Philip Hoffman
Mat Wenzel
July 17, 2019
ENC 2135
Start of my Adult Life
All throughout my high school career I have been very active and involved in sports, organizations, and groups. But there was nowhere I felt more heard in my life than my senior year on my baseball team after losing one of my closest friend and best teammate I knew named Connor. In all my years of playing sports, I would have never thought of being a leader or being someone that people would listen to, wanting to know what my thoughts and ideas. I came into the season expecting to be taught by our coaches by practicing every day for our games and going home and get ready for the next day. Not only did I learn that I would be the leader for the team, but it would teach me very important life skills and lessons that I will use for the rest of life to be successful.
During my years of high school, I never thought I would be the type of person that would emerge as a leader or even a person where someone would for advice. I was always the person that would wait to be instructed or wait for someone else to do something for me. It was during my baseball career that I thought I could change and lead my teammates and where I could be heard in my life for something, that I think is right and will lead the team to success. It was halfway through the season, where our coaches have lost the players in everything that they have done to try and better us, for example, we would watch film of another team. My opinion was to hit on the field and actually practice baseball, but the coaches would never listen to my ideas, so I ultimately gave up trying. What really triggered this was when one of teammates named Connor and close friend passed away on the team. This was the first time in my life where I have lost someone in my life where I was close to and was my age. It was a major awaking and our team was left broken in pieces and everyone didn’t know what to do next. It took a couples of days to catch our breath, but this was the moment where I realized I could be the leader on the team and bring our team together to finish out our season strong. Our coaches didn’t know to handle situation and canceled our practices, but I knew that we had to be together in order to cope with something like this. I reached out to all my team mates to meet at the baseball field and we had to hop a couple of fences to get in, but we were determined to be together were Connor lived at, which was the baseball field. I realized that my ideas, such as hitting on the field and being an actual team, where much better and would help the team become much better and succeed from what we have experienced in our life. Sitting on the baseball field, just the kids, it was a very sad scene. It was overcast really windy and everyone hugging and crying. Right here and then I said Connor would have laughed at us and I cheered up everyone, Connor was always making jokes and making us laugh so I knew it was a good idea to bring the team closer at the moment. During all of this I start realizing that I was a leader on the team and that people were listening to me and follow my directions. For the first time I was being heard.
Knowing that I had the team all on board with me and having ideas that were more fitting for the team, we knew we wanted to move along the season for Connor. It was my first time in my life where I knew what I wanted to do and was being vocal with my thoughts. In the past, I would keep all my thoughts and actions to myself. I would always wait for someone to do something for me, and then I would follow them, even if I didn’t think it was right to do. I knew it was time for me to change as a person and that I knew that I saw a perfect example to do so on my baseball team. I also had a very good idea where the team would meet every Friday night at a player's house to hang our have dinner become closer to each other. I found this to be a very important process to help keep our team together with everything surrounding our team this season. During the team bonding, I took charge of what we should each night and what was the plan for dinner. Before every meal I made it very important that we are to include a prayer for Connor because we all knew we wanted to win and continue our live with him looking down on us. After each Team bonding night, I would look back and realize what I am doing how important to each one of my teammates using my voice. All my teammates believed in how I would handle things. Team bonding is the reason what helped me realize that I can be a leader and be heard. Also realizing throughout all this, is that this was my last chance as a kid to really have an impact on someone life. I remember thinking that no one is given opportunities like I had in my senior year in high school and I knew I wanted to make the most if and leave an impact where everyone could hear my voice. Not only did I think it was important to share my ideas with my team, but I also knew it was important share my ideas and thoughts with everyone involved in my life.
The best part of being heard by teammates is that if it felt so natural for me and easy for me to tell them what I think is right and fair for everyone. I knew if I wanted to be heard by everyone, I had address many topics saying that if we are wanting to win games, we are going to have to do things a certain way that it was going to take hard work. I learned that being honest and that telling the team that if we want to succeed, you have to put in hard work, and nothing was going to be handed to us. I feel like this is what really helped realize that my teammates would trust me is that if we wanted to do anything in life, we had to put in work and that nothing will ever be handed to us. I had many life skills that would help each person on the team outside of baseball but in the real world. Coming home each day after baseball was tough because I knew my parents wanted to know if I was okay and how I was doing. I knew I had to tell them everything that happened that day and I realized that being open and letting them my thoughts and ideas with the team was important. I would tell my parents about team bonding and how we would pray before every dinner. Going on in life I was able to be a lot closer to people than I ever was before, sharing my views on life and my feelings impacted so many people. Many of team mates would text me after team bonding and practice and say, “they were ready for the next day” and that I “keep communicating with team the way you are, we are going places now” with my thoughts and actions.
To conclude, in all my years, the first place where I felt heard was my senior year in high school on my baseball team. Being a senior, I knew it was my last year as a kid and I knew that I wanted to have a lasting impact on my team and my community. Having lost of one of my closest friends and closes teammate on the team, I knew that I had to step forward and become the leader on the team. You don’t need someone close to you to passed away for you to realize that you need to step and be a leader to have your thoughts be heard. It can start whenever you want, you control when you want your thoughts heard and because someone will always listen to you. I realized that sharing your thoughts and feelings with people will only better yourself and make you a better person.
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