I was lucky, because of Student Council, my classes, sports and social life, there were different people I had friendships with.
Winning isn't everything, but playing and competing and striving and going through things can be a lot of fun and really important. As long as you're doing it in a way that's healthy, sports can be an incredible opportunity.
The biggest lesson from Africa was that life's joys come mostly from relationships and friendships, not from material things. I saw time and again how much fun Africans had with their families and friends and on the sports fields. they laughed all the time.
I got too competitive... But if you have different friends; maybe you are in the higher-level classes and have some friends there, and you have some friends from sports or others from a club. The more kinds of real friends... you can have, the better off you'll be.
We often think the exterior things-being good at sports or really smart -translate to feeling great about yourself.