Leadership

This past week has been incredibly busy (this is not new) but perhaps even more busy than I had been previously. Because of this, I feel my body becoming sick. Ploski is feeling it too. We are both light headed and feeling a bit nauseous today. I'm hoping it's just something we ate and not something that would make us both be ill. We have yet to do the tandem sickness thing that tends to happen when two people live together. In any case, I'm taking airborne and really trying to rest.

Sadly, and happily this weekend was in no way restful. Tuesday morning the head coach of our volleyball team had a death in the family. She had to take off Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. In those 3 days, we had three games and a practice. I became the head coach.

I have never described myself as a leader. I am however not a follower. I'm the person off to the side who watches both and takes part but just outside of each category. Simply put, I don't like taking orders, or giving them but I'll do what I have to depending on the situation. I can teach. When teaching writing at the women's prison, I assumed a role of leadership and was successful because writing is something I know and understand. I can help others. I know I am a good critic. And I'm blunt. I want to be honest with people and do my best to do so in a constructive way. I'm beginning to apply that same knowledge to coaching, although it is still new.

I became a leader- if only by default these last few days. I was forced to be head coach of a volleyball team I was on only 2 years ago. Two of the girls on the team, I had played with and the rest knew me as their assistant coach. On Thursday the girls banded together and rose to their potential to be an outstanding team putting up an excellent fight against the number one team in our conference. They took it seriously, and took me seriously. Their captain also took on a larger role and more important presence on the court. Friday was practice, and the majority of the girls handled their head coaches absence with ease. They showed up on time. A few, did not show me the same courtesy. For that, they ran suicides. A team needs to show up no matter who is in charge. You aren't there because an authority figure is threatening you. Instead, you are there to participate and be on a team, a unit. You suffer and succeed together. After the running, they practiced well and got ready for two games. On Saturday, the team and I went to Brooklyn to play a tri match. We won both games, and they made fewer errors than I had ever seen from them.

I've learned a great deal about teams during this season. One being that I focus and feel too much anxiety when put in charge of a large group of people. And I've learned more about volleyball than I ever knew as a player. If I were on a team now, I would be much stronger than I ever was. In any case, I'm glad to be out of the lime light. I enjoy coaching but not the mental stress that is being a head coach. This week, I will go back to writing and working on grad applications, as well as being there for my team.