Gag bag

In shambles,

Or am I in pain

I see you at a distance

Or am I just trying to see you in vain.

I hear a call, and it is for me.

But I am scared, scared to know the reality.

A loud noise, a clap of thunder

Flashing in front of my eyes,

When will this end, when will it fade away

I shout out towards the skies.

I start running,

Afraid that I am being followed.

I look back and I see a figure

Just one look tells me that I am done for.

There is no escaping this one,

And there is nothing I can do I am sure.

Why, you ask me? Well, it’s my own ghost,

Now what do you do with those?

I have heard and seen many kinds of shit

But this is new and unheard of.

She knows me in and out, and I can’t fool her, I can’t shout

And as she reads my mind, I hear a sorrowed laugh.

I turn back,

Facing myself, weeping, standing alone

And I can’t help but notice, that she is just like me

Just as sad, as lonely and waiting to see

If I can be friends with her

Cause she too lives parallelly.

I approach her, and she backs off

Well that’s new I wonder

For what has she got to be afraid of.

But then I realize, that she is just as afraid of me

As I am of her, and I start to wonder

At what point of time did all of this start.

To be good with yourself

You need to accept yourself, however you are

And once your conscience is clear,

Neither of you will be afraid or lonely.

All you need is honesty and forgiveness

Cause only these are the real pillars of happiness.

It’s hard to rid off your past

Just as it is hard to make your future.

Make friends with yourself, and never feel lonely

Cause no matter where you are

No matter what you do

That ghost from your past, will always be there with you.

Shattered now, she lay still

Knowing that moving wasn't helping

Attracting attention wasn't the way out

Nor could she just shout.

Bound were here hands and legs, though figuratively

Motion of any kind disengaged

And though her senses were up and running

She felt numb, useless and paralyzingly ill.

The castle was broken into

That bloody rascal of an ass****

As she lay down she thought back

To the better times, when trust wasn't a loophole.

Everything was always assumed

That things could always workout

Never did she for once believe

That her privacy and security would be breached.

Life had quickly taken a turnaround

Within a short time, the light had been withdrawn.

The one whom she believed in with her life

Was the one who let her down.

For days she couldn't believe what was happening

It all seemed so unreal and hazy

And though it had been a long time since then

She still had to pinch herself to understand the gravity.

It was the stronghold in her life.

Something which she was proud of.

And though she never made a big deal out of it

She knew how much she relied upon it.

And she thought it was reciprocated evenly

That it was the same wave on either bank

But the tsunami that came one day

Destroyed the very existence of her life.

As she lay crippling, succumbing to her own wounds

She thought about a way to get back at her enemies.

But she wasn't used to all this, she wasn't the fighting type.

She would rather slit her own throat than go after those hounds.

She had always been the peaceful one.

Never protesting, just wanting the bare necessities,

The castle that she had acquired,

Even that was something she had herself built.

She had a mission to her life.

And she couldn't just give up.

Yes, life isn't fair, and it doesn't make sense anymore.

Maybe it will never make sense as well.

After all, what good is life if you are perennially bound

Burdened by the misgivings of people all around

Tortured constantly, slowly impaled,

But she was the fighting one, she would live through this hell.

From today she would start a life anew.

Picking up pieces one by one, she knew she could put it all back again.

It will take a long time, and it will never be as good as it was.

But she was known as the “living one”, the one who could live no matter what.

She had evolved a lot since all this happened.

And only time would tell if she was doing any better.

But her conscience was clean, she had done the right thing.

And she could still face everyone without a shard of evil.

For those who had played with her life,

She had started to feel pity on them.

Maybe they missed the best of her,

And she the worst of them.

But it was all about belief now,

For it is a beautiful weapon to carry

With belief you can act as you want,

Without any regret, without any worry.

Today she had that weapon.

She could wield it to her defense

And if someone did come to hinder her path

Her belief would see that it was the last she sees of them.

That’s what belief does for you, it gives you a charm.

It gives you peace of mind, it gives you strength in and out

Lying there in misery all these days, made her resilient, made her strong

Today she believed, that she could scrape through life somehow.

I have contemplated on this either ways. I always was of the opinion that one doesn't need a coach to make it far in any field. What you need is willingness from within yourself. And a desire to win at all costs. I think more of it is in this desire, and most people lack this. And coaching is more about bringing out this best in you. But if you can manage it yourself, I think you don’t need someone tutoring you.

Why then are coaches in demand? Why do we as humans always need an eye on us to keep us motivated? Why can’t we just realize what is good for us, and build on that? Why do we need a third person telling us everything?

I was so very against taking help, getting coached in anything, that I believed that if someone else can do it, I should be able to do so too. And I did my efforts to reach there. Maybe the efforts were totally focused, but whatever I gave, I gave more than a hundred percent to everything I was in. And as it turns, I fared fairly well. I say fairly, for a reason. My opposition to getting coached stunted some nuances which would make my effort totally worth the input.

As we grow older, some of our inhibitions change, (while some new ones crop up, but that isn't the point here). We realize what we missed out, and how taking up certain things would have helped. But well, it is never late is it?

When you start helping someone else in something they consider you are good at, is the time you realize that well, maybe you could have had your model to learn from too. And you wonder why did you not think about it earlier? Sitting outside is by all means no easy, and as a teacher, you often have to put yourself in that seat. You have to sit outside, see others make mistakes, and fight with yourself to let it go. Mistakes are meant to happen, and while you are in it, it is hard to not commit them. Be it a result of lack of time to think, or just something you had no idea of.

But somehow, when you start putting yourself in the same seat, you start realizing how and where are mistakes committed.

Let us fast forward now, since I am taking the above conversation to no end. As most of the bright amongst you must have realized, I am talking about football (soccer for the more westernized among you).

Just a week back, I started my stint at coaching young kids some football. It has been a long standing dream for me, and as things stand, this is the best time to make good of that dream. I always wanted to go out there, form a league of enthusiastic teams, and play some good regulated football. I wanted to go out there, and revive that fighting spirit we have in each of us. Many of us go and do something for the sake of it, but there has to be that beacon lit up within us, that if we are doing a certain thing, we have to be the best at it. And somehow, as a coach, you can challenge yourself to achieve that within the players out there. Ultimately it is not always the quality which stands out, but it’s more of this spirit which we see reflected in the final result.

At every moment, you want to excel at what you do. If you can do that, then yes, you are a winner no matter what the outcome is.

Coaching is a lot like watching a game on the television. Remember how you always sit in front of the box and yell out when someone commits a mistake. It’s like you want to go out there, and tell them a thing or two of your own, cause you have seen the mistake happening and you know why it happened. It’s not like the person who committed it doesn’t know. It’s just that when you go out there, you make mistakes inspite of knowing everything. And you as a coach are just expected to reduce these mistakes in your team.

Is it necessary that you have to know the game really well to be a good coach? Well not necessarily. Atleast I don’t think that is a very important factor (although yes, you do need some basic knowledge). I think the most important characteristic I would like to see in any mentor is a way to reach out to you. Often we meet people all around us who are always giving advice, no matter you ask for it or not. But there are a few whom we hold close, and whom we revere and listen to no matter what. We don’t tell them so, but yes, we do try to emulate and take the advice for good. If you can get a coach to reach out to all his players or pupils, you have a very good mentor at hand.

That was all about coaches in general. What do I like about it? Well yes, I love working with kids. I think the reason why I took up this act is more so cause I want to go out there and make a change. It was my dream (And is still is) to buy a nice plot for a good 7 on 7 game of football, and grow a nice turf on it, and have a competitive league played there through the year. And the best people to work with is small kids. For the one very big reason, that they bring the best out in you. You laugh over their silly behavior, and maybe get exasperated over their antics, but you love them no matter what. They are innocent, they are untarnished, and they never play any sort of fake game with you. Things like honor, respect, mind games have still not penetrated into these minds, and you get the response of what it would be in a world full of honesty. All this apart from the fact that they are the cutest and the most adorable beings in the world.

Understanding a kid is very important. And you always feel that you are the one teaching them to grow up. I often think of it the other way round. I think they are teaching us how to be young. I think that is one of the best feelings in the world. You have to go young and innocent and carefree to get their approval. And once in that mode, you start enjoying a lot since it feels good to be that person. It’s what you always wanted to be, but couldn’t thanks to the horrible things going around in the world. A kid will never stop himself/ herself from doing a thing, just because it won’t get approved. And he/ she will never do it just over some earthly material thing. They can’t always give you the reason, but they are very innocent in their approach and very bold in their stance.

Another thing is they like you for what you are. They have no expectations, expect for the fact that they should have fun. If they are not having fun, they let you know that as well. I think you yourself start improving as soon as you come in contact with these kids. They teach you how humans are meant to be, how beautiful a world it is when there is no guile or treachery and how you can mix up and match up with any other person, barring all the hurdles of language, religion, color. All you need is fun people around you, and you shall be good to go.

Often I like to quote the phrase “Football is a religion”. I talk about football, cause it has helped me know people I would never have ventured out to know in the first place. It has always given me the best. My friends, my job, my success and for many, a way to know and link me with. I want this network to grow a lot, since it is one I can build on very easily. I like how easy it is to walk up to a stranger and just ask his/her name when you go out there to play. It becomes so easy. You forget your inhibitions, your weird ideas and thoughts, for the sole reason that you just want to be a part of the game they are in. I think this is what I have learnt from playing football for so many years. And this is what I would like to teach to those young kids. That no matter where you are, however lonely you are, if you walk out there on a small stretch of land, with a football in your hand, 10 people will join in in less than 5 minutes to start a game off. You needn't know their names, their backgrounds or where they come from. You don’t need to meet them again. You can just have the best hour of your life and you won’t ever regret it.

To me, my best achievement will be to go out, and bring people together over some reason. And if its football, it would be even better! :)

He got up early

Or so he thought

For it was the only way

To get what he sought.

He ate little

And slept further less

Cause he had so many others

To catch upto in this race.

Time fought with him

And he with time

But he just couldn’t figure

A way to rhyme.

For want of more

He messed up his little

And he just wondered

How everyone else could settle.

One fine day

As he set off again

He was stopped by someone

Someone who he felt was in pain.

But time was short

He checked his watch

But he gave in promising

To later step it up a notch.

He walked across

From his laid down path

A thing which he had

Never ever doth.

As he approached her

He felt the tension rising

He instinctively knew he had to be slow

For she had had too much to take in.

But slow he wasn’t used to

Slow wasn’t the way to go

But her eyes he saw

Made him forget all that he believed ago.

He lay his hand on her shoulder

A gesture he wasn’t used to

He could feel the tremor

And he just wanted to take her pain off too.

She gave in quickly to her will

And rest her head on his shoulder

And it was then that he felt

The world had come to a standstill.

For years together

He had searched for an answer.

How he had never realized this,

He could only wonder.

Today he understood

How to conquer time

Today he felt at peace

Today he felt himself rhyme.

He gave her a hug

And she melted with soft purrs.

She had shown him his way,

And he had shown her hers.

She was nothing he had ever imagined

Not even in his wildest guess.

She was calm, soft and caring

And he, ruthless, fast and restless.

But she completed him

She calmed him down

She helped him see

Beauty in things he would frown.

Life was short, time was less

Had been his thought for all these days.

But she taught him to enjoy what he thought less

In so many a different ways.

While running around the town

He had come across many others

But there were none he knew

Whom he could call his own.

If ever there was a thing called destiny

He wanted it right now

He knew it started and ended with her

And he knew the what and the how.

Life had been cruel to him

Under-performing, playing second fiddle.

But he knew he was right on this

Cause he had the answer to the ultimate riddle.