Footy4MySoul

Eyes Up: How Vision Training Soccer Transforms the Pitch to Life (Footy4MySoul with guest TJ Kostecky)

• Footy4MySoul

Share episode

Enjoy listening to TJ Kostecky, the lead innovator of Vision Training Soccer, a developmental program that empowers athletes to maximize their playing potential. At its core, this approach emphasizes how widening your vision can transform not only how players approach their sport but also how they approach life.

TJ is also the author of the inspiring book Eyes Up; this book coaches you through making small shifts in your perspective that have major impact, helping you recognize new and unique opportunities. By emphasizing real-time awareness and a growth mindset, TJ shares real examples of transformation—not just in the way we play soccer but in the way we live our lives. This is truly the synthesis of success on the pitch and true joy in life.

https://www.seeingthefield.com/
https://www.tjkostecky.com/

00:00 - Intro Vision Training
⚽ 14:20 - Elevating Performance Through Vision Training
⚽ 27:43 - Evolution and Revolution of Vision Training
⚽ 34:52 - Courage and Presence
⚽ 46:10 - Parental Role in Youth Sports
⚽ 56:38 - Enhancing Performance Through Vision Training
⚽ 01:02:05 - The Future of Vision Training
⚽ 01:10:49 - The Power of Vision Training

Support the show


Justin Van Til:

Welcome to Footy4MySoul, where curiosity, caring, courage and creativity shape our exploration of this beautiful game, connecting experiences from the pitch to life. This is your space to learn and to be inspired, whether you're a player, coach, parent, mentor or anyone. Let us enjoy this journey of beautiful growth. Welcome to Footy4MySoul. I'm grateful to introduce TJ Kostecky. Tj has coached thousands of players and coaches around the world as lead innovator of Vision Training Soccer, a developmental program that empowers athletes to maximize their playing potential. At its core, this approach emphasizes how widening your vision can transform not only how players approach the sport, but also how they approach life. The outgrowth of this work is that TJ is much more than a coach. He's an innovator, a mentor and a trailblazer. By applying the processes simple processes, which you'll learn about into vision training for life, he's created a philosophy that transcends this beautiful game. His work empowers individuals to unlock their potential, build meaningful connections and broaden their perspectives. Now for context, tj's work has spanned decades with universities six universities actually. He served as a professor, director of athletics, coach and mentor. TJ currently runs the men's soccer program at Bard College in New York. Previously, he spent 20 years at LIU, long Island University. Serving as a men's Division I soccer coach, his team were big-time winners. Numerous trophies, yes, but the awards for academics and sportsmanship alike. You'll learn why when we talk more about vision training in general. TJ is also the author of the most inspiring book, Eyes Up. This is the most impactful book I have ever read. We learn how small shifts in perspective can have major impacts, helping individuals recognize new opportunities and achieve fulfillment in their careers, family life, personal growth. You're also a better footballer. By emphasizing real-time awareness and a growth mindset, TJ shares real examples of transformation, not just in the way we play soccer, but in the way we live our lives. This is truly the synthesis of success on the pitch and true joy in life. In this episode, we learn about his journey, his innovative coaching techniques, how they foster creativity, confidence and decision-making, while helping players and coaches connect more deeply with the game and with each other. His work through vision training soccer has taken him all over the globe, conducting leadership seminars and workshops in countries such as Iceland, Ukraine, Costa Rica, Jamaica, keeps going. His contributions to this sport have been recognized with honors many honors, including induction into the Ukrainian Sports Hall of Fame. It's eye-opening as TJ's philosophy of perception as the foundation for success has redefined soccer and will continue to inspire personal growth for years to come for many, many people. As we dive into the transformative power of vision training, I hope you enjoy TJ's stories, from impacting the greatest American footballers ever to play to influencing many football organizations all over the planet Look, if you're a coach, a player, a parent really anybody I really hope you enjoy this footy for my soul experience Now please subscribe to our channels. This footy for my soul experience Now. Please subscribe to our channels. Your support lets us continue to do this work as a service not only to the soccer community but to everybody that really cares about the things that we're looking to accomplish and make the beautiful game more beautiful. Without further ado, let's get started. Our experience with TJ Kostecky begins now. TJ Kostecky, welcome to Footy for my Soul.

TJ Kostecky:

Justin, what a joy to be here with you. Thank you so much for inviting me.

Justin Van Til:

I am deeply grateful that you will be a meaningful part of what we are building and hopefully continue to impact people with footy for my soul. So thank you.

TJ Kostecky:

Appreciate you.

Justin Van Til:

Vision training. There's vision training on the pitch and then there's vision training impacting life. Yes, take us through the journey of when did you figure out or what moment did things change where it was? This doesn't only create great players and great teams and great people on your teams as a coach, but transformative globally as well. Take us through that journey great question.

TJ Kostecky:

Uh, so the feel to life, basically, I think right, is that your question? Well, I was doing vision training for decades, many decades, and I was doing a coaching course on vision training, a licensed course that I ran out in Bakersfield, california, and we were in the classroom after we had done work on the field and coaches were already building a habit of scanning and looking, playing with their eyes up, and I'm on the board and doing some reminders and one of the coaches says, tj, vision training, soccer, taking looks, scanning, gathering information is just like life. I go, what do you mean? Well, you want to make informed decisions. So at that time or soon after, I came up with the five P's Perceive process, plan, perform and persist. This is, on the pitch, the most important is perception the wider, the brighter, the deeper your perception on the field, your ability to process, right, abstract a lot of information, plan, perform and persistence the habit loop. When you're persistent about scanning, you're gathering real-time information and making the best decisions. So he says to me well, that's life If we do that in life and if we're perceptive, we're open, we're looking around, we're gathering information and we're able to make the most informed decisions if we're always scanning and open.

Justin Van Til:

Let's start on the pitch. Okay, some player that was my idol as a kid, I believe was still the greatest central midfielder. Some will say Pulisic's the greatest attacker of all time in the States. I won't argue with that, okay, yeah. However, from a distributing eyes up, scanning the pitch, making players around them better, Claudio Reyna was one of my idols as a kid. He's somebody that you've impacted as a coach and a mentor at a young age. Tell us that story.

TJ Kostecky:

I had the privilege of coaching Claudio when he was 13 to 15 years old on the state team in New Jersey. At that time there were no academy teams, mls academy teams whatsoever, so the ODP level was really the stepping stone to the national team. And Claudio was a great player. His father's from Argentina and as a youth player he would go down and train in the summer with the Boca Junior Youth Academy, argentine Academy. So he was already a gifted player. His vision was really good and certainly in this space, maybe another 10, 15 yards. And what I would do with him is I would say to him Claudio, can you find a player that's 30 plus yards away from you with a one or two touch pass? And to be able to do that, he had to look at second, third options, right Different layers on the pitch, and it was a real privilege to work with him and have that opportunity to really help him with his journey.

Justin Van Til:

Now that was many years ago Now the transferability of this to other players and other sports. We're going to get to sports and then life in a minute, but let's talk about within the football soccer context.

TJ Kostecky:

Sure.

Justin Van Til:

Learning that awareness, that head on a swivel, becoming that sort of a player. How hard is that? Like, Like that's something that coaches say to do Check your shoulder. It's got to be that easy. That's very top level. Top level, right. I mean really superficial. How deep does this really get into the vision, training and how someone like Claudio would have embraced it and then other players?

TJ Kostecky:

Well, vision is the missing link in our developmental model. In our country, we are teaching technique, we're teaching tactics, we're doing the physical, we're doing the psychological part, but we're not actually training players to scan and to make informed decisions. We remind them, perhaps, and we're talking to them. Like you said, make sure your eyes are up or make sure you're taking a look over your shoulder, but it's not part of our former curriculum. Vision training soccer, which is what we've been doing for now it's four decades, by the way is about adding into every exercise and drill that you do the importance of vision, because if you don't see, then the decisions you're going to make. Because if you don't see, then the decisions you're going to make. Or if you can't see as much as you're able to see because you're not practicing it, your decisions are going to be limited. So it's really crucial and important to build that habit is to constantly be doing it. So to look at your if you're a soccer coach, for example soccer coaches that are watching this to reevaluate your exercises that you're doing right now, not throw them away, because they're very useful and there's some phenomenal coaches I'm sure they're going to be listening to this podcast and some youth coaches. But are you training vision? Can you take an exercise that you're doing instead of having your players dribble with their eyes down, because if they dribble their eyes down they're going to build a habit of eyes down, correct? Can you change it and tweak it so that players are now looking around and you're developing the habit which we call the myelin sheath, that it becomes automatic, and when it becomes automatic you don't have to think about it?

Justin Van Til:

I've read many books that I thought transformed me and I read it like that's great. But this is the one book in my life called Eyes Up. This is written by our guest TJ Kostecki and for context and I want to get to this because it's the impact of what you're talking about on the field for the coach, transferring that to life Sure, so I love this book. Ego is the Enemy by Ryan Holiday, because how that meant to me, about checking yourself at the door right and your ego. And we spoke on another podcast about shoeless soccer and the impact on the field. Exceptional books in the walks of life, the walks of football. This book is the greatest single bit of writing which I listened to in my life. Oh, my goodness. It explains the transferability from the field to life. Now you spoke about the coach. That coach now is a mentor to the player. They're helping them become better on the pitch for better outcomes. I think this helps them become a better person and transformative. So I'm gonna go back to the first question now that we've spoken a few minutes. When did that realize? So give me some examples, or your favorite example of when there was that aha moment, where somebody that embraced vision training. On the pitch was like wow, this is transformative in life.

TJ Kostecky:

Well, I think what? The answer to that is players that I've had the privilege of coaching in my career, that have gone out and have gone into communities and have introduced this concept and changed communities. That's been really the impact of this work, because the impact of vision is empowering people, isn't it? Yeah, impact, the impact of vision is empowering people, isn't it? When you give someone, when you have a vision, or you empower someone to think about their vision on the pitch and in life, now you empower them, they start believing in themselves and help them believe. Belief is one of the greatest indicators of success in any field. That we do in life is the belief part. When you empower someone. Do in life is the belief part. When you empower someone, you give them the skill set, you give them the resources to take risks, to get out of their comfort zone, and when you do that, we grow as human beings. So embracing criticism, trying different things and discovering gifts that you have.

Justin Van Til:

To our younger generation that will watch this belief. Ted Lasso, let's just picture what's over the door to the office.

TJ Kostecky:

Yes, believe, yes, yes.

Justin Van Til:

And now let's segue to. We believe in connecting experiences here, Sure. And we're going to talk about that quite a bit At one of our podcasts with Chris White of Rosati. We ended it with that great Danny Rojas. Football is life another Ted Lasso piece. So, as we think about vision, training, the fundamental side of what we can do on the pitch football is life. Is this something that's global? Is this something that is multiple sports? Give us the context of this, beyond the coach and the player being better in soccer. Give me global examples, because this to me sounds transformational.

TJ Kostecky:

On the pitch, Absolutely, Absolutely the first part when I recognize how global it is. If I can get back to Claudio, you asked me me about Claudio. I was in my late 20s when I was introducing this and really working on this with, uh, with, my business partner, Len Billis. So we were dabbling, I guess, in the in the laboratory of vision training, if we can use that term. And in 1989 Claudio was selected for the US under-16 national team and the US played in Scotland in the World Cup that year. Claudio was a central midfielder. The US beat Brazil 1-0, and he was on the pitch in that game. It was the first time the US men had ever beaten Brazil in a World Cup play. When he came back from that experience, I asked him. I said Claudio, tell me about it, it sounds incredible. And he says to me TJ, you know what the difference was. I said what he goes my vision, I go really. He goes time and space. I had very little time and space on the ball when we were playing against Brazil. They were closing me down. But because I built the habit of scanning, I was gathering so much real-time information I was able to play at my best level. So for me. I realized that this piece that we're teaching, this little fundamental piece this is back in the 80s helped him succeed at that level.

Justin Van Til:

And now it's transferable on the pitch. It's transferable in life, as a mentor and a leader, for skeptics that say, okay, well, I teach that. I teach players to be aware and keep their head up. The aha moment for a skeptic. You must have, in your journey, had great the great, I'm assuming. And look, I've read this exceptional book where I have some great stories and I wish we had half a day, TJ, to go through these. But give me one of your best skeptics and the one I would love. I'll let you answer. How do you handle those skeptics?

TJ Kostecky:

Well, you either have an open mindset or a growth mindset, or a fixed mindset. We know that terminology. If you have a growth mindset, you want to get better, you want to learn, you want to improve, you want to be the best version of yourself. If you have the fixed mindset, you have all the answers. Then you stay in your lane. I'm not speaking to folks that have a fixed mindset. You know what? And they're not listening to this podcast, exactly Okay. But those that have a growth mindset. It changes your life. For me, it was Jurgen Klinsmann. Do you remember Jurgen Klinsmann, the great German player?

Justin Van Til:

He was a striker. He's a guest on ESPN now. I think one of the finest attacking players, world Cup winner right yes, won in Germany yeah. So you know, Jurgen Klinsmann.

TJ Kostecky:

So Jürgen Klinsmann after he retired. He retired at quite a young age he could have still played, by the way and he lived in California. His wife is American and he lived in California, his wife is American and he was doing a clinic at an all-star event in North Carolina and he was trying to figure out his own journey at that point. This is before he coached the US Men's World Cup team and the German team. After he did this clinic, I came up to him and I introduced myself and I connected with him. I said I really admired how you played, the choices you made, your ability to see and scan before you scored goals, and I told him about some of the work that I was doing in vision training. And he says to me what are you doing for lunch? I said I don't have any plans. He goes. I want to hear more about what you're doing. I said really, he goes. Yeah, come with me, join me for lunch. So he took me out to lunch and we sat down and he leaned in after we ate lunch and says tell me how you apply these ideas on vision training, because I've had this. I grew up scanning when I played football, but how do you teach it. So I showed Jurgen Klinsmann the different steps of scanning, of how to add that within a training session, within the training session that he did, how to get players to take peeks, how to eliminate the noise, how to reward players by looking, so, designing exercises that are about scanning and rewarding players. So it becomes a habit and it's automatic. You don't have to remind people. And he asked for my coaching manual. I had a coaching manual that I put together just for youth players. It was very, very simple and I sent it, and Jurgen adopted this information when he was coaching afterwards as well. So that's probably one of the examples.

Justin Van Til:

Wow, now you have been a coach. You're still a coach, yes, at Bard College, but a good, I want to say 20 years almost, at Long Island University. That's a Division I program for those listening outside of the Northeast, that's in the New York area right, we've got people listening all over the world.

TJ Kostecky:

So I love giving context to where we're at LIU was one of the top programs I had the privilege of coaching. The first Herman Award winner, Dove Marcus, in the 1960s, scored 35 goals in 12 games at LIU, so I was a caretaker of this incredible program. Yeah.

Justin Van Til:

And don't take the college players that have embraced vision training. And it's beyond understanding the five Ps right, and it's beyond the look, listen and learn, which are big core fundaments of kind of the thesis. What drives vision training?

TJ Kostecky:

right, correct.

Justin Van Til:

But so they're great players. And then the players become leaders. If I were to ask one of your players now, someone that played for you 20 years ago, vision training, what is it? What do you think they'd say?

TJ Kostecky:

It's the ability for me to make the most informed decisions on the pitch and in my life, and if they were to say you sampled them.

Justin Van Til:

I remember there's a great story in the book when LIU, you left LIU and the team, they changed the structure of the team. It was your last season and you asked the players because you had that group, knew it was the last season there, right? And you asked all of your alumni. Yeah, you're giving me chills right now I had chills reading this and the alumni would send notes and you read those notes game on game. Okay, that is what's transformational, okay? So if we can get into the soul of parent coaches and the clubs out there that want to do more, sure Right.

TJ Kostecky:

Sure.

Justin Van Til:

And they say you know, tj, and they had a chance to sit in my seat and ask the question, say I want to do more for my players because I care so deeply yeah, absolutely Not only on the pitch, but off the pitch, absolutely. What is my steps? What do I need to do to embrace it?

TJ Kostecky:

Sure Phenomenal. You did your homework, by the way.

Justin Van Til:

I love this book. Tj, you're a young man, you did your homework.

TJ Kostecky:

Young man.

Justin Van Til:

We're about the same age, but anyway.

TJ Kostecky:

I wish I was your age. But thank you, You're welcome. You know what I'm asking, right the coach.

Justin Van Til:

So much of what we do. It's beyond a college coach or a high school coach, but for this game to be more beautiful, it's at the grassroots level and the parent even of a five-year-old that's kicking the sock around and they want to embrace it. I think it was so cool we haven't known each other very long to learn that a DVD on Vision Training in 2005 sold more copies than. Beckham. That's unbelievable. That was an aha moment. Well, that's when you know, right. But what's the steps? To embrace Sure.

TJ Kostecky:

So any parents that are out here, or youth players or youth coaches, when I travel around the country and I work with players or work with coaches I was in China in June actually doing vision training in China as well. I've been to Ukraine, Guatemala, costa Rica yeah, Turks and Caicos was a beautiful place to go to Canada. So I've traveled. I've been very fortunate and blessed to have gone a lot of places. So what I share with players is really simple. If you do these three things right now, your game could get 10% to 20% better permanently, permanently. So these are the things the top players in the world, the research of the Premier League players. They take five plus looks every 10 seconds. That's the research of the Premier League players. They take five plus looks every 10 seconds. That's the research analysis of the top players in the Premier League. So what's Kevin De Bruyne's? He's way above five. So what happens is to take looks. You don't have to be the fastest, you don't have to have the most technique, you don't have to juggle the ball a thousand times to be able to take looks. Every human being can do that, every soccer player listening to this to do that, and every coach can train their players to do that. So the first thing is coach your players. Can you take up to five looks every 10 seconds? If you're doing that, you're gathering real-time information. You don't have to wait for someone to tell you man on turn, give me the ball, Justin TJ clap, because that becomes noise. Noise destroys decision-making and flow. Dancer, musician, writer, poet when we're in the flow moment, everything slows down, like right now we're in the flow. Noise destroys flow. So by gathering information, you're in that flow moment, all right. So, number one, get your players or players watching. Can you look up to five seconds? You'll see the defender. You'll see an open pass, keepers off his or her line, chip the goalkeeper Thanks for coming. Like Finley, like your daughter did in the game you showed me last time we had dinner, like Carly Lloyd did against Japan in the World Cup from 52 yards because she was scanning. It all starts with looking around with your head up right. So, number one, can players take up to five looks? That's your goal. Some may be two or three, right? Number two is when you're practicing with a player, with a teammate, and you're passing as soon as the ball is delivered, start building the habit of taking a look over your shoulder, don't look at the ball to your feet, because if you are your myelin sheath, your habit forming sheath is developing tunnel vision. All right, as soon as the balls touch, gather information. So now, in a match, when you deliver me the ball and I see cobra and you're our, our, cameraman, off camera pressuring me, I could now turn or play a ball back or do whatever it is, as opposed to playing the ball back because you're yelling at me, mad on Sure, how limiting is that right? And the third thing is are you familiar with wall ball? Oh, yeah, yeah, all over the country people do wall ball. Right, you're knocking the ball. What are you working on with wall ball? You're working on what part? Signing for a typical Technique, right Technique. How does that do with vision wall ball, by the way? How does it do in life? No good, yeah, what are you developing? You're developing a habit of tunnel vision. Every time you hit the ball against the wall and you're looking at the ball, you're reducing your vision. So little change, powerful change. As soon as the ball comes off the wall, turn your head, take peeks. Imagine you're in a match. You do that three, four times a week. You hit 200 to 300 balls. Then go to training and watch what your coach is going to say. How did you become so informed? How are you reading pressure? How are you understanding what's going on? You do those three things permanently.

Justin Van Til:

Your game gets 10 to 20 better so to that young player, at any age? Um, how does that make them a better person? So how do we translate those techniques? Right, it's not among a technique. It's rewiring your brain, rewiring your muscle memory love it okay, um, so there's perception. Yeah, there's perception.

TJ Kostecky:

Yeah.

Justin Van Til:

There's other P's there.

TJ Kostecky:

Yeah.

Justin Van Til:

Right, and that's what's interesting it's taking that foundation into the other P's, other life Into life. Yeah, go ahead.

TJ Kostecky:

So this is how we do it. When we gather information on the pitch, what are we doing? We're learning, right Learning.

Justin Van Til:

We're learning right.

TJ Kostecky:

Learning. We're learning so in life. This is how the five Ps works. Again, the five are perceive, process, plan, perform, persist. By perception, this is what I mean. I mean judge less, accept more. Why, since the origin of man and woman, right, fight or flight, we're constantly judging for our own safety. If we didn't, we wouldn't be here, we'd be extinct. Is that fair right? If we didn't, we wouldn't be here, We'd be extinct. Is that fair Right? Absolutely so. The challenge is is, too often when we meet someone, we put them in a box, justin, exactly, we put blinders on right and we have these preconceived notions. So, eyes up. And the five P's is take away the blinders, lean in, look, listen and learn. When I'm doing that, I realize that every human being is a tapestry of beauty and every human being has something I could learn. And I'm doing that. I'm gathering information right, and when I'm gathering information, I'm moving forward in life. That's how we apply the five Ps on the pitch into life.

Justin Van Til:

You're a massively humble person. I'd like you to put more of a chip on the shoulder on this one, okay. Is vision training in soccer football? Vision training in life? Would you characterize it as evolutionary or revolutionary? You understand the question. One more time, please. Vision training football and vision training life Is it evolutionary? It's an incremental right, sokka, you can get a little bit better. You don't have to change what you're doing. You can get better and you'll have better outcomes. Vision training life is it? I'm a better person or am I fundamentally different? So I mean for my person, I have an opinion on this and this is about you, not about me, so I'm not going to share my opinion on this. But do you think vision training it's just decades, impacted tens of thousands, millions, potentially someday right? Is it evolutionary or revolutionary?

TJ Kostecky:

Evolutionary. Vision training is evolution. Vision training is transferable to other sports. Why was Tom Brady in his 40s winning a Super Bowl and football? Because he was the fastest, the strongest? No, because he was making the most informed decisions. Why was he making the most informed decisions? His ability to collect data quickly and make that most informed decision. Data quickly and make that most informed decision. Why was Larry Bird who didn't play too far from here because we're in Portland Maine right In Boston? Why was he a great player? He was a great shooter, a great defender, he was an extraordinary passer. Why? Because he was constantly gathering real-time information. Right, that's the differential. The differential is gathering that real-time information and being. That's the differential. The differential is gathering that real-time information and being at your highest and at your best. That's the evolution. Taking this vision, training soccer and applying it to every player on your pitch, everyone on your pitch. So the evolution is that piece, okay.

Justin Van Til:

I believe it's revolutionary in life. I'll give you my opinion now. I think it's evolutionary From what I've learned in listening to you. I think it's absolutely evolutionary in soccer. I think in life it is revolutionary because it fundamentally changes who you are and how you impact people. So I'm just going to give you that's my opinion.

TJ Kostecky:

So then, If I could pause. I believe it now. My book has only been out for less than a year and the feedback from readers that I've gotten across the country has been extraordinarily humbling. The country has been extraordinarily humbling that they're applying these and they're looking and they're having conversations with family members, with their bosses, with their colleagues, that are completely different, that are enriching their lives. So I believe the same.

Justin Van Til:

So a doctor is trying to keep you more healthy and they get the MD next to their name. The person that manages your money and your retirement plan often has like a CFA next to their name chartered financial analyst. The coach or the club that embraces this and helps the kids should have a designation like VT vision trained. So I guess to that. Is there a certification where I, as a coach, or someday, if I am a coach? I'm not a coach today, but I wanted to present myself as being certified by this process or this way of thinking. Is that something? Is it a brand? I guess is the question.

TJ Kostecky:

Yes, yes, yes it is. So I have two ways we have we certify clubs. In the book you read about a club in Oregon, portland, oregon the incredible story about Karen Wright and the work she's doing in Carlton, oregon, for the Yamhill Valley Soccer Club. So the coaches in her club are certified in vision training. I've been out there and I've done the level two coaching course on vision training, which is a classroom and on the pitch. So that's a vision training certified club. Oregon U Soccer for the Oregon U Soccer. I've done a vision training coaching course for coaches in Oregon that attended state coaches from all over Oregon and that was the first state association that I certified the coaches in vision training. Okay, we also have an online course that, if you go to our website seeingthefieldcom is our website you could go right now and take an online course that'll give you the low-hanging fruit I called of vision training, so how you could implement all these simple exercises and add them to what you're doing right now and to enhance the performance. So that's one way of doing it. We also host coaching courses. My business partner, len, has a soccer field in his farm, so we've done courses at his farm and a soccer field, in eastern Pennsylvania, in Hellertown, pennsylvania. We also travel. Like I said, I travel around the world.

Justin Van Til:

Where's your next one? You told me Is it Senegal, africa, africa.

TJ Kostecky:

It's very, very likely. It looks like in June our plans are to go to Africa and introduce vision training. Can you imagine?

Justin Van Til:

how cool that's going to be in Senegal. Let's spend a second, go back to understand your background, which will bring us to Senegal actually.

TJ Kostecky:

So TJ is a kid in Brooklyn where you grew up New Jersey, new Jersey, yeah, yeah, oh that's right.

Justin Van Til:

You grew up in New Jersey as you were building out and you were a player right and you played some other sports. What sports did you play?

TJ Kostecky:

I grew up. In high school I played soccer, basketball and track, and in college I played soccer and volleyball as well.

Justin Van Til:

Okay, and then as you went through and you met your partner Len it's a great story in the book and you realize that this was vision. Training becomes really your life that you build around. So as a coach and an athletic director, I guess at one point how much of the success of your on the field and then the gratitude or the pride you have in your players that become contributors to society right, they get jobs, they have families and kids how much do you attribute that to the vision training concept?

TJ Kostecky:

much do you attribute that to the vision training concept. Well, I, I'm trying to be better every day, justin. I'm, I'm, when I, when I connect with people, I'm trying to learn and discover how I can be the best version of myself, and my belief is that having conversations with players and having them be introspective and be present is a rich part of their journey. We are very much either looking at the future or the past in our lives and with the advent of Steve Jobs' iPhone, he has changed the way we communicate and our eyes are down all the time. Our eyes are down. So when your eyes are up and right now our eyes are up and the readers and the listeners to my book and the listeners to your podcast right now that are really plugged in. When your eyes are up and your heart is open, you discover the richness of the moment, of being present, and when you're present for someone, you give them your time. So, as a coach, when you're present for your players, they understand that and they feel that and they will do extraordinary things for you. When you're present, when you're present for your children and you're there for them and you're listening to them, just like last night, the dinner we had with your daughter Finley, and we listened to her, we empowered her, we allowed her to speak, to share. There's no limit to what we could do to help each other and help ourselves.

Justin Van Til:

We need to be present, we need to have courage.

TJ Kostecky:

Yes.

Justin Van Til:

One of the go back to your roots Ukrainian family. It's my pin right here right Pin of Ukraine.

TJ Kostecky:

I don't know if you could see that, if it's on camera or not, but that's my heritage, yeah.

Justin Van Til:

But, as you shared, last night, you wore the sweatshirt as you were inducted in the Ukrainian Sports Hall of Fame a few years ago, along with some names that I couldn't even like Mike Ditka and Wayne Gretzky, and you probably could name some other you know, great company, tj, and a great honor to be part of Ukrainian health. Thank you, but on courage. You told a story of being with basically the head of soccer within the country, and so the reason I'm asking this question is there's being present, because you know getting that person's time is hard, because, you look, you mentioned iPhone no one has time. We need to be present. It's hard, it's hard for everybody. It also takes courage to lean into that to get people to be present. So take us through that story when you were with the Ukrainian head of football, where from my recollection he didn't know time for you wasn't going to be present, and it took a lot of courage. And this book has so many stories where you it's not even leaning in, you're jumping in, you're in, and that creates a lot of the synchronicity that we're going to talk about at the end of this podcast, I hope. But tell that story about the Ukrainian head football coach in the context of courage.

TJ Kostecky:

Sure. Well, this story didn't get in the book and quite a few friends and colleagues said you should have put this in the book. I said well, you know, maybe it's in the second book but not in this one. So I was in Ukraine during the Maidan and, as the first time was ever in Ukraine, this is when, when there was all those, 94 civilians were killed by the ruler, the president, the puppet president of Ukraine. So I ended up in Ukraine three weeks afterwards and my contact that brought me there. His father-in-law was the vice president of the Ukrainian Olympic Committee and I was going there to do recruiting and not to do a vision training course. I was going there recruiting through my contact. When I found out that his father-in-law was the vice president of the committee, I said can you get me to talk to the president of the Ukrainian Football Federation, because I have something that would be very beneficial. And he was able to do that. So we had a 30-minute meeting. I arrived in Kiev in the evening and the very next morning jet lagged at 8 am. We meet with the President of the Ukrainian Football Federation so that the listeners understand in Ukraine it is football, soccer and nothing else. It would be like the NFL in America and no soccer, baseball, football, basketball. That's how there's a gap. So I met with, basically, the commissioner of sport. He was not happy to see me because he was doing a favor for his friend. He had a half hour. His office was five times as big as his office. I find out he was an oligarch and a billionaire on top of that. So we come in and his Ukrainian was not very good. It was rucified because at that time and his Ukrainian was not very good, it was russified because at that time Stalin back in the 40s tried to russify Ukraine, which is what's happening right now. And my colleague was kind of translating a little bit. So I mentioned to him about vision training. And he says to him and to me we do this already. And I said no, you don't. And he said what I said no, you don't. And he said what I said no, you don't. And this guy's not used to people saying no to him, by the way. And he goes what do you mean? I said do you have a ball? And he had an autographed soccer ball of the Euro Cup Ukrainian national team and I said to him do you have another ball? He goes use the ball. I said I don't want to dirty the ball. He yells at me use the ball. I go okay, use the ball, I'll dirty the ball. It's here, I'm sure you can get another one. So we put the ball down and my liaison. I didn't realize he was a soccer player. So I show him the three S's shield, scan and spin, which is the foundation of vision training, which is what Iniesta, messi, cruyff, xavi do, right Head on a swivel, which is the foundation that when you learn that there's no limit to what you can achieve keeping the ball. So in the office he's shielding, scanning, spinning away and I can't catch him. It's as if we've been working for a month on stage for this. Then I take the ball and I start hitting the ball against the wall and his trophies are rattling. And as the ball comes off the wall, what am I doing with my eyes, justin? Where am I looking? I'm looking behind me. I'm training my eyes. Well, he cancels all these meetings. I'm in this office for three and a half hours. He calls up after lunch. Zirka Football Club, which is essentially like the Revolution or the Red Bull Academy in Ukraine, says tomorrow morning I'm going to have an American coach who's going to license all of you in vision training. Make sure you're there. And the next morning I licensed the Zirka Football Club in vision training.

Justin Van Til:

How did that make you feel? like I was making a difference, like I was making a difference in their game and making a difference in their life the butterfly effect has been a discussion in every single podcast where something flapped its wings a long time ago that had a ripple effect that gets you to there. If you can reflect for a minute, sitting in front of a billionaire, changing his perception and then changing the lives of a soccer federation, how they coach, that's a moment to not pat yourself on the back but just reflect. Who flapped their wings? To give you the courage to create something, to then have the courage to say to an oligarch no, you don't. That takes a lot of courage. Why did you do it? Who ultimately impacted you? Reflect back on what got you to that place, because that's a defining moment to me when I listen to that. Sometimes it's a defining moment. It's good to stop and say what the hell did they do? Who impacted this?

TJ Kostecky:

It was my grandfather when I was 12 years old, my grandfather, who was Ukrainian, who survived the Holodomir Stalin's Holodomir starvation. He sat me down in New York, in Queens, in his apartment and he looks at me and says someday you're going to be the president. And I laughed. And then he leaned in a little bit closer and he said no, someday you're going to be the president. And, justin, I didn't laugh. The second time, man, I got it. He saw something in me, whatever it was at 12 years old, a little bit more than I saw in myself. And that part of that journey I talk about it in Eyes Up in the leadership workshops I do for students, for high school students, for college students, in the corporate world, for amateur teams, about the power of belief in the corporate world, for amateur teams. About the power of belief when you believe in someone and say I see you can do that, that you can accomplish it, I believe in you is a transformational statement. So that courage came from my grandfather saying I believe in you. And everyone that's listening to this podcast and your daughter was such a great example last night was such a joy. Hearing her story at 17 years old is that we all have the confidence within ourselves, and when you have something to offer, that is good. I believe we have a responsibility to share it Everyone, no matter how old you are.

Justin Van Til:

My two daughters, kate and Caroline they're younger than me, they mentor me, they are my mentors and they're less than half my age that element of service as a responsibility is something that your daughters, I think they've lived it with you and that is that ripple effect into their lives. Any advice for the parent that has the young boy and girl that wants to be the next Marta or messy, the and the advice um, and which I asked this is um a lot of our other podcasts, when we're asking it so much of this world is a. It's either a push or a pull, and we know the pulls end up being successful because no one wants to be forced anything. So I guess part of the advice would be for parents helping the youth today, where there's limited time, so many distractions, how do we help them? What advice do you have for them? Ask questions.

TJ Kostecky:

How did you feel? Do you enjoy playing after a game? I talk about an eyes up, about my daughter Caroline. Caroline was a college player and she was a very good high school player and a very good club player. On the women's side it's arguably the best women's club, or one of the best in the country. They've put out. Carly Lloyd was a PDA player, right, and many, many others, tobin Heath and so on and so forth. And after the soccer games, when I would go to the games by the way, nobody knew that I was a coach I would wear maybe something like this I was in the background, I just listened and watched and I applauded and cheered at the right moments. I never gave information, I never gave instruction as a parent, ever whatsoever. I was never going to be trying to be the micromanaging my daughter's journey because it's her journey. And after the car ride, when we would go after the game, the car ride home, we would just sit there and I'd let her talk. I wouldn't grill her, I wouldn't tell her what she was doing, right or wrong, and I'd ask her how she felt, you know, and we'd talk about the game and how she felt she did. How'd you play, regardless of the result. I never ask players if they won or they lost, ever. I always ask how did you play? And you know what? Everybody always tells you that they won or they lost. And my comment back I always do this and I taught sports, psych, philosophy, coaching at LIU as well, besides coaching for 20 years, and I coach future coaches. In my class were three future Olympic medalists. One of them won the gold medal for Canada this past year, was a student in my class and we would talk about how did it feel? How did you play? And now you start thinking, well, I could have done better, or I did well, but the other team was better. Or I didn't do as well, I could have played better this at the other team, but we were stronger. We did get a result. So it's about your performance, the things we can and can't control. We can't control results. We could always control our attitude and we could always control our effort. We know that. That's a logical thing. So for parents listening to this, allow your child to have the space, support your child. If your child has questions, be there to support them and answer them. But you are a parent first and foremost. You're there to guide them, to support them, to be there for them. Right, you're not their coach, their manager. You're not their agent.

Justin Van Til:

Well, let's continue on this path of parents for a second, because parents on the sidelines like to yell at the referees. And there's you know, sometimes rarely a time and a place, but for the most part, think about quiet on the pitch, the flow and the beauty of a quiet pitch. Yes, yes. As a coach, with overbearing parents, maybe yelling at referees or yelling at their child. Having decades of experience, how do you handle? Well, I guess you have a good example of how you handled a parent. And then what advice to that would you have to parents today that get frustrated and are just yelling on the sidelines at everybody sometimes? Not many, but there are too many. Let's just say that.

TJ Kostecky:

When you yell at someone and you're criticizing someone, you're never going to get the outcome you want. You're never going to get the outcome you want. Referees are human beings.

Justin Van Til:

Such an important part of this podcast is. I would like a better connected experience between parents. Coaches, players and referees are part of the journey and I think that's one of the questions that parent-referee parent-coach dynamic on balance is relatively unhealthy in my opinion, or can be improved. Make the game more beautiful. That's why we do this. What would you recommend?

TJ Kostecky:

Well, a couple of things. One think about yourself. Let's take a video camera and film you behaving yelling at a referee, yelling at a young kid and let's take a look at that and pause for a second and let's show that to every friend, every relative, everyone. That's not the image you want to be modeling and portraying for your kids ever, ever, ever. That's the the image you want to be modeling and portraying for your kids ever, ever, ever. That's the last thing you want to be doing.

Justin Van Til:

Where's the breakdown in the five Ps on that?

TJ Kostecky:

The first perception Exactly Wide open, deep and bright. Exactly that's where the five Ps is. I'll give you a story. When I coached at Pfeiffer, north Carolina, and I went up to Appalachian State my first year at Appalachian State Division, I coach my first year and I was very fortunate I had a really great player that came in and scored 11 game-winning goals a freshman for me, and he made me look really good because he was a tremendous finisher Jordy Broder. Well, that year we went down to Winthrop, which was a top Division I team, and I showed up on the field. We were on the mountain in North Carolina and I'd been out of that region Before the game started. The head referee comes up to me and goes TJ, it's great to see you, we miss you. This is the referee telling me a coach that we miss you. Wow, and I said it's great to be back, bill. The game went on and the other coach was harping on him all the time, every call, criticizing him. I was not. There was an offsides in overtime. Nil-nil Appeal look to offsides. The linesman raised his flag that we were offsides. Appeal look to offsides. The linesman raises flag that we were offsides. Goal was scored. The referee overrules in front of 2,000 people and calls it a winning goal and we win. And he comes up to midfield to the score and says the player was onside position when the shot was taken. People in the stands went nuts, the coach went nuts. People in the stands went nuts, the coach went nuts. I told my players afterwards if I was berating that referee, if I behaved the same way that other coach, if I was berating a transactional coach when I coached at Pfeiffer, we never get that call. We never get that call because referees are human. Treat them with respect and with dignity, like you would treat every human being that's involved with you. That's the takeaway. It's about integrity. Integrity is striving to do the right thing. Your children see you yelling at a referee. Do you want your child to see you like that? You want your child to be the ones going to be yelling when they're adults, to be embarrassed? Absolutely not. Think about that and pause. This is where the five Ps come in. This is where being perceptive and intentional and present comes in, and everyone that's listening knows what I'm talking about, because you've seen that yourself and how uncomfortable that is. Just strive to do the right thing. Strive to do the best thing.

Justin Van Til:

I believe and I'll remind the details in the story it was the last year at LIU and in the championship there was a call made where you would have won the championship and someone came over to you and said the referee made a mistake and you had an opportunity to call the referee out and you didn't in a sign of humility. It was in the book.

TJ Kostecky:

Oh my gosh, I got to remember.

Justin Van Til:

You got to remind me on this one, trying to think of what situation it was the season, if I recall, you had won and you would have gone on to the championship and the referee made a terrible mistake. Oh, and somebody after you said something. I just remember my recollection.

TJ Kostecky:

This book is incredible, and there's so much in there to remember.

Justin Van Til:

But one part was I remember being you as a coach or trying to put myself in your shoes and how frustrated I would have been. And you know you look at the reflection when you watch a Premier League match and you see the certain people that act with dignity and grace and those that do not, and you acted with dignity, and I think it's a beacon of hope for others to follow. Do you remember?

TJ Kostecky:

That story's not in the book. That's a story that we talked about. That. This is a conversation you and I had. I don't believe that story's in the book. So you're talking about the four overtime game when the referee blew the call. I think that's the one you're talking about, aren't you? Yeah, that didn't make the book. That was a conversation we had. You have a great memory. That didn't make the book. That was a conversation we had. You have a great memory. So it was the finals. It was the finals when I was at LIU, brooklyn, my early years, where we were the better team, we were the dominant team, we were a man up and a referee missed an obvious call, a foul outside the box that we would have had a free kick. The ball was stolen, they countered penalty, they scored and we lost. We lost four overtime games the last time the NCAA went into double overtimes. That was, at that time, the longest game that year in college soccer. We lost and what had happened is the referee's wife was expecting a baby and, instead of coming the night before, he drove early in the morning and he was exhausted. He was so tired and he apologized to me that he made the wrong call and I couldn't be livid. How am I going to be angry when a person makes an error as a human being? It cost us a championship. We got in the NCAA tournament, but again, everything we're doing here is about it's a level of grace.

Justin Van Til:

It's grace.

TJ Kostecky:

What's more important. More important is treating people the right way and striving to do the right thing and that's what happened, and he admitted his mistake the right way and striving to do the right thing and that's what happened and he admitted his mistake.

Justin Van Til:

So I think there's a lot for parents to learn, a lot for players to learn. I want to spend a moment on the larger club and us soccer broadly yeah sure, okay. Um, there are mentor programs, there's curriculum everywhere. It's largely a pay-to-play model and so forth. I'd be remiss not to ask about the economics of all of this. So soccer US soccer is a multi-tens of billions of dollar industry. Um, vision training is um not core to the us soccer curriculum. It could be incremental. It could be incremental to all of the clubs, and there's thousands of clubs in pay-to-play. Um, some may say how do I make money with vision training? My sense in meeting you is this is not. There's. No, this is not for you. Economic. I mean, we have a living, we need to all pay bills. There's a far bigger purpose. But if there are those listening that say I want to, I want this, but I want to make money on this thing, do you, how do you handle kind of that? Do clubs not embrace vision training? Because they struggle, they don't know how to make money with it? Is that a fair question?

TJ Kostecky:

Not enough people know about it. It's not that they don't embrace it because of the money part. I don't have a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign on vision training. I'm not on TV or on the Internet to promote it. If I did, and it was 30% of what it is, people would be buying it and be doing it because of advertising. No, that's not the case. So, in terms of how to monetize it, you apply things that are good in anything that you do, right, whether it's your pitches, your curriculum, your training for coaches, the competition, the environment, the support, the mental health, the strength and conditioning. These are all different elements that clubs and coaches resources that they have. Vision training is another resource. It's a very powerful resource, is what it is. It's a way to enhance what you do. You don't throw away the. I think earlier I said it's not about throwing away your drills. That you're doing.

Justin Van Til:

The water, I think the baby in the water. I think that was a great example. Yes, can you remind me of that one? That was a good one.

TJ Kostecky:

This is something we talked about earlier this morning. So think about a baby in a bathtub and the dirty water is. Think about a spring where the water keeps on coming through like a spring and fresh water comes in all the time. So the baby's in there, but always with fresh water. That's what vision training is. Vision training enhances everything that you do. So what coaches are doing right now and parents are doing right now, it brings massive value.

Justin Van Til:

When you bring massive value's the economics that was driving question on the economics of it. The economics of it by doing good, right, yeah, um, and I think you know a lot of people that listen and frustrate, are frustrated with pay-to-play model and the lack of accessibility for some, and some get better and don't. And you know, is there something that's beautiful about the game that by just incorporating it, it will be by doing the right thing there's an economic benefit. It's not a ploy, it's not a brand to say, oh, I do vision training because I want to make money, I do vision training, I embrace it because I care and we do good by that. That was kind of the nature of the question.

TJ Kostecky:

I mentioned the 10 to 20% right and I gave you some ideas to listeners what to do with their kids. Obviously, it's much greater in terms of our curriculum that parents In the book. I talk a little bit deeper about some of the exercises in the book. I'll give you an example about the 10 to 20%. I got a video three years ago from a player from California I was recruiting. He was a striker scoring goals all over the place and we zoomed and I said really love how you play and how you score on these goals. He says well, you were in California at the ID clinic talking about vision training and I was in your group. I go. What are you talking about? He goes. Remember in California a year ago in the sun it was so hot we sat in the tree under the shade in the trees and you were telling us to take five. This is a youth player, he goes. I applied all these ideas that you were talking about and I scored seven goals in four games in the Las Vegas classic. My mom is from Guam. I'm now on the Guam U18 national team. The following year he was on the full national team by applying what I shared with him under a tree with his team. That's the power of vision training. Could you imagine if every coach and player in our country was doing this? How good would we be as a nation? How good would we be as a nation if a player that I just spoke to about these concepts applied it and his game got, he told me, more than 30% better. More than 30% better.

Justin Van Til:

Your favorite football team in the world and your idol.

TJ Kostecky:

Oh my gosh, my idol Zidane.

Justin Van Til:

My favorite player in the world too, we need to talk about synchronicity. This is scary now, seriously, I can't so. I have a picture of Zidane upstairs In our sunroom. Okay, zidane.

TJ Kostecky:

The game he played Before he got sent off Against Italy, against.

Justin Van Til:

Brazil.

TJ Kostecky:

Yep, when he scored two goals. If you watch that game again, he was in a Completely different flow From every player on the pitch In that World Cup semifinal. He was above everyone. His decisions were exquisite. Every decision he made, everyone was the right decision. He was in a completely different flow state.

Justin Van Til:

Was that your favorite team of all time as well?

TJ Kostecky:

that year they were phenomenal. That year they were phenomenal Phenomenal. They were extraordinary.

Justin Van Til:

So for young kids that want to watch football, is there a team or a coach or an organization that you say they're doing it right?

TJ Kostecky:

I think it's yeah, good questions again. I think it's style of play. You know who's innovative, who's problem solving, which teams are creative, because those are the skills that we want to also have in life. Right, how we transfer those same skills into life. To me, those are the teams that I like to watch. I like to watch Dutch football, the Johan Cruyff Johan Cruyff who was impacting Barcelona, who's impacting Pep Guardiola, who's impacting man City. So those type of coaches and those type of teams, the way they play right now. You know, not everyone's an MLS fan, but the LA Galaxy are playing that kind of football. So the coach of the LA Galaxy and today is actually the final right, no, tomorrow, Tomorrow's Saturday, Tomorrow's the final game. So whenever this is going to be shown, they're the one team in the league. There's others that are players, are changing positions, they're independently figuring out the spaces on the field where it's really difficult to defend them. So look at teams that are organic and they're moving and they're problem solving. Those teams are the ones that have players that are constantly gathering real-time information. You want to be that player. You want to be that problem solver, that difference maker.

Justin Van Til:

On the other side of our studio here is a big flat screen television, you saw, and it's like where we watch football quite a bit. And about years ago we had some parents of players of my daughter and we're just watching a game. Don't remember the game, but I remember a comment was made because everyone was looking at the ball, like watching the ball, okay, and a gentleman asks me when you watch the game, where are you looking? And I made the comment five years. I typically am not looking at the soccer ball when I'm watching a soccer game. That's just for me. The ball is in the peripheral side and I'm watching everything else. Okay, I don't know if most people do that, but that's just how I do it when you watch a soccer game what are you looking at?

TJ Kostecky:

I'm always looking at players off the ball. I'm never looking at the ball, or rarely. I'm rarely looking at the ball. I'm looking at players off the ball. What players are scanning the peaks they're taking their looks they're taking, what are the decisions they're making based on the looks they're taking, and also players that are looking late or not looking at all and they miss the golden opportunities to do something effective and impactful. That's what I'm looking for.

Justin Van Til:

Have you, as a coach, taken a player off the pitch because they're just way too tunnel vision. Do they notice it? Or would you never play a player that doesn't scan?

TJ Kostecky:

Well, they would know how to scan, because I wouldn't put them on the field Exactly, so it's an if-then yeah. It would be like throwing somebody in the deep end without teaching them how to swim. It's that big a difference. It's the complete, it's total difference.

Justin Van Til:

And it's hard for people listening to say wait, how is it Football's football? How?

TJ Kostecky:

different, could it be Okay? How different, could it be Okay? Well, let's stop for a second. What do you do before you cross the street? Look both ways. Oh, you don't say can I cross the street now? Hey, that's so funny. That's a great example, what happens if you don't look when you cross the street? Right, you never do that. So when you're in a soccer pitch, every time you step, the metaphor is you're crossing the street because there's traffic. There are 21 players on the pitch. What are they doing? Are they standing still, justin, or are they moving? They're moving, they're moving. So if they're moving, I have to be doing what? Gathering what Information? And gathering real-time information. If I'm not gathering information, then I'm walking in traffic. So if you have the ball and I'm yelling to you what to do, what am I not doing that I should be doing? What should I be doing? Looking, looking, why, so I know what to do when the ball comes, I know where to go without the ball. That's the model. The difference is our country is over-structured. Football, basketball, baseball those primary sports are all coach-centric, overly structured. Soccer is not a coach-centric sport. When you train it to be overly structured and patterns, you eliminate the creativity, the problem-solving. You eliminate the creativity, the problem solving. When you empower players to see and to ask them questions that are open-ended questions, they find the solutions. It's like a job. When you hire someone, you don't hire someone just to do one skill set, they would disappear. In that job you hire someone who could problem solve and do many things, and that's what the game on the pitch is like. It's problem solving. So think about how you're coaching as a coach, that's, listening as a player. Are you problem solving or you're giving structured information? If you're giving structured information, if you're just doing skill work, drills, without problem solving, your brain is not firing at the same rate. So you're doing technical skills. Make sure all your technical skills add some kind of vision. As you're dribbling around, don't dribble around cones, don't dribble through cones. Dribble with your eyes up, take peeks. When you're dribbling, that habit forms. And you're working on the technical. When you're passing pass, work on some technique and make sure you're then scanning. So you're applying the technical and the looking. When you're finishing on goal, before you shoot, take a peek. Maybe you look up, maybe you look in the corner of your eye, know where you're shooting, all of it. When you're defending head on a swivel, my back line, step up, drop Right, pick this player up. So everything is predicated on vision. Speed of light, speed of sound which is faster? Speed of light how fast? Speed of light is 186,000 miles a second. Speed of sound is only a thousand feet a second. So if I'm telling you man on or turn, it's too slow. If you're scanning, you've already seen it. You don't need me to tell you what to do. That's the differential. Nobody tells Messi man on or turn. Nobody tells De Bruyne to do that. If they did, you'd never hear them. You'd never know who they are, because they would be ordinary players. Be extraordinary. Never know who they are because they would be ordinary players. Be extraordinary. Develop the capacity to scan like a kreuf, like a pulisic. You develop those qualities like a carly lloyd, like a julie fowdy who's a big time player. You develop those. There is no limit to what you can do, and it's truth. Okay.

Justin Van Til:

So as this episode comes to an unfortunate, almost ending point because we could go for days and I'd love for you to come back sometime I want to think about on the pitch here and what we've talked about in life where do you see it, where do you want to see it and where do you see this conversation in? Do you want to see it? And where do you see this conversation in five years and ten years in the future and the impact that's been made? And then I want to ask you about your legacy, but first I want to ask about the impact of this in the future.

TJ Kostecky:

My hope is, in the short term, that everyone that listens to this podcast, that has gained something valuable to help improve their lives. Number one. Number two if they decide to get the book or listen to the audio book because the audio book is also in my voice that they apply these ideas and they have some structured ideas and a framework to live the best version of themselves in their life. And on the pitch, in terms of what I see, is that a question in the future.

Justin Van Til:

Yeah, what do you see?

TJ Kostecky:

What I see is that in 30 years I'm not going to be around anymore, but everyone will be doing some version of vision training on the pitch. In soccer. You cannot stop innovation. It's like the cell phone. We no longer go to phones that are connected to a wall. When something makes sense and it's tested and it works, people will do it. In 30 years, everyone will be doing some version of the fresh water going through the bathtub with the baby, and our game will just continue to elevate and elevate. That's my expectation and that's what I see.

Justin Van Til:

My hope after reading it and the impact you've had on me. I'm going back to college days when I remember Intel was the chip and you had the computer. If it Intel and it was Intel inside, that was kind of the branding going back to how many years, decades that was Okay. The modern day it's about the NVIDIA chip. It powers AI, it powers everything, it powers the phone. So that's why NVIDIA is probably going to be the largest value company in the world someday. Nvidia, okay. So the NVIDIA chip. So you have Intel inside of an NVIDIA chip. And then vision training inside. Vision training to me isn't personally a brand, it's just that DNA. It's what drives you. If it is training inside, that is the benefit and I hope that in the future people don't even think about it. It's vision training. I'm vision trained. I'm an MD. No, this is just who I am and I hope that that is when I asked the question. I was thinking selfishly for the younger players and coaches and clubs that I've tried to have been a part of. If I had known about this, it would have been core. I remember like U7, whatever, not even U7. They're seven, not even you nine. You're like what number am I holding up Right as they're juggling or dribbling those early days of vision training. But I didn't have the process around it, it was just play the right way.

TJ Kostecky:

Yes.

Justin Van Til:

Okay. So my question kind of to legacy of your soul, of why you built it and I actually to me, and it was so nice spending time with my daughter and you think about your daughters as they think about TJ Kostecki and building vision training when you're not here. Hopefully it's more than 30 years. We'll give you 50 more years, tj. We'll have to move to the Mediterranean for that. You'll be one of those centenarians. But we don't need to do the math. But for your soul and deep down building this when you're remembered for your contribution to the sport and to life, set aside the word eyes up in the book and vision training, the process. What's the impact? That's most important to you.

TJ Kostecky:

The impact that's most important is that each of us is important and that everyone that you meet is important. And when we have that mindset, justin, that every human we meet is important, we connect and we lift each other up and we find the best in each other, and when we do that, there's no limit to what we can do and there's no limit to what we can achieve together.

Justin Van Til:

Powering. That is the legacy then. Powering that importance ingrained in people and recognizing and perceiving. That is what I heard. Yes, so I am grateful to you for your time, for your contribution to footy, for my soul, for what you've done in your career and you will continue to do and impact people. So I just want to thank you very much.

TJ Kostecky:

Thank you for inviting me this morning to be with you. It's a gift and a pleasure and tomorrow morning when I wake up you're going to be number one on my grateful list, my friend. Thanks, sir, it's a pleasure. Tj Appreciate

People on this episode

Head Shot

Justin Van Til

Host
Head Shot

TJ Kostecky

Guest