Celebrating The Champion Minset with Manasi Joshi and Tejaswin Shankar
On a day we launch a new series, Metamorphosis: Best Through Sport, Health and Education in collaboration with Federal Bank Hormis Memorial Trust, it is pertinent to explore how athletes deal with mental and physical health challenges and emerge triumphant.
While we profile Manasi Nayana Joshi in today’s episode, the other athlete I want to talk about here is Tejaswin Shankar, in the news for his medal winning effort in Decathlon at the Asian Athletics Championships, a first Decathlon medal for India.
To Manasi first.
When I asked her how she deals with criticism, her answer was starting. “I just go back to the days of my accident. Can there be more pain? Can it get more difficult than that? Can anyone make me feel worse? Is it conceivable that I could face a greater challenge? So if I could come out of it and make a niche for myself and start enjoying life again what is all this criticism? Frankly, it doesn’t bother me anymore. It is about trusting the hard work and the process. Do my best every single day with complete passion and commitment. The results will come”, she had said.
A huge Sachin Tendulkar fan, her life philosophy is simple. “Play sport by overcoming all the challenges that life had thrown at me. Urged me to dream on for Dreams do come true. As I get ready for Paris 2024, which will be the greatest stage of my life, Sachin’s mantra will stay with me. I will continue to dream. For I know dreams do come true.”
Also Read: Trailblazers – Celebrating Paralympic Champions: A New Series
Tejaswin Shankar
Tejaswin is an atypical athlete. He speaks outstandingly well, worked for Deloitte in the US, is happy to experiment and fail and is living life on his terms. Tejaswin, who is now a success story with a CWG medal, an Asian Athletics medal and Asian Games qualification under his belt, wasn’t sure if he was going to Birmingham for the CWG till 5 days before the event.
“ I don’t want to sugarcoat it and so I will say this to you- it wasn’t easy. I was finding it very hard. Anyone will. Ahead of a mega event athletes focus on the event, how to perform and yet in my case I was wondering if I was at all going to Birmingham. One day I was going and the next day I wasn’t going and trust me it wasn’t easy in any way. Now when I look back and the story had a happy ending it all seems fine but at the time it was a very difficult period for me. I remember on 25 July just 3 days before the CWG started it was my grandmother’s birthday and in normal circumstances we would all be happy celebrating her 84th. Not so that day. This is all the more so because we are a close knit family and are all very close to each other. On that day when she saw me she was unhappy. She could sense I was tense and said something like this shouldn’t happen to anyone. Like I just said to you, it was hugely challenging. How do you deal with such uncertainty that’s not even in your hands? How can you rein in your mind in such a situation?”
Winning a medal was not even in his mind.
“If I tell you winning a medal was in my mind when I went into the stadium I would be lying. All I was saying to myself was I shouldn’t make a fool of myself. This was my biggest opportunity and I just had to put on a show. I couldn’t fail for if I did you can imagine what I would be subjected to back home. Now that’s the most difficult thing for an athlete. I wasn’t happy while competing. Never did I think of adding to the team’s medal tally. It was all about doing something respectable. And when it finally happened and I won the bronze it was something unbelievable. I can’t actually express to you what I was going through.”
These experiences are evidence what sport can do. How playing sport gets the best out of people in times of adversity and how it helps makes them better as human beings. Sport is a life lesson more than anything and that’s what we will look to celebrate as part of this series in collaboration with Federal Bank.