Chapter 54: BAGGAGE – ROOKIE: Surviving Your Freshman Year of College Soccer

Soccer practice is not the place to drag your personal baggage. You and all of your teammates have plenty of battles to fight off the soccer field. You’ve all got to deal with academic challenges and relationship issues and car troubles and the many other landmines that make up the college experience. The soccer field should be a sanctuary from all of that baggage for you and your teammates. Soccer practice should be the favorite part of your day. You should be happy when it starts and a little bit sad when it’s over. When you drag your baggage onto the field, you ruin the experience for you and also for your teammates.

You need to develop an on-off switch for your soccer life. You need to compartmentalize soccer as the part of your day that remains immune to all of the other stresses that might happen to consume you on any given day. If you don’t, you’re going to cheat yourself out of a big part of the college soccer experience and you’re going to negatively impact the entire culture.

You’re not going to play soccer forever. Chances are these are the last four meaningful years of soccer that you will ever experience. Protect them! Don’t waste a single day of them by allowing personal issues to contaminate your soccer. It’s just not worth it.

When it’s time for soccer, leave your baggage at the door.

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