u/Infamous-Jelly7627

this might be a long one so please stick around because i really need help.

so i like this guy. he doesn’t go to my school, but his school is relatively close, and he literally lives like 5 minutes away from me (walking). i see him at the gym on the weekends, and somehow i always end up running into his friend group too. they all know who i am because we play the same sport, and i’m friends with a bunch of people from his school. like 2 days ago i went to get food and saw them there again, and i literally avoided going inside because there was no way i was about to run into after all the other awkward interactions i've had with them (i would love to give context, but it's long so for now, just assume i've been around them a lot and NOT by choice).

anyway, we follow each other on instagram, but we’ve never actually interacted. the problem is we kind of have “history,” but not really good history. around 7 months ago, my friend from his school tried to set us up. i said yes even though i wasn’t interested at the time, just for the plot. it turned into this whole chain where my friend asked his friend, who asked him. it only lasted a few hours, and then my friend told me he said he was talking to someone. honestly, i think that was a lie jst to make me feel better because she showed me a screenshot where he said “okay” when asked if he wanted to be set up, so that didn’t really make sense. but at the time i didn’t care.

then months later (like january), i heard that his friends all knew about me and were talking about me, which i thought was weird because to me it didn’t seem like a big deal at all.

now i keep seeing him at the gym, but we’ve never actually talked, and i don’t know what to do. i don’t want to be the one to approach him again because that feels embarrassing after what happened.

so how do i get him to approach me? or at least how do i make some kind of interaction happen? i feel like i really like him now, but i genuinely don’t know what to do.

hey guys, i’m currently a junior in high school and i play volleyball.

for the past three years, i’ve been playing every season: freshman year i was on the freshman team, sophomore year i was on JV, and this year i made varsity. but honestly, this year has been the worst for me overall. at the beginning of the season, volleyball wasn’t helping me at all. i was extremely burnt out, i sprained my leg, and i ended up being benched on varsity because i lost the passion, confidence, and love i used to have for the sport. it got to the point where my first semester grades dropped a lot. i’m not saying volleyball is the only reason, because i was dealing with a lot in my personal life too (family, friends, etc.), but it definitely didn’t help.

sophomore year on JV was completely different. i felt like i was at my best—i had confidence, passion, and i was really dedicated. i was one of the top players on the team, and i put a lot into it. the summer before that season, i spent around $600 just on volleyball. even then, i was able to balance everything and my grades stayed fine.

now senior year is coming up, and i don’t know if i should keep playing or quit. in terms of academics, I definitely think not playing volleyball would help and i lowkey need as much time as i can get to get straight A's my senior year. in terms of the sport itself, i’d most likely be a guaranteed starter, but i don’t know if that even matters if i don’t enjoy the sport anymore. anyway, the real question is that i only have one varsity letter, so idk if i should continue just to keep it as an EC.

right now, i was thinking of playing until senior night and then quitting, but i realized senior night is usually toward the end of the season, so that probably wouldn’t work. plus, i wouldn’t get another varsity letter if i quit early anyway.

i’m just really stuck and don’t know what to do. should i push through and play one more year, or is it better to quit and focus on my academics?