The following was submitted by students Amy Albright, Tommy Allgaier, Cyrus Amour, Cameron Aragon, Ryan Flint, Danny Hodges, Nick Hodges, Emily Toombs and teacher Edee Kulper from the Orcas Christian School.

Many of you know Chama Anderson. For those of you who don’t, we’ve calculated that she has touched the lives of at least 10 percent of us here on Orcas as a girls soccer coach – but she is no ordinary coach.

“I was born into a team,” says Anderson, who is retiring from the team after founding it seven years ago.

One of seven children, she lived in Chicago until age four, and then in Indiana up through college. As a child in a family of nine, with parents doing their best to raise a big family, she and her siblings’ purpose in “the team” was to help each other out, especially their younger sister with cerebral palsy.

Anderson’s family loved sports. They moved to a certain part of Indiana specifically for the Olympic-size pool there. She grew up swimming on teams with her family and says that, “by the end of the summer my hair was almost blond from the chlorine – my fingers and my feet were rubbed raw from the bottom of the pool.”

In high school, she played basketball and soccer. She also played college soccer at Indiana University. Directly out of university, Anderson moved to Portland and then Orcas to be a nanny and a farmer. Later in Seattle, while playing soccer in a Division 1 Washington State League, she became a coach for the first time for a parks and recreation team of seven- and eight-year-olds.

She was intrigued by meditation and also trained to be a massage therapist. She worked what she knew of meditation into her coaching style.

“My meditation teachers have also worked doing mental fitness with the Green Berets and Olympic athletes,” she said. “So watching them do that and hearing their stories about that, then I thought, ‘Oh, let me try it with seven-  and eight-year-olds.’ Before practice started I would have them close their eyes, put their hands on their hearts, and just breathe for 30 seconds. And before each drill I’d have them close their eyes, visualize what they were going to do, and when they were ready, they would go do the drill. We did a lot of coming back to their heart and breathing.”

Anderson specifically remembers a rambunctious boy who always seemed busy while the other kids were doing the breathing exercises. But to her surprise, one day at a game while all the other kids were running around at halftime, she noticed he was sitting quietly with his hand on his heart.

“It was so beautiful to see him utilize this at that moment,” Anderson said. “For whatever reason, that stuck with him. And I think from that moment of seeing this boy, it made a big impression on me. ‘Wow, these kids get it. They’re not just doing it because I’m asking them to as a coach. He’s integrating that in his life in the perfect situation at the perfect moment.’ From that point on, I always do that with my team. And not that it makes a difference, but we were also undefeated that season.”

Seven years ago, Anderson was approached by a student asking if she would be interested in coaching a girls team at the public high school. She helped found and develop the program and in 2009, the girls won Orcas Island’s first state championship title.

“I love to see whomever I’m coaching learn about themselves and grow,” she said. “I love to see the unity that can be created and how that can actually be even more effective than individual skill … if you are in it with your heart, so much more will come alive for you.”

Beyond skill and understanding the game, Anderson says she wants her players to really know “what that true and wise voice is and sounds like inside your heart. And to have the strength to honor that even if maybe your peers have a different choice … To really know when you are speaking your truth.”

Anderson is now living in Berkeley, Calif., to be with her brother’s family. She is applying for graduate school on the east coast to be a college coach.

She says that Orcas will always be in her heart and that she intends to come back one day and own some land and a home.

Anyone who has been touched by Anderson’s spirit recognizes her depth in a heartbeat. Racking up trophies looks certain in her future. But her ultimate goal?

“To love,” she says. “To love deeply and fully … Physiologically, your heart is created and starts beating before your brain’s even developed, and then your whole body grows around your heart. So essentially, we come from that beating heart. We’re created to come from the heart.”