So recently I have been quite down. For anyone that knows me I never get angry, never get depressed, never really get sad, but for some reason I have been down these past two weeks. PJB has really been making strides as we opened up two new courts in town, gave out 30 scholarships to our most deserving players and we even just rented a great new office for a year. So progress is being made for sure, and it is just increasing our potential to become a great basketball academy in Africa.
I have been down though because of the one reason I came to Africa, and that is to coach. I feel like these past couple months I have gotten so caught up in all the other aspects of a good basketball program that I neglected my duty to coach. This neglect also came from the fact that I have been trying to ease off on always coaching, to let the local coaches step into their roles again as head coaches and begin to really thrive from what they have learned throughout the year. My expectations were definitely not met.
Napoleon Bonaparte: “If you want a thing done well, do it yourself.”
I had great plans for these last couple months. I would be able to just oversee practices, work on my game as a player and focus on playing for our team as just a player and not a player/coach, and watch the players improve day by day. Instead I saw our boys and girls teams, in exhibition matches, play basketball like a bunch of inmates fighting over a bar of soap. The ball moved around with no purpose as on both offense and defense every player on the floor chased after the ball like it was an autographed picture of Justin Beiber in a crowd of adolescent girls. It was like watching middle school girl’s basketball, no offense to middle school girl’s basketball but you know what I mean.
The games were just evidence of the poor poor job the coaches were doing in teaching the game and if the coaches were doing a poor job that means that I am not doing my job. This is really what brought me down, and last weekend I met my breaking point. It got to a point where I was so stressed and angry I got myself sick. Then I read the above quote by Napoleon. I want the best for these kids and coaches here, so I could just do everything myself. That is definitely something I can do, and of course we will have the results I want because I will be doing everything!
I began planning and forgot about everything else except what I was going to do. I was going to train all the kids starting at 7 AM. I was going to demand the coaches to be at the office all day every day, and make them listen to my teaching all day. If the coaches didn’t do what I say they would just be suspended. That would be easy. That would make them listen, and at the end of the day I would get what I want.
I was ready on Tuesday to go in a lay down the LAW! Then I watched the Terry Fox; Into the Wind documentary from ESPN. This really got me thinking about what kind of leader I want to be[1]. There are many different types of leaders you can be in this world, and I’m not going to get into that lesson, but what kind of leader do I want to be?
There is always the Napoleon type leader who always wants to take things into their own hands. They don’t trust anyone because they are the leader and they are the only ones capable of getting things done. I find myself at times falling into this trap. There are the power hungry leaders, like the one here in DRC, Joseph Kabila, who gives up on their purpose or cause when there is struggle and just use their power to gain wealth and a name for themselves.
Socrates: “I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think.”
Then there are the leaders that never back down and never give up because they are living for those that they are leading. This is the leader that I want to be. Terry Fox didn’t give up until he died in leading the cause of cancer. He didn’t give up when he lost his leg, he didn’t give up when he saw his efforts to run across Canada produce no fundraising, and he didn’t even give up when he found that he again had cancer that found it’s way into his lungs. Terry Fox was only 22 when he died of cancer, yet he was an example for leaders all over the world. He was a selfless servant to his cause, and in being so he changed the world.
This week I changed. Though pessimism is still alive in my mind I realized exactly what Socrates said, “I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think.” In the same way I cannot make my coaches change their ways, I can only make them think about something different. I cannot make them come to my daily teaching sessions, but I can show them my commitment to the cause by being there daily. I cannot make the coaches make daily practice plans, and coach off of those plans, but I can do that and show them how effective it is. It is not within my power or my duty to make sure the coaches are always doing exactly what I want them to do, but at least I can try to make them think about basketball and think about teaching in a way that is different than before.
I went into our meeting on Wednesday ready to ream the coaches out for their poor performance. Instead I pleaded my case. I told them that I am here everyday. I came to Goma just to teach basketball and just to teach them. 24 hours a day I will be there for them, to teach basketball, help with their trainings, or just be a friend. If they want to come they can, if they don’t I will still be their friend. But like I wish for them to grow and learn as coaches, I too wish to learn and grow as a coach. I know that I cant do it alone, so I try to call daily meetings and schedule events so that I can grow and learn and experience. I can only encourage that the other coaches to want to learn and grow along with me. If not, I guess it’s my loss along with their loss…
[1] Just as a side note for those of you that haven’t seen the documentary, it is a must watch. Even though you probably already know the Terry Fox story, the way the doc is put together is great. I just remember the first time I flipped to it on ESPN, it was the last 15 or 20 minutes of the movie. I was with my girlfriend, and within the first 5 minutes of watching it a commercial came on and both of us sat silent, sniffling back tears. The power of Terry Fox’s story, but also the documentary is quite overwhelming.
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