"Training, practising and trial and error are everything! " Interview with Pedro Jesus, Futsal Coach

Hey, Pedro! Thank you for accepting to do this interview to the @Walkieman blog.

I want to start by saying that we have met before in a futsal team where Pedro was the trainer. He also coached student association of the Faculty of Science and Technology (AEFCT) a university feminine (won 3º place in University league) and masculine team where he was a student.

So, how are you doing?

First, thank you for the invite! It is an honour giving this interview, and also is the first one!

@Walkieman is about mental health and to have tools for developing yourself. Do you think sports can help people with mental health issues? Can it help with our confidence?

Yes, of course! Not only people that are coping with that kind of situation, but for everyone! Sports, or physical activity, have multiple benefits, not just for the physical aspect but for the psychological and emotional aspect too!

And speaking especially on team sports, it’s very important because it introduces many interpersonal aspects and relations, like responsibility, sense of belonging and cooperation that so important for our mental well-being.

"Team sports, it’s very important because it introduces many interpersonal aspects and relations"

How did this passion for sports start?

I think it runs on the family. My father was a pro-athlete, my sister also, in her younger years. We also are vivid spectators on any kind of sports on TV, like tennis, Track and Field, ever biathlon!

On a more personal side, I love practising team sports! They’re my favourite! I’m a very social person, so the more people, the better!

Do you think sports can unite people?

When a person is doing a sport, you don't think in anything else. You are thinking “how can I do better? What I did wrong? What I did right? Can I give more?”. And when you are practicing a team sport, you are just there, there thinking “How can I get along with this person, with that person, so WE could win?”.

We can’t think if you are black or blue, big or small, fat or thin. So, in that way, sports are the most uniting activity in the World.

Which do you think it was the secret that lead to the best year in university AEFCT feminine team history?

In one word, work. We worked to the bone in that year. We had some problems, but we solved like a team should do, everyone communicating. The coaches were very present, the girls were giving their all in training, and we even got lucky sometimes! In that year, I think the stars were with us.

I remember when I arrived in the team I did not know how to play. But you insisted in me trying and I have improved a lot with your help. What is the importance of training and failing?

Training, practising and trial and error are everything! Only practice makes perfect. If you are good on doing something, you should do it until you became better. And making mistakes it was makes you grown and learn.

When you do something right, you just know if that way works. but you could have a million ways that work also, and some even better! And, when you got a way that works, you always keeping doing the same thing, you become static. And if you are static, you aren’t going anywhere.

"Training, practising and trial and error are everything!"

What made you join a project of inclusive football team? And why do you think it is important?

To be honest, I almost stepped on that project! I was fresh out of college, between jobs, and I was a different proposal by the coach of the rugby team that worked with me, so I accepted! But it was one of the decisions that I ever made!

I think it's so important because, even if we are on an open society, there are still many stigmas out there and so many misconceptions around sports and the gay community. And projects like the Lisbon Foxes and associations like BJWHF that combat those stigmas and prejudice.

What is the success for you? And the importance of goals?

For me, success is achieving the goals that you set for yourself. One of the problems with our society is that we open Instagram and we see our friends traveling, eating out, buying stuff. And then you think “I don’t any of those thing, I’m just a big failure.” But those activities aren’t any of the thing or purposes that you think that are most important! So you are judging you by the standards of another person. We always should be successful for ourselves, not for anyone else. And setting those goals, by your priorities, by the things that you want and need with the resources you have are what makes your grown, gives you meaning. It is what makes you, You.

Why do you think some people are not successful in life?

Nowadays, there is a lack of patience and commitment in addition of with so many laziness, that those are the many factors. Everyone wants something, and they want it now, without the work that you have to do it. If we set a goal, we should work on it. There is a big virtue in stability too.

Right now, I know that you are not coaching anymore but you keep sometimes going to train. Can you tell the importance of stopping and changing? Settling new goals?

Yes, I bonded with the team so much that I kept training just for the fun of it! First of all, for me, there is a big difference in stopping and changing. I think we never should stop doing what we love or quit of the goal we set for yourself. Quitting, not putting the work in are so normal right now, that we even think about it. It gets hard? Quit. I don't want to leave the bed? Quit.

But people are dynamic, our priority change, we evolve. We get older, we get sick. Things happen, Life happens. Knowing that something doesn't bring you any good is one of the most important for a good mental well-being. And a good general know that you shouldn't fight a losing battle.

Changing is what makes you - we evolve, we get better! Settling new goals is what makes us go forward. But walking in that line, between quitting and changing is a very tricky thing.