Meet Arvin M.

Arvin Mosley here, a.k.a. Coach Mosley, born and raised in Tacoma in Pierce County, Washington, I’m a former head college basketball coach, Tacoma Community College, and at the Evergreen State College. Go, Titans! Go Geoducks! I’m a father of three. Grandfather of one. You know, initially I felt like I was doing great before the pandemic.

I thought everything was good and then the pandemic hit and everything got bad.

As I’ve kind of gotten some more self-awareness, some self-discovery, I’m finding that maybe some of the stuff that wasn’t going good for me before the pandemic I was able to hide because I was busy. I could deal with that later. I’ve got things to do to keep me occupied. I’ve got places to go. Then the pandemic hit, and we’re quarantined.

Now you’re really faced with a lot of alone time and a lot of quiet time. And for some people, myself included, I am someone who — whenever I felt myself being too quiet — I’d go find something to do. That solitude sometimes causes us to have to deal with some of those emotions that we maybe don’t want to or aren’t equipped to deal with. 

Initially, I thought the pandemic was terrible because of that. But then I started to realize that it actually allowed me time to work through some of the challenges that I was having. It allowed me a chance to build some stronger relationships with people and repair some relationships and I might not have had those opportunities had everything kept going the same — status quo. 

I think what people need more of is listening. 

We need people just to listen and not to judge, not to provide solutions. You don’t always need to give answers. You know, I always laugh because I’m a big brother and I don’t ever want to “big brother” my siblings. I try not to always have the answers. You know, “I know what’s right because I’m older, because I’m the big brother.