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073 - Purpose After Sports
108 Plays1 month ago
"Sports don't teach lessons—coaches do."
Captains & Coaches Founder Tex McQuilkin recently joined Mikki O'Neil on the Purpose After Sports Podcast to reflect on his journey from captain to coach. In this compelling conversation, Tex shares his superhero origin story—how rejection from high school football coaches accidentally sparked a movement when he and nine teammates started a lacrosse team in football-obsessed Katy, Texas.
From breaking his leg eight days before his first college game to accidentally injuring an athlete as a novice coach, Tex reveals every pivotal moment that shaped his transformational approach to leadership development. Now a global presenter who's trained tip of the spear operators and coached across 16 countries, Tex continues empowering athletes and coaches to lead with authenticity, purpose, and connection over perfection.
Training - Old Bull Program - 7 Day Free Trial - https://bit.ly/old-bull-train
Education - Why They're Not Listening: Coaching the Modern Athlete - http://listen.captainsandcoaches.com
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast and Hosts
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to the Captains and Coaches podcast where we explore the art and science of leadership through the lens of athletics and beyond. I'm your host Tex McQuilkin and today we have a special episode where I am co-releasing an interview I did with Mickey O'Neil on her podcast Purpose After Sports. Mickey did an amazing job with the interview and I got to tell some fun stories from my athletic career, start of my coaching career, and then the the start of captains and coaches.
00:00:27
Speaker
So glad to share this episode with you. Go ahead and give Purpose After Sports a follow on Instagram and Spotify. Mickey does an amazing job with all of her interviews.
00:00:38
Speaker
without further ado, let's hand it off to Mickey who helps us raise the game. Ready, ready, and ready.
Tex's Athletic and Coaching Journey
00:01:05
Speaker
Welcome to Purpose After Sports, where we interview athletes to share their post-sport journeys and explore how they are reinventing what it means to compete. Today, i am here with Tex McQuilkin. He is a former lacrosse, college lacrosse player, and now he is a strength and conditioning coach, an educator, and a global presenter.
00:01:24
Speaker
He's trained everyone from youth athletes, even Navy SEALs, and he's taught in 16 different countries. He has now built a career around helping coaches and athletes reach their potential.
00:01:35
Speaker
We'll dive into his journey, the lessons he's learned through sport, and then how to build purpose and structure long after your sports career ends. Tex, thank you for being on today. Excited to be here. Thank you for having me.
00:01:48
Speaker
And shout out Chad Hobbs for connecting us. Yeah, I love that. Shout out to Chad. ah What a good man. um ah Yeah, so he definitely reached out to me to let me know that Tex was such a great person and a good person to have on our podcast. So without further ado, let's get into a little bit of your story, Tex. Talk to me about lacrosse and how you got into the sports and choosing that university and what it's helped you with.
00:02:17
Speaker
Yeah, i I love to feel that lacrosse found me, and I was very fortunate. So I grew up west of Houston in a town called Katy, Texas, where we're football is life. If you've seen the movie Friday Night Lights, it was very representative how I grew up.
00:02:32
Speaker
If you've seen the TV show... Trust me when I say this, high school is not that dramatic. So town was shut down. the The challenge was we had two high schools. We had one that was a winner state championship every single year.
00:02:45
Speaker
And then we had where I went to school. We won the academic decathlon state championship. So... It was that kind of institution. And we would lose a lot in football. But there was still this passion and connection to the sport.
00:02:59
Speaker
And unfortunately, coaches broke it for for me and my boys. And that's when we started a lacrosse team. They made a decision for us about our performance. They took the sophomore class of my junior year.
00:03:11
Speaker
They put them on varsity. and told the the boosters that, hey, we're going to lose for one, two years, and then we're going to compete that third year for their senior class. What the coaches didn't see coming was Andy Dalton, phenomenal athlete, NFL quarterback, torched us for 60, and never looked back. Needless to say, that coaching staff ended up ah getting fired eventually, but what became name of it we started our lacrosse team. So 10 of that junior class friends and I, we started the team.
00:03:43
Speaker
Five of the 10 of us went on to go play in college. And that's what led me to Marymount University. I was the first NCAA lacrosse player from that community. And 20 years later, the Katie program is still going strong. 22, 23 later.
00:04:00
Speaker
but either way like um just we We started ah movement, and I'm so happy that it it continues to affect that community positively. and i continue to give back to the game and coach high school lacrosse now, but that that spark, that moment of dejection, rejection from high school coaches,
00:04:22
Speaker
led me to then never let anyone put my performance in their own hands again and that's that's where my leadership journey started and fortunately going to the east coast to play lacrosse it was very style and finesse and i brought a physicality to it that was football all i knew was lift weights run as fast as you can and play your sport and i got lost on the field a lot i just went 100 miles an hour through guys eventually I was able to find my role on the team, but until that that was only after an incident occurred eight days before the first game of my freshman year, I broke my leg in practice, hidden hit a teammate in practice, and then hit him so hard he fell on the ground. I stepped on him. I rolled my ankle, and then my fibula snapped.
00:05:11
Speaker
So both that slowed me down. I mean, I was going 100 miles an hour. i was i was lost a lot. but going to be physical. And now I had the opportunity to to slow the game down and learn it.
00:05:25
Speaker
I was keeping stats for the team and just understanding the game at a different level that I just didn't have growing up. No, I mean, I only played for 16 months and then went to go play college with dudes that have been playing their entire lives.
00:05:41
Speaker
And yeah, yeah That was a a ah shining moment, and that's that's what also led me to grad school because I had this extra year. And I graduated in 2008, and the world economy was terrible in 2008. I couldn't get a job, so I go back to grad school. I play an extra year.
00:06:01
Speaker
And then... Introduce coaching where I have this extra year coaches invited me. I was a three year team captain, invite me to be a grad assistant coach for the squad. And that was my first exposure to
Coaching Mistakes and Learning from Mentors
00:06:14
Speaker
coaching.
00:06:15
Speaker
I had and imposter syndrome stepping into this because I was recruiting kids now that have been playing longer than I have. It's yeah six years at this point.
00:06:26
Speaker
And so I thought, okay, how could I contribute? What am I going to look for in recruiting? How can I contribute as a coach to guys that know the game better than me? And that was the weight room. So this introduced me to now strength and conditioning as a profession because we didn't have a strength and conditioning coach in college.
00:06:42
Speaker
It was me just stealing a weightlifting program from my boys that played football at University of Texas. And this was the heyday. this is I was steal and doing the same workouts as Vince Young as a Division III freaking short genetic trash can lacrosse player from Katy, Texas, and not getting the same results as Vince Young.
00:07:05
Speaker
So, yeah yeah, I didn't know anything about strength and conditioning. it was just lift weights, go hard. And now I was forced. this Here's another just defining moment for me.
00:07:16
Speaker
My first practice coaching, ah we needed upper body strength. Our weight room was a fitness center, not a weight room. So now we couldn't bring 40 dudes into a fitness center that was also open to students and teachers because it was just madness. Yeah.
00:07:32
Speaker
So I had all the guys kick up into a handstand against the wall, and one of them goes down. He hurt his shoulder when he kicked up. And we got to recall, I was on this team. This was my teammate.
00:07:45
Speaker
He was still my friend, but now he was my athlete. And he tore his rotator cuff, and I took away his senior year of lacrosse because I didn't know what the hell I was doing. So that just, I mean, I felt an immense shame. I love to joke, I'm a recovering Irish Catholic. Everything I do wrong, I feel deep into my soul.
00:08:06
Speaker
So yeah I needed to find experts in the field and i i I would fly to them and just spend weekends with them. So I was introduced to a couple of great mentors of mine after this moment. I found them, flew out to California, spent two days with them and just cracked the bone, sucked the marrow out of this thing and really started to understand what performance training was.
00:08:31
Speaker
It's not just the weights ah on the bar or the numbers that we're recording or the times that we're we're clocking in or the calories burned or any of that. No, it's it's yeah connecting.
00:08:42
Speaker
just ah emotionally and spiritually with these athletes and taking them where they can't take themselves that they wanna go. So ever since then, it just been a force nonstop.
00:08:54
Speaker
i I will value education over money. I will find the best in the world. I would go spend time with them. And now i've I've downloaded so much information ah from such amazing coaches.
00:09:05
Speaker
And that's what I'm aiming to do now is distill it down, to deliver it to tools for both athletes and coaches to help them hold on to these lessons that are going to translate and carry over into the real world. And that's that's what
Leadership Styles and Evolution
00:09:18
Speaker
Captains to Coaches is all about.
00:09:21
Speaker
I want to rewind a little bit because from talking to you before, i know a little bit of your story and why this is such a passion and important avenue for you um because of the coaches you grew up with or or had in your life. Can you talk a little bit about those coaches, maybe some not so good moments and why it led you to even helping the coach you had find the coach in college?
00:09:47
Speaker
Yes. So I would differentiate the two different types of coaches, and I want people to think about these experiences in their life. It comes down to transactional versus transformational coaching.
00:10:00
Speaker
I mentioned the high school coaches that I had in football. They were very transactional. They made decisions in order to best support themselves and keep their jobs. You can understand how that is very transactional.
00:10:12
Speaker
Now, yeah they were willing to sacrifice the senior class and my junior class for these bright stars. And they were justified because there was one player from that sophomore class that went on to go play in the NFL.
00:10:26
Speaker
So I've since talked to them about this to help me understand because I did take it personally back then. Now, yeah just have a bigger picture. But there are different ways that they could approach it.
00:10:37
Speaker
In a one-on-one meeting, said coach, he told me, I work hard on the field. I work hard in the weight room. I'm just not any good. We could have reframed that. that Okay, guess what backup linebackers do?
00:10:49
Speaker
They start on special teams or you're going be on kickoff team. You're going to be on punt team. And go make plays. So we're going to need you this year at special teams. I want you to lock in and master all of those aspects.
00:11:02
Speaker
See, now i I did the same thing. I took away the starting position of linebacker, the the the glimmer of maybe some playing time in garbage games. And I put into an empowering performance where, hey, you're going to have a very small role on this team, but it matters. It counts.
00:11:20
Speaker
yeah Saying the same thing, just different ways. Now we have a transformational coach that what I just did was turn that into more transformational language where it's yeah on the depth chart, it's the same.
00:11:33
Speaker
The playing time is probably going to be the same, but how I'm now empowering the kid to just believe in themselves. So yeah I had a lacrosse coach. He was from Long Island down in this small town, Texas. We lucked into him.
00:11:46
Speaker
He was, an amazing man. His name's Mike Cavanaugh. And he He wanted us to succeed just as young men because he saw he had a nephew that played football for the Katy Tigers, and he saw what football did to his nephew and how it wasn't the health healthiest thing for him as a young man.
00:12:07
Speaker
So now Coach Kavanaugh, he he told me a great quote, and I i want to hand this off. And he said, you're going to be remembered for what you're not supposed to do. Now, there's two sides to that coin.
00:12:20
Speaker
Not supposed to do, like if I'm an amazing athlete with super high potential in my town and then I get this scholarship and then I don't pan out. Guess how I'm going to be remembered in that town?
00:12:32
Speaker
The never was. Okay. Well, guess what genetic trash can over here did? I wasn't supposed to people don't even know what lacrosse is in my town. Then I wasn't supposed to be a collegiate athlete.
00:12:44
Speaker
I wasn't supposed to be a leader. I wasn't supposed to be a captain. I was i was no good to contributing to that one particular football team. So I wasn't going to be remembered for that.
00:12:56
Speaker
And guess what? Now I go on and was a collegiate athlete, started for four years, three-year captain, and now get the fortune to travel the world and teach people how to teach people to lift weights, run fast, and believe in themselves.
00:13:09
Speaker
So I held on to that one quote. It was a, maybe it was a backhanded compliment that, hey, we're gonna we're going to rock the world here. And lovely from Kavanaugh. But that's that's transformational language.
00:13:23
Speaker
He saw how we were treated as individuals. And he wanted us to just, he wanted to plant seeds in us for us to just go on and kick ass in life. Because, I mean...
00:13:34
Speaker
it was through lacrosse that he was able to make a connection with us. It wasn't about whether we won or lost, uh, cause we lost a hell of a lot more than we want, but we had fun doing it.
00:13:46
Speaker
Um, yeah so then I had this same experience in college. I had two different head coaches, um My freshman year, technically the coach that recruited me, he was very transactional. He played at Yale.
00:13:58
Speaker
He was very demanding. And he wanted the he wanted the best for us, but he was going to demean and grind and push us until we made we went from coal into diamonds.
00:14:12
Speaker
Now, the result of that was a lot of dudes quitting the team. So now we had less people on our team, which then he demanded more of less people because he drove a bunch of people off.
00:14:24
Speaker
And then the core that remained, we spite played. We did not quit because we didn't want him to win. And it brought us together. We were able to develop the tools to come together come together, connect and lead ourselves where he did not lead us.
00:14:42
Speaker
And so almost ah presenting and developing these barriers against this negative attitude and fortunately created a lot of resentment up.
00:14:53
Speaker
where I don't like to to lead that way. I was prepared for it and had experienced this in high school. So I was able to just brush a lot of that stuff off and continue to move forward.
00:15:06
Speaker
And I brought a lot of teammates with me with that mindset, with that attitude. So I was able to now start into a leadership role where being like, dude, don't listen to him. You're the best player I've ever seen.
00:15:18
Speaker
Whether that means anything you are not, dude, you're amazing. Let's fight through it. So try starting to get my reps of leadership at that moment, especially with a broken leg, I couldn't contribute on the field.
00:15:30
Speaker
So then ah that coach, transactional coach, he went on to leave and take another job and he knew he was leaving and he didn't recruit.
00:15:40
Speaker
So he left our team out to dry. So the few dudes that we had left, Again, we became even more enmeshed and closer together. And as a leader in the the team, and I was at the time, I think vice president of this the SAC student athlete advisory committee.
00:15:57
Speaker
I got a saying in the the hiring process for the new coach at Marymount. And they ah they brought in a number of dudes. I got to sit down with each one of them and The one that just connected the most with me was a 28-year-old high school coach who Marymount was his alma mater.
00:16:16
Speaker
And he had big big vision, big picture four for our team because Marymount was a great program back when he played in the the late 90s, early 2000s.
00:16:28
Speaker
So it was a matter of him presenting this dream, this vision to get us back to the heyday. And he just he just so happened to play with my brother-in-law. So I had heard these stories a thousand times.
00:16:40
Speaker
So ah not brother-in-law at the time. That's a whole different story for another podcast. Okay. Okay. the Yeah, so i I got the opportunity now and fortunately he was hired.
00:16:53
Speaker
And here we are 20 some odd years later, and he's still the head coach. So I was one of his first team captains in our meetings. What we were able to establish as the culture, as the vision for the program is still in play today.
00:17:08
Speaker
So that is a transformational coach. He wanted us, instead of yelling at us and telling us how it's going to be, he wanted us to bring our autonomy, our vision, our our our family that we had already established into the fold and help us understand what it truly meant to be a saint.
00:17:26
Speaker
So, yeah i mean, just I i couldn't i couldn't write a better leadership experience. Our record wasn't what it was like – It's nothing write home about. I couldn't even tell you our record, but it wasn't good. yeah But now the stories and the experiences are just so many lessons within there that i I'm ready to hand off and and deliver to people in these trying times.
00:17:51
Speaker
So it's not supposed to be perfect. And anybody that's been on a winning team or a losing team knows that. And anything you see on social media where it's it's this picture-perfect locker room, that's all BS.
00:18:04
Speaker
So what lessons can you learn and take away from your current team and situation that's going to help you as a future leader, parent, or give her back to you your community as a coach or otherwise?
00:18:17
Speaker
I liked when you talked about – um when you were stepping into trying to find your leadership role in that first year or so in college of how you were used to um being kind of demeaned or talked to a certain way by coaches.
00:18:35
Speaker
And it can be hard to hear because so many athletes come to me and I'm sure with you with that same experience, even parents probably as well as, Oh, I'm just used to that. Like, that's just how all I've known. yeah,
00:18:48
Speaker
and To me, it's you know it hurts my heart because as somebody who wants to empower that next generation, it shouldn't be. That's not how it should be. um What are your thoughts and what are ways that you talk to athletes and coaches now when you hear things like that?
00:19:03
Speaker
i And I still hear it. Like I got mentioned, I'm coaching high school lacrosse. so about 50% of my dudes play high school football. So they are they're in it. And what I find the most interesting is when ah young athletes take on leadership for the first time.
00:19:18
Speaker
they they just try to mimic what they believe leadership is. So just having 16 years of different teams from high school to college levels, just seeing what their interpretation of leadership is, and they mimic their role models.
00:19:36
Speaker
So for a lot of guys that play football, they come in and they are jerks. They are hard-charging jerks, just telling the freshman what to do or else. And threatening them with with ah punishment like running. It's like, no, dude, i guess I got a specific speed and conditioning plan.
00:19:55
Speaker
You're not going to rue it by ah some kid not listening to you because you're not treating them well. So yeah that's that's interesting. And then you have more... Guys that they come from club sports only.
00:20:08
Speaker
So they don't play the competitive football, but then they play a very entitled game of club sports and then step into leadership. And they're they're more quiet. They just...
00:20:22
Speaker
art have a trouble connecting socially. So the football guys are great socially because they spend so much time together already. And now instead of locker room football, now it's locker room lacrosse.
00:20:34
Speaker
The club guys, there is no locker room. The club ball is people from all over all the different schools. So seeing them default to, um i'm just I'm just a lead by example guy.
00:20:46
Speaker
I'm not going to say anything. They're going to do everything that you ask them to do. However, they're afraid to stand up against the the big personalities and confident ah football personalities on the team.
00:20:59
Speaker
So then it's, yeah okay, how can i empower and give the tools of communication to the lead by example guy? And then at the same time within football, help them have some form of empathy.
00:21:13
Speaker
Yes, a teenage boy is capable of empathy. And yeah and ah the fun conversations are are trying to navigate this. For the less empathetic player, I talk about fiction.
00:21:27
Speaker
So it could be Star Wars, it could be ah Lord of the Rings, or just one of the big fictional things that is ah that's popular, whatever they globbed onto as a kid, and helped them realize the the hero's journey.
00:21:39
Speaker
And they walked a mile in Luke Skywalker's shoes, or Han Solo's shoes. And how did that feel? And then now we connect to, oh, that was empowering. So who had mentors? Luke Summers.
00:21:53
Speaker
ah Luke Summers. Luke Summers my pal. Luke Skywalker. Luke Skywalker had a mentor. So now as a leader, guess what you get to be? You get to be Obi-Wan.
00:22:03
Speaker
This kid, he's a freshman. He doesn't know anything. Remember when Luke Skywalker picked up a lightsaber for the first time? Again, i haven't seen this movie in 20 years, but the story is the story.
00:22:14
Speaker
So it's helping them understand now, hey, dude, even Luke Skywalker needs a mentor. And that needs to be you right now. Was Obi-Wan a jerk? No. He led him yeah to the answers.
00:22:27
Speaker
So it's helping them understand now what a true leader is. And it's it's that mentor. It's that guide. It's not telling them exactly what to do. It's leading them.
00:22:38
Speaker
So you're leading them to water in a sense, and you're helping them make their own good decisions. They want to go set up the field and get the water because that's what's best for the team, not they're threatened with running.
00:22:54
Speaker
So then that that's with our are very aggressive um aggressive leaders, I'll call Then with our quieter, more lead-by-example guys who are quote-unquote shy or they have their imposter syndrome of speaking is uncomfortable.
00:23:14
Speaker
Now I find ways for them to speak in warm-ups. This is counting. Everybody can count to 10. So now i I hand off counting our pushups or counting our squats, the the dynamic warmups that I'm leading.
00:23:31
Speaker
I'm not counting the reps as coach. I hand it off and I call out, okay, Augie, you're going to lead five four-count pushups. So a four-count pushup, this is a military count where the leader on one he yells out one.
00:23:46
Speaker
Everybody goes down in a pushup. Two. Everybody pushes up back to a top position. Three. They go down into ah the bottom. And then everybody pushes up.
00:23:58
Speaker
Instead of the leader saying four, the team says the rep number. One. So now that is embarrassing for a lot of people. They're afraid to mess up the count.
00:24:09
Speaker
good. This is just the warmup. This doesn't matter. But you are getting valuable reps with your voice leading. So now, yes, you are leading by example. And we're introducing vocal ah leadership opportunities that are highly controlled.
00:24:27
Speaker
I'm not saying, hey, you're the quarterback, go lead. I'm telling them, hey, dude, you got I need five four count pushups. You got it. Ready, ready. So now it's, and that's that's another fallacy I see with a lot of coaches that have poor communication and poor leadership skills.
00:24:44
Speaker
They put the onus on the the team. Hey, go lead. Our guys are having this problem. we need you to to solve it. Okay. But then they'll default to what they grew up with.
00:24:56
Speaker
And that could be just being an asshole. And that's unfortunate. So now we start to build, that builds resentment. And resentment is the killer ah killer of culture, unfortunately.
00:25:08
Speaker
So now if my freshmen, they're being talked down to by seniors, guess how they're going to talk down to, guess how they're going to talk to the freshmen when they get there? Speaking down, yeah guess how they're going to lead in the office in future life?
00:25:22
Speaker
They're going to start talking and down to people. They're going to demand all this stuff versus empowering and motivating and asking for help.
Handling Criticism and Self-Leadership
00:25:31
Speaker
So it's it's ah it's fun social, I call it social emotional leadership, just playing ah playing different games, running different plays in the leadership camp every single day that I'm out at practice and having fun and then just translating that into lessons.
00:25:50
Speaker
But I mean, I've been there. I was the quiet leader. Like I mentioned, three-year captain. I started as yeah I'm just going to be the guy that just does everything above and beyond that. Then my vocal seniors graduated, so now I step up, oh crap, I i gotta to start holding people accountable. I gotta to start calling people out for stuff that I see instead of just being quiet, ah lead from the front guy.
00:26:13
Speaker
And then by the time I was my last year playing, now I had plenty of reps vocally and it's teaching people how to go. And there's there's never been a moment where I've been more confident than that last year playing. I knew all the systems.
00:26:28
Speaker
but now it's okay. I have to step up into a leadership role. And so ah last, last point here is that relationship. Fortunately with my transformational coach, John Reynolds is he was able to lead me from just shy, quiet example kid into leading a squad.
00:26:48
Speaker
And then i tackled any so social, emotional issues that we need to get guys in line, more connected to behavior. And if there's a problem that was beyond, ah ah a strong talking to from one of your teammates, then I just sent it a flagpole to coach and he had the authority to, to take away ultimately playing time and truly punish with what most athletes value the most.
00:27:13
Speaker
So if I couldn't solve it, and send it up the flagpole, or if it involved situations that needed ah authority, then sent it up the flagpole. But yeah, it was, was sometimes I was a jerk, but it's that, that was getting reps at leading and seeing what worked and didn't work.
00:27:31
Speaker
And yeah, it wasn't, wasn't always perfect, but all of those are just fun stories I get to tell on a podcast now. yeah yeah Talk to me about, um I'm intrigued now. I'm jumping up my own questions.
00:27:46
Speaker
As you, have started to coach and share and teach leadership. Do you have pushback with those ah maybe coaches that are those transactional or maybe those leaders that just don't want to kind of step out and maybe have a voice?
00:28:05
Speaker
Oh, yeah, which is mind-blowing to me, but I'm receiving ah Internet hate. But then that forces me to get tools to now practice this.
00:28:16
Speaker
So this yeah i in when I post something or say something or teach at a conference – um and people aren't buying in, um I started out as being like, what what do you mean?
00:28:31
Speaker
Now it's like, okay, how did I phrase it? And my goal was to allow my experience to be listened to. And if they're not willing to listen, well, that's that's not on me. I'm not taking it personally.
00:28:45
Speaker
So yeah yeah putting them in a position to understand the message. This is the beauty of social media clips. I have my 60 second clip and then I got text to provide more context.
00:28:57
Speaker
And within both of those is an opportunity for them to connect with it. Did they choose to read the context? No. Okay, well, that's on them. if they're yeah If they're in denial of this or maybe their limited experience didn't ah doesn't reflect what my experience does, okay, you just need more time in the field, dude.
00:29:18
Speaker
Because I've been 16 plus years, 16 different teams each year. a team evolves. I've been at the tip of the spear all the way to understanding parents and development and child development.
00:29:31
Speaker
this This comes from a place of passion for for people. And yeah maybe there's something internally that is going on with you. So I've learned to not take this stuff personally, where I always used to hold the mirror up and take full responsibility for ah for them to understand the message. And this is where Chad Hobbs and I can can have some fun banter, where if I was making a point and Chad chad was pushing back against it,
00:30:00
Speaker
my defenses, I would posture up and get defensive and try to XYZ help him understand my point. But he had a different perspective. He was coming from a basketball background. I'm coming from ah a field sport background.
00:30:14
Speaker
While there are similarities, there are completely different cultures. And at the same time, we're talking grass versus court. So different rules apply to this.
00:30:25
Speaker
So some particular speed conversations that we had, it led me to then reflect on and understand better now this. So I internalized that and then took it into a lesson to now understand speed and footwork better to then translate better to guys like chabs who Chad who are willing and wanting to learn. That's why they're asking questions.
00:30:49
Speaker
Now, the people on the Internet that are speaking negatively, they're not willing to ask questions. They're just trying to demean and go down. So it's yeah it's it's giving all these tools and filters. And then ultimately, this is the most valuable tool that I've taken away from it. And this is I'm going to start referring to this as the Charles Barkley method.
00:31:09
Speaker
Simply, is it true? So this this is a quick aside. So Barkley, when he was a rookie, he had Julius Irving, Dr. J, at the end of his bench.
00:31:20
Speaker
And Barkley, traveling all over the country with different NBA sports writers, he would read the performance from the previous night in the next day's paper, and then that would that would ruffle his feathers, and he'd get pissed off.
00:31:34
Speaker
So now yeah him understanding, like – These are individuals that are critiquing your play that never played the game or have a limited experience in playing the game, and he's playing at the highest level.
00:31:48
Speaker
So Dr. J had enough of this, and he asked Barkley, okay, read through it. Is it true? So then Barkley would say no like and highlight a point. No, he said this, though, and blah, blah, blah.
00:32:01
Speaker
And then Dr. J would stop him from his his emotional tirade. And yeah is it true? No. So if it was true, well then, okay, that's a critique on me and my game.
00:32:15
Speaker
Guess what I get the opportunity to do? In practice, I'm going to attack this and turn it into a strength. So the next time I get to to visit you know New York Knicks, I'm going to use this move that the guy called out before.
00:32:29
Speaker
So he was able to use that into fuel, hold that mirror up, and then make corrections. But it had nothing to do with Barkley's game. was more about the the writer trying to be a ah critic and sit sit on his high horse.
00:32:46
Speaker
Forget about it. So now right i I had to learn that lesson via social media comments and just be like, is it true? So certain comments i and I leave them up there because it makes that coach or whoever look really bad.
00:33:04
Speaker
So I don't delete. I just leave it up there and I ignore it. Yeah. And that that's a great tool as well. so And now handing off the lessons because what do kids at high school do?
00:33:16
Speaker
They read the social media and it affects them. They hear the gossip, it affects them. So now working this, is it true into practices? And this this is a big tool I lean into is banter and radical candor. So radical candor is is true critique with compassion.
00:33:37
Speaker
So if I see something, I will say something because I want them to correct it and improve. The banter is now how I apply some light humor to it. So that could be some rolling some self-deprecating humor in there, ah saying like, i've already I've already done it a number of times on this podcast.
00:33:56
Speaker
I'm a 5'7 genetic trash can being like, dude, I see this in your shot. I know you can get there. I'll never be able to get there. Or I don't play offense. I play defense.
00:34:06
Speaker
So now I'm the putting some banter on top of it, putting it on me if I know that he's a freshman and he can't necessarily take it. But as the higher they get up in the classes, now I direct the banter intentionally more towards them, being like, dude, you missed that shot because you've been skipping your cav work in the gym.
00:34:26
Speaker
Trust me, dude. Look at those pencils. Yeah. And they have developed calves. So is it true? I'm intentionally saying the opposite of what they know to be true.
00:34:37
Speaker
And when they get ruffled, like Barkley started with being like, dude, you know, I'm just messing with you, right? Look at your calves. Look at mine. You've got bigger calves than me. Like I've been training and trying hard to get those for, for 40 years.
00:34:52
Speaker
You were born with this gift. So now anytime somebody talks trash to you, which is very common on the court, in the on the field, ask yourself, is it true?
00:35:04
Speaker
So that takes reps. it's I love to call it building calluses because we do ah we do weight training as well. So building calluses on their their hands for weight and stuff.
00:35:16
Speaker
Now we're building calluses socially and emotionally, preparing us for the people that are going to go after us that are maliciously trying to pull us down because of their own stuff going on.
00:35:30
Speaker
Yeah. No, I like that because, you know, obviously we want our kids and adults to be self-aware. I think that's super important. But also at the end of the day, maybe you're in a situation where you can't switch a coaching staff and you have a coach that's, you know, putting you down constantly, or maybe you're in the work aspect and forever or for whatever reason, you don't have a good leader.
00:35:51
Speaker
um and at the end of the day, um If you can take anything from their message, great. But as long as you can tell yourself, are those things that are malicious and trying to attack you, are they true?
00:36:01
Speaker
No. Okay. we got to We got to put those in a separate box. We got to move on from those. I like that method. i'm I'm going to use that a little bit more myself. it Is that true? Yeah.
00:36:14
Speaker
um As you move down the questions, as ah certified strength and condition specialist, what are foundational must-haves for someone who is coming out of sports and want to build a training habit again? I'm sure you know and our former athletes, we come from such structure and then it's none, nothing at all.
00:36:31
Speaker
How do we slowly start to build that back again? Well, the that's the beauty of D3 sports. There is no structure. You got to do it yourself. So I'm grateful for that. yeah If you were used to that, the aim is to start to hold yourself to the same accountability as your coach would.
00:36:49
Speaker
So this this is self-leadership. So if your aim is, okay, we had practice every morning at 8 a.m. or weights at every morning at 8 a.m. m or weights Monday, Tuesday, whatever your schedule was, the best opportunity for you is to maintain that schedule.
00:37:05
Speaker
So now if you have a nine to five and you cannot maintain that schedule, I need you to pick your days to get up early and go before. I love training in the morning before the the whole world comes crashing down on your business. So if you say, oh, umm I'm going to get to that.
00:37:22
Speaker
something always comes up, you're never going to get to it. um Yeah, very true. the The same discipline that you've established, those are tools that are going to prepare you for getting back into to fitness.
00:37:36
Speaker
One of the beautiful tools of discipline that you learned and mastered as an athlete is called delayed gratification. I'm going to bust my tail during the summer for for a spring season.
00:37:48
Speaker
I'm going bust my tail during the winter for fall season the the next year because it it was so painful and emotional for me to lose. I'm never going to lose that feeling.
00:38:00
Speaker
So that is delayed gratification. Now, are you, um I'm not feeling motivated today. I'm not willing. Well, now what is your identity?
00:38:11
Speaker
Do you identify as a champion? Well, Champions keep showing up. Yeah, yeah. It doesn't matter how they're feeling. More often than not, their feelings are lying to them.
Goal Setting and Personal Success
00:38:22
Speaker
And there's one of my favorite ah ah authors, his name's Steven Pressfield. He wrote a book called The War of Art. And he refers to ah something he calls the resistance.
00:38:34
Speaker
So it's that little voice inside your head that's telling you to to sleep in or telling you it's too cold outside or telling you like, ah just wait till five o'clock when we get off work.
00:38:45
Speaker
So that is that is resistance. That is an enemy trying to pull you down. So if you're identifying as a champion and you feel that that conscience, that pressure, that little voice inside your head, that resistance trying to talk down on you, flip the competitive switch that allowed you such great success in college and get after it.
00:39:09
Speaker
View them as an enemy. Yeah. I feel like that's so important too, because um it is a tool that I had to think about after sports is, you know, you hear the time management, you hear the the common ones that you get from being an athlete, and they're very, very good. But one that has been brought to light in the past couple of years that I think is so important is the delayed gratification.
00:39:33
Speaker
We don't. Depending on how long and how serious you took sports, you have worked for an extremely long time at a goal you might not ever reach. But for some reason, you keep in that grind, whether it's discipline. um It has to come into discipline after motivation is gone.
00:39:50
Speaker
um And I think that is such an important reason and way and a tool that we can still use in everyday life um to build those habits again. um As you talk about behavior change, what does that mean day-to-day for someone who is no longer in sports? It's a topic which was your master's, and I'm sure you use that day-to-day. How can our everyday athlete or former athlete use that?
00:40:19
Speaker
So that you need to to get aligned with your current behaviors, and then I truly believe in the power of goal setting, but you must write them down to make them real.
00:40:30
Speaker
So write your goals down. And the paper, like handwritten, not printing and typing or putting on your phone, handwritten. And then you just put it in your bathroom mirror.
00:40:42
Speaker
You're going to go there every single morning and stare down those goals and think of the opportunity for me to get closer to them today. You're also going to go to bed, brush your teeth, and you got to stare at them and think about, did my actions bring me closer to what I'm trying to accomplish?
00:41:00
Speaker
Do my actions match my goals? If it's nutrition-wise and you were going out to happy hours, those are not aligned. So we have an opportunity to realize are our actions, our behaviors, our decisions, responsible decision-making that is leading towards our goals.
00:41:20
Speaker
So that's something very, very important to consider. If you don't have goals, that's step one. And it is important. very difficult to take that pen to paper, but that's why I want you to do it.
00:41:34
Speaker
And from goals, now we can create objectives. And objectives became become the boxes that you check on your daily to-do list. So what leads to accomplishing that goal?
00:41:47
Speaker
If it's losing weight, if it's exercising five times a week, whatever it may be, 10,000 steps. Okay, what do I need to do to walk 10,000 steps? Okay, well, I got to get up earlier.
00:41:59
Speaker
I'm going start my day with 2K because I know I got a long meeting. We're going to be sitting down for two hours. as an opportunity. So it allows me to get and schedule my day just so much deeper. It's not what do I have to do today?
00:42:13
Speaker
It's what am I going to do today that allows me to accomplish my goals on top of everything that my boss is demanding of me. um So if we can't write them down, you're not going to accomplish them.
00:42:26
Speaker
And then here's the beauty is you can mark them off. And that is the most rewarding experience. Yeah. ever So what I have is a giant calendar, and this was a gift.
00:42:40
Speaker
And at the top, this is a gift from Coach Justin Cavanaugh. It says, live your telos. And that that's his his personal mantra. And then it's each month right across there.
00:42:51
Speaker
And on the bottom, it's got personal, it's got business, it's... ah It's different goals that you can create. And so then I have yeah different color permanent markers and I write down the personal goals.
00:43:04
Speaker
And then on my calendar, I'm marking off when I accomplish them. So with different symbols. So, for example, a podcast, I want to do 52 interviews a year.
00:43:16
Speaker
That's one interview at least a week on average. Some days, some weeks I get more than one, but I just mark it with a pyramid. I got Coach Wooten's pyramid for success because that's that's representative of getting better each day for me.
00:43:31
Speaker
So then I mark those pyramids, and at the end of the year, I'm tally up how close I came. Under that goal is the objective. I want 85% of my podcast to be in person.
00:43:44
Speaker
Why? Because 93% of communication is nonverbal. It's in person. And I feel that's a richer, deeper experience. And I know you've done some in-person podcasts and you feel the difference. It's difficult for us to talk about it.
00:43:58
Speaker
ah to our listeners, but you feel the difference. And that that means something to me is a rich richer, deeper connection. And when I come visit Chad, you better believe we're going to sit down for one.
00:44:09
Speaker
So yeah but that's ah that's an objective. So now I got to manage, okay, I know my goal is 52. Here's 85% in person. What trips am I going to make? What connections? what yeah Who am I going to invite out to Austin?
00:44:24
Speaker
And just try to game plan for the whole year. That's that's an example. So there's different business, personal, relationship, financial goals that are on there that I'm tracking.
00:44:36
Speaker
And then... ah just marking on that calendar, it holds me accountable every single day. And at the end of the year, it's going to feel great because I'm doing the di due diligence of just marking ah my daily or my weekly wins.
00:44:53
Speaker
And you got to write them down. It's the most difficult part. And this is a challenge from Justin Kavanaugh. He says, your your dream 100. So whatever that means for you, for me, it was podcast guests. I got a dream 100 It is so difficult to think of 100 people that I'm going to talk to.
00:45:13
Speaker
Yeah. So that could be Dream 100, whatever it may be for people. I don't know. Make this. is These are my personal goals. So whatever you want get out there, what's your Dream 100 clients? If you're a personal trainer, Dream 100 athletes, whatever it may be, if you're if you're a strength and conditioning coach, like who do you want to personally work with?
00:45:36
Speaker
um Right. Or learn from. Right. Who do you want to go visit and shadow for a couple days? if you If anybody wants to come out to Austin, Texas to see how we integrate movement, leadership, and athle long-term athletic and leadership development into practice, come on out.
00:45:54
Speaker
You're going to learn a thing or two about lacrosse along the way, but that's – That's just the little things. See how I lead a team between the whistles and get up and close and personal. And that is going to change how you lead practices or you lead your strength and conditioning sessions with your teams.
00:46:10
Speaker
Cause the programs, whatever's written on the the paper, the practice plan, Doesn't matter. It's leading them with intent, the intensity in 10 cities to allow them to practice going full speed with urgency and then really making whatever is on the practice plan come to life.
00:46:31
Speaker
With the goal setting, I like how you touched upon writing them down. Super important. And I'll bore my audience with the science. i You're more likely to accomplish that goal with writing them down.
00:46:43
Speaker
So not only is important, but you're more likely to get those goals accomplished. But I also like how you talked about writing the objective. So we write the goal. Then what are we going to do to help ourselves achieve that, which is also very important as well.
00:46:56
Speaker
And so that way, we're not only just seeing that goal, but how are we working towards we're going to reach that. And I think it's important. I'm sure you can agree to write that down as well. um We can think through it, but writing down how you're going to accomplish that.
00:47:10
Speaker
um Like you said, you want this many podcasts ah ah to get done. Well, how am I going to accomplish Well, that means I need at least once a week or once every other week. um So just seeing how you can create that dream or goal or reality is also very important as well. So it doesn't seem so large.
00:47:27
Speaker
Or one them large. Okay. Then there's steps climbing that mountain. Exactly. um For success, what does that look like six to 12 months out for someone who commits to structured, whether that's change training or behavior change, um especially tailored towards our former athletes?
00:47:48
Speaker
that That's a great question. I think everyone's going to have to decide that themselves. And i would encourage them to create definitions of success in each of those buckets.
00:48:00
Speaker
So what I did, i only had success in my professional career. So traveling the world, finding the best in the world to learn from them, to bring back to my athletes.
00:48:11
Speaker
There was a lot of neglect for that, ah everything outside of that. So I would encourage people to then focus on relationships. Relationships take reps, just like leadership does.
00:48:23
Speaker
So I hope that you gain some some confidence and learn something from each relationship you're in about yourself that you can bring into future relationships. So I wouldn't limit it to to career success.
00:48:38
Speaker
yeah Just like where athletes, when we were in college, we were caught in the trap of what does success look like? And it was only ah connected to our performance in the sporting arena.
00:48:52
Speaker
Yes, there was school. And I, the yeah, the the joke is, right, academics are number one, athletics is number two.
00:49:03
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. like I laugh. I checked my transcript ah just the other day, and I'm like, wow. i I was clearly there to do one thing.
00:49:14
Speaker
So i was just did enough to get into grad school. That's about it. um Yeah. But I... I found that I i learned through through leaders and mentors rather than just reading and memorizing. So I found my own way to learn, and I didn't justify and de define success as what was told to me by yeah university.
00:49:37
Speaker
Define success in its own buckets, whether it's financial goals, but if you're only financial goals, Something's going to give relationally. So include relationships, include include family, include travel.
00:49:50
Speaker
I didn't travel until, ah let's see, 2013 for me. I forget how old I was, but I got to do math. but maybe 27, 28 didn't have a passport until then.
00:50:05
Speaker
Get a passport, get out there. There's so much world that is amazing. I turned that into success of what experiences and stories can you bring back?
00:50:17
Speaker
Not necessarily the amount of countries that you did, but what stories from each country did you did you live and can bring back for some fun stories with with friends? So...
00:50:28
Speaker
Yeah, don't just limit it to career and don't neglect relationships. That's one thing I'll say.
00:50:35
Speaker
I like that tidbit of writing down and defining what you you personally define as success because um with everything, and we're so used to being so driven in one area that that's not all that life is.
00:50:50
Speaker
um And not to go on a tangent, maybe for another podcast, but you know you once you get that free will high of no longer having that dedication to one one thing, it can...
00:51:02
Speaker
be crazy or it can be really good. And so defining what you want now to success to look like, but that doesn't mean it has to be circled into one thing. know And giving yourself that avenue to have multiple areas of what you define as success.
Future Plans and Leadership Advice
00:51:17
Speaker
As we're wrapping up here, Tex, you've been amazing. i want to ask what's next for you. What are you excited about in coaching, education, or with helping athletes? I'm going talk to us a little bit about how people can connect with your work ah like captains and coaches.
00:51:32
Speaker
Yeah, what's next for me is it's exciting to go into universities, go into prep schools and teach hands-on leadership. So a very common thing, and I don't know if you had this in college, where they brought in motivational speakers. They talked for 60 minutes and then see ya.
00:51:50
Speaker
And we were right back to our ah rambunctious Division III things. ah Cheeky and fun shenanigans. So, yeah, that felt good for an hour, but then we didn't apply any of those tools.
00:52:03
Speaker
Knowing that and understanding the population extremely well, now actively going into schools and doing three-hour workshops that include captain's workouts, so teaching them how to run captain's workouts.
00:52:17
Speaker
What I hate to see is every single year there is a college that does a captain's workout that leads to dudes going to the hospital with rhabdomaleosis. Because yeah nobody knows how to strengthen condition.
00:52:28
Speaker
So, okay, well, here's a playbook that you can run. What's the purpose of a captain's practice for us to come together, for us to hold each other accountable and do a ah wellness check before the conditioning test?
00:52:42
Speaker
Saying, all right, well, one, two, three dudes, they're not even close. I'm going to get with them on the outside to do more fitness. So I will lead a captain's practice, captain's training session to show them the value and actually how to ah get better, test each other and come together.
00:53:01
Speaker
So then the next part of that is is more instruction on conflict. So how to initiate a confrontation. Then include a bunch of role-playing techniques.
00:53:13
Speaker
And the the aim, I've done it with specific full teams, but I've also done it where schools give me all of the team captains, whether it's volleyball, softball, football, lacrosse, basketball, baseball, whatever.
00:53:26
Speaker
So it's men and female dynamics. Mm-hmm. So now we get reps doing conflict with same sex. So the male coaches or excuse me, male athletes and leaders, kind bringing up conflict and confrontation about real life examples and doing dry runs.
00:53:44
Speaker
Then we have yeah same with the females. Then we have. Aspects where, okay, how does female confront male? Because that's realistic in the in the workforce. So we're getting reps on standing on our values and how to have constructive criticism, how to so have constructive conflict that leads to a resolution rather than a resentment.
00:54:07
Speaker
So that yeah that's a big part of it. So it's a fun, interactive, movement-based, ah social agility-based aspect of the leadership development.
00:54:19
Speaker
And then they go take these tools and they apply them right to their team. Rather than listening to just a motivational speak, now we get tangible aspects, confidence, and the abilities to go and and lead.
00:54:33
Speaker
And that's what it's all about. So, yeah, leading different workshops at the college level and different prep schools all over the country. So that that is that is very fulfilling.
00:54:44
Speaker
And then ah continuing to travel for the podcast. And I did, I've accomplished a lot this year, respect to goals. So done Notre Dame, ah then head to LSU next week to sit down with Jay Johnson. He's the the baseball head coach that just won the national championship.
00:55:02
Speaker
So just continuing to show and show up and lead with purpose. That's going to continue to open a lot of doors and lead to a lot of great fun conversations on the podcast.
00:55:15
Speaker
Talk to me about how our audience can find you outside of here and if they're looking for any of your services or just want to hear more about what you do and like ah the messages you share on social media, especially.
00:55:27
Speaker
Yeah, easiest is is Instagram. So it's at my last name, McQuilkin, M-C-Q-U-I-L-K-I-N. Then the podcast is Captains and Coaches Podcast. Super easy to search and all over the YouTubes.
00:55:42
Speaker
And the but if if you're looking for fitness and training programs, I post my workouts. So deliver my workouts that I'm doing.
00:55:53
Speaker
I'm pretty beat up from years of playing and training. So this is more of a rebuilding ah model. yeah And then each day I have a a leadership devotional.
00:56:05
Speaker
And but my big thing, the program is called Old Bull. We're training with wisdom. My big thing with that program is who's looking out for the leaders. So I got people from all over the world. And then if they need something, they say something. If they need coaching on movement, they film their lift and put it in there.
00:56:21
Speaker
Or if it's ah they share their daily journal from that little little segment, then we can explore that. So that that's the big thing I'm super proud of. i got um yeah I got a bunch of old teammates on there following the program, ah coaches that I've run run into throughout my career.
00:56:42
Speaker
So it's a growing community of athletes that are training intelligently and then all looking out for each other. That's amazing. Wow, I love that. um What is the most powerful driver of performance that you've learned with your work?
00:57:05
Speaker
ah Now I feel relationship comes before rules. Yeah. Yeah. I like that one. That one's really good. I think that one's super important as you talk throughout this podcast um and the audience can see your passion through it is, ah like you said, whatever's on that piece of paper is important foundationally, but the relationships, that's what's going to keep people coming back. That's what's going to keep you and doing what you do.
00:57:33
Speaker
um Relationships is top of everything. We have one more question for you. I ask most of our guests on the podcast, if you could give one piece of advice to your younger self, or maybe somebody you know could um use this piece of advice, what would you tell that athlete standing on that field?
00:57:50
Speaker
The great question. I mean, I wouldn't change a thing about my playing career. I mean, i I did the most with my genetic and skill abilities, but and I found the right team that allowed me to emerge and and find who I am as a leader.
00:58:09
Speaker
So athletically, I couldn't ask for a better thing. Maybe some son issues off the field that and led to dudes being suspended that cost the team.
00:58:22
Speaker
So maybe seeing those behaviors earlier and getting ahead of it. um But then I did not have the conflict tools to confront them.
00:58:34
Speaker
And that that did cost the team. So for me as an athlete, I wouldn't change anything. For me as a leader, it would be more confident to call out people on stuff that was going against the team goals ah that we've established that were outside of their character at at certain times.
00:58:56
Speaker
That's really great advice. Not being too hard on yourself, but also a little bit of reflection of, I didn't have the tools, but maybe something I could have fixed looking back. Is there anything else, Tex, thank you so much for taking time out of your busy schedule that you'd like to leave our audience with before we wrap it up?
00:59:13
Speaker
Yeah, I would encourage athletes, former college athletes, to just adjust their identity, right? They they were a volleyball player. They were a track athlete. They were a lacrosse player, yes.
00:59:26
Speaker
Now they're not, but what are they? yeah They're a leader. So hold on to all the intangibles, hold on to the lessons, hold on to the stories, the conflict, the confrontations, the wins, the losses, and then think how can you apply them to the people that you are leading now?
00:59:43
Speaker
And it it is all valuable. So I'm not asking you to forget the glory days. I'm just asking you, what can I what can i squeeze out that could be an ounce of prevention or support or motivation for the people that you do have the fortunate opportunity to lead now?
01:00:02
Speaker
Thank you so much again for taking time to be on here today. if you know any athletes, former athletes or coaches that could use this episode, please like, share, turn on those notifications, and we will be back.
01:00:20
Speaker
Thank you for tuning in to this special episode. Again, be sure to give Mickey a follow Purpose After Sports on Instagram and Spotify. If you want to get more information about captains and coaches and leadership, I suggest going to captainsandcoaches.com, signing up for our newsletter for weekly highlights, toolkits, and everything in between. Thank you for joining us. Moving forward to next time.
01:00:43
Speaker
Bye. And see.