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Fortune cookies

Fortune favours the brave. The cliché to end all cliches. But have you ever considered that the brave more often than not, don't depend on Madam. No (inverse) sexism here, but the lady is fickle, and can be as iffy as Mother Nature. Don't know when she'll pour down on you.

So, the brave do the smart thing. They don't wait for her to deliver. Venture out and try and win each one on their own. Not waiting for other's to do that job for them.

Then there are those, that blame mis(s)fortune for all their troubles. For most of them at least. And still wait for her to do the trick. Stop believing that they can do the needful.

Like our own cricket team. When the outcome of other's games starts becoming critical in defining one's own position in a tournament, then you know you're in trouble. Again. How do I put this? World Cup 1999. Not so long back, was it, that most Indians would have their eye on the matches between Zimbabwe and South Africa, Kenya and Sri Lanka, and so on and so forth, hoping against hope that X, Y or Z would win or lose, to increase India's chances of moving into the next stage?

Rather cumbersome, the whole process becomes. Of course, it's exciting and riveting when each match has significance to the tournament. Absolutely. Would be boring if certain results were a foregone conclusion and the matches rendered uncompetitive. But, when time and time again, a team loses most of its matches, and seems to beg a back door entry, waiting for the other to slip up. That is not competitive cricket. That is depending on other's fortune to save your own face.

And, India has been doing that too often of late. After a point, it's embarrassing to read about how *Australia's win over Pakistan keeps Indian hopes alive*. For chrissakes, an Indian win would go a whole lot further in creating hopes, much less keeping them alive. But, when the likelihood of that happening, is nigh on impossible, why are these permutations even considered? Is the spectator that naïve? Or is the team just non competitive?

Competitiveness. An important attribute in any sport, heck, in any aspect of life. But who's to define what this term really means? Seems to be about wanting to win, right?

Team X winning, and Team Y losing. However, Team Y need not be a loser. Always. If Team Y figures out why it lost, and even attempts to change that, then I'd call Team Y a winner.

Because this effort will bear fruit. Be it in the long term, but succeed they will, because they know their faults and are willing to work on them. No competitive person or body can be a loser in the long term, because they are constantly fighting to improve themselves. They know that the only critical ingredient to success is working on the self, because that is the only factor they have control over. How do you control what the other guy is doing? Barring acts of violence and illegal means, there is no other way to success but learning and improving.

Instant cures are passe and ineffective. And circuitous routes to respectable positions in tournaments may give you some more breathing space from your audience and media and selectors, but for only that long.

Let's stop beating about the bush. And understand that there are watershed points in life. And often times, they have to be recognized, and an appropriate route taken. Failing to do which, you're headed down that road, which would get to you to nowhere land.

Where you're still waiting for fortune to deliver. And like I said, as does the rest of the world, fortune favours the brave. And certainly not those, that beg for her favours.

The Spare Crib/Abhilasha Khaitan