritionist, physical therapists/athletic therapist, and a physician. The goal of a IST is to ensure that Canadian athletes are healthy, fit and psychologically ready for optimal performance.”
IST’s are great for bringing everyone around an athlete on to the same page with respect to any aspect of their development. People from every discipline come together and a lot of great information is shared and it can be very insightful and helpful to have so many perspectives sitting around the same table.
However, when I competed prior to 2006, we didn’t have IST’s and in fact one year we didn’t even have a coach. We had a very good team leader, which I personally found very valuable, and we had good medical support, but in terms of an on-ice technical coach, we just couldn’t find someone to fit the bill after the previous coach left for other opportunities. The surprising thing was that it was actually a very successful year overall, and for me personally it happened to be my best ever.
The reason it worked was because my teammates and I each had very good self-awareness with respect to actually sliding down the track. We didn’t have a coach but we learned the tracks as well or better than we otherwise would have because we coached each other. At the time there were four of us on the men’s national team so in effect each of us had three coaches. If we arrived at a new track, after the first run we would meet and discuss our issues. If someone had a problem steering effectively through a corner that another team member had been successful with, there was a passing along of information. Occasionally there would be corners that we all had trouble with and in these circumstances we would get together, come up with a plan such that each of us would try a different strategy and then meet again after the run to determine what we had learned.
It was an effective strategy only because each of us were very self-aware with respect to where we were in a corner, when we were steering, how hard and for how long. In a sport where you can at times be more upside down than right side up going well over 120 km/h and under several G’s, that’s not easy to do. It worked because we could accurately convey information about a corner and because we were willing to invest in each other’s success. Your own information was going out to the team but you had three people’s information coming back to you which both speaks to the team environment we had, and the importance of being self-aware.
Now, myself and the other coaches preach two things above all others. One is the team environment and the other is to listen to your body and learn what it is telling you. It can take a long time to get there but that information is key.
Duff Gibson
“Butterflies are funny. Some days they make you run to the toilet… Other days they make you laugh, and long for the fight… Figuring out your butterflies, deciphering what they say about the status of your mind and body, is the first step to making them work for you.”
Hope you enjoy the post.
These days, most national teams in Canada operate under the Integrated Support Team (or IST) model. Right from the Own The Podium website,
“IST’s are the Sport Sciences, Sports Medicine and other team management professionals that support coaches and athletes/teams. ISTs typically include a physiologist, sport psychologist, biomechanist/performance technologist, nutritionist, physical therapists/athletic therapist, and a physician. The goal of a IST is to ensure that Canadian athletes are healthy, fit and psychologically ready for optimal performance.”
IST’s are great for bringing everyone around an athlete on to the same page with respect to any aspect of their development. People from every discipline come together and a lot of great information is shared and it can be very insightful and helpful to have so many perspectives sitting around the same table.
However, when I competed prior to 2006, we didn’t have IST’s and in fact one year we didn’t even have a coach. We had a very good team leader, which I personally found very valuable, and we had good medical support, but in terms of an on-ice technical coach, we just couldn’t find someone to fit the bill after the previous coach left for other opportunities. The surprising thing was that it was actually a very successful year overall, and for me personally it happened to be my best ever.
The reason it worked was because my teammates and I each had very good self-awareness with respect to actually sliding down the track. We didn’t have a coach but we learned the tracks as well or better than we otherwise would have because we coached each other. At the time there were four of us on the men’s national team so in effect each of us had three coaches. If we arrived at a new track, after the first run we would meet and discuss our issues. If someone had a problem steering effectively through a corner that another team member had been successful with, there was a passing along of information. Occasionally there would be corners that we all had trouble with and in these circumstances we would get together, come up with a plan such that each of us would try a different strategy and then meet again after the run to determine what we had learned.
It was an effective strategy only because each of us were very self-aware with respect to where we were in a corner, when we were steering, how hard and for how long. In a sport where you can at times be more upside down than right side up going well over 120 km/h and under several G’s, that’s not easy to do. It worked because we could accurately convey information about a corner and because we were willing to invest in each other’s success. Your own information was going out to the team but you had three people’s information coming back to you which both speaks to the team environment we had, and the importance of being self-aware.
Now, myself and the other coaches preach two things above all others. One is the team environment and the other is to listen to your body and learn what it is telling you. It can take a long time to get there but that information is key.
Duff Gibson
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Fantasy Sports Unites Fans All Over The World
While sitting in a New York bar watching the New Orleans Saints successfully open the football season last week, it struck me that there is one thing that unites sports fans all over the world. Whether it is the NFL here in the US, rugby league in Australia or the English Premier League (EPL) soccer, today’s sports fans want to be engaged and actively interact with their favorite sports. They satisfy that desire by playing fantasy sports or by getting involved in forecasting weekly results. In Australia we call that tipping. Technology, fast-speed internet access and our increasing use of social media is making this engagement even easier and more fun for the fan.
The connection we have with our favorite sports now runs far deeper than merely supporting your local team or purchasing a few pieces of replica merchandising as was once the case. Trash talking your colleague over your fantasy quarterback selection is a big part of office culture on a Monday morning (or almost any day for that matter). Similarly, earning bragging rights over your mates with your superior tipping skills is a big deal Down Under.
This is all good news on a commercial front. The sport rights holder extends it product, sports marketers have something else to promote and broadcasters and, more importantly, sponsors have a wider reach.
The numbers involved are staggering. Fantasy sports are recognized as a multi-million dollar business. In 2010, the Fantasy Sports Trade Association “represents more than 110 member companies in a mature industry with a market size…at 27 million adult Americans”. It is estimated that about 85% of participants play on-line. That, of course, makes large consumer-oriented companies sit up and take notice. The industry is worth approximately $1 billion a year and that may well double in the future according to analysts.
Our interest and interaction is still growing despite the poor economy and this is taking place the world over. European fantasy football (soccer) is growing and the official EPL fantasy game has over 2 million players. Tipping is big business in Australia too as tipsters predict scores in most sports including Australian Football (AFL), rugby league, rugby union and soccer.
As I sat watching the Saints’ quarterback, Drew Brees, thread another successful pass I, like many others, had more than a passing interest in who scored the touchdown as opposed to the final score.
Chris Conway
The connection we have with our favorite sports now runs far deeper than merely supporting your local team or purchasing a few pieces of replica merchandising as was once the case. Trash talking your colleague over your fantasy quarterback selection is a big part of office culture on a Monday morning (or almost any day for that matter). Similarly, earning bragging rights over your mates with your superior tipping skills is a big deal Down Under.
This is all good news on a commercial front. The sport rights holder extends it product, sports marketers have something else to promote and broadcasters and, more importantly, sponsors have a wider reach.
The numbers involved are staggering. Fantasy sports are recognized as a multi-million dollar business. In 2010, the Fantasy Sports Trade Association “represents more than 110 member companies in a mature industry with a market size…at 27 million adult Americans”. It is estimated that about 85% of participants play on-line. That, of course, makes large consumer-oriented companies sit up and take notice. The industry is worth approximately $1 billion a year and that may well double in the future according to analysts.
Our interest and interaction is still growing despite the poor economy and this is taking place the world over. European fantasy football (soccer) is growing and the official EPL fantasy game has over 2 million players. Tipping is big business in Australia too as tipsters predict scores in most sports including Australian Football (AFL), rugby league, rugby union and soccer.
As I sat watching the Saints’ quarterback, Drew Brees, thread another successful pass I, like many others, had more than a passing interest in who scored the touchdown as opposed to the final score.
Chris Conway
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Owning the Zone with Colli Christante - final interview by Brendhan Rohan
Owning the Zone
Owning the Zone with Colli Christante
10:59 am in Interviews by Brendan Rohan
Here we are back with Colli Christante, kinesiologist and author of the forthcoming book “In Search of the Zone”.
Q. I see in your profile you have written a book called ”Owning the Zone”. Could you tell us what inspired it?
The documentary is called “Owning the Zone”. The book is “In Search of the Zone” and was inspired from what I experienced during a performance at the age of 11.
Rehearsals went amazing yet when it came to the actual performance something was missing. That night my quest began. To experience being in the Zone. Many athletes go through this. It is an elixir for an athlete. Through all my years as an athlete and Kinesiologist I have now refined the process and I can guarantee anyone that if you work with me you will experience the Zone and have the strategies to enter at will.
Q. How long has the project taken to complete – from thinking about writing to the eventual final copy?
I am still in the process of completing the book, however, the idea for the book came prior to meeting with ESPN at Hot Docs in Toronto in 1996. They were extremely interested in my documentary and the possibility of the book to go with it.
I have had a publisher express interest and so that has really motivated me to get it completed. The creative process is a unique and wonderful experience. It is almost complete. Once it is I guarantee you that you will be included as one of the first people to know.
Q. Were there things that you wished to have included in the book? Will these things be written into a follow up / sequel?
Interesting question Brendan. I strongly feel one of the reasons the book has not completed itself is because there were things that needed to be told, wanted to be added. Situations, experiences that needed to be revealed.
Q Have you written other material – you know, training manuals, etc?
Yes, I have written other things. Articles for various magazines, articles for Ezines ( Electronic Magazines ) , Self Growth.com, concepts for TV programs. Created and wrote “Owning the Zone” pilot, a Woman’s show called “Somewhere I Belong” and I am working on another book (cannot reveal name as of yet:)
Also created, developed various programs and manuals. “The Art ‘n Science of Responsible Communication” was one such program and manual. This program and manual were used in facilitating coaches at the Canadian Figure Skating Association in Ottawa Canada. The same is true of another course and manual I created “The Art n’ Tool of the Question” taught to private investigators but cannot reveal which firm it was for.
I have also developed various other courses and love facilitating them – love sharing information.
Q. When will the book be launched? Will there be a media release of some kind that will go with the launch?
The documentary, “In Search of the Zone” has not been released so no media coverage has been done. As I mentioned, the interest is there so I am sure once it is released the media will enjoy it with a touch of controversy which I love.
Q. What are your hopes for your readers? Want do you want them to get out of having read your work?
My hope and wish for my readers is that they not only feel and hear but also see themselves in similar experiences and know that they too can reclaim the missing pieces of their life and become whole and complete. What an experience! It is the best gift one can give to themselves because it affects 7 generations in either direction. What a gift Kinesiology is. We are blessed to have had the experience of Kinesiology and to be a Kinesiologist.
Q. Inspiration is the key to so much in life. Did you use personal stories to inspire your readers?
Brendan I totally agree with you. Inspiration is key in life. Yes, I do use my stories to inspire my readers and in some way my stories inspire my clients. My clients also seem to take personal interest in how I came to Kinesiology but I have to remind them Kinesiology called me.
At some level I wanted to heal and knew that in order to do so I needed to uncover my deepest wounds – kinesiology peeled through the layers and now I bring this gift to others.
There is nothing more precious than being free in one’s own skin. What a gift. Stories run deep. My childhood was a roller coaster and life experience has been deep. Far from being a shallow person, sometimes very intense but the best of all is I love who I am and what I do.
Q. Are there any plans for other materials in the Colli Christante library? You know Dvd’s ( nearly said video’s – but that’s so 1980’s ), music or audio’s?
Yes, there are other plans for more material to be added. The other book I am writing which is my life story (so many people have told me I must write this) and Owning the Zone documentary will get made.
There will be downloads from an Internet TV show I am in the midst of creating – all will be revealed soon and again you will be one of the first to be informed.
Boy you are busy! Do you even have time to see clients lol!
Q What are your plans for the future as a kinesiologist and therapist?
My future as a Kinesiologist and therapist is very clear. I will only be working with clients that are very committed to becoming Champions in all areas of their life. This means they have to undergo a screening process to qualify to work with me and then commit in a way they may never have had to for anything else. This is the full meal deal.
I agree with you Colli that you have to have committed clients. In my practice, I adopted the mindset that I only would see ‘professional clients’; people who were dedicated to themselves, their creative vision ( and not their previous story ) and the work we did… It’s an equal transaction… “professional therapist + professional client = professional results”.
Q Do you teach workshops and speak in public? Where can people see you in action?
Yes, I do speak in public and teach workshops – I have created various seminars, workshops, talks – love to share information.
Currently in negotiation with an organization to do seminars across Canada in 2011. The best way for people to see me in action is to check my profile page and website http://www.inner-expression.com for upcoming dates.
Q. Last but not least, any plans to travel and teach in Australia or overseas to Canada?
I would love to travel and teach. I have so much information to share. This is one of my dreams, goals. To share this with other Kinesiologists and therapists. All I have experienced. The science and art behind the difference that makes the difference.
Brendan, let me know when you want me to come to Australia and I am there for you. To be part of your dream, journey and to be your first featured Kinesiologist has been a real honor.
Colli, thank you for a wonderful series of interviews. You are very inspirational and you illustrate that there are many different ways that you can lead a rich and fulfilling life as a kinesiologist other than just being ‘the traditional clinical therapist’.
When starting out, many new kinesiology people try to ‘fit the mold’ of ‘being a kinesiologist’ and forget that Kinesiology is a tool. A tool in their hands that brings more than ‘balance’ or better health… butcommunicates the therapists own unique, creative spirit to the spirit of the people that they work with.
Congratulations on providing your clients with an inspiring example that is yourself! And congratulations on ‘being bigger’ than ‘the tool’ and fitting your kinesiology work into YOUR greater expression!
To find out more about Colli Christante, see her 1st and 2nd interviews and visit her profile page.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Interception
According to Wikipedia, “an interception is a very specialized move that occurs when a quarterback’s pass is caught by a player on the opposing team.
This leads to an immediate change of possession during the play: the defender who caught the ball immediately assumes the role of the offense and attempts to move the ball as far towards the opposing goal as possible. Following the stoppage of play, if the interceptor retained possession of the ball, their team takes over possession at the spot where he was downed.”
That’s the long version. However, according to the player who got intercepted, it’s simply a pick. We’ve all seen how an interception can change the course and momentum of a game. When it happens, the main goal of the team who lost the ball to get it back as fast as they can before the opposing team capitalizes on the pick.
In life, love, and work, we all get intercepted on occasion. An opponent snatches the ball in mid air. Opponents can range from financial setbacks, loss of health, a car accident, an unexpected loss of a loved one, or even cruel, insensitive words from someone you thought was your friend. It can also be your own self – sometimes you are your own worst enemy – and you are “picked” by self-doubt or the sum of poor choices.
When an NFL QB is picked off, you’ll typically see a few reactions. Sometimes he just gets mad; mad at himself for allowing it to happen or mad at a receiver for not being at the right place at the right time. At other times, after a frustrating game, the QB is dejected; realizing his failure to perform the job properly. Most often, he gets back up and continues the game with strength and style. Brett Favre is a great example of this.
What have you been intercepted by?
What has caused you to lose your grip?
Getting mad provides a temporary adrenaline rush but does it accomplish anything useful? Does it make the opponent go away?
NO. The opponent still has the ball. Getting dejected drains you of precious energy and just as with getting mad, it does not accomplish any purpose.
Will you choose to remain mad and dejected or will you get back up and continue the game of life with strength and style? You can do what you can to protect yourself from some interceptions but not all. Life happens and each and every event is part of your own unique story.
If you don’t learn from your life events, then that’s all they are…events. If you learn to press forward with strength and style, a purpose has been accomplished in your life; you’ve learned, you’ve matured, you’re internally stronger.
So, take those life interceptions, learn what went wrong, get the ball back, move down your life’s field in strength and style and you WILL win.
Written by Michelle Hill
This leads to an immediate change of possession during the play: the defender who caught the ball immediately assumes the role of the offense and attempts to move the ball as far towards the opposing goal as possible. Following the stoppage of play, if the interceptor retained possession of the ball, their team takes over possession at the spot where he was downed.”
That’s the long version. However, according to the player who got intercepted, it’s simply a pick. We’ve all seen how an interception can change the course and momentum of a game. When it happens, the main goal of the team who lost the ball to get it back as fast as they can before the opposing team capitalizes on the pick.
In life, love, and work, we all get intercepted on occasion. An opponent snatches the ball in mid air. Opponents can range from financial setbacks, loss of health, a car accident, an unexpected loss of a loved one, or even cruel, insensitive words from someone you thought was your friend. It can also be your own self – sometimes you are your own worst enemy – and you are “picked” by self-doubt or the sum of poor choices.
When an NFL QB is picked off, you’ll typically see a few reactions. Sometimes he just gets mad; mad at himself for allowing it to happen or mad at a receiver for not being at the right place at the right time. At other times, after a frustrating game, the QB is dejected; realizing his failure to perform the job properly. Most often, he gets back up and continues the game with strength and style. Brett Favre is a great example of this.
What have you been intercepted by?
What has caused you to lose your grip?
Getting mad provides a temporary adrenaline rush but does it accomplish anything useful? Does it make the opponent go away?
NO. The opponent still has the ball. Getting dejected drains you of precious energy and just as with getting mad, it does not accomplish any purpose.
Will you choose to remain mad and dejected or will you get back up and continue the game of life with strength and style? You can do what you can to protect yourself from some interceptions but not all. Life happens and each and every event is part of your own unique story.
If you don’t learn from your life events, then that’s all they are…events. If you learn to press forward with strength and style, a purpose has been accomplished in your life; you’ve learned, you’ve matured, you’re internally stronger.
So, take those life interceptions, learn what went wrong, get the ball back, move down your life’s field in strength and style and you WILL win.
Written by Michelle Hill
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Not only for athletes -The need to be Acknowledged - the world has you trapped
It has to be remembered that the need to have approval and be recognized is everybody’s question. Our whole life’s structure is such that we are taught that unless there is a recognition we are nobody, we are worthless. The work is not important, but the recognition. And this is putting things upside down. The work should be important...a joy in itself. You should work, not to be recognized but because you enjoy being creative; you love the work for its own sake.
There have been very few people who have been able to escape from the trap the society puts you in, like Vincent Van Gogh. He went on painting — hungry, without house, without clothes, without medicine, sick, but he went on painting. Not a single painting was being sold, there was no recognition from anywhere, but the strange thing was that in these conditions he was still happy...happy because what he wanted to paint he has been able to paint. Recognition or no recognition, his work is valuable intrinsically.
By the age of thirty-three he had committed suicide — not because of any misery, anguish, no, but simply because he had painted his last painting, on which he had been working for almost one year, a sunset. He tried dozens of times, but it was not up to his standard and he destroyed it. Finally he managed to paint the sunset the way he had longed to.
He committed suicide, writing a letter to his brother, “I am not committing suicide out of despair. I am committing suicide because now there is no point in living; my work is done. Moreover, it has been difficult to find ways of livelihood. But it was okay because I had some work to do, some potential in me needed to become actual. It has blossomed, so now it is pointless to live like a beggar.
“Up to now I had not even thought about it, I had not even looked at it. But now that is the only thing. I have blossomed to my utmost; I am fulfilled, and now to drag on, finding ways of livelihood, seems to be just stupid. For what? So it is not a suicide according to me, but just that I have come to a fulfillment, a full stop, and joyously I am leaving the world. Joyously I lived, joyously I am leaving the world.”
Now, almost a century afterwards, each of his paintings is worth millions of dollars. There are only two hundred paintings available. He must have painted thousands, but they have been destroyed; nobody took any note of them.
Now to have a Van Gogh painting means you have an aesthetic sense. His painting gives you a recognition. The world never gave any recognition to his work, but he never cared. And this should be the way to look at things.
You work if you love it. Don’t ask for recognition. If it comes, take it easily; if it does not come, do not think about it. Your fulfillment should be in the work itself. And if everybody learns this simple art of loving his work, whatever it is, enjoying it without asking for any recognition, we would have a more beautiful and celebrating world. As it is, the world has trapped you in a miserable pattern: What you are doing is not good because you love it, because you do it perfectly, but because the world recognizes it, rewards it, gives you gold medals, Nobel prizes.
They have taken away the whole intrinsic value of creativity and destroyed millions of people — because you cannot give millions of people Nobel prizes. And you have created the desire for recognition in everybody, so nobody can work peacefully, silently, enjoying whatever he is doing. And life consists of small things. For those small things there are not rewards, not titles given by the governments, not honorary degrees given by the universities.
One of the great poets of this century, Rabindranath Tagore, lived in Bengal, India. He had published his poetry, his novels, in Bengali — but no recognition came to him. Then he translated a small book, Gitanjali, “Offering of Songs,” into English. And he was aware that the original has a beauty which the translation does not have and cannot have — because these two languages, Bengali and English, have different structures, different ways of expression.
Bengali is very sweet. Even if you fight, it seems you are engaged in a nice conversation. It is very musical; each word is musical. That quality is not in English, and cannot be brought to it; it has different qualities. But somehow he managed to translate it, and the translation — which is a poor thing compared to the original — received the Nobel prize. Then suddenly the whole of India became aware.... The book had been available in Bengali, in other Indian languages, for years and nobody had taken any note of it.
Every university wanted to give him a D.Litt. Calcutta, where he lived, was the first university, obviously, to offer him an honorary degree. He refused. He said, “You are not giving a degree to me; you are not giving a recognition to my work, you are giving recognition to the Nobel prize, because the book has been here in a far more beautiful way, and nobody has bothered even to write an appraisal.”
He refused to take any D.Litts. He said, “It is insulting to me.” Jean-Paul Sartre, one of the great novelists, and a man of tremendous insight into human psychology, refused the Nobel prize. He said, “I have received enough reward while I was creating my work. A Nobel prize cannot add anything to it; on the contrary, it pulls me down. It is good for amateurs who are in search of recognition; I am old enough, and I have enjoyed enough. I have loved whatever I have done. It was its own reward, and I don’t want any other reward, because nothing can be better than that which I have already received.” And he was right. But the right people are so few in the world, and the world is full of wrong people living in traps.
Why should you bother about recognition? Bothering about recognition has meaning only if you don’t love your work; then it is meaningful, then it seems to substitute. You hate the work, you don’t like it, but you are doing it because there will be recognition; you will be appreciated, accepted. Rather than thinking about recognition, reconsider your work. Do you love it?...then that is the end. If you do not love it, then change it!
The parents, the teachers are always reinforcing that you should be recognized, you should be accepted. This is a very cunning strategy to keep people under control.
I was told again and again in my university, “You should stop doing these things...you go on asking questions which you know perfectly well cannot be answered, and which put the professor in an embarrassing situation. You have to stop it; otherwise these people will take revenge. They have power; they can fail you.”
I said, “I don’t bother about it. I am enjoying right now asking questions and making them feel ignorant. They are not courageous enough simply to say, ‘I do not know.’ Then there would be no embarrassment. But they want to pretend that they know everything. I am enjoying it; my intelligence is being sharpened. Who cares about examinations? They can fail me only when I appear in the examinations — who is going to appear? If they have that idea that they can fail me, I will not enter the examinations, and I will remain in the same class. They will have to pass me just out of fear that again for one year they will have to face me!”
And they all passed me, and helped me to pass, because they wanted to get rid of me. In their eyes I was also destroying other students, because other students started questioning things which have been accepted for centuries without any question.
While I was teaching in the university, the same thing came about from a different angle. Now I was asking the students questions to bring to their attention that all the knowledge that they have gathered is borrowed, and they know nothing. I told them that I don’t care about their degrees, I care about their authentic experience — and they don’t have any. They are simply repeating books which are out of date; long ago they have been proved wrong. Now the authorities of the university were threatening me, “If you continue in this way, harassing students, you will be thrown out of the university.”
I said, “This is strange — I was a student and I could not ask questions to the professors; now I am a professor and I cannot ask questions to the students! So what function is this university fulfilling? It should be a place where questions are asked, quests begin. Answers have to be found not in the books but in life and in existence.”
I said, “You can throw me out of the university, but remember, these same students, because of whom you are throwing me out of the university, will burn down the whole university.” I told the vice-chancellor, “You should come and see my class.”
He could not believe it: in my class there were at least two hundred students...and there were no spaces, so they were sitting anywhere they could find — on the windows, on the floor. He said, “What is happening, because you have only ten students?”
I said, “These people come to listen. They dropped their classes; they love to be here. This class is a dialogue. I am not superior to them, and I cannot refuse anybody who comes to my class. Whether he is my student or not, it does not matter; if he comes to listen to me, he is my student. In fact you should allow me to have the auditorium. These classrooms are too small for me.”
He said, “Auditorium? You mean the whole university to gather in the auditorium? Then what will the other professors be doing?”
I said, “That is for them to think out. They can go and hang themselves! They should have done it long before. Seeing that their students are not going to listen to them was enough indication.”
The professors were angry, the authorities were angry. Finally they had to give me the auditorium...but very reluctantly, because the students were forcing them. But they said, “This is strange, students who have nothing to do with philosophy, religion or psychology, why should they go there?”
Many students told the vice-chancellor, “We love it. We never knew that philosophy, religion, psychology can be so interesting, so intriguing; otherwise we would have joined them. We thought that these are dry subjects; only very bookish kind of people join these subjects. We have never seen any juicy people joining the subjects. But this man has made the subjects so significant that it seems that even if we fail in our own subjects, it does not matter. What we are doing is so right in itself, and we are so clear about it, that there is no question of changing it.”
Against recognition, against acceptance, against degrees...but finally I had to leave the university, not because of their threats but because I recognized that if thousands of students can be helped by me, it is a wastage. I can help millions of people outside in the world. Why should I go on remaining attached to a small university? The whole world can be my university.
And you can see: I have been condemned.
That is the only recognition I have received.
I have been in every way misrepresented. Everything that can be said against a man has been said against me; everything that can be done against a man has been done against me. Do you think this is recognition? But I love my work. I love it so much that I don’t call it work even; I simply call it my joy.
And everybody who was in some way elder to me, well-recognized, has told me, “What you are doing is not going to give you any respectability in the world.”
But I said, “I have never asked for it, and I don’t see what I will do with respectability. I cannot eat it, I cannot drink it.”
Learn one basic thing: Do whatever you want to do, love to do, and never ask for recognition. That is begging. Why should one ask for recognition? Why should one hanker for acceptance?
Deep down in yourself, look. Perhaps you don’t like what you are doing, perhaps you are afraid that you are on the wrong track. Acceptance will help you feel that you are right. Recognition will make you feel that you are going towards the right goal.
The question is of your own inner feelings; it has nothing to do with the outside world. And why depend on others? All these things depend on others — you yourself are becoming dependent.
I will not accept any Nobel prize. All this condemnation from all the nations around the world, from all the religions, is more valuable to me. Accepting the Nobel prize means I am becoming dependent; now I will not be proud of myself but proud of the Nobel prize. Right now I can only be proud of myself; there is nothing else I can be proud of.
This way you become an individual. And to be an individual living in total freedom, on your own feet, drinking from your own sources, is what makes a man really centered, rooted. That is the beginning of his ultimate flowering.
These so-called recognized people, honored people, are full of rubbish and nothing else. But they are full of the rubbish which the society wants them to be filled with...and the society compensates them by giving them rewards.
Any man who has any sense of his own individuality lives by his own love, by his own work, without caring at all what others think of it. The more valuable your work is, the less is the possibility of getting any respectability for it. And if your work is the work of a genius then you are not going to see any respect in your life. You will be condemned in your life...then, after two or three centuries, statues of you will be made, your books will be respected — because it takes almost two or three centuries for humanity to pick up that much intelligence that a genius has today. The gap is vast.
Being respected by idiots you have to behave according to their manners, their expectations. To be respected by this sick humanity you have to be more sick than they are. Then they will respect you. But what will you gain? You will lose your soul and you will gain nothing.
Osho, Beyond Psychology, Talk #32
There have been very few people who have been able to escape from the trap the society puts you in, like Vincent Van Gogh. He went on painting — hungry, without house, without clothes, without medicine, sick, but he went on painting. Not a single painting was being sold, there was no recognition from anywhere, but the strange thing was that in these conditions he was still happy...happy because what he wanted to paint he has been able to paint. Recognition or no recognition, his work is valuable intrinsically.
By the age of thirty-three he had committed suicide — not because of any misery, anguish, no, but simply because he had painted his last painting, on which he had been working for almost one year, a sunset. He tried dozens of times, but it was not up to his standard and he destroyed it. Finally he managed to paint the sunset the way he had longed to.
He committed suicide, writing a letter to his brother, “I am not committing suicide out of despair. I am committing suicide because now there is no point in living; my work is done. Moreover, it has been difficult to find ways of livelihood. But it was okay because I had some work to do, some potential in me needed to become actual. It has blossomed, so now it is pointless to live like a beggar.
“Up to now I had not even thought about it, I had not even looked at it. But now that is the only thing. I have blossomed to my utmost; I am fulfilled, and now to drag on, finding ways of livelihood, seems to be just stupid. For what? So it is not a suicide according to me, but just that I have come to a fulfillment, a full stop, and joyously I am leaving the world. Joyously I lived, joyously I am leaving the world.”
Now, almost a century afterwards, each of his paintings is worth millions of dollars. There are only two hundred paintings available. He must have painted thousands, but they have been destroyed; nobody took any note of them.
Now to have a Van Gogh painting means you have an aesthetic sense. His painting gives you a recognition. The world never gave any recognition to his work, but he never cared. And this should be the way to look at things.
You work if you love it. Don’t ask for recognition. If it comes, take it easily; if it does not come, do not think about it. Your fulfillment should be in the work itself. And if everybody learns this simple art of loving his work, whatever it is, enjoying it without asking for any recognition, we would have a more beautiful and celebrating world. As it is, the world has trapped you in a miserable pattern: What you are doing is not good because you love it, because you do it perfectly, but because the world recognizes it, rewards it, gives you gold medals, Nobel prizes.
They have taken away the whole intrinsic value of creativity and destroyed millions of people — because you cannot give millions of people Nobel prizes. And you have created the desire for recognition in everybody, so nobody can work peacefully, silently, enjoying whatever he is doing. And life consists of small things. For those small things there are not rewards, not titles given by the governments, not honorary degrees given by the universities.
One of the great poets of this century, Rabindranath Tagore, lived in Bengal, India. He had published his poetry, his novels, in Bengali — but no recognition came to him. Then he translated a small book, Gitanjali, “Offering of Songs,” into English. And he was aware that the original has a beauty which the translation does not have and cannot have — because these two languages, Bengali and English, have different structures, different ways of expression.
Bengali is very sweet. Even if you fight, it seems you are engaged in a nice conversation. It is very musical; each word is musical. That quality is not in English, and cannot be brought to it; it has different qualities. But somehow he managed to translate it, and the translation — which is a poor thing compared to the original — received the Nobel prize. Then suddenly the whole of India became aware.... The book had been available in Bengali, in other Indian languages, for years and nobody had taken any note of it.
Every university wanted to give him a D.Litt. Calcutta, where he lived, was the first university, obviously, to offer him an honorary degree. He refused. He said, “You are not giving a degree to me; you are not giving a recognition to my work, you are giving recognition to the Nobel prize, because the book has been here in a far more beautiful way, and nobody has bothered even to write an appraisal.”
He refused to take any D.Litts. He said, “It is insulting to me.” Jean-Paul Sartre, one of the great novelists, and a man of tremendous insight into human psychology, refused the Nobel prize. He said, “I have received enough reward while I was creating my work. A Nobel prize cannot add anything to it; on the contrary, it pulls me down. It is good for amateurs who are in search of recognition; I am old enough, and I have enjoyed enough. I have loved whatever I have done. It was its own reward, and I don’t want any other reward, because nothing can be better than that which I have already received.” And he was right. But the right people are so few in the world, and the world is full of wrong people living in traps.
Why should you bother about recognition? Bothering about recognition has meaning only if you don’t love your work; then it is meaningful, then it seems to substitute. You hate the work, you don’t like it, but you are doing it because there will be recognition; you will be appreciated, accepted. Rather than thinking about recognition, reconsider your work. Do you love it?...then that is the end. If you do not love it, then change it!
The parents, the teachers are always reinforcing that you should be recognized, you should be accepted. This is a very cunning strategy to keep people under control.
I was told again and again in my university, “You should stop doing these things...you go on asking questions which you know perfectly well cannot be answered, and which put the professor in an embarrassing situation. You have to stop it; otherwise these people will take revenge. They have power; they can fail you.”
I said, “I don’t bother about it. I am enjoying right now asking questions and making them feel ignorant. They are not courageous enough simply to say, ‘I do not know.’ Then there would be no embarrassment. But they want to pretend that they know everything. I am enjoying it; my intelligence is being sharpened. Who cares about examinations? They can fail me only when I appear in the examinations — who is going to appear? If they have that idea that they can fail me, I will not enter the examinations, and I will remain in the same class. They will have to pass me just out of fear that again for one year they will have to face me!”
And they all passed me, and helped me to pass, because they wanted to get rid of me. In their eyes I was also destroying other students, because other students started questioning things which have been accepted for centuries without any question.
While I was teaching in the university, the same thing came about from a different angle. Now I was asking the students questions to bring to their attention that all the knowledge that they have gathered is borrowed, and they know nothing. I told them that I don’t care about their degrees, I care about their authentic experience — and they don’t have any. They are simply repeating books which are out of date; long ago they have been proved wrong. Now the authorities of the university were threatening me, “If you continue in this way, harassing students, you will be thrown out of the university.”
I said, “This is strange — I was a student and I could not ask questions to the professors; now I am a professor and I cannot ask questions to the students! So what function is this university fulfilling? It should be a place where questions are asked, quests begin. Answers have to be found not in the books but in life and in existence.”
I said, “You can throw me out of the university, but remember, these same students, because of whom you are throwing me out of the university, will burn down the whole university.” I told the vice-chancellor, “You should come and see my class.”
He could not believe it: in my class there were at least two hundred students...and there were no spaces, so they were sitting anywhere they could find — on the windows, on the floor. He said, “What is happening, because you have only ten students?”
I said, “These people come to listen. They dropped their classes; they love to be here. This class is a dialogue. I am not superior to them, and I cannot refuse anybody who comes to my class. Whether he is my student or not, it does not matter; if he comes to listen to me, he is my student. In fact you should allow me to have the auditorium. These classrooms are too small for me.”
He said, “Auditorium? You mean the whole university to gather in the auditorium? Then what will the other professors be doing?”
I said, “That is for them to think out. They can go and hang themselves! They should have done it long before. Seeing that their students are not going to listen to them was enough indication.”
The professors were angry, the authorities were angry. Finally they had to give me the auditorium...but very reluctantly, because the students were forcing them. But they said, “This is strange, students who have nothing to do with philosophy, religion or psychology, why should they go there?”
Many students told the vice-chancellor, “We love it. We never knew that philosophy, religion, psychology can be so interesting, so intriguing; otherwise we would have joined them. We thought that these are dry subjects; only very bookish kind of people join these subjects. We have never seen any juicy people joining the subjects. But this man has made the subjects so significant that it seems that even if we fail in our own subjects, it does not matter. What we are doing is so right in itself, and we are so clear about it, that there is no question of changing it.”
Against recognition, against acceptance, against degrees...but finally I had to leave the university, not because of their threats but because I recognized that if thousands of students can be helped by me, it is a wastage. I can help millions of people outside in the world. Why should I go on remaining attached to a small university? The whole world can be my university.
And you can see: I have been condemned.
That is the only recognition I have received.
I have been in every way misrepresented. Everything that can be said against a man has been said against me; everything that can be done against a man has been done against me. Do you think this is recognition? But I love my work. I love it so much that I don’t call it work even; I simply call it my joy.
And everybody who was in some way elder to me, well-recognized, has told me, “What you are doing is not going to give you any respectability in the world.”
But I said, “I have never asked for it, and I don’t see what I will do with respectability. I cannot eat it, I cannot drink it.”
Learn one basic thing: Do whatever you want to do, love to do, and never ask for recognition. That is begging. Why should one ask for recognition? Why should one hanker for acceptance?
Deep down in yourself, look. Perhaps you don’t like what you are doing, perhaps you are afraid that you are on the wrong track. Acceptance will help you feel that you are right. Recognition will make you feel that you are going towards the right goal.
The question is of your own inner feelings; it has nothing to do with the outside world. And why depend on others? All these things depend on others — you yourself are becoming dependent.
I will not accept any Nobel prize. All this condemnation from all the nations around the world, from all the religions, is more valuable to me. Accepting the Nobel prize means I am becoming dependent; now I will not be proud of myself but proud of the Nobel prize. Right now I can only be proud of myself; there is nothing else I can be proud of.
This way you become an individual. And to be an individual living in total freedom, on your own feet, drinking from your own sources, is what makes a man really centered, rooted. That is the beginning of his ultimate flowering.
These so-called recognized people, honored people, are full of rubbish and nothing else. But they are full of the rubbish which the society wants them to be filled with...and the society compensates them by giving them rewards.
Any man who has any sense of his own individuality lives by his own love, by his own work, without caring at all what others think of it. The more valuable your work is, the less is the possibility of getting any respectability for it. And if your work is the work of a genius then you are not going to see any respect in your life. You will be condemned in your life...then, after two or three centuries, statues of you will be made, your books will be respected — because it takes almost two or three centuries for humanity to pick up that much intelligence that a genius has today. The gap is vast.
Being respected by idiots you have to behave according to their manners, their expectations. To be respected by this sick humanity you have to be more sick than they are. Then they will respect you. But what will you gain? You will lose your soul and you will gain nothing.
Osho, Beyond Psychology, Talk #32
Thursday, August 5, 2010
The Energy Body - Yoga Part 11
But fasting is important. It should be done very carefully; one should understand the functioning of the annamay kosh – only then. And it should be done under proper guidance, of one who has moved through all the phases of his annamay kosh. Not only that, one who has gone beyond it and who can look at the annamay kosh as a witness. Otherwise fasting can be dangerous…then, just the right amount of food and the right quality of food has to be practiced; fasting is not needed.
But this is important because this is your first body and, more or less, people cling to their first body; they never move to the second. Millions of people are not even aware that they have a second body, a deeper body, hidden behind the first sheath. The first covering is very gross.
The second body Patanjali calls pranamay kosh – energy body, electric body. The second consists of electric fields. That’s what acupuncture is all about. This second body is more subtle than the first, and people who start moving from the first body to the second become fields of energy, tremendously attractive, magnetic, hypnotic. If you go near them, you will feel vitalized, charged.
If you go near a man who lives only in his food body, you will be depleted – he will suck you. Many times you come across people and you feel that they suck you. After they have left, you feel depleted, dissipated, as if somebody has exploited your energy. The first body is a sucker, and the first body is very gross. So if you live too much with first body-oriented people, you will feel always burdened, tense, bored, sleepy, with no energy, always at the point of the lowest rung of your energy; and you will not have any amount of energy which can be used for higher growth.
This type, the first type, the annamay-kosh oriented person lives for food. He eats and eats and eats, and that’s his whole life. He remains in a way childish. The first thing that the child does in the world is to suck air, and then to suck milk. The first thing the child has to do in the world is to help the food body, and if a person remains food addicted, he remains childish; his growth suffers.
The second body, pranamay kosh, gives you a new freedom, gives you more space. The second body is bigger than the first; it is not confined to your physical body. It is inside the physical body and it is outside the physical body; it surrounds you like a subtle climate, an aura of energy. Now in Russia they have discovered that photographs can be taken of this energy body. They call it “bioplasma,” but it exactly means prana – the energy, elan vital, or what Taoists call chi. It can be photographed now; now it has become almost scientific.
And one very great discovery has been done in Russia, and that is that before your physical body suffers some illness the energy body suffers it – six months before – then it happens to the physical body. If you are going to have tuberculosis, or cancer, or any illness, your energy body starts showing indications of it six months before. No examination, no testing of the physical body shows anything, but the electric body starts showing it. First it appears in the pranamay kosh, then it enters into the annamay kosh.
Osho Yoga; The Path to Liberation Talk # 1o, Yoga: The Path to Liberation, Talk #1
But this is important because this is your first body and, more or less, people cling to their first body; they never move to the second. Millions of people are not even aware that they have a second body, a deeper body, hidden behind the first sheath. The first covering is very gross.
The second body Patanjali calls pranamay kosh – energy body, electric body. The second consists of electric fields. That’s what acupuncture is all about. This second body is more subtle than the first, and people who start moving from the first body to the second become fields of energy, tremendously attractive, magnetic, hypnotic. If you go near them, you will feel vitalized, charged.
If you go near a man who lives only in his food body, you will be depleted – he will suck you. Many times you come across people and you feel that they suck you. After they have left, you feel depleted, dissipated, as if somebody has exploited your energy. The first body is a sucker, and the first body is very gross. So if you live too much with first body-oriented people, you will feel always burdened, tense, bored, sleepy, with no energy, always at the point of the lowest rung of your energy; and you will not have any amount of energy which can be used for higher growth.
This type, the first type, the annamay-kosh oriented person lives for food. He eats and eats and eats, and that’s his whole life. He remains in a way childish. The first thing that the child does in the world is to suck air, and then to suck milk. The first thing the child has to do in the world is to help the food body, and if a person remains food addicted, he remains childish; his growth suffers.
The second body, pranamay kosh, gives you a new freedom, gives you more space. The second body is bigger than the first; it is not confined to your physical body. It is inside the physical body and it is outside the physical body; it surrounds you like a subtle climate, an aura of energy. Now in Russia they have discovered that photographs can be taken of this energy body. They call it “bioplasma,” but it exactly means prana – the energy, elan vital, or what Taoists call chi. It can be photographed now; now it has become almost scientific.
And one very great discovery has been done in Russia, and that is that before your physical body suffers some illness the energy body suffers it – six months before – then it happens to the physical body. If you are going to have tuberculosis, or cancer, or any illness, your energy body starts showing indications of it six months before. No examination, no testing of the physical body shows anything, but the electric body starts showing it. First it appears in the pranamay kosh, then it enters into the annamay kosh.
Osho Yoga; The Path to Liberation Talk # 1o, Yoga: The Path to Liberation, Talk #1
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