What Nixor Taught Me

 

 The players almost shoved each other in the bid to get the ball. Some of them toppled over as others pushed through mercilessly. I stared at them exasperated. Whoever invented this game must have been a lunatic probably with the sole (and very crazy) ambition of kicking a muddy ball across a field for the rest of his life. And trust a bunch of adrenaline-charged males to do just that!

That is how I viewed football

Today I look at them and smile. Amidst the version of this game as disorderly there is another light to it that shines only to a few. According to George Owen, the Welsh Writer, “The gamesters return home from this play with broken heads, black faces, bruised bodies and lame legs... Yet they laugh and joke and tell stories about how they broke their heads... without grudge or hatred." It’s a game that follows a principle we all learn, sooner or later in life; an aspect so profound that mere words cannot describe it.

Nixor helped me see that light. I came here overwhelmed, almost bewildered. I struggled at times to adapt to an environment that I thought was too competitive. I was full of doubts about fitting in. I was afraid to stumble, to make a mistake. I felt the only way to survive was to be just…perfect. I laugh at myself now for thinking that. Life is never perfect and we certainly, as humans, are not meant to be so. Just when everything seems perfect, life comes and hits you in the face. You fall, again and again and just when you think you cant possibly go down more, you sink further. But you know the best part about hitting rock bottom? When you are there, there is nowhere to go but up.

Of all the lessons I have been taught, what I have learnt the most is to get back up and to pick something up in the process. Maybe I learnt the hard way but now I am sure that the lesson was worth it. Because now, my milestones are not confined to paper only; I carry them around with me wherever I go. It is the self worth that comes from being able to reach out to others, the contentment and satisfaction of having tried things I never dared to dream about before. I have had my shares of failures, of humiliation, of falling down lower than I ever thought I could and   then getting up back again; Not making the debate team, only to win an award at another debate competition later., getting horrible marks in a physics practical and then practicing like crazy and bagging an A in the subject I feared most. Also the realization that teachers are not some heaven sent creatures who 'walk on water' but normal human beings like us...if we are the dreamers of tomorrow they are the dream of today.

Most of all and the one things that adds the most colour to school life are the friends I have made. In the months that I have been here, I have laughed harder than ever before, holding my cheeks and feeling the blood rush to my face at the pure euphoria of it all. We have been through the same banal ups and downs; we have cried over stupid tests and exams and faced all these monsters together. We are done with them, once and for all....these are the enemies we have conquered so far and I am pretty sure, somehow, we will miss them too.

At nixor, we learn to run the hardest for the score. Out there in the playing field, we are the champions because despite everything, when it comes to ourselves, we sharks choose camaraderie over competition. We look after one another. We are a whole family and anyone who has doubts about ‘fitting’ in, if their core values are the same, they find themselves to be a perfect fit before they even know it.

So have I grown up as a person, as a 'leader'? I dont know. We all have different definitions of those words but that’s what I have learnt at Nixor; to find my own definitions. ...and according to me, to answer that question, I will have to ask myself, 'Am I happy with myself? Do I have that sense of fulfillment about doing the right thing even though it took so long to figure out what that was?' I know I am. I feel it all the time. Not backing down in face of a challenge, not being unsure of myself and most of all, not letting people (my parents, teachers and friends) down. Most of all, I know that wherever I go, I will have the courage to take an initiative, if ever needed. A lot can go down when you take a stand but to remain in your comfort zone is playing it too safe, being too cowardly even. It’s that little extra step you take when you put your fears aside that defines you.

I once heard the quote, ‘Success can never be spelt without a ‘u’’. The trouble (especially with Pakistan) is that we take that ‘u’ to be any but ourselves. Maybe we do so because of doubt and fear but then by doing the same, we forget our responsibilities and obligations. Living in a society makes you responsible for it. Individually, we are all its safeguards. That is another lesson I learnt at nixor. Don’t wait for someone else to take a stance. Do it yourself. Chances are others will follow because it something they probably wanted too, all along.

Nixor was our choice: my parents’ and mine. I cant thank them enough for giving me this ‘gift’. For myself, I have never before been certain of anything more as I was of Nixor from the day I came there for the ILAN. For now, I can look back and say this was the best choice I ever made.