Soccer key to understanding guru sadhu and sastra

[Guest guest]

>

>

> The association (ie, LIVING with them) and presence in this world of

empowered

> and high-class Vaisnavas makes a tremendous difference.

>

> What do you think?

>

>

> Srila dasa

 

It makes a great difference and is essential.

 

Srila Prabhupada has said that this is a natural process, not an artificial

imposition on the senses. So we should be able to just look around us and see

how

it is that the world actually works.

 

I coached under 12 soccer(that is American for football) this spring. I am not

an

uttama coach, nor even a madhyama. At best, I am a kanistha soccer

coach(yes,

I know I am misusing the terms). But for a new player just starting, I am

the

authorised representative of the sampradaya of the local soccer club. He can

play

soccer without me, but if he wants to play in authorised games, he needs to

be

approved by me. I am like the diksa. There are soccer camps available where

he

can learn to play, taught by much better coaches than me, he can hire

individual

tutors to teach him better than me, but to play authorised game, I have to

be

the one to insert him in the lineup.

 

He can read books by Pele, or by the greatest coaches in the world. All

techniques can be described in those books, all tactics can be explained. He

can

watch Manchester United score 2 goals in injury time to win the European Cup,

but

unless I show him hands on how to kick, trap, shoot and defend, he will have

a

very difficult time to learn how to play. Of course, if I study those books,

i

am a better coach, and can help him even more - asa a matter of fact, without

those books I will be almost useless as a coach. But if he just tries to learn

the game with just the books of even the greatest playeers and coaches,,

without

the physical presence of someone to show him how to actually kick, he will

never

be very good.

 

Anyway, we could play around with this example, and if I wasn't rushed by

summer

work, I would, but you get the idea.

 

When I starting coaching, I read books, watched tapes, but really the way I

learned the most was by joining an adult league and actually going out and

playing

the game with guys who had been playing for many years ( I played 3 years as a

teenager but then never touched a ball for 30 years so really was like starting

from scratch). That is like associating with the sadhus. To just kick a ball

against a wall and read a soccer book, I never would have learned as much.

 

Eventually, I took a couple coaching classes and am now a level E coach(which

isn't very much - lowest is F, highest is A). I have been certified as a bona

fide coach in the sampradaya. Players I coach would do well to continue to

hunt

for an utama coach, but I am better than nothing. Incidentally, we started

slow, but my team ended the season 4-2-1, so I must be learning. So even a

kanistha or madhyama guru has a chance to improve.