#218 Johan Cruyff (A Life of Total Football)

**David Senra** (0:00)
I want to tell you about a one-time only limited event that I don't think you're going to want to miss. I am doing a live show with Patrick O'Shaughnessy from the Invest Like the Best podcast in New York City on October 19th. Patrick has interviewed over 300 of the world's best investors and founders for his podcast. I've read over 300 biographies of history's greatest entrepreneurs for my podcast. We'll be talking about what we learned from seven years of podcasting, sharing our favorite ideas and stories, and doing a live Q&A. There will also be special event-only swag. If you live in New York City, I think it's a no-brainer. But if not, I think it's a great excuse to fly in. I've already heard from a bunch of people that bought tickets, they're flying in from other cities. Some people are flying in from other countries. That's setting the bar really high, so I will have at least four shots of espresso or four energy drinks before or during the show so we can make it a night that you'll never forget. If you're interested in attending this unique live event, I will leave a link down below. I highly recommend you get your tickets today, and I hope I get to see you in New York on October 19th. I'm not a person with college degrees.
Everything I've learned, I've learned through experience.
After I lost my father at the age of 12, my life was defined by IACS.
First, by my second father, who was the club's groundsman, and later by my trainers.
Thanks to IACS, I didn't just learn to be a better footballer. I learned how to behave.
Through my father-in-law, I gained financial experience. When I started out, no footballer in the world had ever heard of marketing, and dealing with business was something completely new.
But someone came into my life who would help me with that and bring me up.
Because every time I thought I could do it on my own, things immediately went wrong. It doesn't matter. It's part of life. In the end, it's more important whether you learn from it or not.
I want to stress how important my family is. Not just my parents, my in-laws, wife, children, and grandchildren, but also all the people who took me by the hand at IACS in a phase of my life when I was very fragile.
Family has defined who I am now.
Someone who has one shortcoming when it comes to football.
I can only think about being at the top.
As a player or a coach, I am not capable of doing something at a low level.
I can only think in one direction, upwards, to be the best possible. That's why in the end, I had to stop. I was no longer in a physical condition to do what needed to be done at the top.
And once that's the case, you have no business being on the pitch.
But because I was in a good mental state, I became a coach.
Above all, I want to say that my life has always been lived with a view of doing things better and getting better. I've translated that into everything I've done.
Those words were written by Johan Cruyff the month he died of lung cancer at the age of 68 And that's an excerpt from the book that I'm going to talk to you about today, which is My Turn, A Life of Total Football. It's the autobiography of Johan Cruyff. And this is another example of a book that I would have never found on my own. One of the benefits of doing this podcast is that people send me, I've probably received hundreds of fantastic biography and autobiography recommendations. And so this was sent to me by a listener named Nicholas. I want to read part of the message he sent me because I think it's a great introduction of why this autobiography fits into everything else that we talk about.
So he says, I know you're always looking for inspiring biographies. Perhaps you'll find Johan Cruyff interesting. He had changed the game of football as a player in the 1970s and continued to do so as a coach after his career. When reading his biography, you'll quickly realize that he's a misfit. That definitely jumped out at me. Here are a few quotes from the last two pages of his book. What was interesting is I just went to pull up this message right before I sat down and talked to you and actually underlined what he's about to point out to us here. This comes at the very end of the book. It's actually from the last few pages of the book.