March 10, 2022

Season 5 Post-Match Show

Season 5 Post-Match Show

In Episode 72, Phil and Paul discuss the highlights and lessons gleaned from the conversations we were able to have with , , , and during the second half of Season 5. Resources and Links from this Episode HSEL Facebook Group information ...

In Episode 72, Phil and Paul discuss the highlights and lessons gleaned from the conversations we were able to have with David Ricca, Jay Demerit, Phil Smith, and Dan Abrahams during the second half of Season 5.

Resources and Links from this Episode

Transcript

Phil: Welcome back to How Soccer Explains Leadership. We are now at the end of another great season, season five, this is the post-match show. And as usual I get to get my brother Paul Jobson in with the me to be able to have this conversation about this this great half of the season to finish off another great season.

So. How are you doing man?

[00:00:26] Paul: Doing great. So it's always great. Yeah. Jump on here with you. I get to listen to the seasons or half seasons and jump in here at the end. And I get, you know, I get the easy part, man. You gotta drive through and figure out questions and I get to come in on the backside and make comments.

That's the easy part, man, but man, what an incredible four episodes that been able to put together here over the last four weeks, it's been a, it's a really, really cool stuff. So I'm excited to

[00:00:51] Phil: jump in. Yeah, absolutely. So folks, if you did not go, if you have not listened to those episodes, I encourage you to listen to them, whether it's before [00:01:00] or after you listened to the rest of this episode.

But we had David Ricca who kicked it off. He is a man who's doing some amazing things and he has an incredible story. I mean, that's kind of the theme of all these is there. They're all incredible stories, which we'll talk about in a, in a few minutes, but David was a survivor or is a survivor of 9/11.

He was, has an incredible story. I'm just going to leave it there and say, go back and listen to it because it will, it will blow you away. And and he draws you in. So you it's like you're there. And how he really overcame the PTSD and the trauma from them through, or is overcoming through soccer and other tools.

And then, the second interview of this half season was And Jay is another great story. That is a, is a guy who, you know, has basically went from being a reject for the MLS to starting and captaining Watford FC in England. played on the National Team and, and played for the Vancouver [00:02:00]Whitecaps as well, and is now doing some leadership training for, for youth, which isn't another great story.

So there's so much more to that story and great conversation we had. Phil Smith who is has become a good friend. Fun, fun dude, who we had a really just good conversation about how he met us. He said, you know, he took the meeting. And as taking the meetings, he got jobs with the New York Yankees and Manchester United and, and how he was able to do that is just, it's just really great lessons we can learn from, you know, and and then finished it off with Dan Abrahams.

Who's just a a wise. Kind of a wise owl, so to speak, you know, just a guy who, who I joked with him that he's not on the, he was, he was, he was going to be a pro golfer. That was, that was his thing. So a lot of people just say he's a failure in that regard, but it clearly was not the calling that That God had on his life because he's now impacting probably millions of people through his sports psychology and some of the different things that we were able to talk about.

[00:03:00] Motivation about culture, about just how we can really be healthy mentally and what does that look like? And so she, those that's really the four people that we were able to have. And you know, I'm just, you said I have the hard part. I'll tell you what I, I love, love, love what I get to do, you know, because I get to be able to talk with people who are thinking deeply about issue. Some people we've heard of other people we haven't heard of, you know, people that are, that are living in these different areas and doing things that are just inspirational, you know? And so we can, we can learn from them. We can be inspired by them. We can be challenged by them.

And I, I love being able to, to get to do that. But before we get into that, I do want to you know, say as we're recording this, this is going to release next week. But as we're recording this, it's been a week since Russia invaded Ukraine and, and it's, it's really [00:04:00] something that is, I don't want to, I don't want to just ignore that there's these things going on that are really. And I, I know it's, it's weighed heavy on me. I have some very good friends in Ukraine who have had to evacuate their homes and they've lived, they lived in Kiev where, which has just been decimated and, you know, nuclear power plant it's on fire right now. And other it's just the country is, is in shambles.

And it's just tragic. And so I just want to remind all of us, you know, please continue praying for the country. Do what you can. If you go to my Facebook page, I actually pinned a post to my, to my profile that gives ways to help. So there's the Phil Darke Facebook page. You can go and check out.

There's some different organizations that I, I unequivocally recommend giving to. If, if you want to get involved financially be praying if there's any, you know, other ways you can get involved, I encourage you [00:05:00] to do so because there are millions of refugees already in Romania and Poland, and likely will be in a lot of other countries.

So, so just, look, as we've talked about soccer explains the world too. And in some of the sanctions that are being levied on Russia are their team is not allowed to play in World Cup at this point, or the World Cup qualifiers that teams have refused to play them because of this. And so it's just something.

I know weighs heavy on me and I imagine it weighs heavy. A lot of on a lot of you, our listeners out there. And if you are in the Ukraine or Russia, cause we do have people listening in those countries, you know, our, our hearts go out to you, our prayers go out to you. Cause you know, as, as we know, not everyone in, in Russia is behind what's going on as well.

So we want to remember that as well. It's not all the different people in these countries are the enemy it's that, you know, the, the war and the, and the aggression and the, and the things that we just do [00:06:00] that are just not right. That is what we are against. So, Kind of went from light to heavy there, but a lot of stuff to unpack.

And I just like to hear, you know, your thoughts on what a, whatever I just threw out there.

[00:06:13] Paul: Yeah, no, first and foremost we don't want to overlook what's going on in our world and I think. You know, our world has things like this going on all the time, but I do think that for some reason, the, the Ukraine there's quite a bit of connection here in the states with certain folks.

And there's some folks as well that are connected there also, and it hits a little bit closer to. Not that it makes it any more severe or less severe than, than any other crisis going on in the world. But right now this is you know, front of mind. And I think that as we dive into different people's stories here on the podcast we remember that there's a lot of other serious things going on in the world that we need to stay connected to.

And, and again, like you Phil our, prayers are with those that are going through this, a lot of innocent people that aren't making decisions, but are having to live. Live through the consequences of other people's decisions. And we're just praying for it for [00:07:00] those folks. And but I think that this is an opportunity as a, soccer culture to, to support our folks and also to be able to dive into a little bit of even David's story you know, the severe things that he had to navigate as well.

And I think there's also a lot of hope as well and hopefully some great things that will come out of hard to say it now, but hopefully there's some great things that will come through this and we'll see, see that hopefully sooner than later, because we hope that this is over soon.

[00:07:29] Phil: Yep. For sure. For sure.

So right now let's dive into into the episodes. So, you know, as I alluded to, there's just some great stories, right. And I think folks, like if you do. If you just look at a store and you go, oh, that's cool. That's your story. That's whatever. And you don't really learn lessons from them. I think you know, We're, we're not giving, you know, the full value of our stories.

Right. And so I look at it and I go, the [00:08:00] lessons we can learn from these different stories. I was able to talk about several of those during those episodes. So I do encourage you to go back and, and listen, and just, you know, hear the commentary that often provide in the midst of those episodes, but you don't get that opportunity, right?

Like you don't, you're not there in the midst of the, conversation, which should we, you know, hopefully we will get you to be able to do that now that you're retired and just sitting on your couch, watching TV. So. We know that I wouldn't say it if it were actually true, we know that's not true.

So, yeah, so anyway, so I would just want to hear from you, like what, what are your thoughts normally, like the last few of these, we've done some Ted Lasso conversations. We are not doing that now. We are going to have some offseason talks where we're going to go into some of these specific issues a little bit deeper.

We're going to talk about your Warrior Way stuff. We're going to talk about Coaching the Bigger Game. We're going to talk about these different programs that we're mentioning throughout, but right now, I just want to hear from you on, on what were the things that stood out [00:09:00] to you? What were some of the stories, you know, and in the power of story, any of any of these other things that you want to chat about?

[00:09:07] Paul: It's interesting. Cause we've been talking to our kids lately about words describing words or heavy weight words have weight or to have meaning. But I think as we hear these people tell stories the weight of words really, really fell on me a bit, especially with David's story. We, we, I, I know me and I'm assuming you and hopefully, well, not hopefully, but I think a lot of people on this listen to this live through the 9/11.

Tragedy. I say we lived through it, but we didn't live through it. Like David lived through it. And I just remember, as he's telling his story, I'm having visuals in my mind of the newsfeed that I was watching, you know, as he's telling the story of coming, you know, coming down the stairwell or the noises that he's hearing while he's in the building and while he's coming out into the lobby area or whatever the Plaza area was, I remember seeing a video footage of that [00:10:00] and seeing the devastation on people and then being covered with Ash. As, as heavy as that was in the moment at the time and how vivid it is in my mind, I can't imagine actually having been in that, the smells, you know, the, the sight that the heat, you know, the, you know, the emotion of it all, but hearing him tell his story through that.

And me having a little bit of visual context, just because of the news was pretty, pretty it was heavy at times, but it was also inspirational to hear hear him fight through that and the battles he's going through gives a lot of hope for some of the little things that we think are such big, such a big deal in our lives.

Some of us are carrying some really heavy burdens and some things I'm not diminishing that, but I think there's some things that at times on a day-to-day basis, you're like, oh man, this is, this is hard. In reality, there's a lot harder things that you could be going through. And you know, the survival mode that David went through.

And then maybe at times I'm not speaking for him, but I'm assuming the only PTSD is still going through at [00:11:00] times and seeing him be able to share his story as an inspiration to others is really, really cool. And I would just say that through the guests through this half of the season, everybody has a story, you know, they've gone through a ups and downs.

Not probably not anybody has, have used what David went through, but you know, Jay Demerit, you know, he bad. You know, what did you call not a has-been of the MLS, but what reject

[00:11:24] Phil: or reject I know

[00:11:25] Paul: was,

[00:11:26] Phil: I don't know, college. Right. He didn't get drafted. He did, he didn't get picked up. He was on a reserve squad and then they didn't, they didn't take him.

And he said, forget this, I'm going to go to Europe because it's way easier to play soccer in Europe than it is in the MLS. So, yeah. And I, and I

[00:11:39] Paul: know, I know some of Jay's coaches, so I heard back stories from the coaches side of that as he's going through. Those things, but having goals and having dreams and being rejected and having to pick yourself back up, I mean, those are true, true things that happen, you know, and Phil, Phil just kind of falls into things.

I just want to

[00:11:58] Phil: follow him and do [00:12:00] stuff to have

[00:12:00] Paul: his own podcast, but it doesn't need to, he also needs like, It's not a 30 for 30, but he can have a weekly reality show where somebody just follows him with a camera. I'd watched that on clubhouse and just, you know, the times that we got to that I was fortunate enough to interact with.

Fantastic.

[00:12:17] Phil: But well, like even during the interview, he's like, oh yeah. Today I just ran into Rio Ferdinand on the street, like yeah, of course. Cause why wouldn't you like we, yeah, I mean, that happens all the time, but yeah,

[00:12:30] Paul: I wrote, ran into a local policeman down the street. He's my local celebrity here in Waco.

[00:12:35] Phil: Right. So,

[00:12:36] Paul: And then of course, you know, Dan and him, you know, thinking that, you know, when he turned 18 and he said, no, I'm, I'm going to be the best golfer in the world. And then coming to the realization that he was up against guys like Tiger Woods. And now looking back with what we know now about Tiger Woods and the time that he came up, he's very smart.

And he says somewhere in the podcast about how he's he's he's not. He's not the smartest man, but you know, he's also [00:13:00] not daft is one of the words that they use over there, but I'm like, dude, you've got to be one of the smartest people I've ever talked to in my life. So to hear someone as smart as him say that he's not very smart just shows kind of how he's navigated a lot within his, how he's humble about what he does.

And one of the things that stood out to me with Dan was he's a, he's a great person. Who's making great people greater and what he does. He's taking people who are already driven to do really well and taking them to a whole nother level of greatness because of what he's able to help them help them reveal about themselves.

I don't believe he's really telling, I mean, he's telling people things, maybe things they don't know, but he's revealing things through their own mind of like how to process things and how to come to the other side of things that I think is. And the way he goes about doing it is, is I think incredible.

I mean, just listening to him talk I mean, I think that's one of your longer episodes. And I had to fragment it into Sections. Cause I don't think I have more than a 20 minute time span during the day [00:14:00] to do stuff, but I always wanted, I was like, man, I gotta get back to that. I want to hear more. I want to hear more.

[00:14:04] Phil: and that was the cool thing about that interview with him, as you said, like he, and this is where any coach, right? So coaches out there, I think what you said is really poignant as far as what is our job. Our job is not to Make you do things that you're not created to do or make you do things that aren't within you.

We can't do that. What we're do is to bring out the greatness in you, right? Or to expand your horizons, to understand that you have more to offer, right. Or that you are, you know, as he said, my job, part of my job and what I want to do as psychologist is to help to expand your definition of success. Right.

Cause we have this narrow vision of success, which is win-loss column or how much money I make or something else, whatever I [00:15:00] got A's in school. Right. But that isn't necessarily success. Right? Like that, that, that could be part of it. Or it could also be something that is completely amiss, a misnomer.

That's actually not success. Yeah. You won a lot of games, but everyone's a total train wreck as a person. Right? Everyone. Yeah. So that was something that I really liked about what he talked about and he's drawing out to make what's already in these people better. What's already in these people to help them understand that they actually have that in them.

And you know, I think that's what you and I are doing. That's what coaches should be doing. Right.

[00:15:43] Paul: And this isn't a connection I necessarily had coming into the episode. But now that we're talking about it, I think all four of these people in this half a season have done are doing the same thing, right? The programs that that Jay Demerit is developing are very similar with, with th with the youth and the Rise and Shine.

I'll call it the [00:16:00] Rise and Shine that he's got going on, Phil, the fact that he wants to please everyone. I mean, I think that the things that he's doing in the people that he's around, he's empowering people, as people empowered him, he's now he's empowering people. And of course, through David's story, he's empowering people.

He's helping people to realize that they can accomplish things maybe that they didn't know that they could accomplish to begin with. So they're really powerful four episodes. And just watching, you know, the four people navigate things. I think I mentioned, this is something I mentioned to you a few minutes ago before we started recording.

But you know, when we, and this isn't a new idea, I've heard this before, but anytime we look at success, right, you can look at all four of these people and say their successful. Right that they've, they've, they've gone through something and they they've achieved something and they're successful people.

And when we see successful people, we never really are able to look behind the curtain and see what it is that it took for them to get where they are. We don't see the valleys they went through. We don't see the mountains that they had to climb. We don't see maybe the mountains [00:17:00] they fell off of and had to re climb again.

But I think that's, what's so cool about these podcasts. Is that we get an inside look at a really in depth, look at some of the tragedies that people have to get through. Some of the challenges they have to fight through. To get to what we call success, right? The winds and life, the winds in the, in the game of life.

And I think really looking behind the curtain for these folks, even, even Jay, we talked a little about his story of how he was the reject of the MLS. We're going to say that too much. It's going to show up on SEOs everywhere, but Hey Hey, that's

[00:17:30] Phil: fine. Draw it on.

[00:17:32] Paul: But he, but he battled through, but what's cool about Jay.

He's not battling through a whole new thing. Like he's creating this Rise and Shine movement. He's done the, you know, he's done the documentary and now he's got this whole thing he's doing with the kids where the EA sports. Like we see that and I'm like, wow, we gotta deal with the EA sports. I'm sure that wasn't, you know, that didn't just happen.

Right. You know, it came with, you know, probably some heartaches and some hard things and he's got, and he's married and has a kid. And I know what that's like. That's not never easy too. So [00:18:00] just probably the things that he's been through, how that's helped him now the next thing that he, that he's, that he's navigating.

And one of the things that one of the sayings I really like is that you can't control maybe the hand that you've been dealt, you can't control maybe the circumstances that you're in, but you can absolutely. You're absolutely in control of your response to those that's right. And I think that's something that all four of these folks have really shown us is that while they were dealt a certain hand, they were given a certain they were in a certain Situation.

They determined how they were going to deal with it. David in nine 11, he absolutely was determined how he was going to respond to that tragedy. J how he, he was determined and how he was going to respond to, to not making it in the MLS. With every, every opportunity he was given, he had to navigate every one of those opportunities differently to find, find success.

And then of course, Dan not becoming a pro golfer, but I'm sure continue to navigate how to grow [00:19:00] his brand into what he is now. He is, he is, he is determined and decided how he's going to out respond to those different things. So that's, those are the things that really kind of stood out to me over the last four weeks.

That to me in my transitional, I've really spoke to me, you know? And those are, you know, that's one thing I love about doing this with you is that selfishly I always get a lot out of it and I know you do too, but but those are some things that stood out to me this this time.

[00:19:27] Phil: Yeah. You know, and I look at it and I go, we joked about it, but it's true.

Like. Jay was rejected by the MLS. And then ironically, I don't know if it's ironic that we misuse that term all the time, but however many years later he ends up captaining in the MLS. Right and becomes where they actually wanted to bring him back to play for them. Right. He was, they probably I'm assuming they probably sought him out to say, Hey, come play for us.

Right. So, and then he starts presumably right away 'cause he was a national team player and captains the team, you know, [00:20:00] it's like. We could take failure. And so most people I'd say probably 99.9, nine, 9% of the people out there when they had that first rejection, they're like, all right, I'm not supposed to do this.

I'm going to go. He had an art design degree. I'm just going to go do that. No problem, no, nothing wrong with that. But he said, no, that's not. That's not what I think right now. So I'm going to go work my butt off and I'm gonna do all these other things, but he does all these other things. And I, and that's the other common thread of all these guys, which is by the way, true of virtually everybody is you will do something after soccer. Or whatever sport golf for Dan, right? In his mind as a kid, I look at my ten-year-old as we were probably as ten-year-olds you have ten-year-old or somewhere around there. I don't know if any of your kids are actually 10, but we at, what do you want to do?

I want to be a pro soccer player. I want to be a pro well, what's your backup pro baseball player. And that's my son right now, you know, and that's how I was. Right. I was going to be [00:21:00] a, I forget what sport it was at any given moment, but whatever it was, you know, and. That's what you see. And so you're like, okay, all in.

And then when that doesn't happen, for most people, some people see that as true, like total failure and they don't know what to do for awhile. And what I saw with these guys was it was, they were able to say, You know, some of them got extremely successful in their sport, but there's, there is going to be life after.

And what I've seen with these guys that I get really excited about because I talk to people all the time is I see that what they're doing after, if we were to ask them and cause even Phil, I mean, he was talking about playing for, you know, Kevin Fogg and Sunderland academy. Like, like that's, that's a big deal.

Right. And so he, you know, he kind of plays it down. He played in college. He, you know, he went to American to play like, so. But I would, I would venture to say [00:22:00] every one of them, even Jay, who had an incredibly accomplished career would say what they're doing now, they would hope to be their legacy. Right. I, I, I I'd knock, I don't want to speak for them, but I would guess if I were to ask Jay, what do you want to be your legacy?

You would say Rise and Shine and the work we're doing in the youth to be able to help them. Cause you hear him talk about it and he, and it's just it's excitement. And that excites me because I go that, that dude knows that dude knows why he's doing what he's doing, you know, and to be able, that's why I asked the question about, tell me your story.

You know, this isn't just some, oh, well Phil can't think of what to ask these people. If you haven't noticed folks, I could talk to each of these people for hours and hours and hours. And we could have really interesting conversation for that long cause they're, they're amazing people and I study them.

So I want, I know a lot about them and we could talk cause they all have things we could talk for hours [00:23:00] and hopefully I'll get some of them on again. But this story question is something I always want to ask somebody. And some of these stories were longer than others because they're great stories.

That's what I loved about this half of the season. It was so story-driven but then also the other question is what's your. And how are you living it out because you know what, some of them you see, they hadn't really thought it through at the level. I guess it's funny talking to Dan. He's like, I probably should know this better because I ask people this and I tell people what I need to do this, you know?

And but if they haven't then I, I really wanna encourage them to think about being able to get it down to that one sentence, to be able to just say, this is why I do what I do so that you can filter it through that. And I want you folks to be thinking about that. 'cause, you know, if we're just doing this to have conversations and it doesn't actually apply to your life, then what are we doing?

Like, I'm not going to stop tomorrow, but I know that these conversations that we're having will help us. I mean, as you and I are talking about Paul, like it's going to help us and it's going to help, hopefully every one of you who are listening out there as you're [00:24:00] listening to this things that we're talking about, even today, you're going, yeah, I want to take that and I want to apply that.

And if that's not doing it, then I'd say go find something else that will. And if it is doing that for you, then, then use it. And I encourage you to connect with us about these things and also share it with others who can help as well, because I have no doubt that if it's helping you, it's going to help others, but I want to get back to this conversation.

So, so that was something that really, really stuck out to me. Too, as what you just talked about there, that each of these people, as we're talking with them, like even, I love talking to Phil Smith, what he realized of all these amazingly cool stories. And I'm going to ask you what you think. What's the thing he's most proud of

[00:24:48] Paul: his daughter, his daughter.

[00:24:50] Phil: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Like if you could talk about one thing, he talked about his daughter and that's so powerful. And this is the dude [00:25:00] Manchester United executive. Like how many people would be like, yeah, that's my crown jewel. No, his crown jewel. There's no doubt. He doesn't have pictures of him with sir Alex or with, for an, he's got a whole wall.

If you watch the video of his daughter, like a million pictures. You know, and that's yeah.

[00:25:19] Paul: So yeah, what's funny is, I mean, I think that's the way it should be. Right. So it's almost, it's almost funny to me that we're having to say that because I do think there's some, I mean, he even talks about how he, he kind of woke up and realized like, what am I doing?

You know, I've got, I've not, you know, he was at home. You know, realizing, you know, with his partner that he, you know, he was so impressed by something that she did and his partner is like, oh yeah, she'd been doing that for a month. Can we do that for three weeks? And he, no, it hit him. You know, that struck me because, I mean, if you guys have listened to anything that we've talked about between me and you on this podcast, that's a realization of mine also, why I changed what I was doing.

But you would, you would [00:26:00] hope that that's a realization that a lot of. Are coming to that you know, I was listening to something it's a podcast that we should reference if I can think of it while we're talking, but I was listening to it the other day. And the coach was talking about. The same idea that he realized that as he, you know, everything that he was doing was for his family, like he was working as a full-time coach at a prominent university on the men's side and was coaching and coaching and doing all that for his family.

In the meantime, they had moved to another city and their transition. He was like, I didn't, we won two championships and I didn't get to come home and celebrate with my family because they were, we were already in transition and they had gone and it's just a realization. They were making that move to be together.

But in that in-between, it stood out to me even more why they were making those decisions. And that definitely stood out to me with, with Phil's conversation. And if you follow. Any of his stuff. He's posting things about his little girl all the time. And like you said, she's a cutie and I, I don't know what it's like to have my own little girl.

So, I live vicariously through those of you who are blessed with little girls. As I navigate stinky little [00:27:00] boys,

[00:27:01] Phil: Yeah, they, they have, they, both boys and girls have their advantages and then tough parts as well. And it's good though. It's it's and he's at a great age to be able to, to really enjoy her.

And she's at that prime daddy age too, for, for a little girl, which

[00:27:17] Paul: is, which is just to, to jump in and you don't get them back. And even Jay Jay's conversation, you know, talking through his little one. And navigating a lifestyle that allows him to, to, to pour to his

[00:27:31] Phil: as well. Yeah. So go, you know, going back to, so the interviews and what you had mentioned too, just about.

You know, these people that are they're learning to. Right. So that's, that's what I loved to, to hear throughout the conversations. And even, you know, so with David he's, he's learning, he's continually learning about, you know, this and yet, as he said his, and you said he's continuing to, to recover too. It's it's, it's a lifelong process.

As he said, even [00:28:00] telling the story again to me, for the, as we had a conversation, helped him. Right. And is helping him, you know, for Jay, as he's learning this new, you know, he's learning the self-leadership stuff, he's learning these, he's a continual learner. Like I asked him about what did you learn on the bench?

Right. And he's like, I can watch and I can learn. And that's something for us to learn. Like if you're not the leader right now, make sure that you're not like just going, oh, I can't wait til I'm leader. I can't wait until I'm the leader. I can't wait till him. No, like be learning and be soaking it up. What you can learn.

Every great leader has to be a great follower. at some point. And so that's something you can learn. And then to hear, you know, Phil, as he said, he mean, he learned everywhere as he, you know, they talked about, go get some scars, As he said, he's not back in the Manchester, United boardroom yet, but he's in a different boardroom and he's learning and he's getting that scar, those scars that you can only get from doing stuff and failing and doing stuff.

And as you, as we said, I think that was the clip we use is don't be afraid of failure. I can learn [00:29:00] from it, as he said, you know, don't go seek it out, but you fail and then get back. And learn from it. And then to here it was kinda cool. Like I love to hear in Dan where he's like, I don't, I hope I'm not doing self promotion here.

I don't mean to be, but when I asked him, you know, what book it, what has he been listening to? And as he talked about his own podcast and what I loved about it, it wasn't like, oh yeah, my bi-pod cast. I talk about I'm so smart. And I do all these things and no, it wasn't that. And yeah, he is a smart dude, I felt like, you know, he was like, you know, my job is to demystify these things and I'm going, bro, you might not want to bring it down another level. but you know, I think that there is a, you know, he is demystifying things, but he still is, like I said, in the interview, like when I was a lawyer, I'd use term unintentionally a lot of times and people are like, Hey, I saw blank stares. And so I imagine he probably gets some blank stares to, but so he's a really smart dude. There's no question about that. Right. And he has a British [00:30:00] accent. We've already talked about that. It makes them smarter for sure. There's no question.

And he has the type of British accent that even makes them even smarter. Right. So. The right British accent. So, he's

[00:30:09] Paul: listening to this

[00:30:11] Phil: swelling as you're talking. Of course it is. And he's laughing, he's laugh. Hopefully he's laughing. Cause, cause that was I, you saw that if you watched the video, like I'd do stuff like that to him.

I try to do that to our guests, to, to, you know, Phil maybe not as much cause he kinda preempted it by saying that we weren't friends. So that kind of hurt me at the beginning of our interview. But for folks that I, we are friends. I'm just going to tell you that right now, whether Phil likes it or not.

I know you too Paul, which, I mean, that's, that's, I mean, that's big time when you can't, it doesn't get any bigger than that. So, but but yes, with Dan, what I loved was he said about that was, he said, I. I'm continually learning. He's I thought I knew a lot about this stuff before I started doing the podcast.

And honestly, folks, that's how I feel about this too. Like I'm continually learning. I get to learn with this, but he said, but as I started learning from these people, I realized there's so much, I [00:31:00]still need to know. And that's such a great lesson in itself. Folks know what you don't know. And if you think, you know, everything, go out and figure out what you don't know.

Like make that, make that, if you think you're at a point of coaching or of leading an organization or of doing whatever it is that you think you don't have any more to learn, make it a point to go out and figure out what you need to. 'cause that's, that's a dangerous place. If you think you got it all figured out.

So I assume if you're listening to this episode or listening to this podcast, you're not that kind of thinker because you are a learner or else you wouldn't be listening to this, but if you know people who are going through that and like, think, oh yeah, I I'm at the top. You know, we talked about it, right?

Like the best players in the world, you look at Ronaldo or Messi or whatever. They're the hardest training. [00:32:00] I love that quote from Christian Bale. I always say Christian Bale, Gareth Bale, Christian Bale probably has some great quotes too. I always say Christian Bale because I mean, it's really good, really good quotes, probably in some other movies that he made, but yeah.

Yes, that's true. That's true. That's true. They weren't his quotes. That's true. Good point. He brought, he might have some quotes and interviews, but anyway, Gareth Bale said, when he got to Real Madrid, he went out there and he got out there an hour before practice started to make sure he was the first one out there to get trained in.

And he realized he wasn't cause Ronaldo was out there before him. And that stuff is the things that, you know, whatever you think about Ronaldo, he's one of the world's best players and he's still training more and more. Cause he knows he can get better and he knows he can learn. And so that's something that we as leaders, I listened to the book by.

And this, this is kind of a dueling as a recommendation for this episode too, but The Challenge Culture, which is that the book that Matt Parker back early episode of this, of this [00:33:00] podcast recommended, but Nigel Travis, who is the Chairman of Leyton Orient, and he was the CEO of Dunkin Donuts as well as Blockbuster and a few other organizations.

But one of the things that was really clear in that. That, that, that book's about pushback. You know, great organizations thrive on pushback and, and inherent in an and implicit in pushback is learning, If you're, if you're seeking pushback, you're learning through the pushback because you're inviting people in to challenge the status quo.

And if you're going to be challenging status quo, presumably part of that will be learning what the new is. So anyway, those are all things that that I, I pulled out of there too. But, but anyway, any other thoughts from you?

[00:33:50] Paul: No. I just, just that correlation of, you know, how, how these conversations meet real life.

You know, some of the things that we're doing through Warrior Way, we're doing some [00:34:00]consulting and I'm talking with a lot of different clubs about some different things and sitting in. Boardroom with some club directors. I think I'd actually listened to the Jay Demerit interview on my way to this meeting.

And even through that meeting pulled out some things that, and even referenced the podcast like, Hey, I was just listening to this interview, that my friend who had Jay Demerit on How Soccer Explains Leadership and and how, you know, as a leader, he even talked about, you know, he had his captain, captainship taken away from him because he was thinking too much about himself and how w how he could be a great leader instead of thinking about the others and how to lead them. And just trying to, to reference that and how we teach our kids about our players, about leadership and being able to take things from the things that we do on this podcast and to, into our everyday life of dealing with people then been pretty cool.

But I thought that was another thing that stood out to you about his story. About how he had his captainship taken away for a bit. And, and obviously earned it [00:35:00] back. But what a quick learner, he was on some of those things.

[00:35:04] Phil: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. all right, man. Well, any parting thoughts as we wrap up another post-match another great season.

I mean, I just love what we get to do. And I think that this, it was definitely one of my favorite seasons. I mean, clearly top five, but no but I'd say this is a, it really was. I think the, I think we're getting better. I think we're, we're getting some people that are everyone who we've had on the show has been amazing, but I think we're getting dialed in more and more to some of these conversations can go in deeper and really being able to have a hopefully helping you folks out there. And, and as we've always talked about, if you have guests that you think would be great for us, please, you know, if it's you connect with us, if it's somebody, you know, just either connect us with him or her, or tell us about him or her, and I'll reach out to [00:36:00] them.

I did that this week, in fact, with a couple of guests that people recommended a book and I read the book and I are, I. Talk or whatever. And I reached out to those people. And so I'd encourage you to to do that. And if you have any thoughts or questions, please reach out to us. We love hearing from ya and we do get back to you.

So please do that. So any, any other closing thoughts on season five?

[00:36:23] Paul: Nope. Another great season in the books and nothing but Forward momentum from, and and greater things since episode one it started really, really low in quality on season, on episode one guy and upward and onward from there.

It's been great. So, but no, some, some great stuff. And I think even to your point, like, You're getting some more high profile guests. I want to encourage people to not be pushed away by that because I think some of our great guests are people that a lot of people never heard of and hearing the stories of just what we consider normal people are some of the best shows.

So we learn a lot from each other whether we're high [00:37:00] profile in the world or just high profile in our own. We all have something to give, so appreciate everything that's going on here. And the feedback that we're getting has been awesome as well and excited about the next season coming up.

[00:37:11] Phil: Absolutely. So on that note, we are going to have some off season talks as we've done in the past between seasons five. Not sure at this point exactly how many of those we're going to have, but we will be talking. And then we talking with Paul about the Warrior Way program. That'll be a short episode talking about that.

We're going to talk about Coaching the Bigger Game program. If you want any information about either of those Paul what's the, so you have a new website for Warrior Way, right?

[00:37:39] Paul: Yes, it's warriorwaysoccer.com. We've is our, our new website. And that goes through everything we're doing with the Warrior Way program.

We even have a nonprofit, a wing of that also called Warrior Way Gives. And also there's some stuff in there about the consulting that we're doing the Warrior Way consulting. So, new, not new branding, but we've gone all branding through warrior way now [00:38:00] and excited about the progress that's had era the last couple of.

[00:38:03] Phil: Yeah, definitely. So check that out and we have coachingthebiggergame.com. If you're interested in that, please reach out as we've talked about before. We'll we'll do we'll do a quick episode on that. One of the off season talks, I'll also bring on Christian , who is the other person who I've been working on that program with.

And so, we'll, we'll talk about the different ins and outs of that. But if you're interested in that, which is basically coaching yourself and being able to lead yourself as a, as a coach and, and leading the individual and leading your team that's something that I'm passionate about. No, it's extremely important in in your coaching and in the thriving. Cultures and you're in your programs. So, we got that. And then again, phil@howsoccerexplainsleadership.com. If you want to reach out to me for any reason. So folks with that, we are going to wrap up another great season, season five, and we hope that you're taking all that you're [00:39:00] learning from everything that we're talking about and you're using it to be a better spouse, a better parent, a better leader in your community, a better friend. And you're continually reminding yourself that soccer does explain life and leadership. Thanks a lot. Have a great week.