I didn’t make it…a spot on the volleyball team had once seemed to be just short of my fingertips, but as I looked over the roster, I felt like it had been yanked harshly away. “I’m sure I made it; the team is a joke,” Amirah scoffed to Sydney as she shoved past me. “Yeah, see? Varsity. You’d have to be, like, an amputee or something to not make this team.” My cheeks flamed red as I ducked my head and squeezed past them, pretending not to hear their laughs.
I felt cheated out of my right. I hated the pity that clouded my classmates’ eyes when I had to mutter that I hadn’t made the team. I hated the feelings of exclusion and humiliation that washed over me every time I went home on the bus instead of going to the gym with my friends. Most of all, I hated the feelings of failure that clung to me stubbornly. My anger fueled a reckless path, and one night, I signed up for eight summer volleyball camps.
When summer came, I was hit with a dreadful shock. The camps were fiercely competitive and the girls, highly skilled. I had been expecting a complacent beginner’s series. While my teammates were perfecting their jump serves and blocking techniques, I was trying to nail the basic form of bumping. Uncoordinated, unskilled, and unconfident, I was the ultimate flaw in every team. My campmates’ frustrations were seeping through their encouraging fronts as their eyebrows pulled down in a quiet anger every time the opposing team gained a point.
I had never experienced absolute failure before, not in school, the arts, or the social scene. At these camps, I learned that the only way to success was through the battlefield; there was no path around it. I couldn’t control how others would react to me, but I could focus on improving myself. Instead of feeling embarrassed and faking sickness to sit out of games, I climbed back after each disappointment, questioning what I did wrong and what I could do in order to improve. It wasn’t about how I was seen or if others were talking about me. All that mattered was if I was improving and doing what I needed to do in order to boost myself upwards, towards my goal.
Volleyball helped me discover a perseverance within myself that I didn’t know I had, and planted in me a confidence I didn’t recognize. I stopped concerning myself with the opinions of others and focused on my own happiness instead. The insecurity that had plagued me in childhood was gone. I did what I wanted, where I wanted, and when I wanted, with a lightness and joy that only confidence brought. Trusting myself and my intentions was a must during the volleyball clinics, and I carried this sureness with me out of those camps. This attitude is the greatest gift the game has ever given me.
