Insights from the World's Greatest Player & Coach of Badminton

Heard Pullela Gopichand speak at #ARIA #ASPIRE event a coupple of days ago in Mumbai. One of the most heart warming and soulful sessions i have personally witnessed. Definitely we got much more than what I expected. Here are a few highlights from the session. #LifeLessons I will followup with a post that relates these insights to investing.

Success & Perseverance

1. Believe 100% in your ability to win; even if you are down 0-20, know exactly how you will win the game and match back. If you lose, then tell yourself that you will come back and beat the guy in the next match. Never for once doubt yourself.
2. Stay sober when success charms you; dont be too elated. When you fail, dont lose heart. Equanimity.
3. Give all of yourself to ‘Work’ or ‘Goal’ or whatever it is. If it doesn't work out, then trust your intuition to know when it's over. Recognise when something is resulting in a dead end.
4. If you are hanging from a cliff and cant climb back then be brave to LET GO and jump to a different place, bounce back and start a new journey afresh. Gopichand had to stop playing active badminton at a young age due to injury, and plunged into coaching.
5. The winners set rules that favour themselves. Example: swimming medals are numerous in Olympics because some countries tend to win those. Not so with say, running events. India needs to work harder at sport.
6. A nation becomes great when a talented few can become the best in the world in their chosen field (quoted JRD Tata).
7. Children should go for sports early on. Even though only 1 in 100 will win; the remaining 99 still gain a lot with life lessons in failure. They get the explore the length and breadth of their physical being. They get to build their character. (Aside to me, this is why i am building a startup though failure rate is high; it pushes me to my limits, something that cushy corporate job would not have).
8. Sport is a great leveller; the boy coming in a chauffeur driven Mercedes wearing Nike shoes learns a thing when he loses to the slum kid running barefoot. Every child must learn such lessons - respect talent, effort, have gratitude for one’s privilege.
9. What matters is not how bad you fall, how deep you fall; what only matters is how quickly you get up. His Chinese coach told him.
10. “Don’t simply trust whatever the media says.” This applies to celebrities and us general public too.
11. When things are not going your way, lie low. Prepare for when the tide rises. When it does, be brave; seize the opportunity with both hands. Sky is the limit. My take: So similar to how you must seize when markets are down and not complain when they fall.
12. He declined a lucrative sponsorship of a soft drink in 2001. Why? He stopped drinking soft drinks in 1997 due to the health hazards; how can he sleep well by endorsing something he wouldn’t do himself? Epic and a slap on the face of those fake celebrities and sportspeople.
13. He had no “Plan B”. Puts you squarely in the present. Unleashes all your energy. This is a corollary to the “what happens if your plan fails” point above. Basically don’t plan to fail. Hence no plan B. But if it fails then don’t kid yourself, recognise and move on.

Self-care

1. Take good care of yourself - eat well, sleep well… think well. Do your journey well. Enjoy the process/journey. Be happy wherever the journey takes you - to success or failure. It really does not matter.
2. Tenets of Health (the most basic thing, in addition to happines, gratitude): eat well, sleep well, breathe well and ensure movement of the body.

Happiness

1. Be hungry at work, and happy at home. Dont mix the two. Learn to be happy and satisfied at home no matter what happens at work.
2. Even the worst situation does mean that life is still good. Have gratitude for having walked the path.
3. His friend Pradeep told him (at his height of success) - a 6 ft tall person can have a 6ft bed; 7ft is luxury; 8 ft is super luxury. But dont hanker for a bed bigger than the neighbour’s bed.
4. When his proteges left him: It is key to evaluate how thing are; not the way you want them to be. A great lesson in getting real. My take: Dont fool yourself, or dont begrudge anything.
5. If God takes away something from your life; dont worry; He is sending something else on the way.

Amazing life lessons from a coach, in fact the best India has seen. Once you listen to Gopi or even simply watch him, you dont need any "lifecoach". He left a mesmerising effect on the audience which was full of wealthy and successful 'people' in their own right.