Lydia
Collins

Six Life Lessons: Why Intramural Soccer is Everything Everywhere All At Once


This story is about how inviting girls I’m kind of friends with to watch a soccer game is the hardest thing ever.

I am confident that being a new girl in a group of girls who are already friends is the hardest thing in the world. I started to put words to this feeling when I noticed tension and anxiety in my gut on my way to my first soccer practice with a group of women here in Belo Horizonte. Returning to my roots as a soccer player – the extracurricular that has been most consistent throughout my life – felt like a natural activity to plug myself into here in Belo Horizonte. Over the first month, I’ve been welcomed with warmth and curiosity and have really enjoyed the weekly games.

Partly because of how familiar I am with the feelings that soccer brings up in me as well as new insights I have gained on myself and the world since the last time I played competitively nearly five years ago, my experience playing here has shown me that the lessons I learn at soccer practice are reflected onto everything else in life. One instance this past week shines a light on how everything is everything all at once.  

It started with a simple desire. I wanted to watch the Brazilian woman’s national team play in the final game of the Copa America tournament. I figured no better group of women to watch the game with than my own soccer teammates. I tapped into 6th-grade Lydia who wanted to play soccer during recess in Spain but the boys didn’t let her. As an empowered Team Evanston B-Team superstar, I was unused to this gendered rejection. Harnessing my blossoming feminism, I brought a soccer ball to school and gathered up my female classmates to play. At first, they didn’t know what to do with the ball or the opportunity, but soon we were playing everyday in a covered area off the main field.  The girls in my sixth grade class were a mixed bag – some took it upon themselves to make me feel awful about myself on a daily basis and others took it upon themselves to become my Spanish lifestyle guides and are some of my best friends to this day. But, when it came to recess, we all played soccer.

Fast forward 15 years and I found myself playing soccer again with a group of women in a land that mostly completely rejects any idea of women playing soccer. Energized and confident during a Saturday scrimmage, I decided I would ask the group if anyone wanted to watch the Copa America final that evening. But by the time the scrimmage wrapped up, I started to get nervous about putting myself out there and started to reconsider the invite.

We gathered for a final photo and when the group started to dissipate, I whipped myself into shape, telling myself that I would carry this regret with me to my deathbed if I didn’t say anything. I blurted out, “Is anyone going to watch the final game tonight? Does anyone want to watch with me?”

To my horror, everyone looked at me but no one responded. Life lesson #1: putting yourself out there in front of a group of people is scary because you may be met with blank stares and inviting people to a party is scary because it’s possible no one will come and you will be left alone with a bowl of punch.  This is scary because it’s easy to think that this means that you are not worthy of friendship and connection which is the purpose of life.

The awkward lack of response from my teammates prompted the coach (who I Admire with a capital A) to add to my embarrassment, saying, “Come on ladies, someone go watch the game with her.” Life lesson #2: It doesn’t feel good when people advocate for you out of pity.  This brought me to a feeling of being a lone fourth grader and the teacher asking other kids to play with me. I don’t even know if this happened to me, but the feeling felt real in my bones. All I wanted was for someone to be like, “YES! That is EXACTLY what I wanted to do tonight!”

The coach’s plea seemed to break the girls out of a trance. One woman came to my rescue, telling me to write a message in the group chat and encouraging me that other women would come. Relieved, I laughed it off and tried to remember where my feet were so I could carry myself off the field.

Later that evening, I was running off a high. My message in the group chat was received by three women who said they were also interested in going to the game.  I felt like I was honoring my 6th-grade self, I was going to become the cool girl who hosts a cool party. Surely, pretty soon everyone would want to be my friend and I would have cool friends forever. Life lesson #3: Good things build off of each other. If you let something good grow, it will take new forms and keep breeding goodness.

I arrived at the bar a couple minutes after the game started, excited to watch it and get to know my teammates better. I wore a winning outfit that I’ve worn 900 times this month, but when I was getting ready I couldn’t shake off the feeling of being a 7th grader getting ready for a Bat Mitzvah, unsure if my outfit was cool or lame. I was confident that if I could just have a chance to chat with my teammates I could win their hearts and be cool forever.

When I arrived no one was there and the TVs were playing a regular season game of a men’s club team from Rio. I messaged one girl who said that she had also arrived but she responded saying that she gave up and went home because she thought no one was going to show up. Mind you, this girl gave up 15 minutes before the game even started. Puzzling. But perhaps guided by a fear of being seen sitting at a table alone?

I asked the bar owner to play the women’s game on the inside TV (the primary TV was outside and still played the men’s game). I settled in to a plastic chair with two older drunk men sitting at the tables on either side of me. Slightly uncomfortable but grateful to have finally made it to a place where I could watch the game, I sipped on a refreshing lime sparkling water. Soon after, my friend who absolutely despises soccer, asked me what I was up to and I invited him to join me, which he soon did. As the game passed on, I slowly lost hope that any of my teammates would arrive. Halftime passed and then the 90-minute mark. After four minutes of penalty time, the game ended and the Brazilian woman were announced the best team in South America for the 8th year in a row.  As I walked to drop my friend off at another bar before heading home, I felt disappointment and shame creeping up. But, knowing I was tired, I turned off my analytical brain, went home and slept hard.

The next day I reflected on why it was so nerve-racking to put myself out there with my soccer teammates and why the whole experience brought up such strong, tangible emotions. I realized that fear was driving the nerves. Life lesson #4: my fear is that if people in a group perceive that the group as a whole thinks I’m weird then the all the individuals in the group will also think I’m weird. I wouldn’t be given a chance. This harks back to memories from adolescence when I was both the loner, but more importantly, when I was part of the passive bystander group. Vividly, I remember times when I perceived that my classmates thought someone was weird and, to save my own social standing, I too rejected them. I didn’t give them a chance to show me who they are or to form my own opinion. And here I was on the other side. Life lesson #5: judgement of others is always reflected back into judgment of myself.

Everything is everything all at once everywhere. Asking a group of women in their 20s and 30s to hang out brings out the same emotional reactions as asking a group of 12 year old girls in Spain to play soccer with me at recess.  It’s the same as being at a Bat Mitzvah in 7th grade and waiting for a boy to ask me to dance. Sitting at the table waiting for the party attendees to arrive but never do is the same as applying to college and receiving a rejection. It’s the same because it has the same effect on your body.

The pressure in my temples when I jumped into my invitation at the end of the scrimmage is the same as the pressure around my eyes when my crush and I both tell each other we like each other. The heart leap I get when someone asks me to hang out with their friends on Friday evening is the same that I get when a job interview goes well, when my teacher gives me an A, when I score a goal, or when my friend who hates soccer wants to hang out with me bad enough that he comes to watch soccer with me.

Ultimately, we are all just trying to get an invite to the cool kids party, whether we go or not. Sometimes we are the ones that have to throw that party and be the cool kid. Sometimes at the end of the night the punch bowl is full, but other times it’s empty. More often than not, we are the cool kids with the cool parties and the cool friends. It’s about reframing your life to highlight those moments. It’s about including others how you want to be included and responding to the invites of others how you want to be responded to.  

Life lesson #6: Because everything is everywhere all at once, it’s easy to make small issues big and big issues small. This is where our values come in, we have agency to decide what weight we assign to the challenges that come up in life. In this story, I chose to make the small challenge of watching a soccer game... big. This practice helped me untangle larger feelings of worth, purpose, and belonging that arise in other, more grave, situations. I’m not sure what the larger purpose of this practice is other than to more clearly exercise the agency I have over perspective on this short, scary, and beautiful life.  

Author (left, row 1.5) pictured with teammates during a Saturday scrimmage.

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