Urban Sightings Essay

Submitted By squarebizbre
Words: 1174
Pages: 5

The overall perception in current times portrays monsters as hideous, creatures that may produce fear or harm into the hearts and minds of even the noblest super heroes. Although this is the perception, there are plenty of people that are not afraid of said “monsters”. A simple monster can be anything that hinders a person from personal growth and goals. Since monsters are usually linked with the emotion of fear, it is assumed that a community or close group with shared interest will all have a common fear of the same type of “monsters”. At the University of Houston, the Women’s Club Volleyball team’s monsters comes in the form of personal failure, team failure, and segregation. This community I chose to interview has a special importance to me because I am a part of this group. I’ve developed friendships and lifetime bonds with my teammates, which is a pillar the club is built on. Starting to play on college level team is a new and exciting experience for overly excited high school athletes or old sports players. You have no idea what to expect, and you have to find yourself and prove your skill level all over again. Freshmen or new additions must also adjust to a more demanding and challenging practice and schedule. The focus of my Urban Sightings research was to find out what the team viewed as monsters at the beginning of joining the team until now`, and has those monsters changed. Having been on the club team myself since the fall of 2012, I consider myself a pivotal part and co-conspirator and I am expected to share the same fears with the new girls on the team today. Before starting my interviews, I knew that I would be able to understand and study this group because I had once been a newbie to this same team and I am still a part of time team and my own misconceptions and fears which I thought would never go away and that I could never beat. As a member of the team my experience with fear is similar to my newer teammates because it’s a familiar feeling.
After practice one day, I and a few of the women from the club volleyball team went to McAlister’s, and I interviewed them in just basic conversation. In that time with new girls and seasoned girls, I discovered that the most common fear that surfaced was the fear of team or personal failure and segregation. Team and personal failure, is a common fear among sports teams because it is aroused by the possibility of making continuous errors, appearing frustrated by the other team’s success, or losing a point or match. Also, specific fears within a player, like self-doubt, and negative thoughts. During games players are expected give outstanding performances as personal goals and as a team. Majority of my interviewees unveiled that they were mostly scared of messing up in front of peers and family, as they would assume that the crowd would think they were a bad player, or the reason that the team won or lost. Included in the interview I incorporated questions toward whether imagining that the crowd was not there or practicing game situations as opposed to noticing the stands and over-thinking affected the way that players approached the game. As an outcome, most of the women declared that they would feel less anxiety or play unconsciously when not thinking about the stands or the mistakes opposed to thinking meticulously because they felt they were able to let their true talent radiate. The love of the game of volleyball truly could shine, which leads to more won games. Club volleyball newcomer Benice C said, “It is motivating when your teammate assures you that when you mess up, it is okay. We’re a team, we’re the ones that matter the stand opinions do not matter and your mistakes are our mistakes” From that statement, you can see that Benice, that she and others are not scared of messing up, but they afraid of messing up and being singled out or taunted about it. Another fear that appeared among the more seasoned players that I interviewed was the fear of